A lively and constructive conversation, but no dissent. | | | | He testified at Coachella on Friday, won a Pulitzer Prize on Monday.
(Scott Dudelson/Getty Images) | | | | | | “A lively and constructive conversation, but no dissent.”
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| | rantnrave:// DAMN. And hallelujah. KENDRICK LAMAR has a PULITZER PRIZE. The hugeness, the meaningfulness, the wonderfulness of Monday's announcement can not be overstated. The recognition. The reality. The truth. Hip-hop doesn't win GRAMMYS, never mind Pulitzers. (Yes, there's an entire Grammy category for hip-hop, I am aware. But the big one, the one that really matters? Hip-hop is allowed a piece of that one about once a century on average. Kendrick Lamar is allowed to be nominated but not to win. This is an open rebuke to that.) This is the same Pulitzer that went to opera composer and performance artist DU YUN a year ago and that has never gone to a pop or hip-hop artist or any artist who doesn't exist in the classical or, on rare occasions, jazz realm. Ever. This is Du Yun's immediate response: "Hot DAMN hell yes!!!!" This is men and women of letters getting it. This is black lives mattering. This is a continuation of MOONLIGHT at the ACADEMY AWARDS and KERRY JAMES MARSHALL at the MET and BLACK PANTHER at the box office and NINA SIMONE and SISTER ROSETTA THARPE at the ROCK AND ROLL HALL OF FAME and CARDI B on top of the pop world and BEYONCÉ at COACHELLA. This it how it came about: The Pulitzer music jurors, mostly from the classical, opera and jazz spheres, were sifting through 100 compositions, including classical pieces that borrowed ideas from hip-hop. "That led us to put on the table the fact that [hip-hop] has value on its own terms and not just as a resource for use in a field that is more broadly recognized by the institutional establishment as serious or legitimate,” said juror DAVID HAJDU. That quote should be inscribed on the UNITED STATES CAPITOL. It should be voted into law. And then, and this is key, the Pulitzer jurors got it right. Damn. And hallelujah... And hey: While the Pulitzer for music has traditionally been a refuge for so-called serious art in a world that otherwise values pop culture, other Pulitzer arts and letters categories have had no problem honoring both. Musicals like HAMILTON compete on an equal footing with serious plays for the drama prize, and bestselling books frequently win the Pulitzer for fiction. There's no reason music juries can't weigh the cases of future Kendrick Lamars and future Du Yuns against each other without prejudice. Here's hoping they do... The Philadelphia DA's office says MEEK MILL's conviction on gun and drug charges should be vacated. Meek Mill, in prison on parole violations related to that conviction, has also received support in recent days from Philadelphia MAYOR JIM KENNEY and Pennsylvania GOV. TOM WOLF, among others. The judge who sentenced him continues to refuse to consider even bail. Judicial independence is important and awesome, but seriously?... VINCE STAPLES has things to say about R. KELLY and about Coachella... APPLE MUSIC's hip-hop programing lead, CARL CHERY, reportedly jumping to SPOTIFY, which recently lost TUMA BASA... This falls somewhere between intriguing and "wait, isn't this just, um, radio?": Playlist Radio... Anonymous donor bequeaths $10m to KEXP... JEFFREY KATZENBERG's WNDRCO invests $11.5m in MIXCLOUD and puts two partners on the company's board, including FUTURE/NAS manager ANTHONY SALEH. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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| An FBI Investigation, an engagement ring, wine coolers... the surprising story behind the ubiquitous anthem that every teenager bangs out on their first guitar. | | |
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| In which the producer nearly sleeps through a festival set, puts a grown man in a headlock, and takes us on a very perilous motorcycle ride. | | |
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| The honor, for the album “DAMN.,” makes the rapper the first nonclassical or jazz musician to receive the honor since the awards expanded to music in 1943. | | |
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| "This just seems like the right moment; the work was on the jury's radar and it proceeded from there." | | |
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| What started off as a clever way to support independent shops during a physical and sonic recession has blown up into an unwieldy grip-and-bitch fest. The only people who are really happy are the major record companies who continue to prop the whole charade up with overpriced singles and needless pic discs. The stores make their nut and keep the lights on for another year. Rinse and repeat. | | |
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| For more than three decades, Steve Albini has cut a divisive figure as a punk rock provocateur, revered and feared in equal measure. In this rare conversation, he talks about "super producers," the future of rock, the death of the recorded music industry and how he feels about "In Utero" 25 years on. | | |
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| It's been a long time since "The Real Slim Shady," but Eminem's headlining set at Coachella reminded us of a better dystopia. | | |
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| Why now might be the right time for the French media giant to make its move. | | |
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| The New Rules singer talks about her Kosovan roots, her strict work ethic and music as an escape. | | |
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| With his first solo album in 14 years, the Talking Heads legend is attempting his trickiest act of subversion yet. | | |
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| She refuses to edit or shrink blackness. Let’s follow her lead. | | |
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| The extraordinary life of American music and civil rights icon Marian Anderson, who will soon appear on the $5 bill, told in five historic concerts. | | |
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| While it's often referred to as singular, the music industry has a history of being fragmented. The divisions begin with the matter of two copyrights for every recording and the fact that different laws govern the use of those copyrights, which results in drastically different revenue streams being generated for seemingly similar uses. | | |
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| On the occasion of their 12th album and 27th year together, Sloan shares their wisdom on how to make musical matrimony last. | | |
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| Drift off with Beach House, Cocteau Twins, Grouper, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, and more. | | |
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| They used it to make your next favorite song. | | |
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| How a gang of weirdos from England, Australia, South Korea, New Zealand, and Japan-via-Maine coalesced into a... Superorganism, and made one of the year’s best albums | | |
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| Today, the company is adding a new feature for all users - both free and paid - that blurs the lines between streaming radio and the typically premium-only option of using playlists: Playlist Radio. | | |
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| Part two of our Tiger Lily exposé focuses on the artists who were wholly unaware—for decades—that an album of their material was released by the company. In each instance, just a few known copies of each LP are known to exist. Why so few? | | |
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| There's a fine line between trying something new out of creative desire, and completely disregarding the scene that made an artist famous. | | |
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