“It’s why I like road trips,” a driver says to his his companion as they hustle down an icy highway. “It’s good to remind yourself that the world’s larger than the inside of your own head.” The exchange — though it’s tough to call it an exchange, given that it …
Read More »Banging a Gong: Inside Producer Hal Willner's Final All-Star Tribute Album
Kesha had just finished previewing her new album, Rainbow, for industry types at a Los Angeles recording studio three years ago when she encountered a stout, bearded guy with a “friendly, happy” vibe in the hallway. “You must be an artist,” he said, referring to her bright-red Nudie suit festooned …
Read More »Miranda Lambert, Luke Combs Lead 2020 CMA Awards Nominations
Miranda Lambert and Luke Combs lead all nominees at the 54th annual CMA Awards, which were announced Tuesday morning from the Grand Ole Opry House in Nashville. Lambert scored seven total nominations on the strength of her album Wildcard, while Combs, on a hot streak since the release of his …
Read More »Eric Church Gives Human Emotions Proper Names in New Ballad 'Crazyland'
Similar to how he did in 2015’s “Kill a Word,” Eric Church personifies emotions and troublesome states of mind in his new song “Crazyland.” The ballad, out Friday, is the third release off Church’s to-be-announced next album. Church wrote the new track with Michael Heeney and Luke Laird (who himself …
Read More »Tulsa's Hip-Hop Artists Are Speaking. Will the World Listen?
On a Friday evening this summer, a group of the most urgent voices in the Tulsa, Oklahoma, hip-hop scene took to a stage in the city’s Greenwood district to tell a story they felt the world needed to hear. “When [we] came out, the energy just shifted,” says St. Domonick, …
Read More »The World Hasn't Changed
None of the three children who witnessed a Kenosha, Wisconsin, police officer attempt to murder their father, Jacob Blake, Sunday night were old enough to sit up front. Even at 8, 5, and 3 years old, though, the boys are old enough to remember what happened for the rest of …
Read More »Sen. McSally Says Skip a Meal and Fund Her Campaign With the Savings
Arizona Republican Senator Martha McSally is asking supporters to “fast a meal” and pass along the savings to her campaign. According to an Arizona CBS local affiliate, McSally made the callous pitch at a recent event in northern Arizona. “We’re doing our part to catch up, you know, to get …
Read More »Drummer Chris Slade on His Years With AC/DC, the Firm, David Gilmour, and Manfred Mann
On the surface, AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” Manfred Mann’s Earth Band’s “Blinded by the Light,” and Tom Jones’ “Valerie” have nothing in common. They were recorded in different decades, targeted at different demographics, and they don’t sound even remotely alike. But they all feature the drumming of Chris Slade, a journeyman Welsh …
Read More »The Conservative Crusade Against 'Wet-Ass Pussy'
The spirit of “WAP” should’ve been unimpeachable. Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion‘s ode to the universal benefits of “wet-ass pussy” and female pleasure seemed like the rare issue impervious to controversy. Watching the two rappers unite at the peak of their pop-music-making abilities to deliver an Olympic-level twerk routine …
Read More »Who Won the Battle of Portland?
Summer morning light, the federal courthouse is eerily calm. The perimeter of the Mark O. Hatfield building, a 16-story high-rise occupying a block of downtown Portland, Oregon, emerged in July as the front line for nightly assaults by federal agents against Black Lives Matter protesters, whom President Trump labeled “sick …
Read More »