| I don’t think there’s ever gonna be a label exec or an A&R guy or a marketing guy who says, ‘Go and sing this different,’ and pushes music forward. No one was telling Picasso to paint the ear on the left-hand side. |
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| Muna's Naomi McPherson (left) and Josette Maskin at Coachella, April 14, 2023. The LA group is back at the Mojave stage this afternoon. |
| (Emma McIntyre/Getty Images) |
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| quote of the day |
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“I don’t think there’s ever gonna be a label exec or an A&R guy or a marketing guy who says, ‘Go and sing this different,’ and pushes music forward. No one was telling Picasso to paint the ear on the left-hand side.”
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- Elliot Grainge, founder and CEO, 10K Projects
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| rantnrave:// |
It's Friday
And YOUNGBOY NEVER BROKE AGAIN, who released eight full-length projects while living under house arrest in Utah in 2022, is slowing down: DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME, which he literally did try at home, is only his second album of 2023 (though with 33 tracks, maybe it counts as two?). The world’s most popular noncommercial rapper has also promised to slow his roll, aesthetically speaking—dialing back his aggro, confrontational lyrics (a little anyway), as if to match the relatively quiet surroundings of the mountain home he’s still not allowed to leave. “I’m only going to get more groovy from here,” he told Billboard early this year...
EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL, aka husband and wife Ben Watt and Tracey Thorn, they of “the chic sway of cocktail jazz, the giddy thrill of jangle-pop, the stirring beats of electronic dance music,” return with their first album in 24 years. They stopped after the 1999 album “Temperamental” to raise their family—while continuing to work on music projects separately—and found themselves drawn back toward EBTG during the pandemic. “We started with low expectations, but actually we’ve impressed us,” Thorn told the New York Times. “If you’re going to come back after a long gap, then come back with a bang.”
Seattle doom metal band BELL WITCH’s epic FUTURE’S SHADOW PART 1: THE CLANDESTINE GATE is a single 83-minute track. It’s the first of a planned three-album cycle in which the end of the final album will connect to the beginning of this one, so the three can be played as a continuous loop... Indie rocker MAC DEMARCO’s ONE WAYNE G, which appears to collect demos and sketches recorded over the past five years, has 198 more tracks than the Bell Witch album, most of them apparently instrumentals and most with nothing more than a date for a title (“20190205,” “20221121,” etc.). It’s as if he uploaded the entire contents of his Voice Memos folder to Bandcamp. Everyone’s favorite artist should do this at least once in their career.
Also today: New albums from Agust D (aka Suga of BTS), Tiësto, Lloyd Banks, Swizz Beatz, Rodrigo y Gabriela, Nourished by Time, Dreamer Isioma, Superviolet, Portrayal of Guilt, Iann Dior, Zombie Juice (of Flatbush Zombies), Gabe ‘Nandez, Jain, Jordy, Ben Wendel (feat. Cécile McLorin Salvant, Terence Blanchard, Bill Frisell and others), John Pizzarelli, M.E.B. (formerly known as the Miles Electric Band), Easy Star All-Stars (reggae remake of David Bowie’s “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust...”), Morgan Heritage , Alfa Mist, Kae Tempest, Brother May, St. Paul & the Broken Bones, Esther Rose, Bella White, Lael Neale, Dorthia Cottrell, Enter Shikari, As Everything Unfolds, Naomi Yang (score to her own documentary film, “Never Be a Punching Bag for Nobody”), All Hands_Make Light, Arthur King (released Wednesday), Silver Moth (new band featuring Mogwai’s Stuart Braithwaite), the Infamous Stringdusters (tribute to Flatt & Scruggs), Cinder Well, Rose City Band, Nathan Connolly (of Snow Patrol), Pearl & the Oysters, Floodlights, Brutal Youth, Cathedrale, the 69 Eyes, Jethro Tull, Ian Hunter (feat. posthumous appearances by Jeff Beck and Taylor Hawkins)... And the 63-track “EarthPercent x Earth Day ’23 Compilation Album” (released Thursday), featuring tracks from Brian Eno, Dry Cleaning, Julia Holter, Michael Stipe & Gaelynn Lea, Nile Rodgers & Chic, and many more... And Saturday is Record Store Day.
Sellers’ Market
Forty-five indie agencies and management companies have signed on to a nine-point proposal by the NATIONAL INDEPENDENT TALENT ORGANIZATION to fix the “broken ticket-buying experience” in the US. The wish list includes all-in ticketing, with service fees included in the advertised price of a ticket but itemized so ticket buyers can see what the fees are; a cap on those fees; a ban on speculative resales; stronger anti-bot laws, and the right for artists to control how tickets are resold. A lot of those bullet points align with what LIVE NATION/TICKETMASTER, which is under government scrutiny for anti-competitive practices and for angering TAYLOR SWIFT fans, recently proposed in its own plan to fix the market. One particular point of non-alignment: The indies want primary ticket sellers like Ticketmaster to be legally banned from participating in, or profiting from, resales.
Screen Shots
ALLEN HUGHES' five-part documentary series DEAR MAMA: THE SAGA OF AFENI & TUPAC SHAKUR premieres today on FX and Hulu... CHEVALIER, a biopic about the 18th century French Senegalese violinist/composer JOSEPH BOLOGNE, THE CHEVALIER DE SAINT-GEORGES, is in theaters today. STEPHEN WILLIAMS directed the film about the overlooked Black virtuoso... Director LISA CORTÉS’ theatrical doc LITTLE RICHARD: I AM EVERYTHING is streaming on demand.
Dot Dot Dot
COACHELLA 2023 happens all over again this weekend, this time without FRANK OCEAN, whose Sunday night slot will be taken over by BLINK-182, who will in turn be followed by a mega dance set from SKRILLEX, FOUR TET and FRED AGAIN.. It was unclear, as of Thursday night, which of those slots is the night’s official headliner, or if it matters. The weekend will again be livestreamed on YOUTUBE... Your Coachella ticket, was it worth the price?... Livestreaming platform MANDOLIN, which launched early in the pandemic, has gone out of business. Count it among a curious subset of recent startups: those that couldn’t survive the pandemic’s end... KAROL G and BECKY G were the big winners at the LATIN AMERICAN MUSIC AWARDS Thursday night in Las Vegas... A well-regulated kudos to STEVE EARLE. Invited to perform Tennessee’s newest official state song for legislators in Nashville, the singer/songwriter, whose “COPPERHEAD ROAD” joins 10 other official Volunteer State songs, took the opportunity to remind the lawmakers he has another song “you gotta check out”—the anti-gun ballad “THE DEVIL’S RIGHT HAND"... The great war to welcome Taylor Swift to town.
Rest in Peace
Oboist/journalist BLAIR TINDALL, whose tell-all memoir, “Mozart in the Jungle: Sex, Drugs, and Classical Music,” was turned into a hit Amazon TV series.
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| - Matty Karas, curator |
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The Ringer |
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| What’s a God to a Machine? |
| By Jeff Weiss |
| Frank Ocean emerged from self-imposed exile to headline Coachella Weekend 1. After a polarizing set, he won’t be returning for Weekend 2. What does his performance say about artistry in an increasingly algorithmic and AI-generated world? |
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GQ |
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| The Inescapable Dominance of Don Toliver |
| By Paul Thompson |
| The Houston rapper and Travis Scott protege released one of the best albums of the year so far-another step on his steady path to industry dominance. |
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Kreative Kontrol |
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| Kreative Kontrol: Adam Horovitz from Beastie Boys |
| By Vish Khanna and Adam Horovitz |
| Adam Horovitz reflects upon his time being Ad-Rock in Beastie Boys, the 2023 NBA playoffs, a toaster oven, 'Beastie Boys Book' and 'Beastie Boys Story' and 'Beastie Boys Audiobook,' satire and comedy, embracing new technologies and making things up as you go. |
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DJ Mag |
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| How to survive as a record store in 2023 |
| By Eileen Pegg |
| Despite the vinyl resurgence, high costs and countless online competitors mean it’s still tough going for record stores. DJ Mag speaks to shops around the UK and beyond about the innovative methods they’re using to stay afloat and provide essential community hubs in 2023. |
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| what we're into |
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| Music of the day |
| “No Lease” |
| YoungBoy Never Broke Again |
| From "Don't Try This at Home," out today on Motown. |
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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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