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LOS ANGELES (AP) — For the second year in a row, the iHeartRadio Awards became the iHeartTaylorSwift show.
Not only did Swift claim three prizes, including album of the year, but her bestie and her boyfriend took home trophies, too.
Swift, who swept the awards last year, won the first and last prize Sunday night — female artist and album of the year. In between, she claimed best tour honors for her star-studded "1989 World Tour," thanking boyfriend Calvin Harris (real name: Adam Wiles) from the stage.
"For the first time, I had the most amazing person to come home to when the spotlight went out and when the crowds were all gone," Swift said. "So I want to thank my boyfriend Adam for that."
Harris won dance artist of the year. Gomez took the "biggest triple threat" award.
Bono and the Edge from U2 accepted the show's Innovator Award, presented by last year's winner, Pharrell Williams.
"The thing that might be the most innovative about our band is we are a real band," Edge said. "We are still in our high school band."
Song of the year went to Adele for "Hello." She accepted via video from a performance in Birmingham, England. Other winners at the fan-voted show included Fetty Wap (best new artist), Pitbull (Latin artist of the year) and Chris Brown (R&B artist of the year). All three men also performed during the show.
Brown thanked "everybody who supported me through all the worst times in my life and the positive times in my life."
"I tend to not have a filter sometimes, and I go off on a lot of people," said Brown, who has been dogged by legal troubles since pleading guilty to felony charges in 2009 for beating then-girlfriend Rihanna. "But the music stays the same."
There were as many performances as awards presented during the three-hour show, hosted by Jason Derulo and broadcast live on TNT and TBS from the Forum in Inglewood, California.
Justin Bieber was the first to perform, showing off his new dreadlocks during a mash-up of "Love Yourself" and "Company." He returned to the stage twice as a winner, claiming male artist of the year and sharing in the dance song of the year award with Diplo and Skrillex for "Where Are U Now."
Bieber thanked his fans for standing by him through what he described as "tough times."
"It's just about our growth and learning," he said.
Meghan Trainor performed her new single, "No." Demi Lovato sang the heart wrenching "Stone Cold" while Brad Paisley accompanied her on guitar. Iggy Azalea unveiled her new song, "Team." Zayn Malik made his solo awards-show performance debut, performing "Like I Would" from his new album, "Mind of Mine."
Other performers included DNCE, The Weeknd, show host Jason Derulo and Maroon 5, which was named duo or group of the year.
NEW YORK (AP) --
Virgin America has loyal passengers who love the airline's cool vibe even if its size and schedule are too limited to meet all their travel needs.
But it appears to be going away.
Alaska Airlines' parent company announced Monday that it will pay $2.6 billion to buy the Richard Branson-inspired, California-based carrier. Alaska hopes to become travelers' preferred airline on the West Coast and a tougher competitor to giants American, Delta and United on transcontinental routes.
The deal would vault Alaska over JetBlue - the losing bidder for Virgin America - to become the nation's fifth-biggest airline by passenger traffic.
Since it started flying in 2007, Virgin has helped bring down fares on transcontinental routes between California and New York, and it engaged in a price war with Southwest that led to dramatically lower fares in Dallas.
Some analysts believe the merger will reduce bargain fares. Mergers and acquisitions have already reduced nine major U.S. airlines to four and made it easier for the survivors to limit flights, an indirect way to avoid cutting prices. Now two smaller carriers are combining, again leaving passengers with fewer choices.
"We think (Virgin) was a price disruptor in the industry, so we think we will see less discounting on these routes," said Jim Corridore, an analyst with S&P Capital IQ.
But Alaska's CEO, Brad Tilden, said Alaska and Virgin thrive because they keep their costs - and as a result airfares - lower than bigger airlines.
"We don't have any intention of straying from that strategy," Tilden said.
Alaska faces the risk that Virgin's most passionate passengers won't like their new airline because it won't be as hip. The combined company plans a campaign to keep those key customers happy and flying.
"I think our biggest advocates, because they are so invested in the brand, will be disappointed," Virgin America Inc. CEO David Cush said in an interview. "We are going to make sure that we spend the proper amount of time with them to explain that we think this is a good deal."
The pitch will go something like this: The route network will be greatly expanded with more flights to more places. A combination of Alaska's Mileage Plan and Virgin's Elevate will be a bigger, more valuable loyalty program. And even if its planes don't have mood lighting and order-at-your-seat screens like Virgin's, Alaska runs a solid airline.
Alaska ranked second among U.S. carriers in on-time performance last year, trailing only fair-weather Hawaiian Airlines. Virgin was fifth. Alaska had the industry's lowest complaint rate. Virgin's rate was in the middle of the pack, three times higher than Alaska. While Alaska charges bag fees, it was the first to add a guarantee - if a checked bag isn't at the pickup area within 20 minutes, fliers get $25 off a future trip or 2,500 bonus miles.
The proposed merger would give Alaska a bigger presence in Virgin's key markets of San Francisco and Los Angeles and a foothold at busy airports in New York and Washington, D.C.
Tilden said the goal is to be "the premier airline for people along the West Coast."
"One of the main things customers want is for you to fly them to places they need to go. This is going to put us in a better position to do that," Tilden told The Associated Press.
The combined airline would operate about 1,200 daily flights and control 5.5 percent of domestic air travel, compared with 4.2 percent for New York-based JetBlue. It would still lag far behind American, Delta, United and Southwest. Those four control 83 percent of domestic seats, according to an Associated Press analysis of data from Diio, an airline-schedule tracking service.
It will be based in Seattle with Tilden as its CEO. Alaska said the deal would add to its adjusted earnings per share in the first full year.
If past airline deals are any indication, Alaska and Virgin will continue to operate separately for several years while combining workforces, computer systems and - maybe - fleets. Alaska flies Boeing planes, and now must decide whether to keep Virgin's leased Airbus jets.
Alaska executives also said they might keep the Virgin America brand name alive in some form.
Analysts pressed the executives on whether Alaska had overpaid for a relatively small airline with only about two dozen destinations. The executives replied that it was a one-time opportunity to grow overnight in California, complementing their airline's strength in Washington, Oregon and Alaska.
Virgin started flying in 2007 with backing from Branson, the colorful British billionaire, as a minority owner - U.S. law limits foreign ownership of airlines. It went public in November 2014 with an initial stock offering that jumped 30 percent on its first day of trading. The airline turned profitable - barely - in 2013 and earned a record $340.5 million last year with help from lower fuel prices.
JetBlue issued a statement saying that it wants to grow on the West Coast and on transcontinental routes, but that the price of an acquisition got too high - it would be better for JetBlue to grow on its own.
The Alaska-Virgin deal is subject to approval by shareholders of both airlines and government antitrust regulators. The airlines hope to close by the end of this year.
Alaska will pay $57 per share in cash. That is a 47 percent premium to Virgin's closing price on Friday and an 86 percent premium to its price the day before Bloomberg News first reported a potential sale.
Alaska shares fell $3.09, or 3.8 percent, to $78.92, while Virgin shares soared $16.21, or 41.7 percent, to $55.11.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) --
A man convicted for his role in a gunfight that killed one bystander and left nine people injured on New Orleans' famous Bourbon Street was sentenced Monday to 60 years in prison, the maximum penalty.
State District Judge Byron Williams sentenced Trung Le, 22, to 40 years for manslaughter in the death of Brittany Thomas of Hammond. The judge sentenced him to 20 years for attempted manslaughter for firing at the other gunman - who has never been captured or identified. The sentences will be served consecutively.
"I wish that I could sentence you to more," Williams told Le, who stood silently as the sentence was pronounced. Williams said Le had "dodged the proverbial bullet" when a jury found him guilty of manslaughter on Jan. 15. He had been charged with second-degree murder, which carries a mandatory life sentence in Louisiana.
The gunfight broke out early on June 29, 2014, as tourists walked the famous street of nightspots in the historic French Quarter.
Thomas' mother was present in the courtroom and told reporters later she was satisfied with the sentence. During the hearing, Assistant District Attorney Laura Rodrigue noted that Thomas, a nursing student, would have turned 23 this year.
Rodrigue also read a statement from Amy Matthews, an Australian tourist who was hit in the face by a bullet.
Matthews' letter described a series of facial surgeries, lingering pain, the loss of most of her teeth and psychological trauma that includes panic attacks and nightmares.
"I contemplated suicide more than once," the statement said.
Prosecutors said Le, from the New Orleans-area city of Belle Chasse, was the aggressor, firing at someone believed to have earlier stolen marijuana from Le's friends.
Le defense attorney Martin Regan insisted throughout the trial, and again at Monday's hearing, that Le fired in self-defense when the other armed man threatened him and his friends. He insisted that video evidence that was a point of dispute through much of the trial shows that Le's friends standing outside a Bourbon Street nightspot were "in fear for their lives."
Williams rejected the notion, calling Le's actions "callous and calculated."
Le faced a possible 20 to 40 years in prison for the manslaughter conviction; the attempted manslaughter conviction carried a possible 20-year sentence. The judge sentenced him to the maximum penalty for both.
Thomas is believed to have been killed by a bullet fired by the still-unknown second gunman. Others hit by the gunfire included Matthews and visitors from Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas and Florida, some of whom testified about their injuries at Le's January trial.
The outbreak of violence stunned the tourism-dependent city, renewed attention to manpower shortages at the city police department and led state police to help beef up the city's patrols along Bourbon Street and the rest of the French Quarter.
Mayor Mitch Landrieu was quick to react to the sentence with a statement saying "justice has been served" and expressing sympathy for Thomas'family.
"Our justice system has sent a clear and resounding message about accountability to the community - if you engage in brazen acts of violence, you will be prosecuted, sentenced and punished to the fullest extent of the law," Landrieu's news release said.