'Dark Knight Rises' actress started dating now-fiancé after very public breakup with Raffaello Follieri.
By Jocelyn Vena 
 

Anne Hathaway has found her not-so-dark knight: She is engaged to longtime boyfriend Adam Shulman.

The actress' rep confirmed that the couple, who began dating in 2008, are engaged after Hathaway was spotted sporting an engagement ring over the weekend in Brooklyn, People magazine reports. Meanwhile, E! News reports that Shulman designed the bling with Kwiat Heritage jewels.

Hathaway, who just wrapped filming her role as Catwoman alongside Christian Bale and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight," began dating Shulman shortly after her breakup with Raffaello Follieri, who was found guilty of defrauding investors of millions of dollars when he posed as a real-estate consultant for the Vatican.

"I hate talking about the breakup because I don't want it to define me, but as is to be expected, there were a lot of lingering trust issues," Hathaway told Vogue of the highly publicized breakup.

But she has been open about her warmer feelings for her soon-to-be husband. "I am very much in love with him, [only] Adam totally ruined my plan," Hathaway explained of falling for Shulman so shortly after her split from Follieri. "I was really actually looking forward to a little alone time, and then I fell in love like a fool!"

Us Weekly reports that Hathaway and Shulman knew each other for a while before dating. "We hit it off immediately, but it took us a pretty long time to get together. Things sped up a bit [when I realized we were both single] — and I think I'll leave it at that."

While her last relationship made headlines, Hathaway described this one as much lower-key. "Mellow doesn't always make for a good story, but it makes for a good life," she said.

'She's always doing 25,000 things in a row,' DJ White Shadow tells MTV News of Gaga's 2012 plans.
By Jocelyn Vena 
 

Lady Gaga is hard at work. The Mother Monster is already coming up with ideas for 2012's Born This Way Tour and even thinking about her next album. When MTV News caught up with pal and musical collaborator DJ White Shadow, he talked about what the Haus has in store for Gaga.

"She's doing prep for the next round of touring, and she's always doing 25,000 things in a row," he told MTV News last week when he stopped by to chat about the opening of Gaga's pop-up holiday shop at Barneys. "But I think the main focus for her after this season is going to be prepping up for the show, touring new songs for the record."

Gaga has hinted that she'd like to get Elton John on this next record, but, right now, anything goes. White Shadow — who has worked with Gaga extensively on Born This Way, including on the tracks "Born This Way" and "Americano" — is ready to drop everything to collaborate with Gaga again.

"I want to try and be as close to it as possible, that way I don't have to wake up at 4 o'clock in the morning and fly to L.A. or wherever or Japan or wherever she's starting to do stuff," he explained. "Maybe when the tour starts, she's working all the time. I send her stuff and she sends stuff. She's always working on something. It just depends. I know she likes to write when she's on the road, [so maybe she'll make a] new album during the tour."

Given the pair's track record, expect across-the-board sounds on the next project. "The kind of stuff that I send her, some of it is so crazy that I don't know what you'd call it," he said. "When I make stuff ... I know what's for her and what's not for her. Some of it's structured as songs and some of it is structured as madness, and she goes through it like a gold miner."

Song about missing someone 'represents the album' well, singer says.
By Jocelyn Vena
 

Avril Lavigne lets her guard down on her Goodbye Lullaby single "Wish You Were Here." The poignant track is about pining away for that one person you let slip away. The emotional pull of the track, produced by Max Martin and Shellback, is the perfect tune for anyone who's not able to be with the ones they love this holiday season.

"I'm excited about 'Wish You Were Here' being the single because it's a ballad and the song kind of represents the album definitely more so than the first single," she told MTV News about the song, which she performed during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade last week. "That was kind of more my older stuff and more pop rock and aggressive and a lighter subject. Goodbye Lullaby, for me, was a record that I was writing for myself."

"Wish You Were Here" and its simple, Dave Meyers-directed video really sum up the album for Lavigne. "It was more raw and stripped-down and more emotional and I wasn't holding back," she said of working on the album. "[It's] sort of more song driven and the production was mainly just like a lot of acoustic guitars and loops and just all about the vocal; the vocal being clear and having an honest emotion to it. And saying that, yeah, the first two singles ['What the Hell' and 'Smile'] were more pop rock, and so now finally with this one, 'Wish You Were Here,' being released, it feels right."

The song comes from a place deep inside and is very much about someone in Lavigne's life. "I love this song. I like this song because I wrote it about missing somebody and that's something that we all go through at some point in our lives," she explained. "It's just about looking back and remembering all those good times you shared with somebody, all the crazy moments. And that's life. We all experience that at some point, but it has a positive message."

Critics call RiRi's sixth album 'often great' and 'relentlessly catchy.'
By John Mitchell

Rihanna's much-anticipated Talk That Talk hit stores Monday on a wave of near-universal praise from critics. The album, which can already claim the #1 song in the country, "We Found Love" featuring Calvin Harris, is earning the Barbadian pop superstar the best reviews of her commercially massive career.

MTV News' James Montgomery already declared Talk That Talk "not only the best effort of her career, but arguably the best pop album of 2011," an assessment echoed by the New York Times, People, Rolling Stone and SPIN.

"The best songs on this lively and often great album sound synth-perfect for that time [the early 1990s]. 'We Found Love' almost criminally recalls the swinging Crystal Waters singles, with triumphant percussion somewhere between church and seventh-inning stretch," the Times writes. " 'Where Have You Been' is even better, with hard, chilly synths, snares from the poppier side of house music, and Rihanna moving in and out of a curled Siouxsie Sioux tone."

In a three-and-a-half -star review (out of four), People calls Talk That Talk "one of 2011's best pop-diva statements," while Spin awards the set an 8 out of 10, complimenting the "occasionally perfect pop" songs on the record and noting the set is easily Rihanna's most cohesive to date.

Rolling Stone also notes that Talk is far more than a collection of singles. "Rihanna's sixth album is her tightest, most assured yet — a relentlessly catchy and danceable pop album, with first-rate contributions from top songwriter-producers," the magazine writes.

Many critics also seem pleased that the pop star is moving away from the darker, brooding material that marked her last two records, Rated R and Loud. Those albums appeared to be heavily influenced by her troubled relationship with Chris Brown, and, as noted in Entertainment Weekly's B-plus review, often "equated falling for someone with feeling tortured."

On Talk, RiRi instead approaches the topics of love and sex — the album's principal themes — with a less-heavy hand, even admitting on "Roc Me Out": "I'll let you in on a dirty secret/ I just want to be loved."

While the album is mostly earning raves, Pitchfork had a few complaints — mostly that the brief set (the 11-track album clocks in at a mere 38 minutes) never fully realizes its potential.

In its summation of the album, Billboard calls Talk "a fleshed-out statement that captures Rihanna's relentless drive and will likely keep her on top. This album's not a victory lap; it's a whole new race."

Whether the mostly stellar reviews will translate into strong sales for Rihanna, who set a Billboard chart record by racking up 20 Top-10 singles faster than any solo artist, with "We Found Love," remains to be seen.

'She took it up a notch in a way that we couldn't have imagined,' lead singer Ryan Keith Follese says of Whatever duet.
By Jocelyn Vena, with reporting by Jim Cantiello 

Riding high off the success of their track "Tonight Tonight," Nashville's Hot Chelle Rae are prepping the release of their album Whatever, due out November 29.

In addition to the top 40 hit, HCR also show off their skills on 10 tracks, and they invited some pals to the party. Among those friends is Demi Lovato, who appears on "Why Don't You Love Me." The group's lead singer, Ryan Keith Follese, dished about the Unbroken singer to MTV News when we caught up with them at Sunday's American Music Awards (the group took home the prize for New Artist of the Year).

"Honestly, I'm really, really proud of the song we did with Demi," Follese said. "We did a song called 'Why Don't You Love Me' ... and we're such a huge fan of hers."

Lovato's big voice made her the perfect choice for the track. "She's such a powerhouse female vocalist for our generation and the one below us," he gushed, "And I just can't wait for the world to hear that song. She took it up a notch in a way that we couldn't have imagined."

So what should fans expect from the track? "It is such a ballad, such a duet. If you can imagine a classic love song, that's what it is," he teased.

Whatever features Lovato, but also appearances from the New Boyz on "I Like It Like That." Bei Maejor, who dropped the track "Trouble" with J. Cole earlier this year, appears on the song "Radio."