Seriously, taking a day off because there isn't even low-grade gossip.  I'll be back tomorrow.

THE LEMON TWIGS played "I Wanna Prove To You" on Colbert.

CLOUD NOTHINGS stopped by Morning Becomes Eclectic for a session.

TIFT MERRITT performed at the WNYC Soundcheck studio.

MIDDLE CHILDREN is streaming their debut, Earth Angel.

I WANT CANDY from The Strangeloves and a super-charged Bow Wow Wow for Twofer Tuesday.

FOXYGEN talks about piecing their new LP together on All Things Considered.

BLITZEN TRAPPER announces the production of Wild & Reckless, a musical written and to be performed by the band in their hometown of Portland, Oregon.

MATMOS talks to Pitchfork about the zen majesty of doing laundry and why they decided to base their new record on the sounds of their own washing machine.

RADIOHEAD's MOST DEPRESSING SONG: It's Science.

THE OSCARS' Best Picture mix-up may be the result of an accountant taking and tweeting pics of Emma Stone.  And that wasn't the only mixup on the show.

THE OSCARS also continued the telecast's recent downward ratings trend, as I would expect when you don't nominate popular films like Gravity, The Wolf of Wall Street, American Sniper, and so on.

JOSH HARTNETT & TAMSIN EGERTON are expecting their second child.

DOUBT: The midseason show starring Katherine Heigl and Laverne Cox has been pulled from the schedule after two episodes. Ouch.

KONG: SKULL ISLAND drops its final trailer.

VERA FARMIGA joins the cast of Godzilla: King of Monsters.

HIGH NOON: The classic American film that almost got shot down.

WALLY the CORGI loves his snow maze.

ISIS jihadists turned a puppy into a suicide bomber, but there's a happy ending.

FURRY FRIENDS ROCKIN' RESCUE is helping dogs abandoned by Dakota Access Pipeline protesters.

MICROBES in a glittering cave are revived after 10000 years. What could possibly go wrong?

THE DEEN WEEN GROUP's version of "Freedom of '76" (maybe my fave Ween song), from their recent World Cafe session.

RYAN ADAMS stopped by Morning Becomes Eclectic for a session.

THUNDERCAT streams Drunk.

MATTHEW LEE COTHRAN streams Judas Hung Himself In America.

THE NEW PR0NOGRAPHERS share "This Is the World of the Theater" ahead of Whiteout Conditions.

ROBYN HITCHCOCK shares "Mad Shelley’s Letterbox" ahead of hiis self-titled LP and it's vintage Hitchcock.

AT THE DRIVE-IN shares “Incurably Innocent” ahead of in • ter a • li • a.

GENE CLARK was saluted in South Pasadena over the weekend.

ELLIOTT SMITH's Either/Or turned 20 over the weekend.

RICK DERRINGER pleaded guilty and agreed to pay a thousand-dollar fine after stepping off a Delta Air Lines flight from Mexico with a loaded handgun in Atlanta’s airport.

PAUL WELLER is crowdfunding a mod clothing collection.

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: Get Out easily topped the chart with a 30.5MM debut against a 4.5MM production budget, riding a tsunami of buzz and a perfect Tomatometer.  The LEGO Batman Movie placed with 19MM on a steeper-than-expected42 percent drop, but also crosses the 200MM mark worldwide.  John Wick: Chapter 2 showed with 9MM on a 45 percent drop, finishing ahead of Fifty Shades Darker for the first weekend since they were released. Wick crossed the 100MM mark worldwide and is likely in the black now.  The Great Wall continues a less-than-great run in the US in the fourth slot with 8.7MM; it's manking hundreds of millions oveseas, tho whether it can profit against a 150MM production budget is still a question.  Fifty Shades Darker rounds out the Top Five with 7.7MM on a 62 percent drop; this one's also grossing hundreds of millions overseas on about a third of the production budget of The Great Wall.

THE OSCARS went to these folks. Congrats!

THE SPIRIT AWARDS went to these folks. Congrats!

THE RAZZIES went to these folks. Congrats?

BILL PAXTON, the prolific actor known for movie roles in Weird Science, Aliens, True Lies, Titanic, Twister, Apollo 13, Edge of Tomorrow, A Simple Plan, and Fraility (which he also directed), as well as his star turn in HBO's Big Love, passed away due to complications from surgery.  He was 61. Also, I have it on good authority that he did not like you saying "Game Over, man," even when he was alive.

JOSEPH WAPNER, the retired judge who literally changed television as the judge on The People's Court, has died at 97.

MERYL STREEP denied she turned down a custom couture Chanel creation after the fashion house refused to pay her to wear it.

NORMAN REEDUS & DIANE KRUGER moved past rumored fling status to romantic road trip couple.

PORGY & BESS: The "Holy Grail" of Missing Movies?"[E]ven if a pristine print were discovered today, significant obstacles prevent it from being shown in theaters."

A SASQUATCH investigator is looking into extremely large footprints found near Seattle.

BAO BAO the Panda Leaves the Beltway Behind to Breed in China.

THE SWARM: Bumblebees can be trained to score goals using a mini-ball, revealing unprecedented learning abilities, according to scientists at Queen Mary University of London.

THE SQUIRREL THREAT: A militant rodent left thousands of Canadians without power after wandering into a local power plant.

THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:

...with OTIS REDDING!  Otis and the Bar-Kays crank up the energy to 11 for a Ready Steady Go special, crashing through "Satisfaction,"  "My Girl" and "Respect," then "Shake" morphing into "Land of a Thousand Dances" performed by Otis, Eric Burdon and Chris Farlowe.  BONUS: from the same special, Eric Burdon covers "Hold On, I'm Coming," while Chris Farlowe covers "It's a Man's World."

GRANDADDY advance streams Last Place,the band's first LP in a decade or so.

CHICANO BATMAN advance streams Freedom Is Free.

IBIBIO SOUND MACHINE advance streams Uyai.

WHITNEY covers Bob Dylan's "Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here With You."

DIRTY PROJECTORS: Dave Longstreth talks to SPIN about a band that's now really a band of one.

LOS CAMPESINOS! is profiled over at PopMatters.

CRAIG FINN talks to amNY about the solo tour, the Hold Steady (and the prospect that Franz may rejoin).

PRIMAL SCREAM: Ten of Their Best.

NOW SHOWING: This weekend's wide releases include: Get Out, which is currently scoring 100 percent on the ol' Tomatometer; Rock Dog, which is currently scoring 43 percent; and Collide, which was not advance screened for critics.

HONEST TRAILERS for the 2017 Oscars Best Picture nominees.

DONALD & MELANIA TRUMP won't be watching the Oscars.

PAULA PATTON made an explosive claim in her raging custody war with Robin Thicke.

RHIANNA has been named the 2017 Harvard University Humanitarian of the Year.

STAR WARS: Are the original versions of the original trilogy finally coming back to the home market?

THE BATMAN, contra earlier reports, will be directed by Matt Reeves.

NIGHTWING: Chris McKay will helm a film based on the DC character Dick Grayson, best known as a member of the Batman family.

DEADPOOL 2 has brought in Drew Goddard to assist the screenplay.

PIXAR IN A BOX: The Art of Storytelling.

IMDb won a ruling that a new California law limiting online publication of actors' ages likely violates the First Amendment.

NORTH KOREA: Malaysian police said on Friday (Feb 24) that the chemical substance used in the murder of Kim Jong Nam -- the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un -- was identified as "VX nerve agent".

RUSSIA secretly deployed a new cruise missile that American officials say violates a landmark arms control treaty, posing a major test for President Trump as his administration is facing a crisis over its ties to Moscow.

IGUANA vs SNAKES: Behind the scenes filming of the BBC's Planet Earth II.

RESEARCHERS at University College London say they found no link between cat ownership and the development of psychotic symptoms.

A BABY GIRAFFE got censored on the Tube for explicit content.

RADIOAcTIVE WILD BOARS roam the mountains of Europe.

LAURA MARLING shared a video for "Next Time."

SKYWAY MAN advance streams Seen Comin’ From A Mighty Eye.

STRAND OF OAKS covers The Stone Roses, Primal Scream and Phish for a Lagniappe Session at Aquarium Drunkard.

RIDE returns with "Charm Assault" and "Home is a Feeling."

THE MOUNTAIN GOATS share "Andrew Eldritch Is Moving Back To Leeds" ahead of Goths.

HA HA TONKA returns with "All With You" ahead of Heart-Shaped Mountain.

HUSKER DU covers The Beatles' "Ticket to Ride," circa 1985.

THE SONGWRITERS' HALL OF FAME 2017 inductees are announced, including Berry Gordy, Jimmy Jam & terry Lewis, and Jay-Z (the HoF's first rapper).

RYAN ADAMS, ranked by Paste.

SLY STONE: Ten Late, Great Songs.

A TINY PIPE ORGAN, powered by a balloon.

ANGELINA JOLIE: Despite reports that she is done with Hollywood, Jolie is lining up new acting and directing projects.

HARRISON FORD: There's video of his airport near-miss incident.

THE MOVIES ARE DEAD, according to Martin Scorsese and Ridley Scott.

THE DISCOVERY:  Robert redford discovers the afterlife in this trailer.

LEAH ADLER, the mother of Steven Spielberg who fostered his interest in filmmaking, died Tuesday.  She was 97.

EGYPT: Thousands mourned the 'blind sheikh' convicted in 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

IRAQ: US troops were wounded on the front lines in Mosul.

A KNIFE-WIELDING, DRUNK MONKEY hopped onto the roof of a makeshift bar in Patos, Brazil.

THE MAMMOPHANT: The woolly mammoth vanished from the Earth 4000 years ago, but now scientists say they are on the brink of resurrecting the ancient beast in a revised form, through an ambitious feat of genetic engineering. They've spared no expense.

THE FERAL HOG APOCALYPSE: Texas Prepares.

TINY FROGS — some smaller than the average fingernail — can barely be heard making their distinct insectlike calls in marshes and under damp leaf litter in a remote rain forest in India.