Nine Simone was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame this past weekend, and several artists took the stage to celebrate her legacy. Lauryn Hill, the Roots, and Andra Day performed a medley of her music, while Mary J. Blige officially inducted her. Backed by the Roots, Day sang “I Wish I Knew…
Kendrick Lamar Wins Pulitzer Prize for ‘Damn’
Kendrick Lamar has won a Pulitzer Prize for music for his album “Damn.,” the organization announced Monday afternoon. It was the first win for a non-classical or jazz musician since the awards began including music some 75 years ago. The Pulitzer board deemed the album “a virtuosic song collection unified by its vernacular authenticity and…
Coachella 2018: David Byrne Remains a Vital Artist
The Talking Heads’ 1984 Stop Making Sense is one of the all-time great concert movies. At the peak of their powers, the New York band choreographed a visual performance that matched the set list in that it was strange and quirky and compelling — and it had never been done before. In that movie/at that…
Beyoncé Takes Coachella With Destiny’s Child, Jay-Z, & Solange
Beyoncé was supposed to headline Coachella last year. That didn’t end up happening. Instead, she got pregnant with twins, and Lady Gaga ended up filling in for her as the first woman to headline Coachella in 10 years. But Beyoncé promised she would be back in 2018, and Beyoncé always keeps her promises. So she…
SPOTIFY ACQUIRES MECHANICAL LICENSING TECH PLATFORM LOUDR
Spotify has acquired another music tech business. The streaming company has bought San Francisco-based Loudr for an undisclosed fee. Loudr, which was founded in 2013, creates products and services that ‘help content creators, aggregators, and music services identify rights holders, secure mechanical licenses, and pay royalties to music publishers’. It does so via proprietary technology…
Why We Love It When Fleetwood Mac Keep Breaking Up
Now this is Peak Mac. Could this happen to any other band? Fleetwood Mac, the crew that loves breakup drama more than any other six or seven bands combined, topped their own standards on Monday, with the announcement that they’d fired Lindsey Buckingham. This split is more than one of the year’s strangest headlines –…
“High Definition Vinyl” Is Happening, Possibly as Early as Next Year
“High Definition Vinyl” has moved closer to a turntable near you. In 2016, a European patent filing described a way of manufacturing records that the inventors claimed would have higher audio fidelity, louder volume, and longer playing times than conventional LPs. Now, the Austrian-based startup Rebeat Innovation has received $4.8 million in funding for the…
You Listen to Music At Work, and It Alters Your Mind. Yes, Seriously.
Many people feel that listening to music at work improves their mood. Others claim it even makes them more productive. Is there any merit to these impressions? Of course, researchers have weighed in. Listening to music at work can make “absorbing and remembering new information” more difficult, according to a 2012 Time Magazine article. However,…
Fleetwood Mac Fires Lindsey Buckingham
Fleetwood Mac has fired Lindsey Buckingham after a disagreement over the band’s upcoming tour, Rolling Stone has confirmed. The band announced Monday that Mike Campbell of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers and Neil Finn of Crowded House will replace him. News of Buckingham’s departure initially broke when former Fleetwood Mac guitarist Billy Burnette shared an April…
Why is a CD 74 minutes long? It’s because of Beethoven
Seventy-four minutes is an awkward length for a CD, right? Especially in this digital age of 1s and 0s, so why this particular number for the length of a CD? Well, the answer to that question actually has everything to do with Ludwig van Beethoven, a man who was born well before the invention of…
