B Sides for 08/20/2014
But before embarking on the cinematic role of a lifetime, Dave Grohl passes the challenge along to Jack Black, John Travolta and appropriately enough, King himself. The Foos' three-minute remake finds Grohl playing Sissy Spacek's prom queen character from the 1976 film, with drummer Taylor Hawkins filling the roll of the prom king in order to reenact the movie's pivotal scene when a reprehensible prank is pulled on Carrie (Spacek's character). Gallons of blood are poured over her head in order to embarrass the teenager. Pat Smear and Nate Mendel assist in the prank, hiding behind the curtain, letting go of the ice bucket just at the right moment. Grohl's footage is brilliantly cut together with shots from the original film. Watch it here.
In theaters this Friday, August 22, "Sin City- A Dame to Kill For" is the highly anticipated sequel to the 2005 international smash, "Sin City." The first film grossed 74 million dollars in the U.S. and 158 million dollars worldwide. Directed by Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller, the story follows the neo-noir crime action that made "Sin City" a success. Check out Tyler's new song here.
The album will be the group's first for Republic Records, after many years on Roadrunner. "I've been a fan of the band since their inception," says Republic Records co-founder and CEO Monte Lipman. "Unfortunately, like many people, I had the opportunity to sign them and blanked, and missed one of the biggest opportunities of my career." "For me, on behalf of Republic and this company, it's about how we can make a difference in their career," he added. "And that's what I convinced these guys -- I said, 'You're a legacy act, and as far as I'm concerned, your trajectory is right into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and I want to be a part of that.'" Watch the video here.
Due September 16, the guitarist recorded "World On Fire"with his touring band, Myles Kennedy And The Conspirators, and producer Michael Baskette. A week after the album's release, Slash will promote "World On Fire" and mark the Guitar Center's 50th anniversary with a series of three concerts in Hollywood's most legendary clubs. The rocker will play shows at The Troubadour (Sep 23), The Roxy (Sep 25) and The Whisky (Sep 26). Check out the song preview here.
KISS are following in the footsteps of several other rockers who paved the way with successful extended Vegas runs, including Carlos Santana, Guns N' Roses, Motley Crue, Def Leppard, Rod Stewart and Meat Loaf, among others. KISS and Def Leppard are currently playing shows across North America on a summer tour that will wrap up in Houston, Texas at the end of the month. Check out the video here.
Jim James of My Morning Jacket takes the lead on the song, and even though he and the others on the track are very much modern, he manages to make the song very much retro-sounding, particularly in the chorus. "I knew I was young enough," he sings. "And I knew there was nothing to it / For I'd already seen it done enough." There's fuzzed-out guitar as well, perhaps either a contribution from James or Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith, from the sound of it. James and Goldsmith are joined on the song - and the entire album - by Mumford & Sons' Marcus Mumford, Elvis Costello and Carolina Chocolate Drops' Rhiannon Giddens, plus producer T Bone Burnett. A lyric video released today to accompany the song features Dylan's lyrics strewn throughout an animation of a walking man. Check it out here.
The song appears on The Paradigm Shift: World Tour Edition, which is a reissue of the 2013 album and includes three new studio tracks and six live ones. Frontman Jonathan Davis has previously described the song as "the most positive sh*t I've ever written." Check out the online stream for the new video here.
Speaking about the album to USA Today, frontman Ryan Key says: "We've always had a burning desire to be a rock band - we've explored it in different ways along the path. "We don't want to keep writing the same record over and over. We've always tried to make each record independent of the others, but on Lift A Sail we really went for it." Yellowcard head out on a 25-date North American tour starting in Las Vegas on October 16. Check out the lyric video here.
So how did "Come Out and Play" come about? Yeah, that was the last song I wrote for that album, and I was trying to figure out how to put it together. I liked the main riff, but musically it bounces around a lot. The verses are kind of like a rap almost, more spoken than sung. And then there's that Middle Eastern riff or whatever you want to call it, which is very Southern California, going all the way back to Dick Dale, and we'd messed with some of that stuff in previous records. I guess I was trying to come up with something in a different way, that would grab you with all these elements. The "keep 'em separated" element was just because I wanted it so there was a stop, with something fun to say in the middle. That just kind of came to me at school one day. So all those things, but you never know if it's gonna work. You just have to go into the studio like "this might sound weird but let's try it anyway." That brings us to "Self-Esteem," which didn't really sound like anything you'd done before that. Is there a true story behind that or a person who inspired it? Sort of. When I talk to people it's interesting how they think that anything a guy writes is autobiographical, which of course it's not, it could be something you've made up off the top of your head, or combined stories. Were any of the images taken from real life, like taking her back and making dessert? The thing where late at night she knocks on my door was real, and practicing all the things you would say was a funny thing that had happened before. Read the rest of the interview here.
One quarter of a century ago, before Spotify, before iTunes, before mp3s and Napster and the resurgence of vinyl, way back in the monoculture before YouTube and Twitter, what did 1989 sound like? One of the most lasting moments that year was Michael Jackson being dubbed the King of Pop for the first time when Elizabeth Taylor and Eddie Murphy presented him with the Soul Train Heritage award. The lowest moment came courtesy of Milli Vanilli, who had several singles on the charts including the big hit "Girl You Know It's True," and who were subsequently discovered to be lip synching the whole time and had their Best New Artist GRAMMY stripped from them. In between those extremes, however, is the real 1989. At best, pop music was off-kilter. At worst, it was a disaster. It was the time before SoundScan, which wouldn't launch until 1991, so there was no reliable public mechanism for tracking record sales. C+C Music Factory formed and the Who broke up. New wave was dead and hair metal thrived. Billboard's No. 1 single for the year was Chicago's "Look Away," but the kids were more into the No. 2 track, Bobby Brown's "My Prerogative" - which Britney Spears would go on to cover in 2004. Even ranking on the Billboard charts was different. The chart today includes streaming data from places like YouTube and Spotify, which would have precluded Chicago's odd reign at the top of the 1989 chart. These additions emphasize things people want to hear, rather than relying heavily on what radio programmers were playing in a time when payola was rampant. If today's technology were available in 1989, the top single of the year would undoubtedly have been Madonna's "Like A Prayer." It was the biggest musical event of the year. The track was sort of popular on the radio, but Madge was a ubiquitous star of the MTV generation. Her big deal with Pepsi kicked in around the album's release, but after the release of her controversial video for "Like A Prayer," it left. So did as did her then-husband Sean Penn; events that would start a social media wildfire in this day and age. But as it is, Billboard only ranked it as the No. 25 song of 1989. It was also an excellent year for one-off, joke hip hop tracks crossing into the mainstream. It was the year of Young MC's "Bust A Move," Tone Lōc's "Funky Cold Medina," Biz Markee's "Just A Friend" and Prince's "Batdance" (that was a joke single, right?). "Shake It Off," owes a debt to is Young MC's track. Her cadence, her narration as the straight man in an unreasonable situation, the appeal to the listener to be on her side: all of these things are tricks he pulled in "Bust A Move." When Swift says she was sonically influenced by 1989 pop, though, and that she's working with Max Martin, citing "bright colors, bold chances, rebellion" as the reference points, it's hard to know what she means. That particular year at the end of the decade was one of the least colorful, in literal presentation, and most filled with morose singles of possibly the entire decade. The Cure's "Lovesong," Martika's "Toy Soldiers" and Poison's "Every Rose Has It's Thorn" were the jams. Beaches, the world's most depressing movie, came out accompanied by the sob-along song "The Wind Beneath My Wings." One of the all-time great karaoke songs, the Bangles "Eternal Flame" was a huge, successful single. The most rebellious pop music moment, after Madonna of course, came when Cher released her butt-bearing video for "If I Could Turn Back Time." The song Swift and Martin hopefully drew their strongest influence from that year is the B-52's "Love Shack." The underdog band from Athens, GA kind of rode their friends in R.E.M.'s coattails into the mainstream and dropped this weird gem on the world. If Swift has one track as bright, colorful and catchy as "Love Shack" on her album she'll be minting gold. With her video for "Shake It Off," Swift taps into a very 1989 idea, that of the superstar, name brand video director. She landed Mark Romanek, who has helmed some of the most iconic music videos of all time. Under his belt are: Nine Inch Nails' "Closer," Michael and Janet Jackson's "Scream," Jay Z's "99 Problems," Johnny Cash's "Hurt" and Fiona Apple's "Criminal." more.
Guitarist Sel Balamir recently said of the record: "It doesn't aspire to emulate any of its predecessors. We've gone back to just trying to write great songs and melodies, and that's where we've decided to stay." They launch a European tour in October, which includes two UK dates alongside Kerbdog and others - one at the Ritz in Manchester on November 15, and the other at the Forum in London on November 16. Check out the song here.
VHF is a band I put together with Joel Hoekstra (Night Ranger, Trans Siberian Orchestra, Rock of Ages Broadway) on guitar and The Fretless Monster, Tony Franklin (The Firm, Blue Murder, Kenny Wayne Sheppard) on bass. I would like to talk about how our debut song/video "Whispers of the Soul" came to be. When I decided to put this band together my vision was that the music would be based on the groove and built from the drums up. I was going for the style of music that I grew up on�.Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, especially their "Animals" album. It is all about the groove; add a little improvisation and creativity on each musician's part and you get a final piece. I equate it to painting a picture�. you start with a blank canvas� then I add a few brush strokes, and set the underlying foundation with the drum groove and arrangement. Next comes Tony on bass where he adds a few more layers and brush strokes with the chord progression and underlying tone. Finally, Joel on guitar to pulls it all together� The video really makes my vision come to life, especially the visual effects and color treatments demonstrate the "painting a picture" metaphor �. Remember we never jammed together in the studio or during the recording process, we created independent parts to make each song whole. Once all of the songs were recorded by each of us, Engineer/Producer Joe Floyd and I added the basic effects, panning, echoes etc. When we had a 90% sound, we brought it to Tommy Kessler of Blondie to help with the separation of frequencies and to add ear candy. We did not want to release a typical instrumental CD, our approach was to allow the engineers to have freedom to experiment sonically. So while the songs may follow ababcab structures, the song can vary with each pass through the "a" section. We were lucky to have engineers like Joe Floyd and Tommy on board and willing to push the envelope. I wanted to make sure the music is headphone friendly�.. Hope you enjoy! Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen for yourself as you watch the video here and learn more about the band and the album right here!
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