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Prince Album 'Welcome 2 America' Due In July -- Five Years After Death

The album being released five years after Prince's death is likely to rank among the artist's most overtly political statements | AFP
The album being released five years after Prince's death is likely to rank among the artist's most overtly political statements | AFP
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Prince Album 'Welcome 2 America' Due In July -- Five Years After Death

The album being released five years after Prince's death is likely to rank among the artist's most overtly political statements | AFP
The album being released five years after Prince's death is likely to rank among the artist's most overtly political statements | AFP

Five years after his death, treasures continue to emerge from Prince's legendary vault, with a previously unreleased album "Welcome 2 America" set for release on July 30, label Legacy Recordings said Thursday.

The album, which was recorded in 2010, is likely to rank among the artist's most overtly political statements, with a title track that concludes: "Land of the free / home of the slave."

That song is immediately available on streaming platforms, with the full 12-track album following this summer.

A second disc will feature a live performance from the tour of the same name, recorded at The Forum in California in April 2011.

The album covers "Prince's concerns, hopes, and visions for a shifting society, presciently foreshadowing an era of political division, disinformation, and a renewed fight for racial justice," the label and his estate said in a statement.

Prince, who died on April 21, 2016 at the age of 57, famously battled with labels during his career and kept "thousands upon thousands" of tapes sealed away in "The Vault" in his home-studio, Paisley Park near Minneapolis.

"I didn't always give the record companies the best song," Prince told Rolling Stone magazine in 2014. "There are songs in the vault that no one's ever heard... tons of stuff recorded in different periods."

Since his death, some of these have started to emerge, including dozens of unheard tracks attached to reissues of his classic albums, "1999", "Sign o' the Times" and "Purple Rain".

Legacy Recordings included a telling and prophetic quote from Prince dating to the recording of "Welcome 2 America" that gives a sense of his mindset at the time: "The world is fraught with misin4mation. George Orwell's vision of the future is here. We need 2 remain steadfast in faith in the trying times ahead."

But as the live recording makes clear, this doom-laden forecast could not halt the good times at a Prince show.

Prince announced the tour with a statement: "Bring friends, bring Ur children, and bring foot spray, because... it´s gonna B funky."

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Annual Orchids Show Brings Vivid Color to Chicago Winter

Orchids adorn a Volkswagen Beetle as finishing touches are placed on the 12th annual Chicago Botanic Garden Orchid Show, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Glencoe, Ill. (AP)
Orchids adorn a Volkswagen Beetle as finishing touches are placed on the 12th annual Chicago Botanic Garden Orchid Show, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Glencoe, Ill. (AP)
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Annual Orchids Show Brings Vivid Color to Chicago Winter

Orchids adorn a Volkswagen Beetle as finishing touches are placed on the 12th annual Chicago Botanic Garden Orchid Show, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Glencoe, Ill. (AP)
Orchids adorn a Volkswagen Beetle as finishing touches are placed on the 12th annual Chicago Botanic Garden Orchid Show, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Glencoe, Ill. (AP)

A soft layer of white snow blankets the grounds of the Chicago Botanic Garden. The air is chilly, the sky gray.

Inside, however, the air is warm and lights illuminate more than 10,000 vividly colored orchids. Staff members move in and out of greenhouses, preparing to open the garden’s 12th annual Orchid Show on Saturday.

This year’s theme is “Feelin’ Groovy" with several installations calling back to the 1970s, including a yellow Volkswagen Beetle filled with orchids.

“It’s just a really great way to get out of the winter cold and come into our greenhouses,” said Jodi Zombolo, associate vice president of visitor events and programs. “I think people are really looking for something to kind of bring happiness and something that they will enjoy and find whimsy in.”

The orchid family is one of the largest in the plant world and some of the species in the show are rare, exhibits horticulturist Jason Toth said. One example is the Angraecum sesquipedale, also known as Darwin’s orchid, on display in the west gallery.

Toth said the orchid led Darwin to correctly conclude that pollinators have adapted in order to reach down the flower's very long end.

"It has a great story and it’s quite remarkable-looking,” said Toth.

Elsewhere, massive, gnarly roots dangle from purple, pink and yellow Vanda orchids in the south greenhouse. These epiphytic orchids grow on the surface of trees instead of in soil.

“I think everyone’s tired of the winter,” said Toth. “So having some kind of flower show at this point is what we’re all craving. And 'Orchids' fits the bill.”

The show is expected to draw 85,000 visitors this year.

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UK Zoo Says Tiny Snail ‘Back from Brink’ of Extinction

This photo taken on February 2, 2026 shows a greater Bermuda snail, which is part of a breeding program, sitting under a microscope at Chester Zoo in Chester, north-west England. (AFP)
This photo taken on February 2, 2026 shows a greater Bermuda snail, which is part of a breeding program, sitting under a microscope at Chester Zoo in Chester, north-west England. (AFP)
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UK Zoo Says Tiny Snail ‘Back from Brink’ of Extinction

This photo taken on February 2, 2026 shows a greater Bermuda snail, which is part of a breeding program, sitting under a microscope at Chester Zoo in Chester, north-west England. (AFP)
This photo taken on February 2, 2026 shows a greater Bermuda snail, which is part of a breeding program, sitting under a microscope at Chester Zoo in Chester, north-west England. (AFP)

A minuscule snail once thought to have disappeared has been saved from the edge of extinction, a British zoo said Saturday.

The greater Bermuda land snail had not been spotted for years until a cluster of shells was caught slithering through an alleyway in the capital Hamilton in 2014.

Some were flown to Chester Zoo, where experts spent years building up the population before they released thousands back into the wild in 2019.

Unique to Bermuda, this type of snail traces its lineage back over a million years -- a relic of the island's ancient ecosystem.

Now "we can officially say the species is back from the brink", said Chester Zoo in a statement sent to AFP.

The snail "once thought lost has officially been saved from extinction by experts in Chester Zoo, London Zoo, and Bermuda," it said.

They confirmed this after a study in the Oryx biodiversity conservation journal found that six colonies of the re-wilded snails had settled successfully on the archipelago.

"The fact that the snails are firmly established in six areas is massive," said Gerardo Garcia, animal and plant director at Chester Zoo.

From specially designed pods in northwest England, they are now breeding and roaming freely in Bermuda, he said.

"Being able to say that the snails are now safe from extinction is amazing ... and something that conservationists might get to say once or maybe twice in their whole career."

At one point, keeper Katie Kelton said the zoo housed around 60,000 snails.

It was "a lot of snails to look after ... a lot of chopping lettuce, sweet potato and carrot," she told AFP.

- Conservation 'success' story -

The snails faced many threats, including habitat loss, pesticide use, and the cannibalistic "wolf snail".

They were rescued in a process Garcia described as "a war game" with growing numbers tracked by flags pinned across a map of Bermuda.

While they cannot say the species is safe forever, he noted they now knew how to rebuild the population quickly and effectively.

But long-term recovery, he said, would go hand in hand with nature regeneration projects carried out by the Bermudian government.

Chester Zoo has now turned its attention to the lesser Bermuda land snail -- even smaller and much harder to breed.

These snails, which can reach about 23 millimeters (0.9 inches) in length, may now be extinct in the wild.

"We're considering things like seasonality, how long it takes a colony to establish and the complexity of their environments," said expert Iri Gill.

But their experience with the greater Bermuda snail should point them "in the right direction", she said.

"These snails are tiny, but this has been one of the biggest success stories in conservation."

Varieties

SpaceX Delays Mars Plans to Focus on 2027 Moon Landing

FILE PHOTO: SpaceX headquarters is shown in Hawthorne, California, US June 5, 2025. REUTERS/Daniel Cole/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: SpaceX headquarters is shown in Hawthorne, California, US June 5, 2025. REUTERS/Daniel Cole/File Photo
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SpaceX Delays Mars Plans to Focus on 2027 Moon Landing

FILE PHOTO: SpaceX headquarters is shown in Hawthorne, California, US June 5, 2025. REUTERS/Daniel Cole/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: SpaceX headquarters is shown in Hawthorne, California, US June 5, 2025. REUTERS/Daniel Cole/File Photo

Elon Musk's SpaceX told investors it will prioritize going to the moon first and attempt a trip to Mars at a later time, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing sources.

The company will target March 2027 ‌for a ‌lunar landing without ‌astronauts ⁠on board, the ‌report added. The news comes after SpaceX agreed to acquire xAI in a deal that values the rocket and satellite company at $1 trillion and the artificial intelligence outfit ⁠at $250 billion.

SpaceX did not immediately respond ‌to a Reuters request ‍for comment. Musk said ‍last year that he aimed ‍to send an uncrewed mission to Mars by the end of 2026.

SpaceX is developing its next-generation Starship rocket, a stainless steel behemoth designed to be fully reusable and ⁠serve an array of missions including flights to the moon and Mars.

The United States faces intense competition this decade from China in its effort to return astronauts to the moon, where no humans have gone since the final US Apollo mission in ‌1972.