| With Ticketmaster just completely failing at their one job, people have really stepped up to make sure that actual fans are in the audience. |
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| Stylish like Billie Eilish: Armani White performs at a Def Jam/Vibe showcase at SXSW, Austin, March 16, 2023. |
| (Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images) |
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| quote of the day |
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| rantnrave:// |
It’s Friday (Bloody Friday)
And there are two new U2 projects, both of which emphasize the “2” in U2: A Disney+ documentary about two of the four members of the band (with help from DAVID LETTERMAN) and an album of stripped-down rerecordings credited to the full band but not always featuring the full band. Interviewer: “Is this U2 reinterpreting U2 songs, or is it BONO and the EDGE reinterpreting U2 songs?” Edge: “Ooh, a very good question.” A reminder, this is, of how rare, unlikely and honestly impressive it is that a rock band, or any band, has gone 45 years with its original lineup intact. And though Bono tells the LA Times that “we have *all* quiet quit U2 over the years” and though a few people on the internet are unnecessarily outraged that the band plans to play a few shows in Las Vegas with a different drummer while LARRY MULLEN JR. recovers from surgery, there are no signs anyone is actually quitting. But “they didn’t need to play on all the songs” on the 40-track SONGS OF SURRENDER, the singer adds, “because then we’d be just a rock band.” The album features some pointed lyrical rewrites, like “WALK ON,” originally written for Burmese Nobel Prize winner AUNG SAN SUU KYI but now about Ukraine President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY. “I felt so let down by Aung San Suu Kyi, like many people did,” Bono says. “So I gave the song to another figure.” Running to not stand still, you might say.
In other it’s-time-for-a-change news, 100 GECS, who made their name with loud, unpredictable, genre-jumping, short-attention-span hyperpop, have followed up the “digital glitchiness” of their debut with “an alt-rock album,” which is how the New York Times describes the equally unpredictable journey to their second album, 10,000 GECS. “We could’ve made an album in the style of the last one quickly,” LAURA LES tells the paper. “The songs would’ve been pretty OK. It was just boring”... T-PAIN’s ON TOP OF THE COVERS is a covers album, and one of the covers is “WAR PIGS” and it’s kind of amazing...On PRAISE A LORD WHO CHEWS BUT DOES NOT CONSUME; (OR SIMPLY, HOT BETWEEN WORLDS), experimental rocker YVES TUMOR seems to be going for “an ecstatic fusion of alt-rock and R&B, seeking the mysterious nexus where LOVELESS meets PURPLE RAIN,” says Pitchfork, and “it’s difficult to imagine many richer-sounding rock records being released this year.” Also, that title.
Plus: New albums from EST Gee, Lil Keed (RIP), M83, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Aly & AJ (released Wednesday), Lil Pump, Princess Nokia, Kahn & Neek, Julian Lage, Ralph Towner, Billy Childs, Dan Tepfer, Kosaya Gora (aka Kedr Livanskiy and Flaty), Kamal., Genevieve Artadi, Dorothy Moskowitz, the Van Pelt (emo band’s first album in 25 years), All Time Low, Now More Than Ever (feat. Tyson Ritter of All-American Rejects), Gideon, Úlfúð, Kruelty, Deathcrash, Black Honey, C.M. Talkington, the Lost Days, Doug Paisley, Band of Heathens, Emilíana Torrini & the Colorist Orchestra, the Cash Box Kings and Daddy Long Legs... And four previously unreleased songs from Taylor Swift, who opens her Eras Tour tonight in Glendale, Ariz., which has been renamed Swift City, Ariz., for the occasion. They didn’t even rename it for the Super Bowl.
Friday I’m in Etc Etc Etc
In the continuing saga of the CURE’s establishment-tweaking ticket rollout, TICKETMASTER has agreed to refund up to $10 per ticket for every verified fan who bought tickets when the band’s North American tour went on sale Wednesday. This is according to Cure frontman ROBERT SMITH, who publicly complained about Ticketmaster's service fees on on-sale day and apparently found a sympathetic (or embarrassed) ear at the ticketing giant... In related news, SWIFTIES take care of their own... Reports of mixtape portal DATPIFF’s death appear to have been greatly exaggerated, but critic JAYSON BUFORD, in “A Requiem for the Datpiff Era,” wonders if its moment has passed even if the site itself hasn’t. In the golden age of Datpiff, Buford writes, “a kid could download a zip file and receive the new wave of hip-hop at that moment.” The end, he suggests, came “sometime around Drake’s ‘If Youre Reading This Its Too Late’ in 2015, [when] the line between street mixtapes and albums was obliterated”... Performers JUNIOR KIMBROUGH, ESTHER PHILLIPS and JOSH WHITE and Memphis historian and documentarian DAVID EVANS are among the names who’ll be inducted into the BLUES HALL OF FAME in May... Citing a “shift” in workplace conditions after EPIC GAMES bought the company a year ago, staffers at BANDCAMP have organized and are seeking to hold a union election. CEO ETHAN DIAMOND said the company is “reviewing the petition to understand their concerns”... JANINE NABERS and DONALD GLOVER's limited series SWARM, premiering today on AMAZON PRIME, is a dark study of an extremely obsessed fan of a fictionalized version of an eerily familiar pop star. Or, to quote Rolling Stone, "What If a BEYONCÉ Stan Became a Serial Killer?" DOMINIQUE FISHBACK stars as Dre, the fan... Netflix's animated AGENT ELVIS, also dropping today, imagines the King of Rock and Roll (voiced by MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY) moonlighting as a government spy. Shoutout rock singer/songwriter JOHN EDDIE, with whom I share some Asbury Park history, who co-created the show with PRISCILLA PRESLEY.
Rest in Peace
PAUL BEASLEY, tenor singer in the Blind Boys of Alabama. He previously sang with the Mighty Clouds of Joy and the Gospel Keynotes... Contemporary classical composer LEWIS SPRATLAN, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning opera "Life Is a Dream" wasn't performed until 10 years after it won the prize in 2000... EDWARD WALTERS, a woodwind player and longtime musical contractor at the National Theater in Washington, D.C., and Wolf Trap in Virginia.
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| - Matty Karas, curator |
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The New Yorker |
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| Hip-Hop at Fifty: An Elegy |
| By Jelani Cobb |
| A generation is still dying younger than it should--this time, of “natural causes.” |
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The Ringer |
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| The Past, Present, and Future of M83 |
| By Ian Cohen |
| After nearly seven years between proper albums, Anthony Gonzalez returns this week with ‘Fantasy,’ his immersive ninth album that hits his nostalgic sweet spot but doesn’t wallow in his history. |
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Music Industry Blog |
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| Reality bites: Recorded music market 2022 |
| By Mark Mulligan |
| Following a spectacular year of growth in 2021, global recorded music revenue growth slowed significantly in 2022 due to the combined impact of global economic headwinds and growth slowdown in mature streaming markets. Context, though, is everything. |
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NPR |
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| Megan's Rule: Being exceptional doesn't make you the exception |
| By Gabby Bulgarelli, Rodney Carmichael and Sidney Madden |
| It felt like the December 2022 trial of Tory Lanez sparked a divide in hip-hop, but it just stoked the flames of a 50-year-long battle for Black women to be heard. In the first episode of our new season, we take you into Megan Thee Stallion's testimony to unpack the impact of misogynoir on rap. |
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LAist Studios |
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| K-Pop Dreaming Ep 5: Solid |
| By Vivian Yoon |
| An out-of-the-blue invitation brought Korean American college student Jae Chong and his friends to Korea when K-pop was taking off. Their group, Solid, would become the Kings of R&B and the first Korean American act to make a splash in the Korean music industry. |
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The New York Times |
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| The Poignant Music of Melting Ice |
| By Grayson Haver Currin |
| Scientists and musicians are recording the sounds of unfreezing water to document and predict the effects of climate change. Can their work help slow it, too? |
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| what we're into |
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| Music of the day |
| “Echolalia” |
| Yves Tumor |
| From "Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds)," out today on Warp. |
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| Video of the day |
| “Swarm” |
| Janine Nabers/Donald Glover/Prime Video |
| Premiering today on Prime. |
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| Music | Media |
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| “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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