Beyonce Sings National Anthem Live at Super Bowl Press Conference

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Beyoncé opened a Super Bowl press conference on Thursday afternoon in New Orleans with a rousing rendition of the national anthem – and this time it was definitely live. After a rapturous round of applause by the media in attendance, the singer took questions about her upcoming Super Bowl gig as well as her controversial lip-syncing of "The Star-Spangled Banner" at President Obama's second inauguration last week.

"I am a perfectionist. One thing about me, I practice until my feet bleed, and I did not have time to rehearse with the orchestra," Beyoncé said. "It was a live television show and a very, very important, emotional show for me – one of my proudest moments. Due to the weather, due to the delay, due to no proper sound check, I did not feel comfortable taking a risk. It was about my president and the inauguration, and I did not want to take away from that. I decided to go with a pre-recorded track, which is very common in the music industry. And I am very proud of my performance."

Readers' Poll: The Greatest Super Bowl Halftime Shows

Beyoncé added that she will be "absolutely singing live" at her Super Bowl performance this coming Sunday. "I am well rehearsed. I will absolutely be singing live. This is what I was born to do." 

She stayed mum on the details of her halftime show performance, particularly whether she would be joined by Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams for a Destiny's Child reunion. "I can't really give you any details, I'm sorry," she said, though she did comment on the recent release of "Nuclear," Destiny's Child's first song in eight years. "I was so excited to hear us together again. I just kind of dropped on the floor and felt like a little teenager again when I heard us harmonize. There's nothing like the sisterhood we have."

Asked whether she has any plans to tour in conjuction with her new album on the horizon, Beyoncé teased: "Soon. I may have an announcement after the [Super Bowl] performance and the fans should just stay tuned."

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Beyonce Sings National Anthem Live at Super Bowl Press Conference

Beyonce Sings National Anthem Live at Super Bowl Press Conference'Any questions?' pop star says with a laugh $(document).ready(function() { $('.socialActionsTop .pageActions .email-content').hover( function() { $('.socialActionsTop .bubble.email').show(); }, function() { $('.socialActionsTop .bubble.email').hide(); } ); $('.socialActionsTop .pageActions .print-page').hover( function() { $('.socialActionsTop .bubble.print').show(); }, function() { $('.socialActionsTop .bubble.print').hide(); } ); }); By

Beyoncé opened a Super Bowl press conference on Thursday afternoon in New Orleans with a rousing rendition of the national anthem – and this time it was definitely live. After a rapturous round of applause by the media in attendance, the singer took questions about her upcoming Super Bowl gig as well as her controversial lip-syncing of "The Star-Spangled Banner" at President Obama's second inauguration last week.

"I am a perfectionist. One thing about me, I practice until my feet bleed, and I did not have time to rehearse with the orchestra," Beyoncé said. "It was a live television show and a very, very important, emotional show for me – one of my proudest moments. Due to the weather, due to the delay, due to no proper sound check, I did not feel comfortable taking a risk. It was about my president and the inauguration, and I did not want to take away from that. I decided to go with a pre-recorded track, which is very common in the music industry. And I am very proud of my performance."

Readers' Poll: The Greatest Super Bowl Halftime Shows

Beyoncé added that she will be "absolutely singing live" at her Super Bowl performance this coming Sunday. "I am well rehearsed. I will absolutely be singing live. This is what I was born to do." 

She stayed mum on the details of her halftime show performance, particularly whether she would be joined by Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams for a Destiny's Child reunion. "I can't really give you any details, I'm sorry," she said, though she did comment on the recent release of "Nuclear," Destiny's Child's first song in eight years. "I was so excited to hear us together again. I just kind of dropped on the floor and felt like a little teenager again when I heard us harmonize. There's nothing like the sisterhood we have."

Asked whether she has any plans to tour in conjuction with her new album on the horizon, Beyoncé teased: "Soon. I may have an announcement after the [Super Bowl] performance and the fans should just stay tuned."

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Macy Gray Sings Metallica, Radiohead and More on 'Covered'

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Macy Gray Sings Metallica, Radiohead and More on 'Covered'

Macy Gray performs during F1 Rocks in Sao Paulo, Brazil.Andrew Hone/Getty Images for F1 Rocks in Sao Paulo

Macy Gray is set to release Covered March 27, and the singer says this project is a long time coming. "After my first record I wanted to do a covers album, but I guess covers albums have kind of a stigma, they’re not known to do very well and they’re designed for people when they’re not doing their own thing anymore," she tells Rolling Stone. "So I was talked out of it, but I’ve always wanted to do one."

So how did Gray convince everyone around her that singing other people's songs was a good move? "Finally I had this idea to do rock covers and everyone liked that idea," she says. Covered finds the Grammy-winning voice behind "I Try" taking on such signature rock bands as Radiohead, Metallica, Arcade Fire, My Chemical Romance and many more.

Yes, Macy Gray does Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters," and kills it, starting off the song slow, haunting and atmospheric, before her  jazzy vocals kick in. It's a radical reinterpretation, one she's already gotten the band's approval for via her producer. "I didn’t talk to Metallica, but the producer, Hal Willner, did ‘cause he’s friends with them and he said they played it a bunch of times and they 'adored' it, that was his word," she says. 

She has directly contacted a few of the artists she reinterpreted. "I emailed Gerard Way, he said it was awesome," she says of her take of My Chemical Romance's "Teenagers." 

"I just met with Aaron [Bruno] of AWOLNation about three days ago, we went to lunch," Gray says. "He really liked 'Sail,' but it’s funny ‘cause he had a lot of questions about how we did it and what made me want to do it and stuff. I thought that was cool."

Gray was inspired on the record by Nina Simone. "I was watching [Simone’s] version of 'My Way' and she did her own thing completely, it’s nothing like the original, and so that’s when I decided to go get whatever songs we really loved," she says. "I think that’s the thing people do, they cover the songs and they try to do it kind of like the artist. But we just completely did our own thing."

Having a completely different style than the artists she covers – whether it's her rousing take on Radiohead's "Creep," the Eurythmics' "Here Comes The Rain Again" or "Nothing Else Matters" – allows Gray to take the songs wherever she wants. And she admits she was free tackling some of these songs because she was a fan, but not in the genre herself. "I imagine if I was a metalhead, I would feel bad about rearranging James Hetfield," she says. "But being that I’m not, I just naturally did my own thing, so it made it a lot easier."

For Gray interpreting rock artists seemed to be the best approach, as she attempted some Prince songs as well, but they didn't work. And one artist she wanted to cover so badly she tried  five songs but could never make work was Fiona Apple.

"We had a few that were disastrous," she says laughing. "We tried 'Criminal' and 'Sleep To Dream,' then we tried 'Extraordinary Machine.' That was the one we really wanted to do, but it’s hard to do her because her songs are so moody, and if you take it out of that it doesn’t sound right.  Her songs are so dark and moody already, so if you move it around it’s weird, and if you do it dark and moody you might as well just leave it as is."

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