Justin Vernon of Bon Iver took to Twitter to offer some thoughts on the Grammys:
I have to say Ken Ehlrich is a dick producer. I’m with Lorde on this, hard. Ken told us Holocene (roty, soty nominee in 2011 (?)) was “too long and slow and that we’d lose 4-6 million viewers cause of that” – and that he’s broken a lot of careers on the show, so I should listen.
Frank Turner sat down with NME to talk about his upcoming album:
I always try and have a different mental approach to each record that I make. The last album that we did was sonically and stylistically a bit of a retrenchment, a bit of an attempt to restate first principles, and I liked it, I’m really proud of that record. We cut the record in nine days with a live band and it’s quite stripped back and lean, but now it’s absolutely different. And it’s my seventh album, I feel like I’ve earned the right to expand my sonic boundaries and possibly a duty to as well. There are people in this world who want me to remake ‘Love Ire & Song’ every two and a half years and they are going to be disappointed, but at the same time I’m not taking Love Ire & Song’ away from them.
Jem Aswad, writing for Variety:
Sources close to the situation tell Variety that the Grammys approached Lorde about performing with other artists but not solo; one source says it was part of a tribute to the late Tom Petty involving his song “American Girl” (which would have been an odd fit for the New Zealand-born singer). Lorde declined.
That source added that the other Album of the Year contenders — all of whom are male — were offered solo spots performing songs from their respective nominated albums.
Michele Amabile Angermiller, writing at Variety:
The only woman presented a solo Grammy during the awards telecast on Sunday night? Alessia Cara, who took home best new artist. Recording Academy president Neil Portnow was asked by Variety about #GrammysSoMale and had this to say:
“It has to begin with… women who have the creativity in their hearts and souls, who want to be musicians, who want to be engineers, producers, and want to be part of the industry on the executive level… [They need] to step up because I think they would be welcome. I don’t have personal experience of those kinds of brick walls that you face but I think it’s upon us — us as an industry — to make the welcome mat very obvious, breeding opportunities for all people who want to be creative and paying it forward and creating that next generation of artists.”
Gee, I wonder why no one watches this boring, too long, and completely out of touch show.
Dominic Patten, writing at Deadline:
James Corden’s second kick at the Grammy host can last night saw 19.81 million tune into watch music’s supposedly biggest night. That’s down 24% from the final viewership of the February 12, 2107 Grammys and the worst the CBS aired ceremony has done since 2009.
The 2018 Grammys were last night and Billboard has a list of all of the winners. The top line is Bruno Mars won album, record, and song of the year. Ed Sheeran won best pop song and album of the year and Portugal. The Man won best pop song for a duo/group.
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iOS 11.3 is bringing music videos to Apple Music:
Apple Music will soon be the home for music videos. Users can stream all the music videos they want without being interrupted by ads. They can also watch the hottest new videos, the classics or ones from their favorite artists back-to-back in new music video playlists.
Pete Wentz, transcribed in Variety:
Today, you can’t necessarily think, “Rock music has to be this and it can’t be that.” We’re challenging the notion of what rock music can be. Listening to a playlist might mean going from a Beatles song into Twenty One Pilots into Lil Yachty. Kids are going to arenas to see Imagine Dragons and to hear those big songs. But they’re also checking out Bleachers and Jack Antonoff; he’s one of the biggest pop producers — one who clearly approaches songs as a kid in his bedroom listening to punk rock.
Matt Skiba of Alkaline Trio sat down with Noisey to rank the band’s albums:
Crimson is one of my favorite Trio records. It’s the last record we made with Jerry Finn and, for a while, I couldn’t listen to it. There was so much of Jerry Finn in the production. Now, when I listen to Crimson, sometimes I think about Jerry, and I miss him, but for the most part I’m just really grateful that we had the opportunity to work with the most amazing producer for our genre that there’s ever been. I’m really thankful for that album, and I’m really thankful for Jerry’s friendship. He was one of my best friends.
Lucas Shaw, writing at Billboard:
In recent months, YouTube has given a handful of musicians a couple hundred thousand dollars to produce videos and promote their work on billboards, part of a larger campaign to improve the site’s relationship with the music industry.
Yet such support comes with a catch, with some musicians required to promise the won’t say negative things about YouTube, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private business transactions. Non-disparagement agreements are common in business, but YouTube’s biggest direct competitors in music don’t require them, the people said.
Over the weekend Alt Press ran a story headlined with, “Are My Chemical Romance planning a tour?,” based on the following evidence:
The band’s site was updated with an “MCRX TOUR” announcement, and the description reads: “Check back soon for more details on the upcoming tour.”
Upcoming tour?
We’re freaking out a little bit. (OK, we’re freaking out A LOT.)
This damn line on their website causes a freakout every few months.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but the website has had that same blurb on it for years. Here it is in October of 2016.
If and when My Chemical Romance return, given everything we know about the band, I’d have to imagine it’ll be a well thought out and produced announcement.1
And I am a believer that it’s a when, not an if, I just don’t know when.↩
Pop Etc. have debuted their new song “Losing Yourself” on Noisetrade.