Roll Up! “Magical Mystery Tour” gets U.S. TV debut

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Give four pop stars turned hippies a movie camera in 1967 and what do you get? The Beatles‘ “Magical Mystery Tour” film, which will receive its long-awaited U.S. broadcast television debut on Friday on PBS.

Long a curiosity in the United States, the film will be accompanied by a new documentary about its making. A restored version was released on DVD and blu-ray in October.

The third film for The Fab Four, after a “A Hard Day’s Night” in 1964 and “Help!” a year later, “Magical Mystery Tour” is a shambolic trip through the English countryside on a bus filled with odd characters, but thin on plot. It first aired on BBC television the day after Christmas 1967.

Although it was initially panned by British critics, time has delivered some justice to the project, Jonathan Clyde, the producer of the documentary, told Reuters.

“‘Magical Mystery Tour‘ has always been the black sheep of the Beatles family, but I think it’s been rehabilitated into the Beatles canon,” Clyde said. “It’s no longer the ‘mad uncle in the attic’ that nobody wants to talk about. It’s been let out.”

In the United States, little was known about the film at the time of its release.

Beatles fans only had the album of music, or saw a poor print of the film in a double-feature midnight showing with “Reefer Madness,” a 1936 anti-marijuana propaganda film often screened decades later for comedic effect.

“I first saw it in 1974 at a university,” Bill King, the longtime publisher of Beatles fanzine Beatlefan, said of “Magical Mystery Tour.” “By then, though, it had taken on mythic status. I loved it.”

At the time of its making, The Beatles were arguably at their creative peak on the heels of a seminal album, “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” and their summer of love anthem “All You Need Is Love,” which debuted on global TV.

SCRIPT WANTED

But even before “Sgt. Pepper’s” release in June 1967, Paul McCartney had already conceived of the film project. The only thing he was missing: a script.

“Paul had drawn out a pie chart,” said Clyde, also a longtime consultant for The Beatles‘ company, Apple Corps. “It just said things like ‘Get on coach,’ ‘Dreams,’ ‘End Song.’ They really had no idea what it was going to be like.”

The group hired a bus, a film crew, and a handful of extras and set out around England, creating scenes with everything from magicians to Ringo Starr’s oversized Aunt Jessie being stuffed with spaghetti by waiter John Lennon.

McCartney did most of the directing.

“It really had something for everyone, which is something I like about it,” Clyde said. “It was really a nod not only to the younger people watching, but to their parents’ generation, as well.”

The film also was loaded with six new Beatles songs, presented as what now would be considered music videos.

The music itself, including songs “I Am the Walrus” and “The Fool on the Hill,” was as innovative as any of the band’s music that year – and mostly recorded just before filming started.

“The Beatles were driven and inspired by having a deadline,” said Giles Martin, son of Beatles producer George Martin. The younger Martin remixed the songs at the legendary Abbey Road studios for the DVD and broadcast.

“And songs like ‘Walrus’ are a brilliant mix of both The Beatles as a rock and roll band and as masters of groundbreaking experimental recording,” Martin added.

(Editing by Eric Kelsey and Nick Zieminski)

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Bayer seeks FDA approval for cancer drug radium-223

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – German drugmaker Bayer said on Friday it requested approval from U.S. regulators for an experimental prostate cancer drug that could eventually generate more than 1 billion euros ($ 1.31 billion) in annual sales.

Radium-223 dichloride, which Bayer used to call Alpharadin, is designed to target bone metastases from prostate cancer that cannot be treated by standard hormone therapy.

Bayer licensed radium-223 from Algeta in 2009, and if approved in the United States, radium-223 will be co-promoted by Bayer and Algeta, the Oslo-based company said on Friday.

Bayer, which on Wednesday said it was requesting EU approval for the drug, will market radium-223 alone in Europe if the treatment is approved there.

Bayer said last year that Radium-223 dichloride could become a “blockbuster” product with annual sales of least 1 billion euros.

The drug has some properties of calcium, which makes it cling to cancerous bone cells and then destroy them via alpha rays, which is more targeted that the shotgun approach of conventional radiotherapy.

(Reporting by Jonathan Gould; Editing by Hans-Juergen Peters)

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NKorea rocket launch shows young leader as gambler

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — A triumphant North Korea staged a mass rally of soldiers and civilians Friday to glorify the country’s young ruler, who took a big gamble this week in sending a satellite into orbit in defiance of international warnings.

Wednesday’s rocket launch came just eight months after a similar attempt ended in an embarrassing public failure, and just under a year after Kim Jong Un inherited power following his father’s death.

The surprising success of the launch may have earned Kim global condemnation, but at home the gamble paid off, at least in the short term. To his people, it made the 20-something Kim appear powerful, capable and determined in the face of foreign adversaries.

Tens of thousands of North Koreans, packed into snowy Kim Il Sung Square, clenched their fists in a unified show of resolve as a military band tooted horns and pounded on drums.

Huge red banners positioned in the square called on North Koreans to defend Kim Jong Un with their lives. They also paid homage to Kim Jong Un’s father, Kim Jong Il, and his grandfather, North Korean founder Kim Il Sung.

Pyongyang says the rocket put a crop and weather monitoring satellite into orbit. Much of the rest of the world sees it as a thinly disguised test of banned long-range missile technology. It could bring a fresh round of U.N. sanctions that would increase his country’s international isolation. At the same time, the success of the launch could strengthen North Korea’s military, the only entity that poses a potential threat to Kim’s rule.

The launch’s success, 14 years after North Korea’s first attempt, shows more than a little of the gambling spirit in the third Kim to rule North Korea since it became a country in 1948.

“North Korean officials will long be touting Kim Jong Un as a gutsy leader” who commanded the rocket launch despite being new to the job and young, said Kim Byung-ro, a North Korea specialist at Seoul National University in South Korea.

The propaganda machinery churned into action early Friday, with state media detailing how Kim Jong Un issued the order to fire off the rocket just days after scientists fretted over technical issues, ignoring the chorus of warnings from Washington to Moscow against a move likely to invite more sanctions.

Top officials followed Kim in shrugging off international condemnation.

Workers’ Party Secretary Kim Ki Nam told the crowd, bundled up against a winter chill in the heart of the capital, that “hostile forces” had dubbed the launch a missile test. He rejected the claim and called on North Koreans to stand their ground against the “cunning” critics.

North Korea called the satellite a gift to Kim Jong Il, who is said to have set the lofty goal of getting a satellite into space and then tapped his son to see it into fruition. The satellite, which North Korean scientists say is designed to send back data about crops and weather, was named Kwangmyongsong, or “Lode Star” — the nickname legendarily given to the elder Kim at birth.

Kim Jong Il died on Dec. 17, 2011, so to North Koreans, the successful launch is a tribute. State TV have been replaying video of the launch to “Song of Gen. Kim Jong Il.”

But it is the son who will bask in the glory, and face the international censure that may follow.

Even while he was being groomed to succeed his father, Kim Jong Un had been portrayed as championing science and technology as a way to lift North Korea out of decades of economic hardship.

“It makes me happy that our satellite is flying in space,” Pyongyang citizen Jong Sun Hui said as Friday’s ceremony came to a close and tens of thousands rushed into the streets, many linking arms as they went.

“The satellite launch demonstrated our strong power and the might of our science and technology once again,” she told The Associated Press. “And it also clearly testifies that a thriving nation is in our near future.”

Aside from winning him support from the people, the success of the launch helps his image as he works to consolidate power over a government crammed with elderly, old-school lieutenants of his father and grandfather, foreign analysts said.

Experts say that what is unclear, however, is whether Kim will continue to smoothly solidify power, steering clear of friction with the powerful military while dealing with the strong possibility of more crushing sanctions. The United Nations says North Korea already has a serious hunger problem.

“Certainly in the short run, this is an enormous boost to his prestige,” according to Marcus Noland, a North Korea analyst at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington.

Noland, however, also mentioned the “Machiavellian argument” that this could cause future problems for Kim by significantly boosting the power of the military — “the only real threat to his rule.”

Successfully firing a rocket was so politically crucial for Kim at the onset of his rule that he allowed an April launch to go through even though it resulted in the collapse of a nascent food-aid-for-nuclear-freeze deal with the United States, said North Korea analyst Kim Yeon-su of Korea National Defense University in Seoul.

The launch success consolidates his image as heir to his father’s legacy. But it could end up deepening North Korea’s political and economic isolation, he said.

On Friday, the section at the rally reserved for foreign diplomats was noticeably sparse. U.N. officials and some European envoys stayed away from the celebration, as they did in April after the last launch.

Despite the success, experts say North Korea is years from even having a shot at developing reliable missiles that could bombard the American mainland and other distant targets.

North Korea will need larger and more dependable missiles, and more advanced nuclear weapons, to threaten U.S. shores, though it already poses a shorter-range missile threat to its neighbors.

The next big question is how the outside world will punish Pyongyang — and try to steer North Korea from what could come next: a nuclear test. In 2009, the North conducted an atomic explosion just weeks after a rocket launch.

Scott Snyder, a Korea specialist for the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote recently that North Korea‘s nuclear ambitions should inspire the U.S., China, South Korea and Japan to put aside their issues and focus on dealing with Pyongyang.

If there is a common threat that should galvanize regional cooperation, “it most certainly should be the prospect of a 30-year-old leader of a terrorized population with his finger on a nuclear trigger,” Snyder said.

____

Jon Chol Jin in Pyongyang, and Foster Klug and Sam Kim in Seoul, South Korea, contributed to this report. Follow Jean H. Lee on Twitter: (at)newsjean.

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Angry Birds beats Samsung in viral marketing as mobile interest surged in 2012

This past year has shown us how effective leading smartphone and mobile app companies have become at leveraging viral videos. In Ad Age’s top-10 viral videos list for 2012, Samsung (005930) and Rovio each hog two spots. The Angry Birds Space video racked up 109 million views and the Angry Birds Star Wars hit the 41 million view mark. Meanwhile, Samsung managed to get 79 million views for its Galaxy S III video and 42 million views for the LeBron’s Day clip. It’s notable that Rovio’s Angry Birds clips were far cheaper to produce, with no major stars or lavish video production gimmickry.

The smartphone/mobile app industry thus held four of the top-10 viral video slots in 2012 — the rest of the list is a motley crew of names ranging from Invisible Children and Red Bull to Intel and M&M. It is telling that the smartphone/mobile app cluster is the only industry or cultural phenomenon that generated more than one spot on the list. Popular interest in mobile content continues surging.

It might also be a sign of the times that Apple (AAPL) did not hit the top-10. Samsung’s ultra-aggressive promotional efforts have started bearing fruit. What was once a boring, stale copycat brand in 2008 has suddenly started gripping the imaginations of consumers in a completely new way.

But perhaps even more interesting is that a mobile app company with less than 100 million euros in sales in 2011 managed to beat the mighty Samsung marketing machine in 2012. Rovio is in the vanguard of spreading mobile gaming into demographic niches that have never been all that interested in technology or gaming.

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‘Homeland’ leads old favorites in Golden Globes TV race

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Cable shows got more Golden Globe nominations for television than traditional network programs on Thursday as HBO‘s political movie “Game Change” and Showtime‘s psychological thriller series “Homeland,” – one of last year’s big winners – led the race.

“Homeland” led the TV drama category with four nominations including best drama, best actor for Damian Lewis and best actress for Claire Danes in her role as a bi-polar CIA agent tracking down a home-grown Muslim extremist.

The show faces stiff competition from British aristocratic drama “Downton Abbey, which also won an acting nod for Michelle Dockery, along with “Breaking Bad,” “Boardwalk Empire,” and newcomer “The Newsroom.”

“‘Homeland’ fans seemed to be a little more split on whether creatively the second season was as successful as the first season so it’ll be curious if that ends up impacting the show’s chances in terms of taking home the awards,” James Hibberd, senior staff writer at Entertainment Weekly, told Reuters.

“Downtown Abbey” creator Julian Fellowes told Reuters: “We’re up against the big boys now, but the whole thing is very flattering and exciting.”

He added: “The themes of the show are pretty international, they’re about adjusting to change and being caught out by what life does to you…all of that is common to every country.”

HBO movie “Game Change,” about the surprise selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 presidential campaign, landed five nods in the miniseries/movie category, including for actors Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson.

“‘Game Change’ is pure awards bait. It’s a well-done, smart political drama based on a book, with a certain amount of left-wing political slant and it’s very much the type of movie you’d expect awards voters to like,” Hibberd said.

New HBO drama “The Newsroom” bumped long-time awards favorite “Mad Men” from the best drama category, surprising many who believed the stylish advertising series was a shoo-in.

“The Globes tend to like the glamorous and sophisticated dramas with big city settings and they tend to shy away from gritty, rural Americana dramas…about sweaty guys with guns instead of charming men in suits, like ‘The Newsroom’ and ‘Boardwalk Empire,’” Hibberd said.

He noted that the only exception was “Breaking Bad,” which finally made the best drama category this year after four seasons on air.

Other notable snubs included HBO‘s epic fantasy drama “Game of Thrones,” which failed to pick up any nominations, and Ryan Murphy’s miniseries “American Horror Story: Asylum” which landed one best actress nod for Jessica Lange, who took home the award for 2012.

‘MODERN FAMILY’ LEADS COMEDY RACE

While last year’s Golden Globes picked newcomers over staple awards favorites for leading nominees, this year’s comedy categories saw the return of many old faces, including “Modern Family,” which led the comedy race with three nods.

Comedians Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, who will be hosting the awards ceremony on January 13, each landed a best comedy actress nod in the television race for their long-popular NBC comedies – Fey for “30 Rock” and Poehler for “Parks and Recreation.”

“You can be sure that the hosts are going to have fun with this during the telecast, they’re going to find ways to play off this during their presentation,” Hibberd said.

Fey and Poehler will replace Ricky Gervais at the awards gala dinner, after the British comedian helmed the Globes with his risqué dry humor for three years.

HBO‘s raunchy new comedy “Girls” earned two key nominations in the best TV comedy category and best comedy actress for Lena Dunham, while Showtime‘s new satire “House of Lies” landed the show’s lead Don Cheadle a best actor nod.

With the exception of NBC’s musical comedy “Smash” in the best comedy series category, no new network comedies managed to break into key races, which Hibberd attributed to a “disappointing” fall season.

Cable channel HBO picked up 17 nominations and Showtime garnered 7 across all major television categories. Networks ABC had 5, CBS and NBC got 4, and Fox got 2.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant)

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Obama, Boehner hold “frank” meeting amid ‘fiscal cliff’ frustration

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama and House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner held a “frank” face-to-face meeting on Thursday in an effort to break an impasse in talks to avert the “fiscal cliff” of steep tax increases and spending cuts.

With an end-of-year deadline looming, the two leaders talked at the White House as frustration mounted over the recent lack of progress in negotiations that had become bogged down in a daily round of finger-pointing.

Aides on both sides used similar language to describe the 50-minute meeting, calling it “frank” and repeating that lines of communication remained open.

The meeting, also attended by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, was announced after frustration broke out on both sides at a lack of progress and U.S. stocks turned negative due to fears the economy could dip into recession again if politicians fail to break the gridlock in Washington.

At times raising his voice, Boehner criticized Obama earlier in the day for putting jobs and the economic recovery at risk by insisting on raising tax rates for the wealthiest 2 percent.

White House spokesman Jay Carney responded by reaffirming Obama’s commitment to raising the top rates and complaining there had been no movement from Republicans on that crucial topic.

“What we have not seen from the Republicans is any movement at all on the fundamental issue,” Carney told reporters. “Republicans need to accept the fact that rates will go up on the top 2 percent.”

In an interview with a Minnesota CBS television affiliate, Obama said he was hopeful of getting a deal and willing to make more spending cuts as long as revenue from higher tax rates for the rich was part of the deal.

“I’m willing to do a lot more cuts in spending. We also need to pair it up with a little more revenue,” he told WCCO television.

At a meeting earlier on Thursday, Obama’s top economic adviser, Gene Sperling, delivered a downbeat message to Democratic senators about the status of the fiscal cliff talks.

A Democratic aide described the presentation as “bleak,” saying Sperling told the group of senators that “we don’t have anywhere to go until Republicans move on (income tax) rates.”

RECESSION FEARS

Economists say failure to reach an agreement before January 1 could push the country back into recession. The main hurdle is the expiring tax cuts, which Obama wants extended for all but the rich and Boehner wants extended for everyone.

But with positions seeming to harden, both sides also emphasized their differences on Obama’s request for permanent authority to increase U.S. borrowing as part of a fiscal-cliff agreement and on Republican calls for an increase in the eligibility age for recipients of the Medicare healthcare program.

At a news conference, Boehner occasionally raised his voice in criticism of Obama’s bottom-line insistence on raising tax rates on the rich.

“Raising tax rates will hurt small businesses at a time when we’re expecting small businesses to be the engine of job creation in America,” said Boehner, who used a chart to illustrate his point that curbing spending increases was the key to deficit reduction.

If Obama persisted on a path of higher spending and higher taxes, he said, “this chart is going to look a lot worse.”

Afterward, his spokesman said Boehner would return to his home state of Ohio on Friday for the weekend, but was available if there were more talks. “Ohio has both cell phone service and airports,” spokesman Michael Steel said. “It won’t be a problem.”

A seven-day rally in world shares came to a halt and commodity prices slipped on Thursday after negotiations over the fiscal cliff appeared to stall.

Today there’s a certain sense that both sides are still apart,” said Gordon Charlop, managing director at Rosenblatt Securities in New York, describing trading as “tweaking” while investors watch Washington’s back-and-forth drama.

While Republicans fumed, Obama planned to continue his public-relations offensive with a round of interviews with anchors from local television stations. He was interviewed by ABC’s Barbara Walters two days ago.

A flurry of new polls showed strong support for Obama’s position. According to a Wall Street Journal/NBC survey, three-quarters of Americans said they would accept raising taxes on the wealthy to avoid the cliff. Even among Republicans, some 61 percent said they would accept tax increases on high earners.

‘REALITY SHOULD SET IN’

A Pew Research Center poll showed Obama’s approval rating rising and 55 percent saying he was making a serious effort to engage in the fiscal talks, while just 32 percent said Republicans were serious about a deal.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, citing the polls, said Boehner “can’t ignore the people forever” on the tax issue. “At some point, reality should set in,” he told reporters.

The polls have put Republicans in a difficult negotiating position, and pressure has grown on Boehner in recent weeks from the right and left. Some Republicans have expressed a willingness to give in on higher tax rates in exchange for deeper spending cuts, while conservatives have demanded that Boehner stand firm.

“I’m not concerned about my job as speaker,” Boehner, who faces re-election to the leadership post in January, told reporters.

Boehner also dismissed any notion that Republicans would agree to giving Obama more authority on the debt ceiling.

“Congress is never going to give up our ability to control the purse,” Boehner said. “The debt limit ought to be used to bring fiscal sanity to Washington.”

A group of 72 House Democrats urged Obama to reject Republican calls to raise the Medicare eligibility age.

Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, told reporters he was told by the White House that raising the eligibility age for qualifying for Medicare benefits was not in the mix anymore.

“My understanding is that is no longer one of the items being considered by the White House,” Durbin told reporters.

He said that raising the eligibility age “creates some serious issues for a lot of people who may be caught in the gap between retirement and eligibility. Where are they going to get health insurance? Many of them are sick people.”

(Additional reporting by Kim Dixon and Rachelle Younglai; Writing by John Whitesides; Editing by Alistair Bell and Peter Cooney)

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Cuban lawmakers meet to consider economy, budget

HAVANA (AP) — Cuban lawmakers are holding the second of their twice-annual sessions with a year-end report expected on the state of the country’s economy.

Legislators are also to approve next year’s budget.

Cuban leaders have sometimes used the parliamentary gatherings to make important announcements or policy statements.

Observers will be watching for word on the progress of President Raul Castro‘s economic reform plan and efforts to promote younger leaders.

The unicameral parliament will reconvene in February with a new membership following elections. It is then expected to name Castro to another five-year term.

State-run media said Castro presided over Thursday’s session.

It was not open to international journalists.

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‘Dishonored’ tops a diverse year in video games

The video game universe in 2012 is a study in extremes.

At one end, you have the old guard striving to produce mass-appeal blockbusters. At the other end, you have a thriving community of independent game developers scrambling to find an audience for their idiosyncratic visions. Can’t we all just get along?

Turns out, we can. For while some industry leaders are worried (and not without cause) about “disruptive” trends — social-media games, free-to-play models, the switch from disc-based media to digital delivery — video games are blossoming creatively. This fall, during the height of the pre-holiday game release calendar, I found myself bouncing among games as diverse as the bombastic “Halo 4,” the artsy “The Unfinished Swan” and the quick-hit trivia game “SongPop.”

Some of my favorite games this year have benefited from both sides working together. The smaller studios get exposure on huge platforms like Xbox Live or the PlayStation Network. The big publishers seem more willing to invite a little quirkiness into their big-budget behemoths. Gamers win.

1. “Dishonored” (Bethesda Softworks, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC): Arkane Studios’ revenge drama combined a witty plot, crisp gameplay and an uncommonly distinctive milieu, setting a supernaturally gifted assassin loose in a gloriously decadent, steampunk-influenced city.

2. “Mass Effect 3″ (Electronic Arts, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii U, PC): No 2012 game was more ambitious than BioWare’s sweeping space opera. Yes, the ending was a little bumpy, but the fearless Commander Shepard’s last journey across the cosmos provided dozens of thrilling moments.

3. “The Walking Dead” (Telltale Games, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC, iOS): This moving adaptation of Robert Kirkman’s comics dodged the predictable zombie bloodbath in favor of a finely tuned character study of two survivors: Lee, an escaped convict, and Clementine, the 8-year-old girl he’s committed to protect.

4. “Journey” (Thatgamecompany, for the PlayStation 3): A nameless figure trudges across a desert toward a glowing light. Simple enough, but gorgeous visuals, haunting music and the need to communicate, wordlessly, with companions you meet along the way translate into something that’s almost profound.

5. “Borderlands 2″ (2K Games, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC): Gearbox Software’s gleeful mash-up of first-person shooting, role-playing and loot-collecting conventions gets bigger and badder, but what stuck with me most were the often hilarious encounters with the damaged citizens of the godforsaken planet Pandora.

6. “XCOM: Enemy Unknown” (2K Games, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC): A strategy classic returns, as the forces of Earth fight back against an extraterrestrial invasion. It’s a battle of wits rather than reflexes, a stimulating change of pace from the typical alien gorefest.

7. “Fez” (Polytron, for the Xbox 360): A two-dimensional dude named Gomez finds his world has suddenly burst into a third dimension in this gem from indie developer Phil Fish. As Gomez explores, the world of “Fez” continually deepens, opening up mysteries that only the most dedicated players will be able to solve.

8. “Spec Ops: The Line” (2K Games, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC): This harrowing tale from German studio Yager Development transplants “Apocalypse Now” to a war-torn Dubai. It’s a bracing critique, not just of war but of the rah-rah jingoism of contemporary military shooters.

9. “Assassin’s Creed III” (Ubisoft, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii U, PC): A centuries-old conspiracy takes root in Colonial America in this beautifully realized, refreshingly irreverent installment of Ubisoft’s alternate history franchise.

10. “ZombiU” (Ubisoft, for the Wii U): The best launch game for Nintendo’s new console turns the Wii U’s GamePad into an effective tool for finding and hunting down the undead.

Runners-up: “Call of Duty: Black Ops II,” ”Darksiders II,” ”Dust: An Elysian Tail,” ”Far Cry 3,” ”Halo 4,” ”Mark of the Ninja,” ”Need for Speed: Most Wanted,” ”Paper Mario: Sticker Star,” ”Papo & Yo,” ”The Unfinished Swan.”

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Taylor Swift reclaims top spot on Billboard 200

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Country-pop star Taylor Swift reclaimed the top spot on the Billboard 200 album chart on Wednesday with her hit album “Red,” keeping three new entries from the No.1 position.

“Red” landed back at No. 1 for the fourth time after selling 167,000 copies last week according to Nielsen SoundScan, ousting Alicia Keys‘ “Girl on Fire,” which fell to No. 7 this week.

New entries this week include rapper Wiz Khalifa‘s sophomore record “O.N.I.F.C.,” which debuted at No. 2 after selling 141,00 copies. Pop star Ke$ ha’s new album “Warrior” landed at No. 6 with sales of 85,000 while country band Florida Georgia Line‘s debut album “Here’s To the Good Times” came in at No. 10.

Ahead of the holidays, festive albums featured heavily in the top 10, with Rod Stewart‘s “Merry Christmas, Baby” at No. 3, Michael Buble‘s “Christmas” at No. 5 and Blake Shelton‘s “Cheers, It’s Christmas” at No. 8.

Bruno Mars’ latest single “Locked Out of Heaven” topped the Billboard Digital Songs chart for the first time with 197,000 copies sold, coming in ahead of Rihanna’s “Diamonds” at No. 2 and will.i.am and Britney Spears‘ “Scream & Shout” at No. 3.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant)

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C-section babies more likely to become overweight

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Children born via cesarean section are slightly more likely than babies delivered vaginally to become heavy or obese, according to a new review of studies.

The results don’t prove that c-sections cause kids to put on weight, but Dr. Jianmeng Liu, one of the authors of the study and a professor at Peking University Health Science Center in China, said the link between the delivery and obesity is important to keep in mind.

“The potential health burden of obesity and other diseases associated with c-section births should not be neglected, even if its impact is modest, particularly given” how often births happen that way, Liu told Reuters Health in an email.

Previous research has tied c-sections to a variety of untoward health outcomes in children, including asthma, allergies and diabetes (see Reuters Health reports of February 5, 2009 here: http://reut.rs/js7tcW and September 18, 2008 here: http://reut.rs/m5Kpji).

Liu said that the relationship between the type of delivery and obesity among kids hasn’t been as clear (see Reuters Health reports of January 30, 2012 here: http://reut.rs/xxjBgo and May 12, 2011 here: http://reut.rs/mv2kS5).

The research team collected the results from nine studies that included more than 200,000 people.

People were 33 percent more likely to be overweight or obese if they were born by c-section, researchers report in the International Journal of Obesity.

Nearly 70 percent of adults in the U.S. are overweight or obese. A 33 percent increase from that number would mean that 93 percent would be heavy.

The risk for childhood obesity in particular was somewhat higher – about a 40 percent increase over kids born vaginally.

Nearly one in five kids aged six to 11 is obese in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Liu said the increase in risk was modest, but that it persists into adulthood. When the researchers looked just at the studies on adults, they found that those who were born surgically were 50 percent more likely to be obese than those who were born vaginally.

WHY THE LINK?

It’s not clear why c-section births are tied to a better chance of being heavy.

One possibility relates to the bacteria babies are exposed to when they are delivered vaginally, which might affect the way they process and store food, said Liu.

Additionally, Liu added, researchers have suggested that c-sections are linked with a lower concentration in the umbilical cord of a hormone important in regulating weight and with a reduced rate of breastfeeding, “both of which are reported to be associated with an increased risk of later obesity.”

Babies who are larger than normal are also more likely to be born via cesarean, but most of the studies Liu’s team analyzed took into account birth weight.

Cesareans have become increasingly popular, and in the U.S. now one in four babies is born through a c-section.

Liu said there’s been concern that some of these are unnecessary, and given the potential negative impacts on children the unneeded ones should be curbed.

“In clinical practice, (the) potential adverse impact of c-section should be considered by medical staff, and non-medically indicated elective c-section should be somewhat avoided, where possible,” Liu said.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/XcjOMh International Journal of Obesity, online December 4, 2012.

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