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The steel guitars are silent today as Beach Boys fans and SpongeBob SquarePants stans everywhere mourn the loss of a music giant.

Composer, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter Andy Paley passed away on Wednesday from cancer complications at the age of 72. A prolific creative and producer, Paley’s fingerprints are all over music history, with credits ranging from Brian Wilson’s solo work to the Ramones’ records to the scores of numerous animated shows, including SpongeBob SquarePants. Paley first broke into the business as one-half of the power-pop duo The Paley Brothers alongside his brother Jonathan, and throughout his nearly 50 years of service to the entertainment industry, the list of high-profile collaborators with whom Paley worked is a veritable who’s-who of the most important musical talents of the later 20th century.

Today, Paley’s past partners mourn him and celebrate his contributions to music history, with Wilson’s official Instagram account...

Andy Paley, a prolific songwriter, producer and musician who collaborated with such artists as Brian Wilson, Jerry Lee Lewis, the Ramones, Madonna, Elton John, Patti Smith and Deborah Harry, and who composed the scores for SpongeBob SquarePants and other TV shows, died Wednesday, November 20, of cancer. He was 72.

“We are saddened to learn of the passing of Brian’s friend and collaborator, Andy Paley,” a post on Brian Wilson’s official Facebook page reads. “Andy was literally instrumental in Brian starting his solo career with his critically acclaimed 1988 album, Brian Wilson. Andy played electric and acoustic guitars, bass, drums, percussion, keyboards, harmonica, and provided backing vocals. He co-wrote three of the songs, including “Rio Grande.” Andy collaborated again with Brian on the legendary, unreleased Wilson-Paley Sessions, counting more than twenty songs. Brian always called him ‘The Genius Andy Paley.’ Love and mercy goes out to Andy’s family and friends.

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For the musical staff at SpongeBob SquarePants, every morning begins with the potential to bring “The Best Day Ever.” That song was co-written by Andy Paley and the voice of SpongeBob, Tom Kenny. It debuted in the credits of the 2004 feature film, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, and captures the anticipatory joy of riding the Bikini Bottom wave.

“That is SpongeBob’s philosophy of life,” Kenny tells Den of Geek. “He jumps out of bed singing, ‘This is gonna be the best day ever.’ Sometimes it’s not. But he goes to bed and believes tomorrow is gonna be.”

The sentiment still reverberates because the songwriters craft lasting tunes. The sounds and music of the beloved animated series have broadened its appeal and prolonged its impact. As Paley explains, “We aim for two things: songs that can be enjoyed outside SpongeBob, and records that, if you...

Brian Wilson has revealed a North American fall tour, while dropping demos, rarities, and outtakes on his new website.

Following an August show in Long Beach, California, Wilson will head to Huntington, New York on October 5th, wrapping up in Waukegan, Illinois on the 23rd.

Wilson’s new site contains a timeline feature organized by decades spanning from his birth in 1942 to the present. He previewed the launch with a 1995 demo of “Desert Drive,” which appeared on 2004’s Gettin’ in Over My Head. Other demos from the era, written with Andy Paley,...

Thirty years ago this month, Madonna released one of the most fascinating records in her catalogue, I’m Breathless. Attached to her role as the nightclub singer/femme fatale in Warren Beatty’s 1990 film Dick Tracy, I’m Breathless wasn’t necessarily a proper solo album, but one of those “Music From and Inspired By the Film” projects that the world’s biggest pop stars always seem compelled to make (see also: Prince’s Batman or, more recently, Beyoncé’s The Lion King: The Gift). Meant to match Beatty’s...

The Broadway stars and director of 2017’s multiple-Tony-nominated SpongeBob SquarePants musical will re-team on Nickelodeon this December, Nickelodeon announced today. Filmed for TV in front of a live theater audience, The SpongeBob Musical: Live On Stage! will star, among other original cast members, Broadway’s Tony-nominated Ethan Slater and Gavin Lee.

Directed by Broadway’s Tina Landau (herself Tony nominated for the show), The SpongeBob Musical features Slater in the title role, with Lee as Squidward Q. Tentacles.

“I’m so thrilled to be able to revisit the show in a new light and with our original cast members,” Landau said in a statement. “The whole creative and I are excited to go back into the world of Bikini Bottom and discover its new life in TV broadcast form. But above all, I’m deeply grateful for the opportunity to share the joy and spirit of our show with a wider audience.

Nickelodeon is taking you to a pineapple under the sea — and Broadway — this December with a live TV special version of “The SpongeBob Musical: Live on Stage!” set to air this holiday season, the kids’ cable channel said Thursday.

Director Tina Landau and members of the Broadway show’s original award-winning company will reunite to film the musical in front of a live theater audience with a production that “will capture all-new depths of theatrical innovation where the power of optimism really can save the world.”

Here’s the description for the musical: “Stakes are higher than ever before as SpongeBob and all of Bikini Bottom face the total annihilation of their undersea world. Chaos erupts. Lives hang in the balance. And just when all hope seems lost, a most unexpected hero rises up and takes center stage.”

Also Read: 'All That' Reboot Gets 13 More Episodes From Nickelodeon

“The SpongeBob Musical: Live on Stage!

Harry Potter and The Cursed Child: Parts One and Two, Angels in America, the Denzel Washington-starrer The Iceman Cometh and the Tina Fey-penned Mean Girls were among the Broadway productions scoring nominations for this year’s New York Drama League awards.

The 2018 Broadway and Off-Broadway nominees were announced in the categories of Outstanding Production of a Play, Outstanding Revival of a Play, Outstanding Production of a Musical, Outstanding Revival of a Musical, and the Distinguished Performance Award. The nominations were announced this morning by Tony Award winners Harriet Harris, Julie White and nominee Christopher Sieber.

The 84th Annual Drama League Awards, the oldest theatrical honors in America, will be held Friday, May 18, 11:30 am at the Marriott Marquis Times Square.

Here is the complete list of nominees:

Outstanding Production Of A Broadway Or Off-broadway Play

Animal

Written by Clare Lizzimore

Directed by Gaye Taylor Upchurch

Atlantic Theater Company...

Perhaps one of the most unusual and surprising shows to open on Broadway in 2017 is a musical adaptation of Nickelodeon’s SpongeBob SquarePants. An international sensation, the long-running cartoon about the adventures of a yellow anthropomorphic sea sponge and his underwater friends living in the city of Bikini Bottom has spawned two movies, video games and theme park rides.

Now, SpongeBob’s eclectic world is the source of a delightful new theater production conceived and directed by Tina Landau with a book written by Kyle Jarrow and music supervision, orchestration and arrangements by Tom Kitt. The show, playing at The Palace Theatre, stars Ethan Slater as the titular sponge, Gavin Lee as Squidward Q. Tentacles, Lilli Cooper as Sandy Cheeks, Danny Skinner as Patrick Star and Wesley Taylor as Sheldon Plankton.

“When I heard that they were developing it, my head exploded,” says Jarrow, who jumped at the opportunity to be part of the production. Having worked in theater...

Spongebob Squarepants has his own Christmas album! Festive festivities in Bikini Bottom! And it’s none of your “Jingle Bells” or “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” It’s all-new, all Spongebobby tunes such as “Don’t Be a Jerk (It’s Christmas)” and “Christmas Eve Jitters” and “Ho, Ho Hoedown.” You can listen to the entire album free at producer Andy Paley’s site, and you can buy it in digital format from Amazon U.S. and iTunes U.S. Alas, the album appears to entirely unavailable in Canada, and only “Don’t Be a Jerk (It’s Christmas)” is downloadable from Amazon U.K. and iTunes U.K. (Via Boing Boing.) This clearly prompts the question: What fictional characters need their own Christmas album? And what songs would they sing? Traditional tunes? Or their own new (or merely previously unheard) songs? I mean, obviously, we are in desperate need of...

Backstage at a performance of The Thrilling Adventure Hour is a bit like a circus. On a boat. That’s on fire. There is the cacophony coming through the velvet curtain from the stage at Largo at the Coronet, a charmingly old-school 280-seat theater in West Hollywood, as the four-piece Andy Paley Orchestra rehearses. There are guest stars -- such as Parenthood’s Jason Ritter, Southland’s Ben McKenzie and Key & Peele’s Keegan Michael Key -- rereading their lines with the desperate studiousness of medical students on cadaver day. The show’s creators, TV writers Ben Acker and Ben Blacker, have the

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I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I chat with actor and voice artist Tom Kenny, late of Mr. Show and the voice behind Spongebob Squarepants, about the release of the Spongebob holiday single “Don’t Be A Jerk (It’s Christmas)” and much, much more…

Be it under a rock or deep in a cave upon the highest peak, you must have been living there if the Spongebob Squarepants phenomenon has passed you by. If you’ve been around any child below the age of 15, they can probably tell you exactly who Bikini Bottom’s most famous animated invertebrate is - and, chances are, there are some hip adults that will also clue you in, being fans themselves.

As the voice of the krabby patty flipping squarepants enthusiast, Tom Kenny has brought to...

Still basking in the underwater glow of the 10th anniversary of SpongeBob SquarePants, Nickelodeon picks up a new season (26 episodes) of the yellow porous one and his pals. This new order brings the total number of SpongeBob SquarePants episodes to 178. The new episodes will, of course, feature the original voice cast including Tom Kenny (SpongeBob), Bill Fagerbakke (Patrick), Rodger Bumpass (Squidward), Clancy Brown (Mr. Krabs) and Carolyn Lawrence (Sandy Cheeks). Additionally, SpongeBob celebrates the holiday season with his new song, Don't Be a Jerk (It's Christmas!), performed by Tom Kenny who co-wrote the song with Andy Paley, which is available on the Nick Records' SpongeBob's Greatest Hits CD. A Nicktoons Production, SpongeBob SquarePants is executive produced by creator Stephen Hillenburg as well as Paul Tibbitt (former writer/director on the series), and produced by Nickelodeon Animation Studios. By the way, if you are looking for SpongeBob you can now...