After nearly a decade with Wings, in 1979, Paul McCartney decided to make a record for himself, by himself, as he’d done with his first solo album, 1970’s McCartney. So he retreated to his Scotland farm with a bunch of synthesizers and bleeped and blooped his way into one of …
Read More »Stephen Colbert Tackles Trump's Attempts to Undermine Whistleblower Rick Bright
Stephen Colbert highlighted the worrying testimony of ousted public health official Rick Bright — and President Donald Trump‘s attempts to drag the spotlight away from his depiction of how the government has handled the COVID-19 crisis — on The Late Show Thursday. Bright, the former director of the Biomedical Advanced …
Read More »Moses Sumney Wants It All
When Moses Sumney finished work on his ambitious new 20-song opus, Græ, he realized that the album’s rollout plan couldn’t be conventional. “If a body of work is at all experimental, the release model should be experimental as well,” the 28-year-old singer-songwriter says. Sumney’s plan: release part one of the …
Read More »OK Go Premiere New Song for Frontline COVID-19 Workers
OK Go released a new song on Wednesday in honor of frontline health care workers battling the COVID-19 pandemic, inspired by both the nightly cheer for essential workers at 7 p.m. and by a recent Rebecca Solnit essay in The Guardian. The track, “All Together Now,” was written and recorded …
Read More »The First Time: The Killers
The Killers are currently in a bit of a limbo state as they await word on when they can reschedule their world tour and release their upcoming record, Imploding the Mirage. But earlier this year, before anyone knew the term “COVID-19,” they stepped by Rolling Stone‘s studio to share memories …
Read More »Jayhawks Return With Piano-Pop Gem 'This Forgotten Town'
The Jayhawks are out Tuesday with “This Forgotten Town,” the second track off the band’s forthcoming album XOXO. They previously dropped the Elliott Smith-esque tune “Living in a Bubble.” The mid-tempo jangly roots-pop gem opens the band’s first album of new material since 2016’s Paging Mr. Proust. The song features …
Read More »Kurt Cobain's 'Unplugged' Guitar Headed to Auction
The guitar Kurt Cobain played during Nirvana‘s famed MTV Unplugged in New York concert is headed to auction with a starting estimate of $1 million. The guitar will be part of the “Music Icons” sale at Julien’s Auctions, taking place June 19th and 20th in Beverly Hills and on the …
Read More »Elton John on Little Richard: 'A True Legend, Icon and a Force of Nature'
Elton John remembered Little Richard on social media Saturday following the music icon’s death at the age of 87. “Without a doubt – musically, vocally and visually – he was my biggest influence,” John wrote in a series of tweets. “Seeing him live in my teens was the most exciting …
Read More »Spike Lee Drops New Short Film, a 'Love Letter' to New York
Spike Lee has shared a “love letter” to New York in the face of the coronavirus pandemic with New York New York, a three-minute short film soundtracked by Frank Sinatra’s classic Big Apple ode. Filmed on grainy Super 8, the first two minutes of the short travels from Brooklyn to …
Read More »How Kraftwerk's Synth Wizard Florian Schneider Rewired the World
Farewell to the great Florian Schneider, co-founder of Kraftwerk, the German electronic duo who changed everything about the way music sounds. “Kraftwerk is not a band,” Schneider told Rolling Stone in 1975. “It’s a concept. We call it ‘Die Menschmaschine,’ which means ‘the human machine.’ We are not the band. …
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