RECENT ARTICLES

British-born and Maryland-raised rapper, IDK (aka Jason Aaron Mills), wants the world to understand that music is so much more than an amalgamation of rhythms, melodies and lyrics. For the Los Angeles-based emcee, who released his major label debut LP, Is He Real, a year ago, music is medicinal. It’s a balm, a salve, a prescription, even, that soothes the mind, body soul and heals in the same way therapy, a massage or Aspirin might.

“The thing I love about music is not really publicized,” IDK says. “A lot of people don’t really talk about it or don’t know. Music is almost just as important as a doctor. It can be looked at in the same way as going to see somebody like a therapist. A lot of people without music or the funds to have a therapist probably would be in a way worse place.”

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Musician and performer, Amanda Palmer, has led an eventful life. But, the artist says, it comes with a price. To experience, to be known, to create, to receive adulation, praise and attention requires putting oneself into the world in vulnerable ways. Often an artist will show the recesses of their psyche, as if splaying ideas out on the laundry line for the neighbors and world to see. But Palmer is used to this. At six-years-old, she began singing in church. As a college student, she dressed as an eight-foot statue standing still in the middle of city blocks to earn rent money as onlookers at times berated. And she’s fronted several prominent music projects, including the wildly popular duo, The Dresden Dolls, which is set to release the never-before-seen 2017 live show film, The Dresden Dolls Return To Paradise, on October 31st to celebrate the band members’ first meeting on Halloween two decades ago.

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In an era when information and options seemingly bombard the world’s population at a never-ending assault, Nashville-based songwriter, Molly Parden, aims to be understated. Her work is subtle. It hovers. While so many of her contemporary peers present explosions and songwriting pyrotechnics, Parden prefers a float down the river with a few pals. The artist, who grew up in a suburb outside Atlanta before moving to the metropolis and, later, landed in the Music City, is set to release her latest solo record, Rosemary, on November 13th. For Parden, who is so experienced at working in other people’s projects (more on this later), the forthcoming EP is a rare offering of her solo work in collection. And today we are happy to premiere the video for the EP’s new single, “Who Are We Kiddin’.”

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Whenever 21-time platinum-selling rock ‘n’ roll band, Hootie & the Blowfish, get together to write and record a new album, the group’s lead guitarist, Mark Bryan, usually leaves with enough material for a new solo record. Each of the four core members of Hootie write and so when the band gets together, as it did for its recent 2019 release, some 70-80 songs are composed. From the batch that don’t make the final album, Bryan reuses the favorite ideas he’s found and written, bringing them to his own studio. This was precisely the process for the musician’s forthcoming solo album, Midlife Priceless, which he will release in April 2021. Today, we are happy to premiere the record’s first single, “Wanna Feel Something,” on which Bryan sings about Hootie’s recent successful reunion.

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Mark Everett, principle songwriter and front man for the Los Angeles indie rock band, Eels, was just trying to make his friend happy. Dora, an old friend of the musician’s who used to work on the band’s tour crew as the lighting director, was feeling blue and Everett (better known as “E”) wanted to cheer her up. The two were text messaging back and forth when, suddenly, E realized the exchange made for good song lyrics. Maybe they could be spun in a way to cheer other people up too? A day or two later, Jeff Lyster, who is known as “The Chet,” sent E a bit of music and he realized it would be perfect for Dora’s text message song. It’s an open temperament like this that’s willing to accept creative “lightening strikes” that’s buoyed Eels for 25 years. And it continues today with the band’s latest LP, Earth to Dora, set for release Oct. 30th.

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When he’s not eating, sleeping or talking, celebrated songwriter, Andrew Bird, says he’s often whistling. At first, though, the Suzuki method-trained violinist thought whistling sounded cheap, not classically musical or respectable enough for his nuanced records. But, after dropping a few without his signature high-end sound, Bird relented. Now, he and his whistle are creatively inseparable on his many anticipated releases. It even landed prominently on his forthcoming holiday album, Hark! Bird recorded the new record over two periods of time – one pre-pandemic and one during – and he’s set to unveil the complete 13-track LP on October 30th (with a vinyl release on November 13th).

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For at least a little while, Gavin Rossdale says his voice was actually an obstruction to his success, not the reason for it. The gravely-voiced front man of the U.K. group, Bush, says that when he and the band were on the rise in the late 80s and early 90s, there was a wave of music that didn’t quickly welcome in a rough, raw singer like Rossdale. At the time, Britpop was all the rage, with bands like Blur, Oasis and Suede topping the charts. But Rossdale was more into – and reflected – groups like Soundgarden, Soul Asylum and Jane’s Addiction. Rugged, ravaged bands with aggression built into their distorted chords. But, eventually, a harder version of rock took the world by storm. Suddenly, Bush was at the center of it. The band’s success continues today with the release of its 2020 album, The Kingdom, which hit number-one on the Billboard Hard Music Albums chart and is available in a deluxe format this week.

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Los Angeles-based singer and songwriter, Eric Bellinger, wants to make everything better. The artist, who has done just about everything under the sun when it comes to the music business, has collaborated with famed celebrities like Justin Bieber and Usher, opened for Ashanti while singing in an R&B group and, as a solo artist, released over a dozen records to date. Bellinger’s latest project, the forthcoming LP, Eric B for President: Term 3, highlights his smooth voice, intricate writing styles and steadfast relationship with his longtime wife. But, it may come as no surprise, that’s not the most noteworthy part. Bellinger wrote and assembled much of the album at home live in real-time with his fans during quarantine.

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It had only been a few weeks and Cassandra Peterson was on her way to The Tonight Show to meet and talk with the famed host, Johnny Carson. That’s when she knew what she’d made was going to be huge. Peterson, known better as the ghoulish goddess, Elvira (“Mistress of the Dark”), had been hosting her B-movie horror television show for just a couple weeks, she says, when the late night show called. At the time, she was a local personality in Los Angeles. With Carson’s blessing, though, she could become a star. Ever since that appearance in 1981, Elvira has become a household name, especially during the Halloween season. And this month, Peterson, in character, dropped her latest single, “Don’t Cancel Halloween!” The track is but another in a successful string of releases for the Queen of Halloween that will continue well into next year.

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Just a few days ago, Atlanta-based R&B singer-songwriter, Queen Naija, celebrated her 25th birthday. While, in many ways, she is still quite a young person, Naija has, nevertheless, already seen a great deal of life. She is a mother to two little sons, she’s been married and divorced, and she’s already built up several prominent careers. But, if you ask her, she’ll tell you that she’s “only just getting started.” The often-glamorous, smooth-singing talent will release her debut LP, missunderstood, October 30th on the heels of several successful single releases and her self-titled Queen Naija EP. But, despite the many gains, Naija continues to focus on topping herself. For the new LP, she wrote and rewrote dozens of songs before landing on the cohesive collection that comprise her forthcoming record.

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Nashville singer-songwriter, Jessie Baylin, practically grew up in a New Jersey bar. Her parents owned the restaurant and, subsequently, had to spend nearly all their waking hours there. Baylin, as a result, was treated to life lessons and people watching in the establishment that would stay with her throughout her years.

Today, relationships (and food) matter significantly to her.
She prizes interactions that feel familial, warm. This energy permeates Baylin’s forthcoming re-release of her record, Pleasure Center EP, which the musician composed with the now-late producer, Richard Swift.

Baylin will release the EP in stores on Oct 24th and digitally October 30th and we’re happy to premiere the video for the EP’s track, “Storms,” here today.

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Chris Barron, founder of the Grammy-nominated rock ‘n’ roll band, The Spin Doctors, likes to make people happy. He’s a songwriter and, as such, he says, that’s his job. He’s proud of this vocation and it’s evident in much of the music he makes – from his recent solo work to his band’s hits like, “Two Princes.” It’s also exemplified in his newfound weekly routine. Every Saturday – or, Caturday – Barron hops on Twitter and engages with his 128,000 followers, sharing and posting charming, cute and lovely pictures of cats all with the aim of spreading cheer. It’s one of the few bright spots on the social media platform that too often engages in toxic bickering or political arguments. For Barron, offering joy amidst difficulty has always been what his life has been about.

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It’s not easy to write a book. To pen a biography of, say, a celebrity-artist like Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell, it takes hundreds of hours of research. You have to find the right macro- and micro-narratives. You have to interview dozens of people, ask difficult questions and be open to surprising responses. You also have to not drive yourself crazy along the way, either by taking on the dark realities you research or by thinking you can’t handle the task of writing Cornell’s biography in the first place.

This is what Northwest writer, Corbin Reiff, had to go through (endure?) in order to research, write and produce his recent accomplishment, Total Fucking Godhead, the biography of the screeching, model handsome Cornell, who died in 2017 of suicide, which is available now.

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When famed music video director, Mark Pellington, asked Matthew Caws, front man and principle songwriter for the rock ‘n’ roll band, Nada Surf, what he was reading, a world of possibilities unfurled.

Caws had been studying writings – meditations – by his father, Peter, a well-respected professor of Philosophy. At the time, Pellington and Caws were discussing a few possibilities for videos for Nada Surf’s 2020 LP release, Never Not Together. But after Caws described what he’d been reviewing, he and Pellington went to work creating the 10-minute music video masterpiece for the song, “Just Wait,” which features a desolate cityscape and both Caws and his now-late father reading existential, self-assuring lines from those poetic meditations. We are happy to exclusively premiere that video here today.

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