At the 2:20 mark of the Milk's "Picking Up the Pieces" video above, an actor turns rapper with disastrous results. Idris Elba, just because you can do one thing well doesn't mean you can do all things well. When in doubt, just stand there and look pretty.
This morning, Taylor Swift has released the first single off her upcoming Red album, "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together." It shot to No. 1 on the iTunes chart faster than any song in history, says MSN Music UK. You will be hearing this song everywhere you go for the next sixth months at least, like it or not. Produced by pop music's mad scientist Max Martin, this thing has instant "Since You've Been Gone" status. Swift's country roots are mostly obscured in favor of ear candy with a slightly druggy four-on-the-floor beat. If this were stripped down and shaded a little more intricately, it could sound like cosmic disco.
Kate Bush wasn't the only one snubbed by NBC's edit of last night's closing ceremony of the London Olympics. The Who's phenomenal medley of "Baba O'Riley," "See Me, Feel Me," "Listening to You" and "My Generation" was broadcast separate from the rest of the closing ceremony, so that NBC could insert preview of its Animal Practice in between. Cheap stuff, but hey, that's America. And that's not all: Muse's and Ray Davies' performances weren't aired at all. So we have those for you, too.
Here is a video of a massive palm tree just burning like hell, and raining fire down on all the innocent Angelenos unfortunate enough to be below it. This happened on Fairfax Avenue earlier this month, when some kids at rap group Odd Future's T-shirt store shot a bottle rocket into it, igniting it and causing it to then burn the awning of the pizza joint next door. I called that pizza joint and asked what the deal was, and a man named Raul said Odd Future has already promised to pay for the damages. Good for them.
Seeking an even less user-friendly alternative to vinyl, singer Beck has announced that his upcoming album will be released solely as individual pieces of sheet music, placing the onus of "playing music that can be heard" on consumers themselves.
In the past few days, in the wake of the Sikh temple shooting in Wisconsin, the national media has once again begun to blame a crime on art. On Sunday, police discovered that Wade Page, the skinhead who stormed into the Oak Creek temple that afternoon and killed six people before killing himself, was once in a white-power band called End Apathy.
Earlier this week, Brit-pop's finest Blur released Blur 21, an exhaustive box set featuring expanded versions of all seven of their studio albums, bonus discs of demos and outtakes and a few DVDs. It's over 20 hours of music. Blur has long represented something very particular in my life whatever the time (Damon Albarn is the first guy I ever allowed myself to acknowledge being attracted to) and with this insurmountable deluge of media, now is no exception.
Yesterday, Mariah Carey released the first single from her as-yet-untitled 14th album, “Triumphant (Get ‘Em).” She’s an odd nonfactor in her own song, singing the chorus, a bridge and some backup while guest rappers Meek Mill and Rick Ross do the heavy-lifting (she does the driving on a house remix, though).
Long live boom-bap.
Those involved in the making of this had to be aware of how cathartic it would be for the haters to see Michael Madsen annihilate Justin Bieber, right? The video for the dubbabystep "As Long as You Love Me" is a gift.
Gospel singer BeBe Winans' memoir based on his friendship with Whitney Houston, The Whitney I Knew, is out today. Winans stole the show at Whitney's funeral with his tale of "crazy Whitney" (as much as a funeral is a show that can be stolen), and he expands on his point further in Knew's Crazy Whitney chapter. He writes about Whitney's tendency to talk through movies and details a spat she had during a showing of The Prince of Tides. This excerpt from it made me laugh harder than anything I've read all month:
This song sounds like a brain massage and it keeps going higher and higher and higher.
Katy Perry's back-up rapper, Snoop Dogg, is set to release a reggae album under the name "Snoop Lion" later this year.
Now that Kate Bush is actually making music again (although who knows for how long), it'd be especially pointless for Natasha Khan (aka Bat for Lashes) to continue making music that wonders what Kate Bush would sound like if she were making music again*. And so she is not. "Laura" is the lead single from BFL's third album The Haunted Man (look at its insane, not-quite NSFW cover). What this song lacks in velocity it makes up for with its intensity. This is straight-up drama — perfect for a slow dance with a drag queen.
