John Nolan of Taking Back Sunday talked with Consequence about “Bike Scene:”
“Bike Scene” was the first song that was named by looking at the cable guide channel at 2:00 a.m. to find interesting titles. Adam and I saw that there was [an episode of the motorcycle show American Thunder] called “Monterey Peninsula Bike Scene” on and felt that had to be the name of a song. It was eventually shortened to “Bike Scene,” and I still regret it.
“Music has always been part of our core at Apple, and bringing it to hundreds of millions of users in the way iPod did impacted more than just the music industry — it also redefined how music is discovered, listened to, and shared,” said Greg Joswiak, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Today, the spirit of iPod lives on. We’ve integrated an incredible music experience across all of our products, from the iPhone to the Apple Watch to HomePod mini, and across Mac, iPad, and Apple TV. And Apple Music delivers industry-leading sound quality with support for spatial audio — there’s no better way to enjoy, discover, and experience music.”
I remember my very first iPod. 10 GB. Black and white. And I loved it.
Brooklyn Vegan has a look back at the Atticus … Dragging the Lake compilation, which was releases twenty years ago on Side One Dummy Records.
It helped shine even more of a light on Drive-Thru Records, which was a crucial player in emo/pop punk crossover and which was growing rapidly thanks to the success of their flagship band New Found Glory and a then-recent deal with MCA Records (home of blink-182). NFG, who were already pretty big at this point and about to be much bigger upon dropping Sticks and Stones a month after this comp came out, were represented with their then-rare Christmas song “Ex-Miss,” and other Drive-Thru bands who were on the cusp of breakthroughs were there too. Philly emo-leaning pop punks The Starting Line were there with “Greg’s Last Day” from their 2001 debut EP With Hopes of Starting Over, and a few months later they’d begin rapidly rising with their debut LP Say It Like You Mean It. Long Island emo/melodic hardcore band The Movielife made the cut with “Walking On Glass,” one of the best songs from their 2001 EP The Movielife Has A Gambling Problem. Finch, who were instrumental in putting a pop punk-friendly spin on post-harcore, made the cut with “Post Script” from their debut LP What It Is To Burn, which came out a couple months before Dragging the Lake.
Pusha T has the number one album in the country:
Pusha T scores his first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart as It’s Almost Drydebuts atop the list dated May 7. It earned 55,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in the week ending April 28, according to Luminate. Streaming activity comprised 83% of the hip-hop album’s first-week unit total.
Jay Peters, writing at The Verge:
Epic Games has filed a motion for a preliminary injunction to stop Google from removing independent music storefront Bandcamp from the Android app store — which Google has apparently threatened to do because Bandcamp is using its own billing system instead of paying Google an app store fee.
Bandcamp, which Epic acquired in March, has used its own billing system on Android since 2015, and was able to do so because of rules exempting digital music from having to use Google’s billing system, according to a blog post from Bandcamp co-founder and CEO Ethan Diamond. “However, Google is now modifying its rules to require Bandcamp (and other apps like it) to exclusively use Google Play Billing for payments for digital goods and services, and pay a revenue share to Google,” Diamond says
Country music star Naomi Judd has passed away:
Naomi Judd, who as one half of the mother-daughter duo the Judds dominated the country music charts in the 1980s with a blend of tight vocal harmonies, traditional arrangements and modern pop aesthetics, died on Saturday outside Nashville. She was 76.
Kim Masters, writing at Hollywood Reporter:
And now, back to the drama. Several important Netflix creators voice a very consistent theory about what’s gone wrong with the streamer’s culture. They see a link between Netflix’s problems and the 2020 fall of Cindy Holland, who played a key role in launching the service’s originals — brilliantly and often expensively — with House of Cards, Orange Is the New Black and Stranger Things, among others.
These sources say Holland was the one who nurtured strong relationships with talent and took time to offer thoughtful development notes while still making people feel safe and supported in pursuing their passion projects.
Important multihyphenates who work or have worked with Netflix say it was Holland rather than Ted Sarandos, then chief content officer, who gave Netflix its profile as a home to buzzy, quality shows. (It was also Holland who warned Sarandos, to no avail, that continuing to order specials from one of his comedy heroes, Dave Chappelle, would lead to internal strife and bad press.)
”We had so much fun playing together,” he said of the recently concluded tour. “It’s been about five years since our last show, and honestly, I wasn’t sure if we would ever get back to this. I think there is a certain sense of gratitude and joy that is present now in our live shows. I think a lot of our fans weren’t sure if we would ever tour again, either, so I think it’s part of the reason for the excitement and overall good vibes.”
Asked how long he thinks Relient K will last, Thiessen didn’t flinch: “Matt and I always said the band will always exist as long as we’re having fun.”
Gabe Saporta talked with Stereogum about Midtown’s upcoming shows:
Saporta was wary about the expectations these types of reunions set for both fans and musicians. “I’m always on the fence on these things. It takes so much work,” he explained. “I also am not the hugest fan of nostalgia. When I’ve seen my favorite bands get back together, I’ve always been disappointed. So I don’t ever want to disappoint anybody and not live up to the vision that they have in their head.”
The Red Hot Chili Peppers have the number one album in the country:
Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Unlimited Love leaps onto the Billboard 200 albums chart (dated April 16) at No. 1, marking the band’s second leader and first chart-topping effort since 2006’s Stadium Arcadium. The new set was released on April 1 and bows with 97,500 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending April 7, according to Luminate, formerly MRC Data. In total, the group has tallied eight top 10 albums on the Billboard 200.
The Format have put up a bunch of new pressings of their catalog.
“I was [once] a trash man there playing in a punk-rock band called Feeble, so to go back in 2022 with my fiancée and just have a day laying on the beach… I can’t say how amazing it is,” Barker reflects. “I feel like I’m learning how to structure my time, trying to work enough to where I feel comfortable and feel like I earn days off and vacations, which I never took until this past year.”
Deryck Whibley of Sum 41 talks with Spin:
Now 8 years sober, Whibley prepares to release a new Sum 41 record. They’ve crafted a double LP (a first for the band) titled Heaven And Hell, which deftly threads a line from their early pop punk days to their current metal era. The first disc, full of songs harking back to the golden age of ‘00s pop punk, was written in the wake of a proposed deluxe-reissue of their debut LP, All Killer, No Filler. Universal Records asked Whibley if they had any songs leftover from their early days. He didn’t, but the challenge presented itself to come up with one or two.
Before long, Whibley had written enough songs to make a record and opted to collect them all as a new record instead of extras on a nostalgic repackaging. At the same time, he had been writing new material that was much more of-the-moment for Sum 41, a band that has moved away from the pop punk songs of their youth into heavy metal arenas.
Motion City Soundtrack’s I Am the Movie is getting a limited re-pressing.
This exclusive vinyl variant is 140g on “translucent ruby red.” I Am the Movie is limited to only 300 copies.
Ed Sheeran did not steal from another songwriter when he wrote his 2017 megahit “Shape of You,” according to a highly anticipated court ruling here on Wednesday.
Justice Zacaroli, the judge overseeing the case, said “Mr. Sheeran neither deliberately nor subconsciously copied” the track “Oh Why,” by the British songwriter Sami Chokri, who records as Sami Switch.
There was “no more than speculative” evidence that Mr. Sheeran had even ever heard “Oh Why,” Justice Zacaroli added, dismissing Mr. Chokri’s claim of copyright infringement.