Credit: Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP
For a music fan, few experiences rival listening to a new artist and recognizing their potential for greatness -- or, in some special cases, witnessing someone capture that magic completely the first time around. We at Stereogum aim to be ahead of the curve -- it's our job! -- and every fall we highlight the new artists we're most excited about in our Best New Bands list. This list acts as both recognition...
Pink is having the last laugh. This past summer, when MTV awarded its Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award to the singer born Alecia Beth Moore, there was much social media cackling; surely they weren't serious about elevating this durable and reliable hitmaker to the same iconic level as Beyoncé, Kanye West, and Justin Timberlake? When this year's VMAs broadcast drew pathetic ratings, those of us...
One sunny afternoon in Charlottesville, the singer-songwriter Julien Baker is excitedly chatting about her guitar pedals when a local homeless man walks up and asks her for some money. Baker hands him a dollar and then apologizes for not having more cash than that. Then she asks him if he's hungry, and she gets up from the outdoor coffee-shop table where we've been talking and walks with him to a pizzeria...
For me, the weirdest thing about Young Thug doing a full album with Future is that Young Thug has already done a whole album with a fake Future -- and the album he made with the fake Future happens to be the best thing he's ever done. In fairness, it's probably reductive to call Rich Homie Quan a fake Future; he's done enough in his career to be considered on his own merits. But when Thug and Rich...
As a music lover, it’s hard to have a “scary” Halloween costume. You can only be “ghost Dave Grohl” so many years in a row before the initial terrifying shock of your costume wears off, and now you’re just a sheet with drumsticks. “Oh, I guess she’s ‘ghost Dave Grohl.’ ...Again.” Nobody screaming at the sight of you anymore, nobody running away. People come to expect it. With...
The rock 'n' roll pioneer Fats Domino has died. No cause of death has been reported yet, but the local CBS affiliate WWL reports that Domino died peacefully while surrounded by family. He was 89. Domino was born Antoine Domino, Jr. in New Orleans, the eighth of nine children in a French Creole family. His first language was French. In 1947, a teenage Domino accepted an invitation from bandleader Billy...
Soon after Crystal Castles broke up in 2014, Alice Glass hinted at the manipulative behavior that she was subjected to by the duo's other half Ethan Kath (real name Claudio Palmieri). When she released her first solo single, Glass wrote about removing herself "from an abusive relationship that started when [she] was a teenager," though did not name who the song was about. Today, she's posted a statement...
Welcome to the latest installment of "Tracking Down," a new Stereogum franchise in which we talk to artists who have been out of the spotlight for a minute. The Donnas' greatest song, "Get Rid Of That Girl" was released two decades ago, and it's still charming as ever in its ramshackle garage-pop way. In under two minutes these expert Ramone clones figure out how they're gonna dispatch a "fine" boy's...
One sunny afternoon in Charlottesville, the singer-songwriter Julien Baker is excitedly chatting about her guitar pedals when a local homeless man walks up and asks her for some money. Baker hands him a dollar and then apologizes for not having more cash than that. Then she asks him if he’s hungry, and she gets up…
One of John Maus’ favorite pop songs is “Dynamite” by Taio Cruz. I know this because he sang the chorus for me a few weeks ago at a park on a crisp, fall afternoon in Brooklyn. Maus revealed his love for this song toward the end of a long conversation about his new album, Screen…
Dive through the sea of sounds that emerged from of the 1980s and you’ll find the material that pulls on your senses the strongest. Maybe it’s metal or new wave or R&B. Perhaps you even quietly, unironically dig Huey Lewis And The News. But if there’s one act with the ability to unite all consumers…
During the epochal period when Belle And Sebastian were making albums such as If You’re Feeling Sinister, Tigermilk, The Boy With The Arab Strap and winning hearts for their wistful melodies and lovelorn character studies, the Scottish indie pop group were also releasing EPs like Lazy Line Painter Jane and Dog On Wheels that allowed…
John Carpenter, the director of such genre-defining shockers as Halloween, The Fog, The Thing, and Christine, permanently scarred our collective childhood with his knack for spooky storytelling. Now, at the age of 69, he’s not only experiencing a deserved career Renaissance, he’s also embracing his status as — plot twist! — a recording artist.
“Hello, baby, how are you doing,” Princess Nokia greets me on the phone. Her voice is tender and genuine. She has been touring for the last year and a half and remains ridiculously busy, but in this rare free moment she’s chatting about 1992 Deluxe, Rough Trade’s expanded re-release of last year’s breakout mixtape 1992.
In the relatively short amount of time they’ve been a band, Toronto four-piece Weaves have garnered a good amount of well-deserved acclaim. Last year, we named them a Band To Watch ahead of their self-titled debut, a collection of bright, frazzled art-rock that wound up earning Weaves a ton of buzz and a nomination for…
Ten years ago, when R.E.M.’s Automatic For The People turned 15, Stereogum released a compilation of artists covering each song from the album (Drive XV is still available here) and, at the time, we got Mike Mills to talk a little bit about every track. Today, Automatic For The People turns 25 — an extensive…
It’s hard to place Faris Badwan. There’s the fact that his name alone sounds exotic. There’s the fact that his demeanor is some improbable mix of stoned, moody detachment and wired, up-all-night intensity. He speaks in a wispy, wandering murmur that could equally signal boredom, mild frustration, aloofness, or reflection. And, obviously, there’s the way…
Welcome to the fourth installment of “Tracking Down,” a new Stereogum franchise in which we talk to artists who have been out of the spotlight for a minute.…
When Jessica Lea Mayfield moved from Ohio to Tennessee a few years ago, it was not merely a professional decision. The relocation put her at the heart of the music industry in Nashville, but more crucially it gave a new start after some incredibly traumatic events in her life. A singer with a gracefully laconic…
Strike one for an indie band forming in 2009: playing “really bad, wussy emo rock 10 years after it was relevant.” Strike two: doing so in Willimantic, Connecticut, a city commonly known as “Heroin Town” in a state whose most renowned rock band to that point was probably Hatebreed. Strike three: call yourself the World…
Lisa-Kaindé and Naomi Díaz are twin sisters who make up the aptly named duo Ibeyi, which translates to “Twins” in the Yoruban language of West Africa. When I met up with them in New York, the two had arrived in the city an hour before — Lisa-Kaindé flew in from London and Naomi from Paris.
Someone hands Joe Casey another drink. He leans back, a smile breaking his reddened face as he observes it, his fingers now cradling an empty whiskey glass and a new apple juice/whiskey concoction, which looks pretty much just like whiskey. An unlit cigarette — the who-knows-which installment in a seriously endless lineage of pre-show smokes…
Rick Antonoff looks like he’s second-guessing this. Wearing a T-shirt and shorts, he’s perched on a board in a dunk tank, surveying the crowd gathered to watch as people take their shot at hitting the target — which clangs with a sound that immediately conjures state fairs and old carnivals — to send him into…
