Earlier this week, two of Latin music’s biggest stars clashed over YouTube accounting. Don Omar, a reggaeton veteran with a slew of hits in the 2000s, called in to the radio show Alofoke to suggest that some artists who claimed to be popular were actually just buying their views. Ozuna, …
Read More »On the Sinister Majesty of Black Sabbath
When Black Sabbath first attempted to tour America in 1970, they had a Hell of a time. “We had to face the mayor of [every] town,” drummer Bill Ward once recalled. “We were banned all the time. They were afraid of us. They thought we were going to put a …
Read More »The Dixie Chicks Return to Country Radio, Prompting Angry Calls
On September 4th, Mike Chase and Amy Faust — morning show hosts for the country station KWJJ in Portland, Oregon — cued up Taylor Swift‘s “Soon You’ll Get Better,” a quietly resilient acoustic ballad featuring the Dixie Chicks. “It’s a song about her own mother struggling with cancer,” Chase explains. …
Read More »RS Road Test: Hayley Kiyoko Drives an All-Electric SUV
Hayley Kiyoko knows cars. Her dream rideshave included a Bugatti Veyron — among the fastest production cars on Earth — and classics like a ’57 Chevy and an Austin-Healey. She can talk everything from torque curves to five-star safety ratings. “I’m obsessed,” Kiyoko says as she pilots an Audi e-tron …
Read More »Why This Is a Golden Age for New Artists (So Long as They Keep Their Ambitions in Check)
What Is happening to streaming’s superstars? That was the big question asked in this very column two months ago. The answer, delivered by a myriad of game-changing stats: they’re getting squeezed. New data now shows that this trend isn’t going away – and is, in fact, calcifying. Industry monitor Nielsen …
Read More »Five Things We Learned From Stephen Malkmus in Our Podcast Interview
In the latest episode of our podcast, Rolling Stone Music Now, Stephen Malkmus breaks down his new solo album, Groove Denied — which combines digital experimentation with some more traditionally Malkmus-ian moments — and touches on many other topics. Most notably, he hints that another Pavement reunion is back in …
Read More »Fueled By Controversy, Lil Nas X's 'Old Town Road' Is on a Record-Breaking Run
In the space of just a few weeks, Lil Nas X‘s “Old Town Road” has already enjoyed multiple lives, transforming from a goofy TikTok craze to a left-field hit to a rallying cry for those who want to eliminate the barriers between genres. Now the single has reached a new …
Read More »Song You Need To Know: The Good, the Bad & the Queen, 'The Truce of Twilight'
“Enjoy it while it lasts, because soon it will be different,” sings Damon Albarn in a new video for “The Truce of Twilight,” from last year’s Merrie Land by his group The Good, The Bad, and the Queen. Actually, it’s the second clip for the song. The first, released last …
Read More »Pearl Jam's Mike McCready on His Fine Arts Renaissance
Mike McCready‘s mother taught art for nearly three decades, and she instilled in him a great love of painting and sculpture. But even though he liked art, the omnipresence of works by Monet, Van Gogh and Warhol intimidated him when it came to making his own visual art. McCready would …
Read More »Some Albums Take Years. Ariana Grande Made 'Thank U, Next' in 2 Weeks
Two weeks ago, the singer-songwriter Victoria Monét made a trip to Disneyland with her friend and longtime collaborator Ariana Grande. “We go often, and there are always fans,” Monét says. “But this particular time, she was [like] Michael Jackson. Security was like, ‘no pictures please, thank you,’ and a fan …
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