Tagged: somethin4theweekend

<span class="mceItemObject" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-1 1cf-96B8-4445535400003 id="ooyalaPlayer_8hrxm_g2tlmrc 43 width="4803 height="3203 codebase=" http://fpdownload.macromedia.c om/get/flashplayer/current/swf lash.cab"><span name="movie" value=" http://player.ooyala.com/playe r.swf?embedCode=ZxNm4xMTrYvTA1 ahcL6w3R-rJXESs-1bversion=23 class="mceItemParam"></span><s pan name="bgcolor" value="#0000003 class="mceItemParam"></span><s pan name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" class="mceItemParam"></span><s pan name="allowFullScreen" value="true" class="mceItemParam"></span><s pan name="flashvars" value="embedType=noscriptObjec tTagembedCode=ZxNm4xMTrYvTA1a hcL6w3R-rJXESs-1b" class="mceItemParam"></span><s pan class="mceItemEmbed" src=" http://player.ooyala.com/playe r.swf?embedCode=ZxNm4xMTrYvTA1 ahcL6w3R-rJXESs-1bversion=23 mce_src=" http://player.ooyala.com/playe r.swf?embedCode=ZxNm4xMTrYvTA1 ahcL6w3R-rJXESs-1b&version =23 bgcolor="#0000003 width="4803 height="3203 name="ooyalaPlayer_8hrxm_g2tlm rc43 align="middle" play="true" loop="false" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave- flash" flashvars="embedCode=ZxNm4xMT rYvTA1ahcL6w3R-rJXESs-1b" pluginspage=" http://www.adobe.com/go/getfla shplayer"></span></span> It's been a jam-packed week, folks: We've picked apart the Grammy noms , feasted on end-of-decade list debates , and celebrated the birthdays of an endlessly quoteable pop star and an aging rapper who's number one . But oftentimes, mere words just don't do [...]

This week is the 29th running of the CMJ Music Marathon, in which bands and bloggers and media-types and music-biz bees (and even a few people who don't fall into any of those categories) run around New York in search of free/sponsored beer, late nights, and the chance to say that they saw a band with 45 or so other people in a dank New York club. (A scenario that is often romanticized far out of proportion. But I digress.) Perhaps it's because my tastes have shifted away from provincial "indie," or because of the economy's clamping down on budgets [...]

Haven't done one of these in a while, and I figure the night that I'm about to run out to the R. Kelly show in New York ( yessss ) is as good a time as any to do so. Also, I am currently in something of a (relative) listening rut, alternating between the Shakira record, my "2009 awesomeness" playlist (now at 32 songs! new additions include Alphabeat and Natalie Imbruglia!), and isolated listens to the new songs/albums that cross my transom. And not much else! So, feel free to plug your favorite music of right now here-there's [...]

Oh man, it's almost Labor Day weekend! Which means barbecues, earlier sunsets, and the close of summer in the American mind-set. (Not to mention the ever-closer encroachment of the Video Music Awards! Ack!) So what better time to look back? Feel free to share your favorite musical experiences of the Memorial-To-Labor-Day period in this space, while you are (I hope!) waiting to go outside and enjoy the last crackles of summer. My list-which ranges from shows to finding out bits of news-after the jump. • Kelly Clarkson at the Great Allentown Fair, duh. [...]

I'm taking off a little bit early today because I'm going to tape an appearance on NPR's Weekend All Things Considered , in which I will be quizzed about this year's contenders for Song Of The Summer, and why this summer's most-people-unifying songs probably weren't ones that came out this year, let alone this decade . (Michael Jackson, duh.) (Well, Michael Jackson and the ever-atomizing nature of "pop music," which is resulting in things like gym staples not getting anywhere near the pop charts and the Black Eyed Peas being the only force that can [...]

John Hughes, a writer/director whose stamp on the movies he was involved with was so iconic his name was turned into an adjective, passed away yesterday at the age of 59. Hughes' heyday coincided with the MTV era, and a lot of the movies that he had a hand in-which included The Breakfast Club , Pretty In Pink , and other totemic comedies of the 1980s -both shaped for the music tastes of the day and had scenes that could have been snipped out of movies and directly placed into MTV's rotation. (Witness Matthew Broderick's performance [...]

Jess Harvell's piece on The Misfits' relationship to New Jersey earlier this week sparked some debate from out-of-state residents over which musicians deserved to be elevated to bard status as far as their respective homelands went. I wouldn't try to speak for all of New York, because, well, doing so would be just silly (plus I think that as someone who still calls Rockland County "upstate" from time to time I'd be disqualified from that particular panel by anyone living north of the Bronx). But I do have one nominee for Long Island's most mythical artist... and [...]

As promised: The state of my "2009 awesomeness" playlist, in which I collect the songs that catch my ear as the year progresses in order to not make my best-of list a last-minute-of-December clusterfuck sort of thing. (It inevitably winds up being like that, but you know, I have noble intentions.) It's after the jump, and has some contextual links added in. Feel free to make your own and share it here! The Joy Formidable, "Cradle" Vistoso Bosses, "Delirious" Lily Allen, "Everyone's At It" Brandy feat. [...]

One of our wonderful commenters posed this question in the wake of finding out that people were actually plunking down money for digital copies of Michael Jackson albums : What are people doing with their CD libraries these days-keeping them, transitioning over to digital storage, shifting to vinyl, or giving up on the whole idea of "owning" music altogether and switching over to a streaming service? It's an interesting question for me at this precise moment, because I'm actually apart from my physical-music library and am relying on a hard drive of stuff to [...]

A lot's been said about the death of Michael Jackson over the past 24-ish hours, so I figured I'd just close out the week with one last song. Let the music speak for itself, because the world of pop-by which I mean, music and culture-will never see another like him again. See you Monday, everyone. [ Dailymotion ]

Friends, I have to be honest with you: Today is the first sorta-nice day in the general New York area in what seems like forever , and I have one eye on the sky and my mind on the book that I am tantalizingly close to finishing . So here's my simple question for you: What's your favorite discovery of recent days? It can be a new-to-the-world band, a recently minted album, or an outfit that's been making music for a while but just came across your transom. Five of mine, after the jump. [...]

Not only is this weekend the time for the muddy, Phishy, mushroom-peanut-butter-cup-fre e spectacle that is Bonnaroo, the UK is currently in the throes of the spiky-edged Download Festival , which has a lineup today that in these eyes trumps today's offerings in Tennessee. This is mainly because the reunited Faith No More's headlining set at Download (which takes place in Leicestershire's Donington Park) begins at 9 p.m. local time (4 p.m. ET), and they still haven't scheduled any dates here yet. (Sadface.) Sure, I would have had to sit through Limp Bizkit's apparently LOL-tastic [...]

Tomorrow I'll be tripping down to Philadelphia to attend The Roots Picnic , an all-day affair masterminded by Jimmy Fallon's sidemen (haha, jk guys) and featuring two sets by the band; TV On The Radio, Santigold, and Antibalas are also on the bill. But perhaps the most intriguing part of the day's festivities will be the start-to-finish performance of Public Enemy's It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back -yes, they've done it before , but this time, the musical duties will be handled by the Roots and Antibalas. This and the impending relaunch [...]

The question's pretty simple, although to make things a little bit tougher, let's say that the songs in question have to be about food , and not sexual metaphors for food. To get the inspirational juices (haha, get it?) flowing, here is "Eat It," which is, of course, merely one of "Weird Al" Yankovic's many songs devoted to gastronomy. After the jump, I survey many people for their thoughts, and post my favorite food-related disco jam : A tragedy! And now, a few picks from [...]

I still love this morning's story about the product-placement deal that was struck between Autograph and Paper-Mate 25 years ago, mainly because it took so long for the obvious-in-hindsight synergy to be noticed by this observer. "With the name Autograph, it's logical for us to be advertising a pen," lead singer Steve Plunkett told the Los Angeles Times when the deal was dissected. "It would only be weird and out of place if we were advertising something like a vacuum cleaner or a roach spray." But what if other videos of the era did [...]

Last night, between a very annoying Mets loss and a session of bug-searching, I took some time to listen to a side of the Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour while sitting on (well, leaning up against, really) a bean bag, a cold beer in my hand. And I did nothing else. It was nice! It was also the first time in a long time that I'd just spent listening to a record and staring into space and not doing anything else-not even a crossword puzzle. And today is a beautiful spring day in New York City, one that's perfect [...]

Judging by the number of times it showed up in my RSS reader this week, the biggest music news of the past five days was the announcement that the Beatles ' catalog would be remastered and reissued, with new versions of every one of their studio albums (as well as a couple of other titles) being made available on Sept. 9, the same day that their version of the Rock Band game comes out. (The date's full of the number nine, don't you know.) While the popularity of this particular story was no doubt due in part [...]

In the morass of press releases I received yesterday, one stood out for an absurd-on-first-glance claim inside: " PAPA ROACH : RECESSION PROOF!" it said, heralding the fact that the Al Shipley-beloved band had sold 44,456 copies of its new album Metamorphosis in that record's first week in stories. Which was enough to land it at No. 8. Normally I would have rolled my eyes at such puffery, but a stat that appeared in Hits on Wednesday was enough to make me think that the press release had a point: [...]

Well, the big story this week was probably the shuttering of Blender , the pop magazine who suffered the one-two punch of being a printed entity about music in 2009. Blender 's overarching popism was a big influence on Idolator from the time of its launch in 2006, and even as the death spiral of ad pages resulted in its once-mighty reviews section being whittled down to a handful of 130-word blurbs, I admired its spunk and willingness to reach across the musical comfort zones that divide people more often than not these days, if not always its [...]

It's been one of those weeks when it seems like I spent eighteen hours a day in front of the computer working on either work or school, and although I don't think I got paid today, it's going to be Friday night soon enough, and I want to hear the ultimate in party music...some New Jack Swing . Below the cut, I'll start off the jams, and you can feel free to take over in the comment section. Johnny Kemp, "Just Got Paid": Wreckx-N-Effect, "New Jack Swing": [...]