T.I. Says He Proved He Was 'Worthy' Of Experimental Plea Deal

Rapper says his ability to relate to at-risk youth helped reduced his prison sentence.

The U.S. attorney who helped broker the arrangement called it "unique." And T.I. himself acknowledged that his plea deal — which reduced a potential 10-year prison term into community service and, more than likely, less than a year's worth of jail time — was "an opportunity."

T.I. wasn't the recipient of the plea deal because he snitched, he's often said. Nor did he get the benefit of the doubt from the legal system because he's rich. Tip landed his plea deal due to a combination of his fame, his familiar troubled past and his ability to recount his transformation from trap star to rap star as a means of influencing at-risk youth.

"If they would have gave Joe Blow, who got arrested with guns the next day or the next week — if [the court] would have gave him my deal, could he have turned around and given as much back to the community as I have? No he couldn't," T.I. told MTV News' Sway during their conversation for "Road to Redemption: The Reckoning," which airs Tuesday on MTV.

"I showed I was worthy of this and this was something possible," Tip continued. "So they decided the opportunity was worth the chance."

The rapper's lawyer has said his client has made upwards of 260 public appearances in the past year, talking to schools, youth groups and churches. T.I. speaks about his mistakes during these appearances, owning up to his behavior and aiming to keep kids on the right path. In his sit-down with Sway, Tip explained that he understands one conversation with children may not be enough to deter them. But he's staying in touch with those he can. The rapper eventually hopes the positive interventions — from "Road to Redemption" and his public appearances — will be a strong enough alternative to an at-risk teen's turbulent influences.

"I try to get eye-level with these kids," T.I. told MTV News, referencing his troubled history. "The only thing I have that they don't have is the experience of making it through."

Tip added that he believes he's helped to give some of the kids he visits "a conscience," even if takes some longer than others to realize it.

"It's like with cigarette smokers," he said. "Not everyone can go cold turkey. Some go from two packs a day to one pack a day to the point where they don't buy cigarettes anymore, they just bum them, and then they quit."

At his sentencing on Friday, Tip's legal team said although there may not be any hard numbers to confirm the rapper's influence, they believe his work with kids to be exemplary. One of T.I.'s attorneys read a letter from the probation officer of one of the "Road to Redemption" kids, Anthony, thanking Tip for his work and hoping he continues his outreach after his prison stay.

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Glastonbury gig for Tony Christie

Tony Christie, famous for his hit (Is This The Way To) Amarillo, is to appear at this year's Glastonbury Festival.

Christie, who said he was "in awe" of the event, will play on the main Pyramid Stage on Sunday afternoon.

He follows classic stars like Neil Diamond, Dame Shirley Bassey, Brian Wilson and James Brown, who have all played Sunday slots in recent years.

Veteran acts look set to dominate this year's event, with Neil Young, Blur and Bruce Springsteen topping of the bill.

Franz Ferdinand, Lily Allen and Fleet Foxes are among the other acts already confirmed.



The full line-up will be announced nearer the event, which takes place in Somerset from 27-29 June.

A limited number of tickets will be put back on sale next weekend


Fans can expect to hear Christie perform songs like I Did What I Did For Maria and Avenues and Alleyways, as well as Amarillo, which spent seven weeks at number one in 2005 after it was re-released for Comic Relief.

His last album was produced by Mercury-nominated singer Richard Hawley, and saw him cover songs by fellow Sheffield acts The Arctic Monkeys, Pulp and Human League.

Christie said he was "excited" about playing Glastonbury. "I'm going to do some of the new album tracks and I've got to do my old stuff as well," he told BBC News.

"I did the V Festival three years ago but I think Glastonbury is the big one, so it's a great honour."

More than 132,000 fans will descend on Michael Eavis' dairy farm for Britain's biggest and most famous music festival.

Tickets went on sale last October and sold out by February. A "very limited number" of cancelled tickets will be put back on sale on 5 April.

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Los Angeles (E! Online) – Jennifer Hudson has spent the past few months recovering from the tragic murder of her mother, brother and nephew. Now, both her personal life and her career are blossoming.

Wednesday night, the star returned to the place that first brought her into our living rooms, American Idol. Following the Motown-themed show, the season-three, seventh-place finisher—who famously went on to win a Grammy and an Oscar—taped a performance of her single "If This Isn't Love" to air on the show at a later date.

Following the performance, Hudson, whose tour alongside Robin Thicke kicks off on March 31, spilled a few beans to Ryan Seacrest. When asked about her engagement and upcoming nuptials to David Otunga, she admitted a date had been set.

"Yeah, but it's a secret," the 25-year-old singer said. "I can't tell anybody."

Hudson gushed a little further when she taped her Thursday-afternoon appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show.

After the two sang "And I'm Telling You I'm Not Going" from DreamGirls as part of the show's Bathroom Concert Series, the host asked about the happy couple.

"We're like big kids, so we like to ride bikes, and one thing I like to do is I put my dog in her little basket and put her on my back and then we ride the bike to the dog park," Hudson told her.

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Courtney Love's apparent online rants now in court

LOS ANGELES – Some of Courtney Love's online rants are now in a Los Angeles court.

A fashion designer's libel and breach of contract lawsuit against the singer includes what she calls several "menacing and disturbing" statements posted on the Internet.

Austin, Texas-based Dawn Simorangkir (Sim-or-AHNG-ker), also known as Boudoir Queen, says Love never paid her for work done. She filed the lawsuit Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

The suit cites remarks from Love's Twitter and MySpace pages, and in the feedback section of Etsy.com. It said Love called Simorangkir a "nasty lying hosebag thief" and accused her of being a drug addict and a prostitute.

Phone messages left for Love's publicist Thursday and Friday were not immediately returned.

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Dancing's Ty Murray Wants Two Kids for Him and Jewel

Los Angeles (E! Online) – When leg injuries forced Jewel to drop out of this season's Dancing With the Stars, she promised she would be back one day.

But from the sound of it, her husband, fellow DWTS competitor Ty Murray, would like to start a family first.

"We'll see what the future holds, but it'll be hard to do [DWTS] if her belly is out to here," Murray says while stretching out his arms and hands to outline a big baby bump.

I caught up with the world champion rodeo cowboy yesterday at a West Hollywood dance studio, where he and pro partner Chelsie Hightower were practicing the Lindy Hop. Read on for more about Ty and Jewel's family plans, his new appreciation for musicals and his heartfelt message to the sports world.

"I think two," Murray says when asked about how many kids he wants. "In a perfect world, it would be great to have a little boy and a little girl, but you don't get to do it like that…We're trying not to focus on it too much. We're just trying to live our life and go about our life. When it should happen, it will happen."

For now, Murray is concentrating on learning his dance steps. It's something he never thought he'd be interested in. "I grew up watching John Wayne, Clint Eastwood and Robert De Niro and that sort of stuff," Murray says. "If ever I was watching TV and a musical broke out, I'd change the channel, but now I am seeing that with a complete different set of eyes."

And he's hoping his appearance on DWTS will open up a lot more eyes to the cowboy world. He not only agreed to compete this time around (producers had already asked two times) because it was something he could do with Jewel, but also, "It's a huge amount of exposure for the cowboy" and the Professional Bull Riders, an international organization that he cofounded and co-owns.

"For me, cowboys never get treated like viable athletes," he says, "and that's a hard thing to take when you dedicate yourself to a sport that is so difficult, is so technical and is so dangerous. The ESPY Awards don't even consider bull riding. I feel [professional cowboys] have every right to be amongst the greatest athletes in the world. So I feel like Dancing With the Stars is a chance to go represent the cowboys in a way that they're not normally represented."

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