Brown is a controversial choice to some, but Ora defended her collaboration saying 'Chris Brown is strong, powerful and someone that is important to me personally and professionally," in an interview with The Sun (via Us Weekly.)
"'The discrimination and what people think? If you have a great song then no one cares." To further build anticipation the artist has released some publicity photos to promote the single in which she appears topless. Read more here.
David Banner, the aughts rapper best known for his racy hit "Play," has filed suit against Weezy for over $100,000 missing royalties according to celebrity gossip website TMZ.
The tracks Banner is seeking payment from are Lil Wayne's stopgap 2014 track "La La La" and his 2007 not-so-subtle track "Pussy Monster," which Banner produced. For those two tracks alone, Banner is seeking $138,787.19. Read more here.
Mastermind Jimmy Page recently told Classic Rock: "It was a very difficult album to approach. We'd lost John Bonham in 1980, but even when I came to do Coda, it still felt tough. It was a contractual album. We had to do it.
"It had to have credibility because it could have been quite unpalatable otherwise. It helped that we had Darlene, Ozone Baby and Wearing And Tearing from the Polar Sessions - and only John and I knew about Bonzo's Montreaux." Watch the video here.
In the song, Drake pokes fun at Meek being the opener on his girlfriend's tour and hints that she should get a pre-nup if they get married. He also claims he will look back on this beef and call it a waste of time but he's having fun in the moment.
This for y'all that think that I don't write enough / They just mad cuz I got the Midas touch / Your lover done gotta get a world tour/ Is that a world tour or your girl's tour? / I know that you gotta be a thug for her / This ain't what she meant when she told you to open up more / Trigger fingers turn to twitter fingers / I don't want to hear about this ever again / Not even when she tell him that they better as friends / Not even when you're sayin' Drizzy tell em again
It has gotten so bad that people are setting up GoFund Me pages for Meek Mill to help him record a diss track. If we are keeping score in terms of music released after Meek Mill's initial ghostwriting claims, it's 2-0 Drake. Listen here.
"I guess I never explained why I left," he tweeted to fans on Wednesday, "it was for this moment to be given the opportunity to show you who i really am!" Simon Cowell chimed in with his congratulations, also via twitter: "We have been working on this for a while and I am pleased to say congratulations to @Zaynmalik on signing with @RCARecords- Simon Cowell (@SimonCowell) July 29, 2015"
A photo was also posted that presumably shows Zayn signing his new contact at the RCA offices. As Radio.com reported earlier this week, Malik has been working with Frank Ocean's producer Malay. See the photo here.
When asked the meaning behind the title, Bieber hushed his voice, whispering, "Well, girls are often just flip-floppy. They say something then they mean something else. It's like what do you mean?"
"I'm trying to have a consistent sound and I get kind of depressed cause I'm so' like, I want it to work so badly. You know I want people to love it, and inspire people and sometimes I feel like, is this good enough? Is this the direction I want to go?"
Bieber explained he had a rough time last week. "I get in my head and I just don't want to get out of bed sometimes." Speaking about the forthcoming album, Bieber says the first single is "uptempo," "amazing," "fun and summery." "I worked really hard on it with a guy named Poo Bear." Jason "Poo Bear" Boyd is no stranger hit songs. He's worked with Whitney Houston, Sinead O'Connor, Pink, Kelly Price, Faith Evans, Carl Thomas, Glenn Lewis, Patti LaBelle. Read more here.
The show took place at 3rd & Lindsley Bar and Grill, where she sang songs with Clare Dunn, Courtney Cole, Karen Fairchild, RaeLynn, Natalie Hemby and Jessi Alexander.
The sold-out concert's proceeds helped raise money for Miranda Lambert Women Creators Fund, which will give a female a scholarship towards Belmont's University's Mike Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business.
Watch a performance of "Smokin' and Drinkin'" and "Girl Crush" here.
The resulting black-and-white video sees the group joined by hardcore fans rocking out to the tune while fist-pumping, air guitaring and more. "Where would we be without our fans?," says singer Justin Hawkins. "Well, we wouldn't have a video for a start. Or at least, we wouldn't have a video with quite so many brilliant people in it. I'm so proud of them, they never disappoint us"
The Darkness have been performing a UK and European festivals this summer and recently announced dates for a fall tour of North America. The month-long run opens in Pomona, CA on October 10 and wraps up at the House Of Blues in Boston on November 1.
The trek will include the group's newest addition, drummer Rufus Taylor - the son of Queen legend Roger Taylor. Watch the video here.
The video features many picturesque southern landscapes and a few very personal cameos. Rucker's wife Beth as well as his two children Jack and Dani appear in the clip.
Rucker recently announced that he will be extending his Southern Style Tour into the fall. A Thousand Horses will continue its run with Darius and David Nail will join the tour in October. Tickets are on sale this Friday. See the tour dates and watch the video here.
'It's because she's incredibly thoughtful. Choosing a godmother is a very sacred and important thing in our family. They're going to be guiding your child, and they're responsible for them if something was to ever happen.
"We try and choose people who we know would raise our child the way that we would raise our child and her thoughtfulness, her kindness, her authenticity--the way that she's generous with her family, with her friends, with her fans--is so powerful to me." See the photo here.
But Em's not the only famous rapper he's tied with. Fetty is also the first male rapper--as a lead act--to have two Top 10 singles at the same time. Lil Wayne achieved this same mark with 'She Will" and 'How to Love" back in 2011.
Fetty has an appearance scheduled at the Hard Summer on August 2nd and then heads out on One Hell Of Night Tour as support for Chris Brown. See the upcoming dates here.
Foals one-upped the concept in their new music video for 'Mountain At My Gates', the new single for their upcoming fourth album What Went Down (which releases August 28), by shooting it with some high grade equipment: GoPro's spherical Virtual Reality technology.
The video takes place in a sidewalk alley between mountains, as several iterations of the band wander around the set. As a viewer, you can pan around 360 degrees, and even towards the brick walkway and the sky, catching everything going on while the band riffs away.
Directed by Nabil, who was worked with artists like Kanye West and Alt-J, and produced by James Ford, who helped create projects with Florence + the Machine and Arctic Monkeys, "Mountain At My Gates" utilized a technology still rarely used by artists. Read more here.
The tour will feature Wondaland Records founder Janelle Monáe and every act on the label's roster including: Jidenna, Roman GianArthur, Deep Cotton and St. Beauty.
Jidenna has had a high profile summer as the featured vocalist on Monae's "Yoga" and his own hit single 'Classic Man." A remix of the track featuring Kendrick Lamar debuted last month.
The first official Wondaland Records compilation EP, Wondaland Presents THE EEPHUS, will be available on August 14. in advance of these dates. See the dates here.
According to Ice Cube, Dr. Dre will be dropping this unexpected release August 1. "Dre is dropping an album inspired by the Compton movie," Ice Cube said in a recent interview (via Billboard).
"He's dropping something on August 1�It's mega, it's Dr. Dre, it's what everybody's been waiting for. It's definitely a dope record, and he's dropping it all on the same day." Read more here.
"I'm so excited to take a step into acting," says Mendes. 'It's something I've wanted to do for a long time, and can't wait for everyone to see my first role in 'The 100'."
Perhaps Shawn has gotten some acting advice from Academy Award nominee Hailee Steinfeld. The two released an acoustic version of Shawn's track "Stitches" just yesterday. Mendes can return the favor as Steinfeld is gearing up for the release of her first single 'Love Myself" which will be released August 7. Read more here.
A release was posted explaining how they arrived at the additional location. "We're pleased to announce the latest addition to the growing Lollapalooza family--Lollapalooza Colombia! Joining the successful international editions in Chile, Brazil, Argentina and Berlin, the festival will be held at Parque Simón Bolivar in the culturally rich city of Bogota in the fall of 2016, with dates and lineup to be confirmed at a later date."
'We have had the ambition to bring Lollapalooza to Colombia for some time now, and have found partners who are true professionals and share our passion for the music. Fans in Colombia have a true love of alternative music and we are excited for the rest of the world to find out what we already know about this wonderful country," said Lollapalooza founder, Perry Farrell in a release.
Watch Farrell explain the concept behind Lollapalooza here.
In the clip for "NWA," the Kurupt collaboration from his album, Miguel does just that, only with--as the lyrics state--"a gangster lean." Cloaked in all black, the R&B singer takes to the streets and hills of Los Angeles. Meanwhile his collaborator motors around the same are in a throwback car until the pair collide.
Again, there's not much plot but Miguel still finds a way to keep things interesting. Off camera, Miguel is currently walking around stages on tour. Tonight the crooner plays in Atlanta at The Tabernacle. Watch the video here.
"Barcode" is the story of what happens when a regular working girl goes to the grocery store for some essentials, and ends up seeing something much more delicious than food....
The song got its start when Lori Martini, my co-writer, came to my apartment in NYC with just an idea "I wanna scan you like a Barcode". I loved the imagery that immediately popped to mind, mostly grocery store and digital imagery. We got started right away brainstorming images and words, and the lyric came together pretty quick. I ran over to my piano and started playing with the words on some music. For some reason, the bluesy/country progression in the song seemed to pop out, and I went with it. We wanted something sexy, groovy, but not overly cutesy.
I took the song to producer Rich DeCicco, with whom I'd worked on songs like "Swim" for "Dance Moms" (also a co-write with Lori). He loved the song and wanted to work on it right away. It was his idea to add the pop and hip hop flavors to it, and have me play a Wurlitzer rather than my main instrument, piano. It gives the track a sexier, grittier feel.
Funny story about the lead vocals... the day we started working on the track, I laid down a scratch vocal. I was thinking of pop stars like Britney Spears and Rihanna and Demi Lovato, because at that time, we thought we'd pitch the song to someone like them. So I wasn't overthinking the vocal, just sang whatever felt natural. After we had played the demo track for some industry people who loved it and thought I should possibly just release the song, I wanted to do a vocal that was "more me", i.e. less intentionally "pop" sounding. We recorded a few more lead vocal takes, and listened back, and nothing sounded as good as that off-the-cuff scratch vocal. It just had the right flavor for the song and track. So the lead vocal was an unexpected one, for sure. It just goes to show, don't overthink art! Just do it!
We're excited about the response to "Barcode," and hope to hear people singing it all summer long. We hope it re-defines possibilities for grocery shoppers everywhere! We have a cool comic-book style lyric video out, and official music video scheduled for release in August. Thanks for listening, downloading, and sharing the track!
Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen for yourself and watch the buzzed about lyric video for the track right here!
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