| An unannounced album still makes a splash, but once fans move onto the next thing days or weeks later, it can be left floundering. Give fans a bit of advance warning, though, and they’ll stream, speculate, and stay plugged in until the album comes—likely with a longer tail to digest the record once it hits. |
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| Midnights at the oasis: Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards, Newark, N.J., Aug. 28., 2022. |
| (Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/Getty Images) |
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| quote of the day |
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“An unannounced album still makes a splash, but once fans move onto the next thing days or weeks later, it can be left floundering. Give fans a bit of advance warning, though, and they’ll stream, speculate, and stay plugged in until the album comes—likely with a longer tail to digest the record once it hits.”
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- Justin Curto, "The Pop-Star Album Rollout Has Returned"
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| rantnrave:// |
Midnight Marauder
It’s Friday, and by 12:07 am this morning my desktop SPOTIFY had seized up and turned into a visual representation of a blank space and my SONOS app had lost touch with the internet, but not before I’d heard the first three or four F-bombs on the high-concept mid-career pop album that may or may not have been responsible for that brief hiccup in America’s digital infrastructure. And not before I’d seen the first dozen or so embargoed reviews that became un-embargoed when the clock struck 12 (day one verdict... actually, it’s best if you read them for yourself, and we can come back and discuss when the rest of us have had time to listen, absorb and consider the layers of thoughts and feelings embedded in this 45 minutes of post [?] pandemic midnight pop from a major artist who both invites and resists such analysis, “kinda like BOB DYLAN”). For now, happy Swiftoween. This is what an old-school album rollout looks like. This is what the bingo balls, billboards and TikToks—and no advance singles—led to. Choose your format(s) and we’ll talk later.
(Update three hours later: There are now 70 minutes of post [?] pandemic midnight pop. MIDNIGHTS [3AM EDITION] is the title of a new Taylor's version of an album originally released three hours earlier. By the time you open this newsletter, the artist may have re-recorded the whole thing from scratch and re-released it again.)
Anyway, It's Friday
And Buffalo rapper ARMANI CAESAR is joined by her Griselda crewmates Westside Gunn and Benny the Butcher on LIZ 2, for which she drew inspiration from both actor Elizabeth Taylor and wrestling manager Miss Elizabeth... DRY CLEANING singer Florence Shaw “floats somewhere between stand-up, poetry and the fourth-wall-breaking soliloquies of a female comic auteur like Phoebe Waller-Bridge” on the UK band’s second album, STUMPWORK... Puerto Rico singer/songwriter ILE navigates the narrow space between toxic relationships and toxic politics on her third album, NACARILE, which includes her Puerto Rican political anthem “Donde Nada Más Respira” written in the wake of the island’s 2019 anti-government protests... Acclaimed Baltimore pop-punks THERAPIST, they of “i’m gonna tell my therapist on you,” kindly request, with their “surprisingly heavy and angry” debut album LOVE ME FOREVER, that you start noticing they’re bound by neither pop nor punk... Ambitious New Orleans singer/songwriter DAWN RICHARD, who first caught the world’s attention when she was working with and being mentored by Diddy, is now, several left turns later, collaborating with experimental New York bassist/composer SPENCER ZAHN. With the release of their gorgeous joint project PIGMENTS, Stereogum’s Chris DeVille writes, Richard's “evolution from expressly commercial pop to avant-garde experimentalism is beginning to parallel Scott Walker’s in its unexpected audacity.”
Plus: New music from NBA YoungBoy (Gangsta Grillz mixtape), Jeezy (ditto), BBNO$, Carly Rae Jepsen, (G)I-dle, Babyface, Tegan & Sara, Arctic Monkeys, Archers of Loaf (first album in 24 years), Ariel Zetina, Burial (EP surprise-released Thursday), Bibio, Hagop Tchaparian, Frankie Cosmos, Pip Millett, Meghan Trainor, Robyn Hitchcock, Brutus, Architects, the Otolith, Exhumed, Tim Berne & Matt Mitchell, Whit Dickey Quartet, Ibises, Walking Cliché Sextet, Duduka Da Fonseca, Kerry Politzer, Doug Wamble, Roberta Donnay (Blossom Dearie tribute), Terre & Maggie Roche, Will Payne Harrison, Alex Williams, Garrett T. Capps & NASA Country, Jean-Michel Jarre, the Soft Pink Truth, Nick Hakim, Alice Boman, Duckwrth, Wiki & Subjxct, Fredo Bang, Rockness Monsta, Joe Ely (children’s album) Whitmer Thomas, Dave Harrington & Tim Mislock Lowertown, Knifeplay, Rubblebucket, Sloan, a-ha, Simple Minds, Too Much Joy, Stryper, MercyMe... And an album of music from and inspired by the movie “Tár,” featuring several pieces by film composer Hildur Guðnadóttir and a track of Cate Blanchett conducting Gustav Mahler’s Fifth Symphony... And the Sleater-Kinney tribute “Dig Me In: A Dig Me Out Covers Album,” featuring St. Vincent, Wilco, Courtney Barnett, the Linda Lindas and others.
Rest in Peace
Stax songwriter BETTYE CRUTCHER, who wrote the lyrics for hits by Johnnie Taylor, the Staple Singers, Sam & Dave and many others... Folk singer/songwriter/guitarist MARY MCCASLIN, known as “the prairie songstress.”
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| - Matty Karas (@troubledoll), curator |
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Streaming Machinery |
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| The Price Point |
| By G.C. Stein |
| Has any company ever been so fundamentally defined by one single price point as much as Spotify? |
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American Blues Scene |
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| Bob Koester speaks about Delmark Records and the Jazz Record Mart |
| By Cary Baker |
| An interview with Bob Koester, conducted circa 1982! in honor of his outsize legacy, I felt this lost conversation on a variety of topics – biographical and occasionally personal and even random – was worth transcribing and preserving to the best of one’s ability to do half a century later. |
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XXL |
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| Lil Baby: Top of the Line |
| By Georgette Cline |
| Lil Baby’s rap moniker pales in comparison to the growth he’s experienced over the last five years. With his newly released third studio album prospering in streams, the Atlanta rapper’s music, business and outlook are steady elevating. |
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The Daily Show with Trevor Noah |
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| Brandi Carlile -- 'In the Canyon Haze' & Playing with Joni Mitchell |
| By Trevor Noah and Brandi Carlile |
| Grammy Award-winning artist Brandi Carlile discusses making “In the Canyon Haze” as a labor of love, feeling successful in music despite not achieving commercial fame until later in her career, and announcing her 2023 show with Joni Mitchell. |
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Music Business Worldwide |
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| Robert Kyncl’s to-do list |
| By Tim Ingham |
| The new Warner Music Group boss may have these queries on his mind when he joins the music company in January. |
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Complex |
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| End of an Era: The Downfall of Rap Groups |
| By Jordan Rose |
| Rap began as a group endeavor. It was born in the melting pot that is New York City and was nurtured by friends who formed crews to spit to the tune of their favorite beats. Decades later, that's no longer (formally) the case. |
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| what we're into |
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| Music of the day |
| “Vigilante S***” |
| Taylor Swift |
| From "Midnights," out today on Republic. |
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| Music | Media |
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Suggest a link  |
| “REDEF is dedicated to my mother, who nurtured and encouraged my interest in everything and slightly regrets the day she taught me to always ask ‘why?’” |
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