"Is it peculiar that she twerks in the mirror?" Janelle Monae asks in her new duet with Erykah Badu. The answer is that if I looked, sounded, danced, wrote music or made videos even a small fraction as awesomely as either of these two, I wouldn't do anything but twerk in the mirror all day every day for the rest of my life. There is no way to not love this.
It's nice to know that we're all getting old together.
Here's the new Beyonce video, which is also an H&M commercial, part of their Beyonce as Mrs. Carter campaign. It's pretty much like any other Beyonce video, except with far less expensive costumes.
"[H]ardcore Eno fans, who have followed his 40 year career as a cultural innovator, may have to suffer a medical misfortune in order to hear his latest work." (It's an ambient piece, if that plays any part in your decision-making process.)
"Friends was about that time in your life when your friends are your family and once you have a family, there’s no need anymore.”
You would think by this point the people who are so insistent that nobody learn about life through literature would realize that there are maybe eight kids total who are still reading books and it would make more sense to focus their censorious impulses elsewhere, but I guess they're gonna keep at it until their God calls them home or whatever.
Two of Brad Paisley's heads could fit inside one of L.L. Cool J's.
Opening up for a Ghostface Killah concert last week in London, mysterious underground rap legend Doom found himself short of breath because those pasty Knifecrimers were "breathing up all the oxygen." He still did a great version of 2009's "Ballskin," though. And, as our friends at ego trip point out, the audience reaction shots in the video are really funny.
The new Alicia Keys and Maxwell video is some good, smutty fun. And I really like the song. But it would be better if they didn't cut the scene where John Goodman runs down the hallway with a shotgun screaming "I'll show you the life of the mind!"
Back in January, Pulp released its first "new" material in years. And here's a remix, just in time for Record Store Day, which is Saturday. Enjoy. [Via]
It's hard to find an exact release date, but one of the greatest albums ever recorded by anybody came out thirty years ago this month. I can remember right where I was the first time I heard "Blister In the Sun," the first song on the first album from The Violent Femmes. I was in my friend James' kitchen, where we'd go every afternoon in sophomore year to pinch a pipe's worth of pot from the brick his mom kept wrapped in plastic under the telephone book in the drawer next to the fridge. James had a tape, a taped tape, a cassette recording someone had made for him. I [...]
Frank Ocean put this up on his Tumblr page Friday afternoon, titling it "summer 2012." It's basically a series of Vine clips documenting his travels around the world last year—Egypt and Dubai are prominent settings. But since he soundtracked them with the excellent song "Lost" from his double-plus excellent Orange album, it counts as a new video—and a good one! It's just that easy when you're a super-talented R&B star signed to Island/Def Jam.
They killed it. (Sorry. You can listen to Ghostface's new album here, at NPR, where one would expect to be able to listen to the new Ghostface Killah album. I recommend doing so. I enjoyed it very much yesterday before Brad Paisley and L.L. Cool J ruined rap forever.)
"and of water course womb rume is a wandering the welkin woman whose fune caul is all umbilical cord code that comes equipped with read volve vît curtains that čun seel my văl én tich radio reason in remembrance of mademoiselle gabrielle and her wone tym pad lock of burd language as it borders on twin tolk the wolk king wall of woolpack pigeons pointing to the fly blind readers riddle and his rian boh" —Neutral Milk Hotel reunion tour, obvs.
"I think it would bring shame to anyone who was trying to read that book on the subway.” —In an age where people feel comfortable listing the TV shows they like on their resumes, are we really going to mock readers who carry around a copy of The Great Gatsby with a movie tie-in cover rather than the cover everyone knows from high school? Go ahead, laugh now, but in ten years when the only thing you ever see people reading is the novelization of "Angry Birds" or Fifty Shades of Grey for Kids you will look back at this era as the last moment of intellectual striving.
Directed by Ryan Staake, the new A-Trak & Tommy Trash video distinguishes itself from OK Go's "This Too Shall Pass" and other Rube-Goldberg-machine classics with its use of toast slices as dominoes and a thrilling underwater u-boat scene. It's totally excellent. Also, if you have never heard the song that A-Trak made with Juicy J and Danny Brown last year, "Piss Test," I encourage you to check it out.
When I first heard this song, I was kinda bummed out. I don't think we need any more of our beardy folk artists buttoning their vests up and, like, twirling canes around while they sing songs that would not sound out of place in the Great American Songbook. Those Monsters of Folk guys seem to have that pretty well covered. But the more I listen, the less I am able to resist. Old Sam Beam is just a fantastic songwriter. This one reminds me of Sgt. Pepper's-era Paul McCartney. And the video, directed by Hayley Morris, matches its liquidy psychedelia just perfectly. The new Iron and Wine album, [...]
A new Amnesty International report says that worldwide trends show that capital punishment is "becoming a thing of the past." Here's hoping so. But the fact that China and the U.S. are not leading the way in this regard, but rather, pulling the numbers in the other direction, well, that seems bad, doesn't it?
