I kinda wanted it to be like going to an escape room or going to a movie theater. | | | | London calling, pre-cellphone: Joe Strummer and Topper Headon of the Clash, New York, 1978.
(Michael Putland/Hulton Archive/Getty Images) | | | | | | “I kinda wanted it to be like going to an escape room or going to a movie theater.”
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| | rantnrave:// I was employed by VIACOM when it was suing a startup called YOUTUBE. Half the company (by which I mean more like 5 or 10 percent of the company, concentrated on the corporate and legal floors) considered YouTube a lawless enemy of intellectual property, while the other half (by which I mean pretty much everybody) was actively using YouTube to promote Viacom content and watch music videos. It was certainly easier to watch them there than on any of Viacom's own music sites. As lawless enemies go, YouTube turned out to be a great resource. (REDEF's JASON HIRSCHHORN was MTV NETWORKS' chief digital officer and he pushed for working with YouTube rather than suing, on the theory that short-form video + MTV + youth = duh. But I digress. And I weep.) I assume this corporate dissonance was not unique to Viacom. I was reminded of it as I read two stories that showed up almost simultaneously on ROLLINGSTONE.com (h/t DIFFUSER's MARTIN KIELTY, who made the connection: "As Artists Try to Ban Phones, Directors Design Shows for Them"). In one of them, JACK WHITE talks about his no-cellphone policy at concerts, which he enforces with YONDR's phone-locking pouches. "And everyone has been just gangbusters happy about it... and so many other bands have been calling us and saying, 'How are you guys doing that? We’re thinking about doing that too.'" In the other story, RAY WINKER, whose STUFISH ENTERTAINMENT ARCHITECTS has designed shows for BEYONCÉ & JAY-Z, U2, MADONNA and others, says he always does so with INSTAGRAM and SNAPCHAT in mind. "The show," Winker explains, "starts the moment the first person takes a picture of it." Winker's clients not only want fans taking photos and video throughout the show, they want them sharing them in real time. So. There's no inherent contradiction in the idea that some artists are cool with phones and some aren't. It's a free world (last time I checked, anyway). Different strokes/folks. As an easily distracted fan with a short attention span, I love the idea of darkness and radio silence. I have lots of friends, as do you, who just want to watch concerts in peace. But I also love to use Instagram to share and document moments. I'm my own contradiction. Will we settle on a standard? Do we need to? What might a standard look like? As much as I like being trapped, submarine-like, in an experience for a couple hours, I know that promoters need to promote and publicists need to publicize and the internet needs to internet. Is there any chance banning phones—and photos and videos—becomes the default? Or will it always be the exception, never the rule?... SONOS IPO pricing... EVENTBRITE IPO'ing too... JAY-Z and PHILADELPHIA MAYOR JIM KENNEY work it out... Owner of SESAC and HARRY FOX AGENCY throws a wrench into MUSIC MODERNIZATION ACT debate. But how big a wrench is it?... RYUICHI SAKAMOTO loved the food at the Manhattan restaurants KAJITSU and KOKAGE but hated the music. So the YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA founder offered to make playlists for them, at no charge. Love this BEN RATLIFF story on sound design for restaurants, which I read while still mourning the late great food critic JONATHAN GOLD. "I tend to be hyperaware of music in restaurant," Gold once wrote. "It represents what the restaurant thinks of itself even more accurately than the art on the walls or the shape of the plates"... Why did the BEATLE cross the road (again)?... Shoutout to everyone who lost their jobs in TRONC's massacre of the NEW YORK DAILY NEWS on Monday; among them were music writers AMY ROWE and SPENCER DUKOFF... Best wishes to JESSE CAMP... RIP DAN CLEARY. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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| Read the room, have a sense of humor, and if you’re standing on a human body, keep your balance. | | |
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| How Ryuichi Sakamoto assembled the soundtrack for Kajitsu, in Murray Hill, and what it says about the sounds we hear (or should) while we eat. | | |
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| The superstar on his songwriting silence, the country today, and his ideal farewell. | | |
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| We have remained on the sidelines since Spotify’s April 3rd direct listing, which has clearly been a mistake. SPOT opened at $165.90 and is now trading near its all-time high of $190. Waiting for a better entry point into the stock has not worked and we believe the Spotify platform is simply too powerful/valuable to wait any longer to embrace SPOT. | | |
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| Launching last year in beta, mobile game "Beat Fever" is trying to swing the games pendulum back to music again. On the surface, it might look like a rehash of "Tap Tap Revenge." Indeed, the basic premise of the game is very similar. | | |
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| Now That’s What I Call Music’s 100th edition includes a greatest hits disc that favours the arena titans -- overlooking the pleasure of rediscovering the one-hit wonders and sub-genres buried in these pop time capsules. | | |
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| Camille Preaker, the damaged protagonist of HBO's "Sharp Objects," is obsessed with Led Zeppelin. This week's episode, "Fix," finally explains why. | | |
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| Leslie Jamison remembers Amy Winehouse, who passed away seven years ago in Camden, London, at age 27. | | |
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| Daft Punk haven’t toured in over a decade, but cover bands like One More Time are thriving in their place | | |
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| In his new song "I Admit," R. Kelly has some words for reporter Jim DeRogatis. Variety spoke with DeRogatis on Monday morning, approximately two hours after the song dropped. | | |
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| On Nov. 2, 2018, "Bohemian Rhapsody," the biopic about the group Queen, but mostly about Freddie Mercury, hits theaters nationwide. I can’t wait because I’m a fan of the group and Mercury in particular, and I generally love music biopics and biographies. I always look forward to finding out things that I didn’t know. | | |
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| Blackstone says its proposed changes are an attempt to offset Senator Ted Cruz's amendment to create competition for the blanket license. | | |
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| "Brand Sudan was built by music, its greatest ever export." | | |
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| From the Cure's 40th anniversary concert to black cabs, navigating London as a music fan was smoother than the US. | | |
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| The German musician’s only ambition was to play her local bar, but the noisy, neo-gothic sound of her new album, Qualm, has put her on the cusp of clubland’s big league. | | |
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| Even though Kamasi Washington didn't set out to become the face of the jazz revival, it was certainly destined as his calling. The 37-year-old has been deeply involved with music for as long as he has been alive on this planet. | | |
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| This chart shows which devices U.S. smart speaker owners use less since having a voice-enabled speaker. | | |
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| The New Jersey native talks about working with Kanye and wanting to be the next Freddie Mercury in this Rising interview. | | |
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| Labels, retailers and artists from across the British music industry have joined forces to launch National Album Day -- a celebration of the LP format that organizers hope will become an annual showcase event, much like Record Store Day. | | |
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| When you first heard the Stone Temple Pilots on MTV—admit it—you probably thought it was a Pearl Jam song you’d forgotten about, unless you thought it was Kurt Cobain singing, except that the chorus sounded a little bit more like Soundgarden. | | |
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