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New Sufjan Stevens Songs in Upcoming Film

Sufjan Stevens
Jason Tate

The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that Sufjan Stevens will have new original songs in the upcoming film Call Me By Your Name:

Set to debut in the festival’s Premieres section on Jan. 22, Call Me by Your Name is based on Andre Aciman’s novel of the same name and stars Armie Hammer as a 24-year old American scholar spending the summer of 1983 in Northern Italy, where he attracts the attention of a 17-year-old Jewish-American boy, played by Timothee Chalamet. Michael Stuhlbarg rounds out the cast as the boy’s father.

Frank Iero Discusses Last Year’s Traffic Accident

Frank Iero
Jason Tate

Frank Iero sat down with MTV to talk about the traffic accident he was involved in last year:

“The amount of HD-clarity that transpired in the next few moments is engraved in my memory,” Iero tells me. “I can remember every second, every action, every sound. I had this little briefcase pedal board that I had been carrying around with me. I put that down and I turned around to say to Evan and Paul, ‘I think I’m just going to take the tuner out of here.’ I said, ‘I think’ — that’s all I got out of my mouth.”

Medium Announces Layoffs

Jason Tate

Medium will be laying off a third of their employees:

Upon further reflection, it’s clear that the broken system is ad-driven media on the internet. It simply doesn’t serve people. In fact, it’s not designed to. The vast majority of articles, videos, and other “content” we all consume on a daily basis is paid for — directly or indirectly — by corporations who are funding it in order to advance their goals. And it is measured, amplified, and rewarded based on its ability to do that. Period. As a result, we get…well, what we get. And it’s getting worse.

That’s a big part of why we are making this change today.

I don’t see much here about what this new approach will be, and without knowing that, I have to remain skeptical. The bigger issue is how most ad-driven media on the internet has worked for decades. It incentivizes clickbait by measuring clicks and page views when advertisers should be more concerned about attention and influence. Online publishers have to make a lot of difficult decisions about what kinds of advertising they want to run, and most of the times they’re completely beholden to what those buying the ads want from them. So you get multiple interstitial pop-ups, impossible to close full screen ads, and other bullshit that advertisers think work because they’re measuring the wrong things. How many times have you accidentally clicked on a mobile ad because of how intrusive it was?

Anecdotally, we’ve seen higher click-through rates on our banners and feed sponsors than I was ever seeing with the horrific ads we were forced to run on AbsolutePunk. But even with that it’s because of our supporters that this website is able to keep running. I still believe readers helping to fund the publications they love will play a big part in the future of online publishing.

Head of Coachella’s Parent Company Is a Real Asshole

Jason Tate

Alex Galbraith, writing for Uproxx, details how Coachella’s parent company, AEG, is helmed by the extreme right-winger Philip Anschutz:

“Phil Anschutz’s extensive influence in Colorado politics has been known for years, but the degree of his support for anti-LGBTQ groups that fund extremist hate groups like Gordon Kligenschmitt’s ‘Pray in Jesus Name’ is shocking,” said ProgressNow Colorado executive director Ian Silverii in a press release. “At a time in American history when discrimination and violence against LGBTQ citizens is on the rise, support for pro-discrimination groups puts Anschutz on the wrong side of Colorado, and on the wrong side of history.”

Just something to think about before spending your money.

Gerard Way Blogs About 2017 Plans

Gerard Way
Jason Tate

Gerard Way has posted an update on his website for his plans in 2017. It looks like we’ll be getting some new music along with all the other creative shit Gerard always thinks up:

Music—I’ll start with my music. I am always writing music, I am very lucky that way—there is always an idea and something that inspires me, even if it takes me a minute to figure out what I want to say, which is what really creates the space between releases. I am about to convert a structure on our property into a recording studio, which actually won’t take a lot of work as the space is already pretty perfect. Great drums sounds and church ceilings. Secret echo chambers. I look forward to making some really weird stuff here, and mine for the really hard to get diamonds.

Terrence Malik to Release ‘Song to Song’ in March

Jason Tate

Terrence Malik’s new film, Song to Song, will be released in March of 2017:

In this modern love story set against the Austin, Texas music scene, two entangled couples — struggling songwriters Faye (Rooney Mara) and BV (Ryan Gosling), and music mogul Cook (Michael Fassbender) and the waitress whom he ensnares (Natalie Portman) — chase success through a rock ‘n’ roll landscape of seduction and betrayal.

Ok, I’m in.

Subscription Streaming Grew in 2016

Headphones
Jason Tate

BuzzAngle have released their annual report that tracks U.S. music consumption:

The continued explosion of audio stream consumption, which increased 82.6% to 250B streams, fueled this increase. Both album sales and song sales continued to decline but the transition to these new access methods has shown to provide overall growth and a sustainable business model for the future. Breaking down the tremendous streaming growth shows what is perhaps the most important stat of the year: the percentage of subscription streams rose from 62% of the total in 2015 to 76% of the total in 2016. The number of 2016 subscription streams grew over 2.25x the 2015 subscription streams amount.

I’m not sure I agree with the premise that this proves streaming is a “sustainable business model for the future,” but the trend lines are in the right direction and I think more artists and labels are figuring out how to use the streaming services to their benefit.

More From Keith Buckley on The Damned Things

Alternative Press
Jason Tate

Keith Buckley talked with Alternative Press about The Damned Things working on new material:

“While we have more than enough material for an EP, we are still very much in the “demo” phase,” he told AP, “rearranging riffs and trying different things vocally. And though it’s a little too early to say what the next release will sound like comprehensively, we’ve taken a different approach to writing this time around. Things are more atmospheric and weirder. We’ve loosened up a bit and learned to let our major influences speak. In that way, it’s the truest sound we’re capable of,” said Buckley.