On Thursday, March 12th I had the pleasure of hosting Sharks’ Teeth— a synthesizer enthusiast band hailing from New Orleans. The group played several songs over the course of the…
As many of you may already be aware, a landmark decision was made this past Tuesday when artists Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams lost a lawsuit to the estate of Marvin Gaye regarding copyright infringement. According to the verdict of the case, the hit song “Blurred Lines” was too similar to Marvin Gaye’s 1977 hit “Got to Give it Up”. Thicke and Williams have been told to pay $7.3 million dollars in damages to Gaye’s estate. Right now, their lawyers have gone on the record to say that they are appealing this decision. Their appeal will be predominately based on the fact that jurors were instructed by the judge to only compare the sheet music between the two songs, a comparison that Thicke and William’s legal team believes does not encompass the true feel of both songs.
Here’s a mashup of the two songs in case you need some reference for comparison:
In the first seven years of the new millennium, Modest Mouse released their most critically acclaimed album The Moon and Antarctica (2000), their most popular song “Float On” (2004), and an album that reached #1 on the Billboard 200, We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank (2007). In the seven years since that impressive run, the band has been relatively silent, with only sporadic festival appearances, a b-side EP, and promises of collaborations with Outkast’s Big Boi to remind us Modest Mouse was still a thing. After years of tantalizing rumors and false alarms, Modest Mouse is back for real with Strangers to Ourselves.
Like a fine wine or high-quality bourbon, some albums just seem to get better and better–some get better with multiple listens, some get better because they were too ahead of their time, and some get better because they exist completely outside of time. Here are a few albums that, if you haven’t heard them in a while, should be given another few listens.
Courtney Barnett names her songs things like “Avant Gardener” and calls her backing band “The Courtney Barnetts.” She’s a clever girl. In 2013, her silly word play succeeded in accelerating…
Like my colleague Brandon Bout, I made sure to catch a live show over Spring Break. For me, the destination was London and the band was electro-pop trio Years & Years.
I had heard of the group from a fellow Lightning 100 intern in December. She had spent time working in Britain and assured me that they were on the verge of blowing up across the pond. Her promise was confirmed when I learned that Years & Years had won the BBC’s prestigious Sound of 2015 poll–an award won in previous years by such acts as Sam Smith, Adele, and Ellie Goulding. So when I saw that the band would be playing in the British capital during my stay there, I convinced my traveling companions that we needed to go to the concert.
We have some insanely exciting news for the month of March. After last year’s smashing success, Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival has agreed to partner with us again to make…
Recently, a friend of mine has gotten me into Viet Cong, the Canadian post-punk band that just released their self-titled debut album in January. So when I stayed with that same friend in Los Angeles over Spring Break, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see the band while they were in town at one of LA’s fine venues, The Echoplex, last Friday night. And what a show it was. I decided to spontaneously purchase my ticket the same day as the show, and I couldn’t have made a better decision on how to spend my last night in LA.
Hey if you’re feeling sad, or maybe only a little sad, or going through some relationship problems, or maybe feeling that life is thwarting your every attempt at happiness or you lost your dog and you can’t find them or you know your dog’s whereabouts and you’re currently playing with them then you need to get on over to Trust fund’s bandcamp page and listen to their new album at least 4 times. Think of it as self-help that actually helps the self. Plus it’s really fun.
Trust fund is from Bristol and is headed by Ellis Jones, a young man who I can only assume is also from Bristol and also seems to be a first-rate lover of dogs, cats, and writing sugary indie pop riffs and melodies. Trust fund also seems to be less of a “band-band” or “solo project” in the traditional sense, and more of a way for Jones to write and perform music with a shifting group of friends. Jones’ songwriting is truly great here, and this is an album where the lyric sheet comes in very handy for two reasons, the first being that Jones’ words are sometimes drowned in noise and the other being that you really want to know what this man is singing. His distinctive, highly pitched voice matches the fast-paced indie pop jams very nicely, and on the slower moments it delivers an extra emotional punch.
WRVU loves the springtime so much that Apple Q [Thurs 6-8pm] has collected an hour of slushmelting bumps and beats just for you. These are short, sweet bedroom tracks that…
We live in a world where Riff Raff can make this claim. Does it matter whether he follows through on his Panther Album Series? I personally would download any Riff Raff album or mixtape immediately post-drop, regardless of panther-color and regardless of when it happens. This is what truly matters in hip-hop nowadays: Internet buzz.
A recent article on Pitchfork was published with the bold title “Britpop is Dead: Why Blur’s Comeback Isn’t One.” Blur was once a popular Britpop band, from, you guessed it, Great Britain. As Britpop raged on in the early 1990s, it has steadily declined, but apparently is making a comeback. Using the article as a reference, I intend to examine what the state, or lack thereof, of Britpop really is.
The past few weeks in Nashville can pretty much be summed up in one word – cold. If you’re anything like me, you are beginning to have trouble remembering what…
Music hunting is something we all do. Though you might not actively pursue it (but you probably do since you read this blog), you had to find your favorite music somewhere. Whether it came from your friends or from the depths of the internet, your music taste is something you’ve crafted from years of exposure to different sounds and styles.
In the digital age, hunting for music is barely a hunt at all. Whether you turn on the radio, open up your favorite Spotify playlist or Shazam what’s playing on the speakers of your local Starbucks, discovering new music is something everyone can do with ease. With wider exposure to new artists than ever before, anyone has the ability to find songs they love but may not have otherwise found. In recent years, accessibility to new artists and genres is at an all-time high; most of the time, we are inundated with so many new names it’s hard to keep them straight.
Proving he’s more than the iconic work he did with The Beatles over forty-five years ago, Paul McCartney has yet again placed himself in the musical spotlight. As many of you are probably well aware, McCartney released several songs recently in collaboration with contemporary pop artists. First was his collaboration with Kanye West on the song “Only One” as previously discussed by WRVU earlier this month. McCartney popped up again with Kanye on Rihanna single “FourFiveSeconds”. Finally, it came out just before the Grammys that McCartney is currently working with Lady Gaga.
If you’re unfamiliar with these recent events, check out the “FourFiveSeconds” video:
For those of you keeping track, yes, this is the third Modest Mouse article I have written in a row. If that may seem weird to you all, imagine how I feel. Little did I know 4 weeks ago, when I first reviewed “Lampshades on Fire” and “Coyotes”, that the band would release another single just two weeks later with “The Best Room”. With three singles out and only a few weeks left before the release of their album Strangers to Ourselves, I assumed the band would just ride it out and let those songs generate the hype they wanted. To my disbelief, just this past week I saw on my Facebook newsfeed that the band was set on having a surprise release of a song to reddit users on February 16th. For the sake of consistency, here’s my opinion on “The Ground Walks, with Time in a Box”.
Last year, Interpol released their El Pintor, an excellent album filled with hooks, grooves, and some surprisingly daring vocals from Paul Banks who I’ve previously mentioned in my articles has a love for singing in an ALL CAPS MONOTONE. It was, by all accounts, a good album, and certainly their most critically successful since they released Antics ten years prior. Yet a cloud hung over the album, a phrase that was spoken with a casual grace that belies it’s endemic presence in today’s music culture: “Their older stuff was better.”
Last Thursday, WRVU hosted Kishi Bashi for an in-studio performance ahead of his Cannery Ballroom show that evening. The acclaimed chamber pop solo artist, real name K Ishibashi, played three stripped-down songs from his 2014 album Lighght: “Bittersweet Genesis for Him AND Her”, “Q&A”, and “Philosophize In It! Chemicalize With It!”. You can check out the three-song performance below via RVU Records.
These past few days, most of Nashville has shut down due to a crazy ice situation. In addition to many restaurants, malls, and schools being closed, several local concerts have also been cancelled or postponed.
As the icy tundra continues to plague (or bless) Tennessee, students throughout the state have been rejoicing for the past two days and pray for similar circumstances in the coming…
“What did you think of the Rites lineup?”
This question has reverberated around Vanderbilt’s campus since February 11, 2015. Rock purists celebrated the appearance of Young, the Giant at the top of the bill. Fans of psychedelia and indie rock were surely excited to see Portugal. The Man make the trip. Music fans of every walk of life are singing the praises of T-Pain’s inclusion.
However, the first name on the bill has generated the most buzz. Chancelor Bennett, known to the world as Chance the Rapper, whose profession, as it turns out, is in fact rapping, has taken the hip-hop community by storm over the past two years. His rise to fame has been exponential, and his headlining position at Rites should not come as a surprise.