I had two cassette decks—there were no digital recorders or even multi-track recorders—and I did one take, one pass, on one tape, then ran it back to the other one, played some other parts by hand that I wanted to add, and that was pretty much the recording process. It wasn't exactly the Beatles. | | | | Fela Kuti in Utrecht, Netherlands, Nov. 3, 1988.
(Frans Schellekens/Redferns/Getty Images) | | | | | | “I had two cassette decks—there were no digital recorders or even multi-track recorders—and I did one take, one pass, on one tape, then ran it back to the other one, played some other parts by hand that I wanted to add, and that was pretty much the recording process. It wasn't exactly the Beatles.”
|
| |
| | rantnrave:// MTV NEWS' decision a year and a half ago to turn itself into a home for longform journalism, politics and highbrow pop criticism—GRANTLAND without the sports—was a curious, daring and probably foolhardy one. Foolhardy because MTV has tried similar brand extensions several times in the past couple decades, and you'd think the company, whose right brain loves to launch these projects and whose left brain loves to kill them, would have learned its lesson. I've learned, having been laid off from two such projects as they collapsed. But bless the music fans in the building for continuing to try. That's why I still want to love MTV. In that year and a half, which officially ended Wednesday, a progressive team of writers and editors produced consistently top-notch cultural journalism, some of it on-brand with the parent company and some of it beautifully and puzzlingly off-brand. They also unionized, which may be the most revolutionary thing they did, and which will be a permanent legacy even if their content isn't. (In that same year and a half, MTV editorial director DAN FIERMAN answered to a succession of five bosses. Don't ever change, MTV.) A lot of good writers are out of work—lest it be forgotten, a lot of other good writers were put out of work when this experiment started—and you'll be seeing their work in other venues, including some significantly bigger ones, soon enough. You'll find a few recent MTV pieces in the story mix below... And no, longform journalism is not dead. Not dead at all... I still stick a pin every night in the voodoo doll of the guy who pulled the plug on URGE, MTV NETWORKS' subscription music service... APPLE MUSIC answers SPOTIFY's DISCOVER WEEKLY with a personalized Sunday morning CHILL MIX... DAVID LOWERY offers a compromise, of sorts... "FLIGHT CLUB, but for records"... RODNEY BINGENHEIMER back on the air... RIP guitarist DAVE ROSSER of AFGHAN WHIGS... And na na na na hey hey, kiss singer GARY DECARLO of STEAM goodbye. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
|
|
| Charity singles and benefit concerts regularly find more success in the U.K. than anywhere else. | | |
|
| Tackling issues around transparency requires music creatives and their managers to be much more specific about what streaming information they feel they need and should have access to. At a basic level, it’s useful to distinguish between usage data, royalty data and deal information. | | |
|
| It used to be a truism: Rap fans are fickle. Rap fans don't take care of their elder statesmen. Rap fans are only after what's new. Once upon a time, you couldn't read an interview with, say, Run-D.M.C. without seeing some sort of complaint about how rock fans will keep going to see the Rolling Stones while rap fans ignore anyone who hasn’t made a hit in the past few weeks. | | |
|
| “Dan was brought in to do a specific thing and he succeeded at it, but it just wasn’t right for MTV," a source tells Billboard. “The whole strategy of getting back into youth and celebrating them and their passion points and artistry is really at odds for 4,000-to-6,000-word written pieces.” | | |
|
| The rise, fall, and afterlife of Washington, D.C.’s ultimate rhythm. | | |
|
| Twenty-year-old rising pop star Jena Irene Asciutto puts her blinker on and adjusts her sunglasses, her tight curls spiraling in the wind. "We should get away from the Wayne County sheriff van if we're going to get stoned," she says. Her British, Emma Thompson-esque manager laughs from the backseat while I watch the mural-covered landscape of Eastern Market from the passenger-side window. | | |
|
| Can Spotify make a profit? Will Tidal and SoundCloud survive? Streaming music is on the verge of its moment of truth. | | |
|
| The charity single, recorded by fifty artists, turns the schmaltzy seventies song into a surprisingly affecting tribute to thefire’s victims. | | |
|
| Ahead of his performance at Sunfall, we spoke to the house pioneer about how one of the 20th century's greatest works of art came to be. | | |
|
| How the Canadian pop star made the most Instagrammable season her own. | | |
|
| Exploring your own history through someone else’s list. | | |
|
| The vinyl boom has helped fuel a banner year for rap reissues, including records by Dr. Octagon, UGK and Afiliashun. | | |
|
| This promising British artist is looking to find her own unique path within the world of music--but first, she’s got to move out of her parents’ house. | | |
|
| I have a feeling I'm about to wander off the reservation here. I say this because what I'm about to propose is essentially a modification of a potential legislative proposal that rumor has it the NMPA is floating. That proposal seems to be generating some negative backlash in songwriter/publisher community (whether it deserves it or not.) | | |
|
| Thug's problem is that even when the music is good, every project only feels like an appetizer before a main course. | | |
|
| "Incineration Ceremony"announces the arrival of a powerful soundtrack composer--Tad Doyle. | | |
|
| Leggings, the elastic waist and spandex-centric pants. All were once relegated to the gym, yoga studio or spin class, but have stretched to encompass a whole new audience: concert goers. | | |
|
| Palm cockatoos are the only animals observed to use tools for rhythmic drumming, seemingly to attract mates, prompting speculation about the rise of human music. | | |
|
| Texas folk music's favorite New England ex-pat talks about his new album, "Ghosts on the Car Radio," his debt to Woody Guthrie (and Jimmy LaFave), writing with purpose, and embracing the Sisyphean task of beating "Broke Down" every time he begins anew. | | |
|
| Notes on the band’s new album, ‘After Laughter.’ | | |
|
| © Copyright 2017, The REDEF Group |
|
|
