Tag: Things We Love (21-30 of 93)

Aug 29 2011 01:30 PM ET

Happy Birthday, Michael Jackson; the late King of Pop would have been 53 today

by
Tags: , , , , YouTube Delights
Michael-Jackson

Image Credit: Kevin Mazur/WireImage.com

It’s hard not to wonder what Michael Jackson would have thought of last night’s MTV Video Music Awards. After all, he was one of the primary artists responsible, nearly thirty years ago, for turning the little upstart music channel that could into a cultural behemoth, and had countless iconic VMA moments of his own.

Some 26 months after his shockingly sudden death at the age of 50, there are a million things to remember about the King of Pop on the occasion of what would have been his 53rd birthday: His remarkable musical and physical genius; his undeniable eccentricities; his ongoing personal struggles.

Personally, I prefer to think of him at his happiest, purest moments: the ones in which you could see how much he loved what he did, and how ridiculously outsized his talent was — even as tiny, precocious boy in a giant lavender hat, way back in 1969 on the Ed Sullivan Show: READ FULL STORY »

Aug 18 2011 12:55 PM ET

Flaming Lips, pirate metal, and why you should spend more time in record stores

by
Tags: , , , , ,

Last weekend, my wife and I took a trip up to Newport, Rhode Island, to spend some time at the beach.

We got some sun, we ate some seafood, we drank some pretty terrible local beer, and we visited one of my favorite landmarks: The Music Box.

I’ve essentially made a trip to the Music Box once every summer since I was about 14, and though it has expanded its reach beyond music and video over the course of the last decade-and-a-half (if you notice on the store’s official website, they also sell sports memorabilia and “gourmet food”), it remains a good old-fashioned record store at its heart.

I almost always go in looking for a handful of specific things—for no other reason than tradition, I always pick up a copy of the new Warped Tour compilation, as I have been buying those things since they’ve been called Punk-O-Rama; this time around, I was on the hunt for the Flaming Lips’ Heady Nuggs, a limited-edition Record Store Day collection of the group’s first five Warner Bros. albums on vinyl—and also for some browsing: Whenever I visit a new city, I always try to seek out a used record store to dig out soundtrack compilations from ’90s teen movies, which I constantly purchase on the cheap for reasons I’ve lost track of.

The Music Box did not disappoint (though they were playing Train’s cover of “Umbrella” on their in-store sound system, which bummed me out profoundly). I walked out with the Lips set (at a fantastic price) and a promotional compilation of Lollapalooza performers from 1994, which includes tracks by Green Day, L7, Nick Cave, Stereolab, and the Breeders.

But the most thrilling moment of the afternoon was completely unexpected. READ FULL STORY »

Aug 16 2011 12:47 PM ET

Happy 53rd birthday, Madonna! You're still our lucky star

by
Tags: , , ,
Madonna

Image Credit: Kevin Mazur/WireImage.com

Fifty-three years ago today in Bay City, Michigan, one crazy little Ciccone roller was born. (and yes, it was—no joke!—a Saturday.)

Today we salute the woman she’s become: a superstar whose single name is so well known across the globe, it nearly subsumes, you know, that other one; a vanguard of pop and power and general cultural next-leveldom whose thighs still look like a 19-year-old Romanian gymnast’s, and whose boyfriend is, in fact, a 19-year-old Frenchman. (Just kidding, pervs; he’s a wise and seasoned 24.)

So let’s watch some classic pre-fame Madge to celebrate. Here she is, auditioning for Fame in 1982: READ FULL STORY »

Aug 5 2011 04:36 PM ET

While you're waiting to 'Watch the Throne,' enjoy these punchline-friendly jams

by
Tags: , , , ,
kanye-jay-z

Image Credit: Daniel Boczarski/Getty Images

On “Otis,” the first single from Kanye West and Jay-Z’s upcoming Watch The Throne, Jay-Z spits, “Photo shoot fresh, looking like wealth/ I’m about to call the paparazzi on myself.” Not to be outdone, Kanye fires back with, “Luxury rap, the Hermes of verses/ Sophisticated ignorance, write my curses in cursive!”

Ba-dum, crash. It’s been a great summer for club-goers and college kids (read: people who love LMFAO), but when it comes to witty, winking rap one-liners, well, let’s just say we’ve missed these guys.

There’s no arguing with the fact that Jay-Z and Kanye are two of the cleverest guys in hip-hop. So if you’re getting feverish waiting for Watch The Throne to drop on Monday, fear not—we’re here to help! To tide you over for the weekend, we recommend that you first watch Jay and ‘Ye’s vaguely inexplicable new teaser trailer, and then check out these other tracks we love by rhymers with a sense of humor. READ FULL STORY »

Jul 11 2011 05:13 PM ET

Lost Elliott Smith song, 'The Real Estate,' surfaces on his high school friend's charity disc

by
Tags: , , , , ,

Singer-songwriter Elliott Smith in 2003.

For those who thought they’d bootlegged every last possible song from the late indie-rock hero Elliott Smith, it’s your lucky day.

An unreleased Smith track called “The Real Estate” will appear July 19 on Live from Nowhere Near You II, a new three-disc benefit comp curated by Kevin Moyer. When we first heard the news, we wondered (as we sifted through our own stacks of Smith recordings), how did it resurface eight years after Smith’s death?

Turns out Moyer went to high school with Smith in downtown Portland, Oregon. He originally reached out to Smith years ago when he was working on the first volume of the compilation, which benefits Outside In, a Portland-based charity for homeless youth, but Smith didn’t end up contributing.

“I think this was either smack in the middle of his downward spiral or during his subsequent rise and recovery from it,” Moyer said in a statement. Sadly, a few months after the charity record was released, he learned that Smith had passed away. “I was completely and totally devastated, and still am.”

Years afterward, Moyer met up with Larry Crane, who owns Portland’s Jackpot! Studio, where Smith often recorded. Crane had just finished mixing Smith’s posthumous release New Moon, and as he listened to unreleased tracks with Moyer, they discovered an unlabeled mystery track hiding between two other known songs on a DAT tape.

READ FULL STORY »

Jun 23 2011 03:00 PM ET

Bon Iver's Justin Vernon talks about his new album, Kanye, and why home is where the heart is: An EW Q&A

by
Tags: , , , ,
Bon-Iver

This week, Wisconsin native Justin Vernon released one of the best-reviewed and most anticipated indie albums of the year in Bon Iver’s self-titled sophomore effort.

Bon Iver takes the promise of Vernon’s quiet, insular debut For Emma, Forever Ago and adds a number of new elements to the mix: The sound is more expansive without sounding bigger than itself, and Vernon has layered each track with new rhythmic tricks, production twists, and even a guitar solo or two.His delicate, dynamic voice carries it all, and his surreal lyrics paint narratives about the importance of home.

EW caught up with Vernon while he was in town promoting Bon Iver, and he had quite a bit to say about the approach on his new album, his attachment to Wisconsin, and what he learned from Kanye West.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Is it true Bon Iver was recorded in a converted animal hospital?
JUSTIN VERNON: Yeah. It was a residence house. The family lived there and the guy worked out of the clinic that he built. It’s huge, this bi-level ranch house that just goes on forever. So we moved in and we’ve been changing everything around. There’s an indoor pool that we made into a recording room and stuff. It’s become a pretty fun place.

Do you live there too?
My cats live there. I have a little apartment in town that I sort of get to when I can.

Bon Iver is a very cohesive-sounding album, like it came out of one marathon writing session.
 It’s interesting you say that. It was written in three years, but it’s all part of the same session. It was like one continuous movement of brain. Like, I had all this s— going on, but this record was always the thing I would return to. I would bring the stuff with me to listen to, and work on lyrics. Just like, “What is this?” We figured it out that way, I think, and it had this flow to it that was mysterious even to me. But it worked somehow. READ FULL STORY »

May 23 2011 11:11 AM ET

Lady Gaga's first album was Green Day's 'Dookie' -- what was yours?

by
Tags: , , , , , , ,

lady_gaga

Image Credit: Andy Sheppard/Redferns/Getty Images

Perhaps you’ve noticed that Lady Gaga has a new album, out today.

Born This Way finally arrived in stores physical and digital this morning—and is practically free on Amazon.com—and tonight, you can get inside Gaga’s elaborately-coiffed head via the special Lady Gaga: Inside the Outside, a documentary special airing on MTV this Thursday at 9 p.m.

The hour-long show goes inside Gaga’s home life, her experiences growing up, and her early brushes with fame. In the exclusive preview clip below, Gaga reveals her early musical inspirations—including the first album she ever bought with her own money. Follow the jump to find her video confession, and to tell us about your own first-album experience:

READ FULL STORY »

Apr 7 2011 03:31 PM ET

Kelly Clarkson tears through a medley of hits on 'Ellen': Watch it here

by
Tags: , , , , , YouTube Delights

Can you believe it’s been almost a decade since Kelly Clarkson beat out Justin Guarini to become the first American Idol? And can you believe there was a time when “Kelly or Justin?” was actually a valid question?

Still the all-time reigning Idol in terms of worldwide sales and vocal prowess, Clarkson performed a knockout medley of her hits yesterday on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. Although her upcoming fifth album has been held back until September, the Texas powerhouse wasn’t holding herself back when she ran through “Miss Independent,” “Walk Away,” and “Since U Been Gone” for a lucky Florida crowd. Watch it here: READ FULL STORY »

Mar 23 2011 08:22 PM ET

SXSW: EW's take on the ten best new bands of the fest, and where you can hear more

by
Tags: , , ,
Black-Joe-Lewis-Foster-the-People

Image Credit: Gary Miller/FilmMagic.com; Andy Sheppard/Redferns/Getty Images

Now that the dust has settled (literally; nobody returns from Austin without accidentally exporting a good handful of gold-toned Texas dirt) from this year’s SXSW Music Festival, we’re left with the headlines—Kanye! Foos! Tasers as indie-rock crowd control!—and the memories.

Of 2,000 bands, a mortal human can only conceivably see some small, smidgen-y percent. But even smidgens translate into dozens, and below, my L.A.-based colleague James Hibberd and I list our favorites outside the Kanye/Foos/taser axis.

(If you weren’t there but you want to fake it, iTunes also has its own dozens of digital-only live-performance EPs from this year’s festival, ranging from Ryan Bingham and Jessica Lea Mayfield to Glasser and Lucinda Williams, most for under $5; click here to view.)

Leah’s Picks

Odd Future (a.k.a. Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All)
I mean, I’m not exactly going out on a limb with this one; people talking about OF at this year’s fest was the new people talking about where the best free day-party booze is. And frankly, the L.A. hip-hop collective is not a remotely sure thing; an incendiary Thrasher party set (in which de facto leader Tyler the Creator broke a kid’s nose in a speaker-stack dive; kid subsequently seemed pretty stoked with his bloody badge of honor) and scene-stealing Woodies performance was just as likely as the 15-lackluster-minutes-and-a-walk-off they pulled in their headlining slot at the Billboard showcase.

Still, there’s something about their whole ethos—in a lot of ways, much closer to the ’90s hardcore/skate-punk scene than anything resembling modern commercial hip-hop—that felt fresh; little else in rap these days feels dangerous or spontaneous in the way Tyler and Co. do, even if all that swag stuff is just extremely smart guerrilla marketing. READ FULL STORY »

Mar 9 2011 04:29 PM ET

Phil Collins' retirement from music: Five reasons we'll miss him

by
Tags: , ,

phil-collinsImage Credit: David M. Benett/Getty ImagesI suspect the news that Phil Collins is retiring—at least temporarily—from music will have been greeted in many quarters with the clink of champagne flutes and hearty cries of, “Thanks god we’ve gotten rid of that bald bastard at last.”

Certainly, the Genesis drummer and solo superstar has been responsible for some terrible music in his time, and I remain amazed that his hellacious 1989 single “Another Day In Paradise” never became the subject of some kind of war crimes commission. But, personally, I’ve always thought Phil Collins was fairly awesome. Here’s five reasons why:

READ FULL STORY »

Advertisement

TV Recaps

Powered by WordPress.com VIP
Which will you see this weekend?