In the heat of their battle this summer, Drake sarcastically rapped, “Kendrick just opened his mouth, someone go hand him a Grammy right now” on the track “Family Matters.” Well, the Recording Academy decided to actually put Kendrick in the running for five Grammys for his magnum opus of a …
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Welcome to ourweekly rundown of the best new music — featuring big singles, key tracks from our favorite albums, and more.This week, Karol G and her fellow Colombian stars pay tribute to their homeland, Zach Bryan wants to take the high road even if he can’t find it, and Griff …
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Ab-Soul is giving us a bit of a break from Ab-Soul. The Carson, California rapper’s last album, Herbert, sheds his alter-ego and gives listeners their clearest glimpse of who the man born Herbert Anthony Stevens IV is. And for Soul Burger, released today, he’s decided to rap from the perspective …
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Decades never start quite on time, pop-culturally speaking, and it’s tempting to say that the Sixties didn’t really kick off until the Beatles played The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, just as “Smells Like Teen Spirt” started the Nineties in 1991. But as David Browne’s new book, Talkin’ Greenwich Village: …
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Bob Dylan‘s “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” has been covered by everyone from Avril Lavigne to the Grateful Dead — and, most famously, by Guns N’ Roses, who made it a hit in the early Nineties. Now, actress-singer Sophie Thatcher is tackling the classic for her upcoming horror film Heretic. The …
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“Africa to the world” has been a popular rallying cry from the continent and its diaspora as the global appetite for its culture has grown rapidly. Many hope to further extend its reach. Yet, as African artisans connect and build upon one another’s successes, they’ve come to center themselves. “Made …
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To the average music fan, Quincy Jones, who died Monday at age 91, leaves behind a legacy as one of contemporary music’s greatest record producers, a titanic figure behind some of the most important records of all time. But to many in the music industry, his legacy towers even bigger …
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You can hear the influence of Quincy Jones, who died Sunday, in practically every genre of music. In the music of Stevie Wonder — who grew up listening to Jones’ own records and work with Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and others — Jones’ influence lives strongest in the …
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Guitarist Steve Lukather is best known for his nearly five-decade stint in Toto. But years before “Africa” and “Rosanna” hit the airwaves, he was a session guitarist that backed everyone from Boz Scaggs and Diana Ross to Alice Cooper, Jimmy Cliff, Jackson Browne, and Peter Criss. He kept up a …
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As Buffalo rapper-producer Ché Noir gets settled in a conference room in the Rolling Stone offices, she gets word that the radio host she’ll be speaking with later on also wants her to freestyle. In the age of social media, freestyling is a tenuous ask for rappers, but Ché’s unfazed. …
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