Opinion
Prince, The Racy-Religious-Conservative-Purple Enigma
Remove all these gentle purple filters and Prince was a weirdo.
K-Pop’s Dark Side
the contracts these poor kids sign to become huge stars are borderline slavery!
Calling For A Revolution: We Have To Change This Ticketing System!
‘All headline shows are now sold out. Despite the strict rules, tickets inevitably will find their way onto secondary ticketing sites…’
LA Electronic Musician White Rainbow Accused Of Domestic Violence
‘Too often do men who have never had a single consequence due to the privilege of their art and trust fund get away with such monstrosities,’
When A Fun Night Is Used To Start A Controversy
‘I’ve always thought that Hedi Slimane was little more than a carpetbagger’.
More Thoughts About David Bowie’s Death
The beauty of all this is that Bowie kept everything secret, sparing us of the pity and this sort of whimpering feelings which are not good for a true appreciation of art.
When Was The Last Time Music Blew Your Mind Away?
When was the last time I was left speechless after a show? When was the last time I said it was mind blowing? I am not sure…
Paris: Two Weeks After
I am not a Parisian, I was not physically hurt on 11/13 but I am just a French girl who loves music
Not With The Band: Why Don’t We Equally Care For Everyone?
After the massacre which occurred in Paris last week, you may have seen most of your Facebook friends update their profiles with the tricolor French flag
Misfits’ Jerry Only Jokes About ISIS ‘ Attack… Was It Too Soon?
It’s never too soon as I am concerned, at the condition the joke is funny and not stupid of course, The way Jerry Only said this line on Sunday night was funny, he looked as menacing as a cartoon character, a Batman villain who has watched too many Halloween movies, but he seemed to speak to the terrorists in a total fuck-you way.
Not With the Band: More Thoughts On The Terror In Paris
Could the terrorists have been aware of the cover art of Eagles of Death Metal’s last album ‘Zipper Down’? This has to put any jihadist in full rage mode… But wait until mid December, when Peaches has a gig there.
How Success Changes Songs Even If It Is The Exact Same Song
I only have to hear that Pitchfork and Consequence Of Sound like a song for me to doubt my own instincts. And absolutely, for me, popularity improves a sound. Lorde’s “Royal” is a perfect example where I dismissed it and dismissed it and though it took a live performance to turn me all the way around, its success was what had me wondering.
This Could Be A Golden Age For Music And We Wouldn’t Know It
What does it mean when you don’t hear great music because it was never written? It is like me, childless, all the wonderful kids I never had and all the wonderful songs I never heard because they weren’t written or because I couldn’t find them and that is the great sorrow of this maybe great moment in pop music. We can’t hear it.
The Unbearable Lightness Of Pop Music
There is so much music out there that I feel if you could find all the good stuff the 2010s would be the equal of the 00s… but how do you find it? Overhere at rock nyc we try and save you time by telling you what to listen to (that’s also why we use grades so liberally, so you don’t even have to bother reading it). The next decade should be interesting at the very least…
Why The Stones Will Always Be Cooler Than U2
We’re on the verge of irrelevance. You have to make stuff relevant to you and where you’re at, make an honest account of what you’re going through. If that’s relevant to other people, great. But we don’t know.’ So why do U2 now think they could be relevant with this new music? Looking at their recent setlists they play a lot of these innocent songs, while the Stones play ‘Sticky Fingers’!
Death Of The “Bop Bop Bop”
Nothing is the same. In a world of ‘been there done that’ rehashed tripe its astounding to think we really haven’t ‘heard it all’
The Summer Of 2015 Is The Summer Of 1982 Repeated
When we look at this great moment in pop, I think we will see it as an equivalent to the summer of 1982: the pieces are on the chessboard but the moves haven’t been made yet. The moment in pop, when videos became central to pop and rock, hadn’t quite happened. In January 1983, Michael Jackson would drop “Beat It” and MTV and videos would become the story of music
Not With The Band: Why Real Life Does Not Necessarily Imitate Art
We are always told to separate the art from the artist, this should be the norm even though it is often difficult. But when it comes to making movies and writing books about artists, I wonder why directors and writers cheerfully transgress this rule and get away with it?
Brian Wilson’s “No Pier Pressure”: A Great Song To Slow Down To
Wilson can make music that sounds like the slow yearn of conclusion. It is one of his many strengths that even as a teen surfer sensation there was something else there, there was an awareness of thought and solitude. “Somewhere Quiet” is the ghost of “Please Let Me Wonder”.
A Second Opinion On Elliott Smith’s Autopsy Report
Stabbing is a very painful way to kill yourself. Those who commit suicide by knife tend to have very deep personality disturbances. And it is more difficult to stab oneself through clothing, requires a lot of strength to do that to yourself (unless the clothing is a thin T-shirt). Being very depressed won’t make it any less painful. There WILL be hesitation marks.
Simon And Garfunkel And Comfort Music
So as illness takes me down yet I can’t, I don’t have the time, to be taken down, so somewhere I am in both places, three places , somewhere I am ill, somewhere I am working and somewhere I have drifted back to a late sunny afternoon. And all three are listening to “The Only Living Boy In New York”.
“Carrie And Lowell” Hits Awful Close To Home
That is a question that goes to the heart of our insecurities, it is the unanswerable, unequivicable question between adults and children. Do you love me? Really? Do you love me enough? How much? How often? Why? Why not? Carrie And Lowell has no answers for Sufjan or us, but it has the right questions, and the right concerns and that is so rare, so important. It illuminates who we are.
Let’s Take The Tidal Sound Test
There is a very simple test you can do on Tidal, it allows you to play five songs (you don’t pick the songs, and I got the Killers, James Blake, Daft Punk, the Eagles and the Dixie Chicks) using two sound sources A and B. You can switch back and forth between A and B during the short music sample, then determine which of the two is the high fidelity sound source. I was using my Macbook connected to a Logitech speaker system. I paid around $40 for them and they sound okay for me, but I did very badly at the test, I guessed 2 out of 5 correctly!! Not bad? Are they kidding?
Oldies But Goldies: In The Wake Of My Zayn Malik Post, Here is Something I Wrote In 1988
Arabs aren’t the only, and not even the biggest, objects of rock racism. In ’76, mindless punks wore swastikas at English concerts (swastikas adorned the label of Vicious’s pathetic Sid Sings). Siouxsie Sioux used to sing “too many Jews for my liking.” By the time punk had passed, an English offspring called “Oi” aligned themselves with the fascist party, the National Front. The NF advocated Pakistani bashing and sending the West Indians back to where they came from
No New York
The bottom of the barrel was Monday evening. No “L” train to Brooklyn, a good 90 minute trip to the club, the doors are at 8pm, opening act, figure it is over 11p to 1130p and then what? If I get home by one it will be a miracle ad then not just work but work and the new releases tomorrow.
We Are All The Beatles
We are Paul with new loves, John during break ups, Ringo over lunch with college pals, George when hungover, John in righteous indignation, Paul in loving sublimation, Paul when we are loving our kids, Ringo when we’re playing with them and John when we are reprimanding them.
The Things We Do For Live Shows…
There have been riots (Run DMC and the Beastie Boys) near riots (Public Enemy), concerts with a single white person (New Edition, Black Street -I sat behind Whitney Houston), people dying mid-set (Patti Lupone), standing in line for entire days (David Bowie at Roseland -actually my friend did most of the standing), hostile audiences (Liz Phair got booed off stage at Town Hall
Bad Weather And The Lack Of Live shows In 2015
For better or worse and even if you are going there for the primary purpose of reviewing the show, you are hoping for a pleasant experience. And last month the weather made sure you didn’t get one, nothing felt worth the effort of going to a show.
Oldies But Goldies: Every Beatles Album Reviewed
let me make it simpler. Buy all the UK official releases up to “Let It Be” except for “Magical Mystery Tour”where you need the US version, “Live At the BBC” “Anthology 2” and “Past Masters” I and II and you can pass on the rest
Madonna Versus Lady Gaga? Madonna.
I am as completely unbiased when it comes to music as I can be,, and if you want proof here is my review of Madonna at Yankee Stadium. But there is doubting her pop music genius and while Lady Gaga may one day find herself in the same league, it sure hasn’t happened yet.
Kanye West, This Crazy God’s Vessel
joke about Kanye West all the time, but he must be the most divisive musician ever, people either love him or hate him, he sure polarizes people, however I just don’t get the coverage that this guy can receive. He comes up with the most trite title and everyone is talking about i, when it is just a name
Kanye West Wants To Make A Video Game About His Mother’s Trip To Heaven
So right now I’m working on a video game for ‘Only One.’ The idea is, it’s my mother going through the gates of heaven and you have to bring her to the highest gates of heaven by holding her to the light. We’ve been working on it for like six months.’
Conor Oberst Discusses Rape Accusation
What she did was terrible, especially to Conor, she singlehandedly blew his last album to smitherines: you can’t be a sensitive songwriter and a rapist: it is one of those either or situations. But still, it is just a horrible, pathetic and sad story.
Will Justice Ever be Done In The Elliott Smith Death?
Suicide is the end of a persons story at the place they decided to end it, and murder is an interruption of a life just about randomly. It matters how people die, it matters how an artist dies. Would Sylvia Path read the way she reads if she didn’t kill herself?
Beck May Have Won Two Grammys But He Is Still A Scientologist
Masterson thinks the documentary ‘interviewed eight people who hate Scientology’, and he ponders ‘I wonder if Sundance would allow a documentary of, like, eight people who hate Judaism’… Is it such an unfair and stupid comparison, does he know there are entire organizations which mobilize against Scientology in order to denounce the abuse and the isolation in which members of the church are maintain?
Kanye West Opens His Mouth Again
Every time Kanye opens his mouth, we reach another layer of Kanye’s mind and this is an endless source of entertainment. But why do people respect anything of what he says? This is a guy who admits to never read a book, to be God’s vessel despite contradicting himself at any occasion, so why giving him so much credit?
Repetition, Music, Streaming
Whatever magic music weaves now it isn’t the magic of old, you don’t listen to it and think that you are finding the deep insides of an album, you can’t unlock or maybe even notice great albums the way you once did. Because one of the ingredients is missing, time
When God Talks To Katy
‘I was praying and I got a word from God and he says, ‘You got this and I got you,’’ she declared to Ryan Seacrest on the Red Carpet before the Grammy Awards. ‘And then I was on top of the lion and a random guy looked at me with a headset that I’d never communicated with before, he looked me straight in the eyes and said ‘You got this.’ And I was like, ‘Oh, that’s God confirming I can do this!’’
Elliott Smith: More Thoughts On The Events Of October 21st
He knocked on the bathroom door. He told Chiba he was sorry. He asked her to come out. He told her he knew he was crazy. He apologized for what he had said. But Chiba wasn’t ready. Impulsively, she told him to leave her the fuck alone. She was sick of the paranoia.’
These Sad Kanye Pictures At The Super Bowl? They Totally Make Sense Now
saw this book from the 1800s and it was velvet-covered with brass and everything. I looked at all these people’s photos and they look so real and their outfits were incredible and they weren’t smiling and people, you know the paparazzi, always come up to me, ‘Why you not smiling?’ and I think, not smiling makes me smile
Car CD Players Will Be Gone Very Soon, Do You Really Want That?
My car is so old that it doesn’t even have a CD player but a cassette player! I kid you not! But I may be a winner at this level because cassettes are making a come back in hipsters’ world – I see more and more cassettes at the merchandize table of local bands in Silver Lake
Must See: Snoop And Diddy, January 2015
Hot 97 Presents: The Tip-Off starring Puff Daddy & Snoop Dogg on February 12 th. 2015. A Thursday, which isn’t a Friday but isn’t a Sunday either. And the chance to see two legends, one of whom stands as the inventor of modern hip hop and the other one of the great voices of rap.