The Rapture Working With Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix Producer on New Album
Following up his work on Phoenix’s Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, French producer Philippe Zdar will lend his creative hand to The Rapture’s forthcoming full-length album.... read more
Carrie Underwood: Play On
Underwood’s third album is overdeveloped and undercooked Carrie Underwood’s new album isn’t meant for iPods or headphones—or, for that matter, for individuals. It’s a more public record than a private or personal one, sometimes for better but usually for worse. Opener and first single “Cowboy Casanova” is a barnburner that will be the prelude to many girls’ nights out, while “Mama’s Song” will no doubt soundtrack innumerable weddings in the next few months. Other songs on Play On have less lofty goals: “Someday When I Stop loving You” and “What Can I Say” are soundtrack-ready montage rock; the latter deserves... read more
Start Press: Details, Details
Like millions of gamers around the world, I spent a decent chunk of this past week clutching an M4 Carbine assault rifle and elbow-crawling around in the muck trying not to get waxed. I watched from space as a nuclear missile detonated over the United States’ eastern seaboard. I scrambled through the charred husk of the Oval Office while the entire city of Washington D.C. smouldered to ash around me like a bad acid trip at a 4th of July barbecue in Hell. On a deep-cover assignment as a CIA operative, I followed a group of Russian terrorists as they... read more
Best of What's Next: Pomegranates
Pomegranates' Everybody, Come Outside! might be the most fitting album title of the year... read more
Joss Whedon Animates Season Eight of Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Joss Whedon’s recent projects have had mixed results. Last year’s stellar Dr. Horrible won an Emmy, but news arrived last week that Whedon’s cult favorite, the beleaguered Dollhouse, will be cancelled, airing its final episodes this January. (For a tongue-in-cheek suggestion as to why Fox cancelled the series, check out this video from College Humor.)... read more
Can MySpace Survive Without Free Music Streaming?
Just a few years ago, when Napster wasn’t such a distant memory and free-streaming sites like Lala, Imeem and Hype Machine were in their infancy, one site ruled as the best avenue for free samples of new bands: MySpace. Sure, the site carried a certain affiliation with young people who take oddly angled pictures of themselves, but the it also held, and still holds, a huge cache of band pages ripe with free-streaming tunes.... read more
Jonathan Safran Foer: Eating Animals
Jonathan Safran Foer’s novels are dense, energetic, concerned with all things moral and Jewish, pleased with themselves, sentimental, and too wordy for a lot of us. They are like wild Russian dances that leave you breathless and wondering why you stayed on the dance floor. Without argument, he is enormously talented and passionate, but his writing and gimmicks can get in the way of the material.... read more
Yo La Tengo Sets Tour Dates Sans Service Charges
Surcharges are the bane of any concert experience, tricking show-goers to pay just a little more than expected for their musical experience. Yo La Tengo is doing their part to sidestep some of these pesky add-ons while supporting their latest Popular Songs. Which is to say: the band’s upcoming January shows in middle-America will be delightfully easy on the wallet, each just $20 or less.... read more
Frightened Rabbit Comes Out of Hibernation for New Album
It’s cold out. Cold and dry, in a way that causes your lips to crack. Even your thickest scarf won’t keep the air from stinging your neck. But you’re inside, under a blanket, a cup of hot tea on your lap; you’re watching wood disappear in the fireplace. You’re comfortable, safe. That’s the mood of Frightened Rabbit’s music. And in 2010, just after the thaw of winter, we’ll get to hear some more of it; the perpetually-sweater-clad band will release it’s third album, The Winter of Mixed Drinks, in March.... read more
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Release Date: November 25, 2009 Director: Wes Anderson Writer: Roald Dahl (novel), Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach (screenplay) Starring: George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Bill Murray, Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, Willem Dafoe, Jason Schwartzman, Brian Cox, Michael Gambon, Anjelica Huston Studio/Run Time: Twentieth Century Fox, 87 min. Wes Anderson’s whimsical animated film features his familiar themes and undeniable fingerprints, but has broader-than-usual appeal.... read more
Mattel Preps Cyndi Lauper, Joan Jett and Debbie Harry Dolls
Mattel is setting the tone for a throwback Christmas by unveiling the first looks of its “Ladies of the 80s” collection, featuring doll versions of Cyndi Lauper, Joan Jett and Debbie Harry.... read more
New Orleans Gets Wired: David Simon Turns His Sights on the Big Easy
On a late spring day in the early 1990s, a Baltimore Sun reporter named David Simon wandered into the now-defunct Funky Butt jazz club on North Rampart Street in New Orleans, where Bo Dollis & the Wild Magnolias were burning through a scorching set of percussive funk. “From the outside, it was like some kind of Tex Avery cartoon,” Simon says, “where the house is dancing and the window shutters are popping out to the beat.”... read more
Fans Push for Superman Returns Director's Cut
The Man of Steel’s lackluster reboot in 2006 apparently hasn’t turned everyone off of the franchise. Some people can’t get enough of it, such as those behind SupermanReturnsTheBryanSingerCut.com, a website urging Warner Bros. to release what is spelled out in the URL, a lengthier director’s cut of the film, supposedly the product Bryan Singer would liked to have seen hit theaters.... read more
Pixies to Sell Recordings of U.S. Doolittle Shows
Although fans have already listened to Doolittle for two decades, the Pixies have found a new way to keep the classic album in the collective consciousness.... read more
Fight Club (10th Anniversary Edition)
Release Date: Nov. 17 Director: David Fincher Writers: Jim Uhls, Chuck Palahniuk Cinematographer: Jeff Cronenweth Starring: Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, Helena Bonham Carter Studio/Run Time: Twentieth Century Fox, 139 mins. A beautiful and unique snowflake David Fincher’s film adaptation of Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club doesn’t tell us anything about consumerism that we don’t already know. That’s exactly why it’s a stunning piece of cinema, and a searing indictment of a society wandering a labyrinth of material comfort and spiritual discontent.... read more
Writer Ian Martin Exposes Hate Speech on Twitter
British writer Ian Martin is engaging in a month-long social-networking experiment that will likely make your blood boil. He has replaced his usual followers on Twitter with hate-filled users (neo-Nazi’s to sexists to racists to homophobes) from all over the social networking site.... read more
Watch Zach Galifianakis, Conan O'Brien, Andy Richter and Andy Dick on Between Two Ferns
In its illustrious seven-episode run, Zach Galifianakis web series Between Two Ferns has played host to everyone from Michael Cera to Jon Hamm, Charlize Theron to Natalie Portman. The latest episode finds Galifianakis getting awkward with new Tonight Show host, Conan O’Brien. As usual, things get pretty uncomfortable pretty fast. But hey, nothing says “good morning” like jokes about Smurfs and sweating, right?... read more
Badly Drawn Boy Readies TV-Movie Soundtrack
Damon Gough, AKA: Badly Drawn Boy, is confirmed to compose the music for an upcoming U.K. made-for-TV film.... read more
Norah Jones: The Fall
Unexpected dance grooves from jazzy folk star As a jazz-adoring youngster, Norah Jones initially made her mark as a performer, her best-known songs written by others. Jones has since grown up as a songwriter on the biggest of stages, a challenge she’s tackled by turning inward, working with a set of regular bandmates and daring to whisper her increasingly pointed lines when others might over-emote.... read more
High Definition: AMC's The Prisoner Escapes From the Ordinary
AMC doesn’t do a tremendous amount of original programming, but when it does, it does it well. After two critically acclaimed series, Mad Men and Breaking Bad, the network is broacasting its second miniseries, a six-episode remake of the 1960s 17-part series The Prisoner, originally broadcast on ITV in the UK.... read more
The 20 Best Gadgets of the Decade…
The 20 Best Live Acts of the…
The 50 Best Albums of the Decade…
The 25 Best Movie Performances of the…
Blind Pilot - One Red Thread
B.O.B. - Put Me On
Punch Brothers - Punch Brothers at CMJ
David Bazan - Hard To Be
Elvis Perkins in Dearland - Stay Zombie…
