W hen the pandemic brought the live-music industry to a complete stop in 2020, Bruce Springsteen found himself at home with a lot of free time on his hands. He decided to make good use of it by poring over his massive vault of unreleased music, pulling out seven complete …
Read More »One Year Later, These L.A. Artists are Still Grateful for The Pop Out
A year ago today, Kendrick Lamar’s one-night-only The Pop Out: Ken & Friends concert shut down LA (and the rap world) on Juneteenth. And while so much of the attention centered on Kendrick performing the Drake diss “Not Like Us” a whopping five times, the Compton rhymer was also lauded …
Read More »Sabrina Carpenter Is Under Fire for a Spicy Album Cover. Tell It to Carly Simon
Almost 25 years before Sabrina Carpenter was born, Carly Simon was in a department store in New York and feeling pretty good. She’d just released her fifth album, Playing Possum, and the frisky single “Attitude Dancing” was looking to follow her hits “You’re So Vain,” “Haven’t Got Time for the …
Read More »Brian Wilson's Last Playlist
The last time I saw Brian Wilson was in March of this year. I’d been going to visit him every few months or so since his wife, Melinda, died in 2024. Brian had quit touring two years earlier, so he was pretty much in retirement mode. We spent time watching …
Read More »Sabrina Carpenter Cold-Plunges Before Every Show and 16 Other Things That Didn't Make Our Cover Story
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Sabrina Carpenter is a really good hang. “Most people who are friends with a pop star would be like, ‘People don’t know that she’s so funny,” says her best friend, Paloma Sandoval. “But actually, it’s this incredibly unique situation where everyone knows that. …
Read More »Clifton Chenier Was a Music Icon. The Rolling Stones and Lucinda Williams Want You to Know Why
A few months ago, Joel Savoy, the Louisiana Cajun musician and label owner, was at a local pressing plant looking over the cover art for a just-finished tribute album to zydeco legend Clifton Chenier. The record already had a high-end roster — from veterans Lucinda Williams and Steve Earle to …
Read More »Sabrina Carpenter Cold-Plunges Before Every Show and 16 Other Things That Didn't Make Our Cover Story
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Sabrina Carpenter is a really good hang. “Most people who are friends with a pop star would be like, ‘People don’t know that she’s so funny,” says her best friend, Paloma Sandoval. “But actually, it’s this incredibly unique situation where everyone knows that. …
Read More »People Are Discovering NYC Mayoral Candidate Zohran Mamdani's Rap Past
Curious voters often dig deep into the archives to find out more about mayoral candidates, but it’s rare for those scavenger hunts to uncover rap songs. That’s the case for Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic Socialist vying to be the next mayor of New York City. Before he became a standout …
Read More »Zak Starkey on Being Fired, Rehired, and Fired Again by the Who: 'These Guys are F-ckin' Insane'
The past few months have been quite a head-snapping time for Zak Starkey. The roller coaster began April 16 when the Who fired the drummer after three decades of solid work (“The band made a collective decision to part ways with Zak”), continued three days later when Pete Townshend announced …
Read More »What Happened at Talking Heads' Very First Live Performance
This year marks the 50th anniversary of Talking Heads, the avant-garde New York band that helped redefine Seventies rock & roll, especially that coming out of the city. A new book publishing Tuesday — Burning Down House: Talking Heads and the New York Scene That Transformed Rock — goes deep …
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