BOSTON (AP) — New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez had a connection to a homicide victim found in an industrial park near the athlete's home, but family and officials were mum on the nature of their relationship, two days after police first visited the upscale division.

BAGHDAD (AP) — Al-Qaida's Iraq arm is gathering strength in the restive northern city of Mosul, ramping up its fundraising through gangland-style shakedowns and feeding off anti-government anger as it increasingly carries out attacks with impunity, according to residents and officials.

NEW YORK (AP) — James Gandolfini would have hated all this fuss.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — James Gandolfini's lumbering, brutish mob boss with the tortured psyche will endure as one of TV's indelible characters.

BOSTON (AP) — After struggling for more than 120 minutes to score even once, the Blackhawks beat Boston goalie Tuukka Rask a half-dozen times in Game 4 of the Stanley Cup finals to send the series back to Chicago tied two games apiece.

Concerts and major music events in metro Detroit June 20-June 26

WASHINGTON (AP) — After secretive talks, key senators expressed optimism Wednesday night that they were closing in on a bipartisan agreement to dramatically toughen the border security requirements in immigration legislation that also offers a path to citizenship to millions living in the country illegally.

James Gandolfini, who won three Emmy Awards for his indelible role as mob boss Tony Soprano in HBO's "The Sopranos," died while on vacation in Italy at age 51. While Tony Soprano was a larger-than-life figure, Gandolfini was exceptionally modest and obsessive — he described himself as "a 260-pound Woody Allen." HBO called the actor a "special man, a great talent, but more importantly a gentle and loving person who treated everyone, no matter their title or position, with equal respect."

A new wildfire near Denver forces evacuations.

MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) — Former investigators are pushing to reopen the probe into the 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800, saying new evidence points to the often-discounted theory that a missile strike may have downed the jumbo jet.

SAXON (WAOW) – The Iron County Sheriff's Department says a 42-year-old woman from the Milwaukee area was killed when an all-terrain vehicle she was a passenger on missed a corner and went over a cliff.

BOSTON (AP) — A man found dead in an industrial park about a mile from New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez's home had been killed, a prosecutor said Wednesday.

By Sara Morrison LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Chet Flippo, a former Rolling Stone editor who had been serving as editorial director of CMT since 2001, died Wednesday morning in a Nashville hospital. He was 69. CMT said Flippo had been suffering from a "lengthy illness." Billboard, where Flippo served as Nashville Bureau Chief from 1995 to 2000, reported that he had pneumonia. Flippo, best known for his writing about country music, authored several books about musicians including Hank Williams and the Rolling Stones. He started writing for Rolling Stone while a student at the U. ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is planning a major push using executive powers to tackle the pollution blamed for global warming in an effort to make good on promises he made at the start of his second term. "We know we have to do more — and we will do more," Obama said Wednesday in Berlin.

WASHINGTON (AP) — In a move that could send interest rates higher, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke ended weeks of speculation Wednesday by saying the Federal Reserve will likely slow its bond-buying program this year and end it next year because the economy is strengthening.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Hopes dimmed for talks aimed at ending the Afghan war when an angry President Hamid Karzai on Wednesday suspended security negotiations with the U.S. and scuttled a peace delegation to the Taliban, sending American officials scrambling to preserve the possibility of dialogue with the militants.

It is official. The Concerts de la Cité, Sherbrooke’s annual summer entertainment program, has been unveiled for the 2013 season.

By Tony Maglio LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Jay-Z once spit, "I deserve platinum plaques, to match my bezel." And while the rapper's got a bunch of those (and plenty of bezels), after Samsung announced it would purchase a million copies of his new album "Magna Carta Holy Grail," is there another platinum disc in the mail already? The answer is "not yet," according to a music industry insider. A record cannot be certified platinum (or gold, or multiplatinum) before it's out, regardless of presale numbers. ...

The Grammy-winning country singer – who in recent years has returned to the traditional bluegrass and gospel that marked the early part of his career – performs in N.C. before the release of his autobiography in August.

By Piya Sinha-Roy LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Veteran heavy-metal band Black Sabbath landed its first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 album chart on Wednesday, more than four decades after the rockers debuted their first album in the United States. "13," the 19th studio album from Black Sabbath, sold 155,000 copies in its first week, according to figures from Nielsen SoundScan, knocking last week's No. 1 album by Queens of the Stone Age off the top spot on the weekly U.S. album chart. ...

By Patricia Reaney and Tim Ghianni NEW YORK/NASHVILLE (Reuters) - Legendary country singer and songwriter Slim Whitman, known for his smooth falsetto and high-pitched yodeling talent, died in Florida on Wednesday at the age of 90, his son-in-law said. Roy Beagle, who is married to Whitman's daughter Sharon, said the singer-songwriter who was born Ottis Dewey Whitman Jr. was admitted to hospital on Tuesday. "He died last night at the Orange Park hospital at about 12:45 this morning of heart failure," Beagle told Reuters. ...

LONDON (Reuters) - The Rolling Stones released a career-spanning digitally re-mastered back catalogue on Apple Inc's iTunes Store on Wednesday as part of their 50th anniversary celebrations. The new iTunes release chronicles the British group's entire oeuvre, from their introductory 1963 cover of Chuck Berry's "Come On" to last year's Greatest Hits collection "GRRR!", their record label Universal Music said on Wednesday. The Rolling Stones - Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood and Charlie Watts - emerged alongside the Beatles in the early 1960s. ...

16TH ANNUAL BRIGGS FARM BLUESFEST88 Old Berwick Hwy., Nescopeck570.379.3342, briggsfarm.com8226 Featuring Lurrie Bell, more July 12-13, 28-90F.M. KIRBY CENTER71 Public Square, Wilkes-Barre570.826.1100, kirbycenter.org

Babies in neo-natal intensive care units may be benefitting from listening to music.        

By Tim Molloy NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) - With "The Voice" finale hours away, tell us if this scenario sounds familiar: A give-it-your-all reality competition becomes a national fascination, and people agonize over whether their favorite competitors will be voted off. Other shows mimic its formula - and eventually another show becomes the nation's reality spectacle of choice. It outpaces its predecessor and makes many of us forget just how original the original once seemed. ...

By Piya Sinha-Roy LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Rapper Kanye West pushes the boundaries of hip hop with his latest album "Yeezus," using aggressive electro-dance music beats to channel his anger and win over critics, who have called the record "daring" and "ambitious." "Yeezus," the 36-year-old rapper's seventh solo studio album, has also sped to the top of the iTunes digital music chart upon its release on Tuesday, led by the single "Black Skinhead. ...

By Todd Cunningham LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - 28 Entertainment has begun work on a movie about iconic country music singer George Jones and his wife Nancy, the company announced Tuesday. It has acquired the rights to the project, written by Dennis L. Baxter and produced by Baxter and 28 Entertainment's Jay Hoffman and Brian A. Hoffman, which depicts George's life as a country music legend while battling his personal demons. Nancy Jones will executive produce and consult on the project. ...

City's annual free concerts in the park program starts in July.

Sure, you’ve heard of “Prancercize,” but now that its creator Joanna Rohrback has teamed up with John Mayer, get ready to “Romancercize.” In the video for Mayer’s new single “Paper Doll,” Rohrback, who created the unorthodox workout in 1989, introduces herself and asks, “What about a...        

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Teen pop star Justin Bieber struck a photographer with his Ferrari sports car while driving away from a comedy club in Los Angeles on Monday night, but the accident was not considered a hit-and-run, police said. Video taken outside the Laugh Factory comedy club showed Bieber behind the wheel of his white Ferrari, surrounded by photographers as he was pulling away. Celebrity website TMZ said Bieber motioned the photographers to clear out of the way but apparently pinned one between his Ferrari and a parked car as he pulled out. He then drove away. ...

iTunes' Official Music Charts for the week ending June 17, 2013

Mumford & Sons bassist on the mend after brain surgery (Reuters) - British folk band Mumford & Sons' bassist Ted Dwane posted a message on Monday saying he was recovering after brain surgery to remove a blood clot. Dwane posted a picture of himself with a shaved head on the band's official website with the caption, "Bear with a sore head! Thanks so much for all the well wishing, it seems to be working! I'm home. ...

(Reuters) - British folk band Mumford & Sons' bassist Ted Dwane posted a message on Monday saying he was recovering after brain surgery to remove a blood clot. Dwane posted a picture of himself with a shaved head on the band's official website with the caption, "Bear with a sore head! Thanks so much for all the well wishing, it seems to be working! I'm home." The Grammy-winning London band was forced to cancel the final three U.S. dates of its "Summer Stampede" tour last week after doctors discovered a clot on the surface of Dwane's brain, which required immediate surgery. ...

By Eric Kelsey LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Rapper Jay Z's upcoming studio album will go to a million users of Samsung smartphones three days before its official release in a promotional deal, but the distribution is unlikely to count toward official sales figures, an industry expert said on Monday. Jay Z, 43, announced on Sunday in a three-minute television commercial during the telecast of basketball's NBA Finals that his latest album "Magna Carter Holy Grail" will be released on July 4 exclusively to 1 million users of Samsung smartphones who had downloaded a special app. ...

By Ellen Sowerby LONDON (Reuters) - Veteran British rock bands Motorhead and Black Sabbath were crowned the kings of heavy metal on Monday, winning the top accolades at the UK's top metal music awards, the Metal Hammer Golden Gods. Motorhead, best known for its 1980 hit "Ace of Spades", received the Golden Gods awards at the 11th annual ceremony for making a significant contribution to the rock and heavy metal industry over nearly four decades. Black Sabbath won the award for best album for "13" which soared to No. ...

The 24 th season of the Payson Park Music Festival kicked off this week, and its director said the organization is ready for another summer of entertainment.

As the nature of AIDS has changed, so, too, have the concerts organized by Mimi Stern-Wolfe since 1990 in recognition of the disease and its costs. This year’s show is Thursday.        

Music Supervisor Ann Kline on how music will be used in the 13-part CBS series.

Music Review: Kanye West is eerie, erratic on decent 6th album, 'Yeezus'        

As the nature of AIDS has changed, so, too, have the concerts organized by Mimi Stern-Wolfe since 1990 in recognition of the disease and its costs. This year's show is Thursday.