| Songwriting has taught me patience. It's taught me to sit with the parts of myself that I maybe don't like as much—or rather than pushing them away, kind of interrogating them and asking why. | | | | |  | Madlib at Panorama, New York, July 22, 2016. "Sound Ancestors" is out today on Madlib Invazion.
(Noam Galai/Getty Images) | | | | | "Songwriting has taught me patience. It's taught me to sit with the parts of myself that I maybe don't like as much—or rather than pushing them away, kind of interrogating them and asking why." | | | | Working for the Weeknd
If I'm ever in the position to be a considered a favorite for an Album or Record of the Year GRAMMY and I've played all the right games and I've rubbed all the right shoulders and then the RECORDING ACADEMY has the audacity to not even nominate me, I want my manager to be the guy who immediately calls the president of the Academy to say, "Hey, bro, how are you? How's your day? Our day is s***. What the f*** just went down?," and who follows up by suggesting the president of the Academy "call a 911 staff meeting and figure out what the f*** happened and then call me back so we can figure out how to handle this." Call me naïve but I had no idea until 24 hours ago that that's how the music industry works. Though maybe that's not how it works because, as far as we know, the 911 staff meeting didn't happen and the situation was not in fact handled. But that's how SAL SLAIBY apparently works and that's how I now want everything to work. So, anyway, meet the take-no-prisoners Toronto crew behind the WEEKND, via this Billboard cover story by KATIE BAIN, in which we also learn the Weeknd put up $7 million of his own money for next week's SUPER BOWL halftime show—about $540,000 per minute—even though he isn't responsible for the cost of the production. He's planning a "cinematic experience." That halftime show, in case you've forgotten, was at the center of one of the main theories for why the Grammys snubbed the Weeknd. The theory was the Academy was angry that the Weeknd had booked a major TV gig a week after the Grammys were supposed to have been held (they've since been moved to March 14 because of the pandemic). The theory never made sense, and the one quote HARVEY MASON JR.—the Recording Academy president who was on the receiving end of that phone call—gave Billboard was that no, that definitely wasn't it. Which leaves it to the Weeknd to offer his own theory: racism. "I don't want to make this about me," he tells Bain. "That's just a fact."
Sundancing With Myself
The QUESTLOVE-directed SUMMER OF SOUL (...OR WHEN THE REVOLUTION COULD NOT BE TELEVISED) was on Thursday's (virtual, of course) opening night slate of the SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL. The doc about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, featuring rare live footage of STEVIE WONDER, NINA SIMONE MAHALIA JACKSON and many others, will be available on-demand on Saturday. The Sundance music slate also includes PÉREZ RIERA's documentary RITA MORENO: JUST A GIRL WHO DECIDED TO GO FOR IT (premiere today; on demand Sunday), EDGAR WRIGHT's SPARKS documentary THE SPARKS BROTHERS (premiere Saturday, on demand Monday); and IN THE AIR TONIGHT, a short by ANDREW NORMAN WILSON that imagines the story behind the PHIL COLLINS song of the same name (on demand throughout the fest, or just watch it on VIMEO).
Dot Dot Dot
From viral tweet about a nonexistent PHOEBE BRIDGERS song (Jan. 14) to viral snippet of how that nonexistent Phoebe Bridgers song might go (Jan. 16) to (soon to be) viral recording of actual song (Jan. 28). What took you so long, JENSEN MCRAE?... PRIMARY WAVE has bought the entire SUN RECORDS catalog—minus the 10 sides a young ELVIS PRESLEY cut for the label before leaving for RCA—for an estimated $30 million. Confirming your suspicions about the current run on classic catalogs, JOHN SINGLETON, who has managed Sun since the death of his brother SHELBY, who bought the label in 1969, told the New York Times, "It's one of those bubbles that might eventually burst. So we thought, well, let's get in before that happens"... The Croatian prankster who convinced a few too many people on the internet that the schematic for a BOSS METAL ZONE guitar pedal was actually the diagram of a 5G chip that big pharma was secretly inserting in Covid vaccines tells GUITAR WORLD his intent was to make conspiracy theorists and anti-vaxxers look like fools. "Every sane person in the world would get it's a joke," he says, "but well, there ain't a lot of sane people in the world"... MARTIN's newest guitar, the 00L Earth, is an eco-friendly model inspired by GRETA THUNBERG... A group of architects, event producers and production directors have proposed a design for a socially distanced "vertical theater"... There's a band consisting of four people in three countries who are all named PAUL O'SULLIVAN, and I guess it's up to you to decide if your PAUL O'SULLIVAN BAND records should be filed under "P" or "O."
It's Friday
And that means new music from MADLIB (his first proper solo album, in collaboration with FOUR TET), ARLO PARKS (her full-length debut), LIL DURK, WEEZER, the ALCHEMIST, GOAT GIRLS, INDIGO SPARKE (Australian singer/songwriter's ADRIANNE LENKER-produced debut), WILLIAM PARKER (10-CD set of new material from the jazz bassist/composer), NAHAWA DOUMBIA, HAITI BABII, 2KBABY, FENDI P, PORTRAYAL OF GUILT, DIVIDE AND DISSOLVE, the BODY (noise duo's album is "a meditation on distortion"), TRIBULATION, BUKE AND GASE & SO PERCUSSION, SELWYN BIRCHWOOD, MARTIN GORE, ANI DIFRANCO, LANGHORNE SLIM, HEATH SANDERS, WILL DOWNING, the NOTWIST, the SONDER BOMBS, LIA ICES, the BESNARD LAKES, LNZNDRF, BAIO, YASMIN WILLIAMS, ANNA B SAVAGE, STEVEN WILSON, DELVON LAMARR ORGAN TRIO, JOE LOVANO TRIO TAPESTRY, EMMET COHEN and the South African jazz comp INDABA IS... And MARSHALL JEFFERSON and BYRON STINGILY team up for the first TEN CITY track in 25 years.
Rest in Peace
Owner/promoter JERRY BRANDT, who gave New York the ELECTRIC CIRCUS and the RITZ... Asbury Park rock guitar staple BILLY RYAN.
| | | | Matty Karas (@troubledoll), curator |
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| | The Weeknd on the Crew That Boosted Him From 'Basically Homeless' to the Super Bowl | | by Katie Bain | | How did pop's leading man dominate the charts (and screens) in 2020? The same way he always has: with a tight-knit group of day ones unafraid to trust their scrappy instincts - or fight alongside him when needed. | |  | | NPR Music |
| | Madlib Heads Back To The Future On 'Sound Ancestors' | | by Piotr Orlov | | For over two decades, Madlib's work has been defined not by any one style, but by the artist's stylistic breadth and tireless output. On a new album, the polymath compiles his artifacts. | |  | | Variety |
| | How Questlove's 'Summer of Soul' Tracked Down Rare Footage of the Landmark Harlem Cultural Festival | | by Jazz Tangcay and Angelique Jackson | | The sheer existence of this footage made director Ahmir " Questlove" Thompson wonder, "Is it this easy to almost erase Black history?" | |  | | MusicAlly |
| | French study offers new data on impact of user-centric payouts | | by Stuart Dredge | | One of the things that's been clear in the debate about user-centric models for paying out streaming royalties - primer here if you need it - is that we need more studies based on recent data from big streaming services. | |  | | The Independent |
| | How music has transformed TV, from 'It's a Sin' to 'Bridgerton' | | by Annabel Nugent | | Annabel Nugent talks to the new breed of music supervisors on shows such as "Industry" and "I May Destroy You," who are making our ears prick up every time we switch on. | |  | | Aquarium Drunkard |
| | The Last Next Place: Sanjay Mishra and Jerry Garcia, 1994-1995 | | by Jesse Jarnow | | Sanjay Mishra's colleague warned him about the corporate spies and that he should be careful. The call for an appointment had come from Washington, DC's Four Seasons hotel, and only corporate spies stayed there. It had to be somebody from DuPont, maybe Exxon. "We're sending them to you, can you deal with it?" | |  | | Music Business Worldwide |
| | 'Artists need to pay attention to their legacy and be very specific about it' | | by Tim Ingham | | Lawyer-manager" John Branca on fighting for artists' rights, and the Michael Jackson story. | | | quote:// "t was like you were really working with Wolverine or something; like one of the X-Men is calling me out the blue sky." - Kool Keith | | |  | | Vulture |
| | The Unknowable MF DOOM | | by Drew Fortune | | Unmasking the late rap supervillain with the people whom Daniel Dumile gave a slightly less obstructed view. | |  | | The New Yorker |
| | A World-Class Guitar-Maker Picks Through the Ashes | | by Paul Elie | | Fire undid Todd Clinesmith's way of life in a few moments. | |  | | The Muse |
| | As Taylor Swift's Self-Appointed Biggest Fan... What the Hell | | by Shannon Melero | | As Taylor Swift's self-appointed biggest fan I humbly and respectfully ask, what is this? By this, I mean Swift's release of a new "chapter" titled the 'forever is the sweetest con' chapter which I assumed was more new music because she's got nothing else to do in that log cabin studio but write record and send her sweet vocals straight to my half-functioning eardrums. | | | | | Billboard |
| | Billboard Change Agents: Leaders Stepping Up In A Year of Turmoil | | Spotlighting individuals doing important work behind the scenes who might not be recognized on a traditional Power List, yet who could reshape music's balance of power in the future. | |  | | Nashville Scene |
| | What We Lose When We Attempt to Silence and Shame Critics | | by Megan Seling | | Talking with critics Andrea Williams and Lorie Liebig and star Jason Isbell about fan pile-ons in country music. | | | rave:// This would be great without the high-concept staging but that makes it better. | | | | | NPR Music |
| | Miley Cyrus: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert | | by Ann Powers and Miley Cyrus | | The provocative pop star covers Mazzy Star's "Fade Into You" and performs two cuts from "Plastic Hearts" for her Tiny Desk quarantine concert. | |  | | MetalSucks |
| | Does Location Matter for Your Band's Chances of 'Making It'? | | by Vince Neilstein | | Also: what will become of "the scene" once the pandemic ends? | | | | Variety |
| | Edgar Wright's 'The Sparks Brothers' Gives Cult Rock Icons Their Due | | by Chris Willman | | When did I get on board?" filmmaker Edgar Wright asks himself, repeating the question about when, over Sparks ' five-decade career, he first took a liking to the band. "I saw Sparks for the first time on TV when I was 5. And even when I was 5..." "What kept ya?" interjects singer Russell Mael. "What were you waiting for?" | |  | | Twenty Thousand Hertz |
| | Twenty Thousand Hertz: Sound 101 With Bill Nye | | by Dallas Taylor and Bill Nye | | What is sound, on a fundamental level? How did animals evolve to hear? And what happens when you go faster than sound itself? In this episode, we explore the physics of sound with the legendary Bill Nye. | |  | | Midia Research |
| | Women making music | | by Hanna Kahlert | | With access to the industry easier than ever, a glaring discrepancy remains: why are there still so few women, and so many men? | |  | | Trapital |
| | Def Jam's Past, Present, and Future with Gary Suarez | | by Dan Runcie and Gary Suarez | | A webinar recording of "Def Jam's Past, Present, and Future," a breakdown on the moves made by one of hip-hop's most storied record labels. | |  | | The Ringer |
| | '60 Songs That Explain the '90s': Do You Remember Pop House Music? | | by Rob Harvilla and Craig Seymour | | "Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)" was a hit at the beginning of the decade, which made both a ton of sense and zero sense at all. Rob Harvilla and guest Craig Seymour break down the phenomenon, the '80s New York club scene, and the illustrious career of Martha Wash. | |  | | Complete Music Update |
| | Dissecting The Streaming Inquiry #04: Equitable Remuneration | | by Chris Cooke | | Performer equitable remuneration is a performer right, which is to say, a provision in copyright law that benefits performers even if – and especially when – they don't own or control the copyrights in the recordings on which they perform. | | | |  | | | Music of the day | | "Dirtknock" | | Madlib | | From "Sound Ancestors," sampling the Young Marble Giants' "Searching for Mr. Right." |  | | YouTube |
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From "Sound Ancestors," sampling the Young Marble Giants' "Searching for Mr. Right." | Madlib, MF Doom, Kanye West and Tyler, the Creator are among the artists featured in this 2013 doc about the influential Los Angeles indie label. | | | Music | Media | Sports | Fashion | Tech | | "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?'" | | |  | | | Jason Hirschhorn | | CEO & Chief Curator | | |  |
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