Success does not go hand-in-hand with credibility. | | | | | George Michael at Wembley Arena, Feb. 25, 2012. (MandyJC72/Flickr) | | | | |  | “Success does not go hand-in-hand with credibility.”
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| | rantnrave:// GEORGE MICHAEL was neither the first nor the last bubblegum pop star to successfully reimagine—and reinvent—himself as a major adult pop star, but he was as good an example as there is. The formula is simple: Be great at the bubblebum and be even greater at the growing up. Don't lose the spark that made you a pop star in the first place. And believe in yourself, no matter who, no matter what, no matter when. You've probably read thousands and thousands of words in the past few days on the music and life of a pop revolutionary who fought for artistic freedom, sexual freedom and personal freedom at significant risk to his career while touching a generation of fans like few of his peers. We've collected the best in our REDEF MusicSET Remembering George Michael. As major pop careers go, it was short: two and a half studio albums with WHAM! and five solo, the last coming in 2004, when he was 40 years old. More a single than an album, as careers go. But a single that shapeshifted with every verse and every chorus, without ever losing its ecstatic beat. And that offered reasons to celebrate even in the darkest moments. RIP... Not to take away from everything else he was, but his positive influence on LGBT kids was incalculable... Oh, and CARPOOL KARAOKE started with him... He isn't in the ROCK & ROLL HALL OF FAME. Just sayin'...The year's best obituary writer, in a year that unfortunately needed one, was QUESTLOVE, whose INSTAGRAM feed has served as a deeply personal but also encyclopedic resting place for the souls of the recently departed. Questlove on KASHIF. On COLONEL ABRAMS. And then, on TWITTER, this devastating response to George Michael and to the black hole that is 2016: " I don't have it in me anymore to write about our greats"... CARRIE FISHER, vocalist... RIP also: RICK PARFITT, ALPHONSE MOUZON, MAR BROWN and RICKY HARRIS. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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 | REDEF |
| As with all great pop revolutionaries, George Michael's battles—for artistic freedom, for sexual freedom, for personal freedom—would be a lot less resonant if not for the ecstatic, soulful wonder of his music. We celebrate a life cut too short with memories, appreciations and, of course, music. | | |
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 | SPIN |
| Marshmello’s 2016 has been comparable to Skrillex’s 2010 — a gathering storm that largely eluded the non-dance media spotlight while reeling in fans by the gross. | | |
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 | The Guardian |
| Apple’s iTunes store revolutionised the music industry, but now streaming reigns supreme and even vinyl is fighting back. | | |
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 | Marie Claire |
| Amidst the media storm about the pressure to perform at President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration, one dancer breaks rank for an interview about the turmoil behind the scenes. | | |
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 | NPR |
| Every year since 2007, the mashup artist has woven the top 25 pop hits of the year into a single track that captures the essence of the year. The title of this year's mashup? "Into Pieces." | | |
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 | The Talkhouse |
| The prolific musician is considering parting with a piece of rock - and personal - history to pay her bills. Spoiler alert: she probably won’t. | | |
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 | Cuepoint |
| The downtown New York hub-famously packed wall-to-wall with music-is ten years gone. | | |
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 | Dazed Digital |
| From cartoon crossovers to Spider-Man samples, rappers seem to draw inspiration from their own childhoods than artists in any other genre. | | |
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 | Salon |
| Who else but Shep Gordon could describe a good life as figuring out "how to not be a jerk" one day at a time? | | |
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 | CDM Create Digital Music |
| If we’re going to see more underrepresented groups in music, we may need new spaces. Step inside a female-only meetup to learn how it works. | | |
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 | Noisey |
| In a time when social consciousness is an imperative, we should be more selective as to who we give a voice to. | | |
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 | Slate |
| That this year belonged to black women in pop who dropped personal and/or creative exegeses in droves: Beyoncé, yes, but also her sister, Solange, whose meditation on black womanhood was so tenderly sanguine and generous it was spiritual | | |
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| Slate |
| We need to be honest about the voices still dominating pop’s mainstream. | | |
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 | The New York Times |
| A veteran performer owns so many guitars, he didn’t miss the ones that turned up when a suspicious seller took them into a Sam Ash Music store. | | |
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| NPR |
| A hundred years after the first recorded samba, São Paulo is pioneering the genre's second act. The city's introspective anthems couldn't be more different than Rio's optimistic, breezy samba beat. | | |
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 | Song Exploder |
| Composer Justin Hurwitz breaks down a song from "La La Land" sung by Emma Stone. Plus, some thoughts from Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, who wrote the lyrics. | | |
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| Noisey |
| Forty years into his career at America’s oldest guitar company, the luthier and polymath talks about C.F. Martin & Co’s history and impact on popular culture. | | |
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 | Yahoo! Finance |
| We all know those Dos Equis beer commercials that riff off a fictionalized, supercool dude who leads a ridiculously over-the-top life. The tag line being: “He is the most interesting man in the world.” Well that guy could pretty much be modeled on Chris Blackwell. | | |
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| The New York Times |
| A discussion about how jazz found new ways to seep out into the cultural mainstream this year. | | |
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 | Digital Trends |
| Although I didn't fully understand the impact it would eventually have, it took the crazy technology behind digital singer Hatsune Miku to finally make me appreciate music, after it had barely played any role in my life at all. | | |
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 | RIP |
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| © Copyright 2016, The REDEF Group |
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