TINA TURNER TALKS BEYONCE, ARETHA & SEQUELS! ALSO OPENS UP ON IKE'S DEATH; SAYS: 'IT MEANT NOTHING TO ME.'

Last night iconic legend and rock and roll diva Tina Turner launched her 36-date North America arena tour in Kansas City, Missouri. This tour comes eight years after her farewell world tour....which racked up $110 million from 89 shows to become 2000's top tour and the highest-grossing trek ever by a female artist (since topped by Madonna), according to Billboard Boxscore. So why is the 68-year-old hitting the road again, even after vowing to never return? "I wouldn't want to diminish my credibility, so if I'm ever going to do it, now is the time. I'm in shape. And once I saw some of the Bob Mackie costumes, I started getting excited." Another answer would be popular demand. I'm sure most of you saw Tina's performance with Beyonce at this year's 50th Grammy Awards (it also marked Tina's 50th year in the music industry!). She showed us that she still has what it takes to rock the stage....even while dancing next to Bey-Bey. That unforgettable performance is the catalyst that led to Tina's decision to go back out on tour. Fans wanted to see more of Anna Mae....and now, if they're lucky, she just might be in a city near you pretty soon. In the meantime, Tina recently sat down with USA Today and discussed everything from Beyonce to Aretha Franklin's slick-at-the-mouth 'I am the queen' comment (Aretha was pissed off when Beyonce introduced Tina as 'the queen' before their performance). Tina also revealed why she never acknowledged Ike's death.

TINA ON BEYONCE: "People said, 'You looked better than Beyoncé.' Well, that's not possible. It's nice that young people hold me up as a model. Beyoncé is elegant and is handling her career well. A lot of new stars go overboard on sex. They're half-naked up there. My dresses were a bit short, but I stayed respectable."

TINA ON ARETHA: "Aretha has always been like that. We've always accepted that from her. She's the queen of soul, and I'm the queen of rock 'n' roll. *snaps finger* There were so many kings and queens there that night. Her ego must be so big to think she was the only one. That's how queens are!"

TINA ON IKE'S DEATH: "It meant nothing to me. He had been dead to me for 20 years. When I left, I really left. It was a bad dream, and when you spend 16 years in a certain lifestyle, you never want to think about it again. My life then was much worse. It couldn't have gotten lower. And since then, every part of my life has been a high point."

TINA ON HER YOUTHFUL APPEARANCE AND ENERGY: "I look better than I did at times in the past.. Part of it may be luck of the draw. It could be good genes, but then again, as I look at my family, I have to say I'm the only one that got them."

Tina's greatest hits compilation Tina! is now in stores. Proud Mary, What's Love Got to Do With It and Private Dancer are just some of the hits included in the set. The singer is also contemplating writing a sequel to her best seller autobiography I, Tina. "Maybe in the next few years," she says. "My head is still quite useful. I'd like for it to be really quite funny and not so depressing."

Below check out a few promo pics of Tina.

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RUMOR OR REAL: WILL SNOOP DOGG OR BOBBY 'BI-POLAR' BROWN TAKE IKE TURNER'S ROLE IN NEW MOVIE?

I may be late on this lil bit of news, but still, somebody better be playing with me! According to New York Post's Page Six, Bobby Brown and rapper Snoop Dogg are the moviemakers' favorites to replace late star Ike Turner in new film Fallen Angels. Turner - who passed away at his California home, last month (Dec07), aged 76 - was scheduled to play a music mogul in the upcoming picture. And the movie's producer, George Angelo Jr., is already re-thinking his cast. He tells New York gossip column PageSix, "(Turner) was supposed to shoot his part this month. He would have been great. We're hoping to get somebody like Bobby Brown or Snoop Dogg."

They better stop playing!

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PHIL SPECTOR ATTEMPTS TO REVEAL THE SOFTER SIDE OF IKE & THE SHEISTY SIDE OF TINA @ IKE'S FUNERAL.

Music legend and murder suspect, Phil Spector, isn't trying to make friends or curry favor with old pals while he waits for a second trial. The thin and frightful-looking music producer turned up at reviled R&B legend Ike Turner's Los Angeles funeral on Friday and gave an impromptu speech that laid into both Tina Turner and Oprah Winfrey. And for someone who 'wasn't prepared to say anything,' he sure did say a lot. "Nobody had told me that I was going to speak. This is a very sad occasion for me," said Spector. Below are several detailed excerpts taken from his impromptu semi-eulogy about his Grammy Award-winning brother from another mother:

"First of all, the things that were said about Ike, that were in that piece-of-trash movie they made about him were ... (applause), it was a piece-of-trash movie. I haven't seen the movie but it was told to me, and [Barney] Kessel was the world's greatest guitar player in the world and the only reason that Ike didn't play on 'River Deep, Mountain High' was because Ike was the second greatest guitar player in the world. I treasured him and everybody knew it except Ike. That's how good he was.

"Ike made Tina the jewel she was. When I went to see Ike play at the Cinegrill in the '90s after his absurd reason for being sent to prison for no reason other than being a black man in America, there were at least, and I counted them, five Tina Turners on the stage performing that night, any one of them could have been Tina Turner."

"And sell-out, whom you really love and respect but I have an ambivalence towards Oprah Winfrey. She made Tina Turner's book into a bestseller, which demonized and vilified Ike. The book wouldn't have sold 10 books. It was badly written. It was a piece of trash and because Oprah idolized Tina, she didn't feel it wrong to vilify a 'brother.'"

READ MORE EXCERPTS FROM PHIL SPECTOR'S EULOGY TO THE LATE IKE TURNER AFTER THE JUMP!

"Other black sisters did the same thing to Ike and there was a very famous story about Whoopi Goldberg, who had a television show for about five minutes, interviewed Ike. Ike had called me and said, 'Shall I do the show?'

"I said, 'You can't get hurt.' And he said, 'OK, I'm going to do it.' And we figured it would be good because it's Whoopi and Whoopi asked him, 'I understand before you were married when you were living together, you beat the hell out of her and she tried to commit suicide because she was so terrified of you and she tried to jump out of a window,' and Ike said, 'Yeah, but it's hard to jump out of a window from a basement floor.'"

"It was only one Ike. I learned more from Ike than any professors I've been around. He never, ever bothered me. He never interfered with me. He never got in my way."

"When we did 'River Deep Mountain High,' people said you can't put Ike and Tina Turner's name on that record. It won't sell because they are rhythm and blues and it's a pop record. I said I signed Ike and Tina Turner, it won't even say featuring Tina Turner; it's Ike and Tina Turner."

Spector said part of the reason he became disillusioned with the record business was because he could not make Ike and Tina as big of an act as he wanted.

"I wanted them to be the biggest revue in America. They were the first act that I recorded that ever could play big-time and break it in Vegas and America."

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IKE TURNER'S CURRENT WIFE ASKS TINA TO FORGIVE HER HUSBAND FOR HURTING HER.

The widow of late star Ike Turner has begged his first wife Tina to forgive him - because he "helped" her during their marriage. Ike died at his San Marcos, California home, on Wednesday (12.12.07), at the age of 76, but Tina refused to pay tribute to the star. The What's Love Got to Do with It? singer was married to Turner for 18 years, but the union was largely an unhappy one as a result of Ike's cocaine addiction and physical abuse. The couple divorced in 1976, with Tina's representative insisting earlier this week the singer had no contact with Ike for 35 years.

But Ike's widow Jeanette Turner hopes Tina can now forgive her former partner, who she brands "a good human being". She says, "I know that she was hurt. But there's something called forgiveness and I know Ike really forgave himself, which is really hard to do. I'm not defending what he did. I'm not saying he didn't do what he did when he was with Tina or me. But he was a human being. And being all of that, he's still a child-like person- pure and a good person always willing to help people. He was a human being and he helped Tina... he helped a lot of people."

Umm, the current Mrs. Turner may mean well, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say Tina isn't the person you should be begging in hopes that she will forgive Ike. As of now, that's between him and his God.

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*UPDATED* IKE TURNER DEAD AT THE AGE OF 76; EX-WIFE, TINA TURNER, RELEASES STATMENT.

Ike Turner, whose role as one of rock's critical architects was overshadowed by his ogrelike image as the man who brutally abused former wife Tina Turner, died Wednesday at his home in suburban San Diego. He was 76. Turner died at his San Marcos home, Scott M. Hanover of Thrill Entertainment Group, which managed Turner's career, told The Associated Press. There was no immediate word on the cause of death, which was first reported by celebrity Web site TMZ.com. Turner managed to rehabilitate his image somewhat in later years, touring around the globe with his band the Kings of Rhythm and drawing critical acclaim for his work. He won a Grammy in 2007 in the traditional blues album category for Risin' With the Blues.

But his image is forever identified as the drug-addicted, wife-abusing husband of Tina Turner. He was hauntingly portrayed by Laurence Fishburne in the movie What's Love Got To Do With It, based on Tina Turner's autobiography. Tina Turner declined to comment on her ex-husband's death. "Tina is aware that Ike passed away earlier today. She has not had any contact with him in 35 years. No further comment will be made," said her spokeswoman, Michele Schweitzer.

Turner, a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, is credited by many rock historians with making the first rock 'n' roll record, Rocket 88, in 1951. Produced by the legendary Sam Phillips, it was groundbreaking for its use of distorted electric guitar. But as would be the case for most of his career, Turner, a prolific session guitarist and piano player, was not the star on the record — it was recorded with Turner's band but credited to singer Jackie Brenston. And it would be another singer — a young woman named Anna Mae Bullock — who would bring Turner his greatest fame, and infamy.

READ MORE AFTER THE JUMP + WATCH VIDEO OF IKE & TINA PERFORMING PROUD MARY.

Turner met the 18-year-old Bullock, whom he would later marry, in 1959 and quickly made the husky-voiced woman the lead singer of his group, refashioning her into the sexy Tina Turner. Her stage persona was highlighted by short skirts and stiletto heels that made her legs her most visible asset. But despite the glamorous image, she still sang with the grit and fervor of a rock singer with a twist of soul. The pair would have two sons. They also produced a string of hits. The first, A Fool In Love, was a top R&B song in 1959, and others followed, including I Idolize You and It's Gonna Work Out Fine.

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WATCH IKE & TINA PERFORM 'PROUD MARY' CIRCA 1974.

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