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Inside an Alleged Abusive Emo ‘Sex Cult’

Jason Tate

Amy Zimmerman, writing for The Daily Beast:

Earlier this month, accusations started circulating about William Francis, the former lead singer of emo band Aiden who goes by the stage name William Control. […] [A]ccording to accusations made by multiple women, Francis only purported to practice BDSM; in fact, they claim, he physically and emotionally abused women, ordered many of them to get matching tattoos of his initials, and even demanded contracts from his sexual partners or “slaves,” signed in their own blood.

This is extremely difficult to read.

The Earliest Images of the Moon Were So Much Better Than We Knew

Globe
Jason Tate

Ryan Smith, writing at World of Indie:

Fifty years ago, 5 unmanned lunar orbiters circled the moon, taking extremely high resolution photos of the surface. They were trying to find the perfect landing site for the Apollo missions. They would be good enough to blow up to 40 x 54ft images that the astronauts would walk across looking for the great spot. After their use, the images were locked away from the public until after the bulk of the moon landings, as at the time they would have revealed the superior technology of the USA’s spy satellite cameras, which the orbiters cameras were designed from. The main worry was the USSR gaining valuable information about landing sites that the US wanted to use.

Frightened Rabbit’s Meltdown Set Replaced by Mental Health Panel

Frightened Rabbit
Jason Tate

Jazz Monroe, writing at Pitchfork:

Meltdown festival will today host a mental health panel in place of the scheduled set by Frightened Rabbit, whose frontperson Scott Hutchison died last month in an apparent suicide. Clinical psychologist Jay Watts will moderate the talk with Throwing Muses’ Kristin Hersh, Placebo’s Stefan Olsdal, musician and poet Dizraeli, and Christine Brown of music charity Help Musicians UK, the Guardian reports.

Warner Music Launching Standalone Elektra Music Group

Warner Music
Jason Tate

Hannah Karp, writing for Billboard:

Warner Music Group is launching a new standalone record company to be staffed by a mix of WMG employees and new hires.

The company, Elektra Music Group, will launch October 1 and consist of WMG’s labels Elektra Records, Fueled By Ramen (FBR), Roadrunner Records, Low Country Sound, and Black Cement Records, marking the first time in 15 years that the storied Elektra label will operate independently. Heading the new 60-person team will be FBR/Roadrunner president Mike Easterlin and Elektra’s current president Gregg Nadel.

Upgrade Your Account: No Ads and Dark Mode for $25 a Year

Jason Tate

You can upgrade your forum account to unlock Dark Mode and remove advertisements from this website. For as little as $3 per month or $25 per year you’ll get all the forum perks and you’ll be helping support this website and support its continued development.

This website can’t exist without your support. If you have the means, please consider signing up. With the the current economics on the internet, and our decision to respect you and not fill the website with disgusting ads and trackers, we need the support of readers like you to exist.

Thank you.

This Clarinetist’s Career Was Derailed by a Deleted Scholarship Letter

BuzzFeed
Jason Tate

Brianna Sacks, writing at BuzzFeed:

Eric Abramovitz had been training for this moment for nearly his entire life: the opportunity to study under one of the best clarinet teachers on the planet, on a full-ride scholarship to a prestigious music conservatory in Los Angeles. […] What happened next, outlined in interviews and court documents filed in Abramovitz’s successful lawsuit against Lee, paint the picture of a promising “what if” life trajectory knocked off its rails by what a Canadian judge called “despicable interference” by a selfish girlfriend.

This story is bonkers. I sent it to my violinist girlfriend and she read the entire thing slack-jawed.

Blink-182 Talk About “The Party Song”

blink-182
Jason Tate

Mark Hoppus of Blink-182 talked with Las Vegas Weekly about playing “The Party Song” during their Las Vegas residency:

I’ll peel back the curtain a little bit. For us and for hardcore Blink fans, it was a cool song, [but it’s] a deep cut from an album that came out almost 20 years ago, so a lot of people just had no idea. And first of all, it’s a hard song to play…It’s super fast. There’s nowhere to breathe. We had to work long and hard at rehearsal so that I sing the majority of the line and Matt sings the end of the line, just long enough for me to take a break and start the next line. It was a lot of work to do, and we played it and some people were like, “I can’t believe they’re playing this!” and some people were like, “What is this song?” These are good problems to have, that your catalog is so big some people don’t recognize the songs.

The Oral History of The Gaslight Anthem’s ‘The ’59 Sound’

Jason Tate

Robert Mays, writing at The Ringer, has put together an oral history of The Gaslight Anthem’s The ’59 Sound:

The intangible thing of “The ’59 Sound,” it didn’t mean anything about the ’50s. I didn’t imagine people banging on jukeboxes and Fonzie and all that. I’m not interested in any of that. To me, it reminded me of my grandmother and a time where simpler things were valued more. Friendships, relationships, and that kind of thing. There weren’t so many distractions. You didn’t have so many goals. Now, a kid grows up, and he could be anything. That’s great, but it’s also very daunting. Because which one of the anythings do you be?

Looking for Life on a Flat Earth

The New Yorker
Jason Tate

Alan Burdick, writing at The New Yorker:

If you are only just waking up to the twenty-first century, you should know that, according to a growing number of people, much of what you’ve been taught about our planet is a lie: Earth really is flat. We know this because dozens, if not hundreds, of YouTube videos describe the coverup. We’ve listened to podcasts—Flat Earth Conspiracy, The Flat Earth Podcast—that parse the minutiae of various flat-Earth models, and the very wonkiness of the discussion indicates that the over-all theory is as sound and valid as any other scientific theory. We know because on a clear, cool day it is sometimes possible, from southwestern Michigan, to see the Chicago skyline, more than fifty miles away—an impossibility were Earth actually curved.

Maybe, and stay with me here, the internet was a massive mistake.

HAIM Fire Their Booking Agent

HAIM
Jason Tate

Sam Moore, writing for NME:

Haim have spoken out about their decision to sack one of their agents after they discovered that they’d been paid significantly less for a festival appearance than a male artist they shared the bill with.

The California trio didn’t disclose which festival show they’d been underpaid for, but they did say that the experience of receiving less than 10 times the pay of that undisclosed male artist was “fucked up”.

Forum Highlight: “Chorus Music Club Society”

Chorus.fm Logo
Jason Tate

One of the best parts of our forum community are the bonds people create over introducing someone to a new band, or album, they haven’t heard before. One of the great ways this happens is in the “Chorus Music Club Society” thread. As the brainchild of forum user Bad Frequencies I figured it was best to have him describe it:

The Chorus Music Club Society (CMCS) is a music trade and review club that functions like a book club and is a gateway to get exposed to music you wouldn’t have thought to listen to before and expose others to your favorites. Each session, which runs Monday through the following Monday, you are partnered with someone different. The two of you talk and decide between 1-2 albums to trade with eachother at the beginning of the session that the other hasn’t heard before. Throughout the week, you listen to the albums your partner has given you and when you have a good grasp on it, report back and review it (why you liked/didn’t like it, favorite/least favorite songs, rating, RIYL and so on).

There is no length requirement for the review, they can be as long or short as you like, as long as it expresses your feelings on the album. This allows you to meet people you wouldn’t have met before on the threads, listen to artists you might not have thought to listen to, and share your favorites with others in a sense of community and a sharing of love for music. Many of us have discovered new favorite albums this way! On top of this, we also have added reviews of concerts you have been to as well as release day reviews, which are optional.

It’s very simple to join, simply contact Bad Frequencies or post in the thread saying you want to join or have questions.