If a song is 10 years old and you still like it, then it's like, ‘OK, it's probably pretty good. Let's use this.’ It's real easy to write a song and be excited about it the day that you're writing it. | | | | I believe that's called guitar face: The Internet's Steve Lacy at one of his first solo shows, Los Angeles, Oct. 29, 2017.
(Kevin Winter/Getty Images) | | | | | | “If a song is 10 years old and you still like it, then it's like, ‘OK, it's probably pretty good. Let's use this.’ It's real easy to write a song and be excited about it the day that you're writing it.”
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| | rantnrave:// Three things we know for sure vis-à-vis the GRAMMY AWARDS, which will announce its 2018 nominations this morning: There will be lots of ED SHEERAN; a little but not a lot of TAYLOR SWIFT, whose best-selling-album-of-2017 came out well past the cut-off date and won't be eligible until the far-off concept that is 2019; and presumably no DRAKE, who declined to submit his own 2017 blockbuster for award consideration. Beyond that, expect the Grammys to be the Grammys, hitting here and missing there, welcoming this and excluding that, perpetually caught between a very real desire to be young and au courant and its inability to shake its old-school, traditional pop values rooted in the production and performance norms of the mid 20th century. Anyone want to take bets on how many times the names CARDI B, MIGOS and LIL UZI VERT get mentioned today? (Whatever the over/under is, I wouldn't bet either way.) Might be a big year for JAY-Z. Also might not. There's no single automatic cultural favorite like BEYONCÉ this time around, and no single automatic commercial sledgehammer like ADELE to upset her come JAN. 28. So, go KENDRICK. Go SZA. Go KHALID. Go MIRANDA LAMBERT. Also, please do not nominate BRAND NEW... The province of ONTARIO was close to passing legislation that would have required ticket sellers tell the public exactly how many seats are on sale for any given event, but it dropped the transparency measure after pushback from pretty much the entire music industry. The relatively low percentage of seats made available to the public for some major events is undoubtedly part of the problem with concert-ticket pricing, and transparency is undoubtedly a good thing, but is it possible this would have been a bit much? Artists' and promoters' concerns are laid out here. They sound—reasonable. Am I missing the bigger picture? Is there a way to incentivize promoters to hold back fewer seats while letting them maintain their business privacy?... Speaking of tickets, BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN, who has never quite figured out how not to come back out for a second or third or ninth encore, has extended his BROADWAY run for another four months. He'll now be at the WALTER KERR THEATRE through June... It's bad enough that overzealous compression is ruining pop music. But is it also ruining your experience of waiting on hold for that one available customer service representative? Because that would be the last straw... The saddest thing about the legal fight between DONALD FAGEN and WALTER BECKER's estate for control of STEELY DAN is that we'll never get to hear a BECKER/FAGEN song that obliquely addresses it... Acclaimed JUSTIN BIEBER/LINKIN PARK/GUCCI MANE collaboratoir BLACKBEAR celebrated his 27th birthday Monday by releasing his album CYBERSEX on whatever day he felt like releasing it. Also, by letting you know he's still in love with you and he hopes your whole life sucks.
| | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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| You've probably been surprised to hear a remarkable song you've never heard pop out of nowhere sometime recently - you're not alone. But as the terms of excavation shift, what are we losing? | | |
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| Kendrick Lamar, Lorde, U2, Kesha, LCD Soundsystem... | | |
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| It's not your imagination; hold music on phones really did sound better in the old days. Here's why, as we talk about old telephone exchanges and audio compression. | | |
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| In the first of our 2017-in-review Wreath Lectures, Emily Mackay asks if the critical hysteria and emoji deluge surrounding the every doing of Taylor Swift is evidence that the poptimists need to pipe down. | | |
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| With labels eyeing hi-res audio as the next add-on for streaming services, we explore the challenges of attaining a future that sounds much better. | | |
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| White Iverson used hip-hop fans to become a star, but doesn't want to be called a rapper. | | |
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| Björk has been immersed in and inspired by club culture since before her ‘Debut’ in 1993. | | |
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| Yes, the DOJ is suing over the AT&T-Time Warner merger, but on the antitrust front, the Trump administration appears to be retreating in other places. | | |
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| Redesigns galore, journalists in demand, even new magazine launches: music’s trade press is suddenly looking more healthy than it has in years. BMG’s SVP Global Corporate Communications, Steve Redmond, asks: what does this say about the future of the music business itself? | | |
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| From "A Hard Day's Night" to "Won't Get Fooled Again," these immortal guitar chords prove that sometimes, it's not the melody or chorus that's the most memorable part of the song. | | |
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| MUSIC • TECHNOLOGY • POLICY |
| There are several myths about streaming, but none so prevalent as the “savior” trope, which streaming services are doing their best to splice into the DNA of the music business. Without streaming, we are told, then piracy: “Streaming stops piracy”. Piracy, of course, is a constant, and is factored into sales these days as a limiting factor. | | |
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| K-Pop is hardly a niche genre, but until recently, its fans were found primarily in Korea, neighboring Asian countries and Korean immigrants in the US and elsewhere. Spotify, with its global footprint, helped change that two years ago with the launch of its Korean pop genre hub. | | |
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| In this panoramic history of the grooviest of genres, we hear track after track of absolute boogie-down classics. | | |
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| Explore the technology that played a major role in World War II cryptography en route to becoming a ubiquitous musical tool. | | |
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| The greatest producer of his generation got hooked on pills and almost lost it all -- now he's ready to return to the charts. | | |
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| The underground is the new mainstream. | | |
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| A Journal of Musical Things |
| Music Industry As early as Wednesday (Nov 29), the Wynne government's new rules for selling concert tickets (and tickets to hot sporting events, theatre productions, etc.) will get third reading as it makes it way into law. | | |
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| The chart-topping, repeat CMA winner has managed to completely take over the Nashville establishment--while still sounding like himself. | | |
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| The treatment of America’s Got Talent finalist Mandy Harvey shows that as deaf people we need to move beyond the oralism v sign language split, says freelance journalist Josh Salisbury. | | |
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| There are moments in life when you realize that the past isn't really all that far gone, and watching a YouTube clip of Barbra Streisand performing with Judy Garland on the latter's 1963 variety show is one of them. | | |
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| | | | | | | From "Cybersex," released Monday on Interscope. |
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| © Copyright 2017, The REDEF Group |
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