Category: Pop (Page 129 of 216)

Rock of Pages: 45 Books for the Literate Music Fan

March 3, 2008 / Will Harris

Yes, we know that writing about music is like dancing about architecture (even if we’re not convinced that Elvis Costello said it first), but let’s be realistic: if you’re a music fan who likes to read, you can achieve a very special level of bliss when you get the opportunity to dive into a book about music. The Bullz-Eye staff knocked their heads together and came up with a list of 45 books that span several musical genres and include autobiographies and biographies, histories of record companies and music magazines, essay collections, and straight-up reference tomes. It’s not intended to be all-encompassing, nor would we presume to call it a definitive list of the best music books of all time. It’s simply a selection of some of our personal favorites, none of which would be out of place on a music fan’s bookshelf…and you can find it right here.

We also got some of the authors in on the fun, as well as some of our favorite musicians, which resulted in enough responses from folks from Kyle Vincent to Henry Rollins to warrant Rock of Pages: Celebrity Edition.

But we know: we’ve missed one (or more) of your favorites. We always miss one (or more) of your favorites. So call us out already and leave a comment. We can always use another addition to our Barnes & Noble shopping list…

Alternative, Artists, Country, External Music, Hip Hop, Jazz, Music Labels, News, Pop, Rap, Rock, Songs, Videos

Road Warriors 54

February 29, 2008 / Mike Farley

The inaugural Outside Lands Festival will take place in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, with Jack Johnson and Tom Petty already confirmed, and Radiohead rumored to be performing too.
The festival is August 22-24.

Hanson will hit the road again for their The Walk Tour ’08. The guys will also be playing SXSW on March 15, a performance that will be broadcast live on Direct TV. The spring tour will be supported by Stephen Kellogg and The Sixers and “One Tree Hill’s” Kate Voegele.

Coheed and Cambria are currently on tour supporting Linkin Park, and there are a few remaining dates that you can check them out Continue reading »

Alternative, Concerts, Country, Hip Hop, Pop, Rock

DMed’s Video of the Week: Kerli, “Love Is Dead”

February 29, 2008 / David Medsker

My head tells me that I shouldn’t like Kerli. One listen to her voice tells me that she worships at the altar of Amy Lee – the song is smothered with Evanescence-style melodrama as well – and the lyric is straight from Alanis Morrisette’s notebook (“I know that you think of me when you’re beside her / Inside her”). But I find myself irresistibly drawn to the Estonian beauty. I feel like Oz in “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” when the band fronted by the female wolf comes to Sunnydale and plays the Bronze. He’s dating Alyson Hannigan, Alyson freaking Hannigan, but damned if he could resist the singer’s siren song. I’m Oz, Kerli’s the wolf.

The wolf also made an appropriately creepy video for her brooding lead single “Love is Dead.” It starts with her horribly aged, standing in front of a CGI background that shows, well, death. As the video goes on, she gets younger, and everything behind her does, too. We get stuff from 20-year-old girls pitched to us all the time. None of it sounds like this. She’s not reinventing the wheel or anything, but you have to love a young girl with some depth. She covers Bauhaus’ “She’s in Parties,” for crying out loud. Hopefully the full-length album, which drops April 22, will follow up on the promise of this single.

Embedding, sadly, is disabled, but I highly recommend checking her out. And in case you still need more convincing, here’s a picture of her.

See what I mean? You’re drawn to her too, aren’t you? Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to lock myself up in my cage, so I don’t accidentally eat anyone when the full moon hits.

To view the video, click here.

Update: Video link switched from Island’s site to YouTube.

Artists, External Music, Pop, Rock Babes, Seen Your Video, Songs, Videos

American Idol: Here We Go Again

February 29, 2008 / Mike Farley

Last night’s “American Idol” results show was less fluff than usual, more results…but two of the results were surprising, one bordering on shocking, at least to me. That can only mean that those idiots who purposely mess with the voting are at it again (you losers know who you are). Either that, or America is just ignorant.

So first they did some bit on Simon Cowell blatantly flashing the “L” for loser sign to either Ryan Seacrest or various others during the auditions. Whatever…we all know he’s a wiseass.

Then came the ’70s medley, which did one thing in particular…it exposed how bad some of these singers really are.

Okay, on to the results Continue reading »

Alternative, American Idol, Country, Pop, Rock

WTF?! Rewind – Taco

February 28, 2008 / Captain Capm

After Eight

Ah, Taco. How you came and went with such a fey flourish! You dominated the singles charts briefly with your synthed-up remake of “Puttin’ on the Ritz” and dared to go the full LP route by also issuing After eight. Seriously, dude. WTF?! Not that I have any room to make too much fun. You see, I bought this album in a record shop at the time it was big (I had already bought the single). Got it and the Atari 2600 cartridge “E.T.” at the same store. Yeah. So maybe you could say I struck out twice that day, but I enjoyed both at the time.

But this album now? It’s just too corny for words. While Taco offers up other cover versions of classics like “Singin’ in the Rain” and “Cheek to Cheek,” the real stomach churners are the tracks he penned himself. “Livin’ in My Dream World,” the original b-side to “Ritz” is bad enough. Taco reminisces about doing the Charleston, enjoying sing-along songs, and dancing on the Milky Way. Yech. If that weren’t enough, then perhaps “Tribute to Tino” in which Taco throws up appallingly bad synths in the faces of his listeners to tell them a tale of silent movie star Rudolph Valentino is. “Fairbanks, Chapman, Barrymore had leading ladies by the score like Tino” croons Taco. “Marie Provost” this is not.

The title track is also pretty abysmal. “After eight, a rendezvous with Kate! / She works late / I’ve had a hard day watching color TV” sings the Tac, trying to inflect as much of a ’30s style mannerism into his voice as he can. Then he tops it even more terribly with “Kate works each day 9 to 5, serving with true dedication / She serves you sodas, and ice creams, and pizzas, and chilis / And burgers, all kinds…and tacos, too…dig it!”

So yeah, basically there was “Puttin’ on the Ritz” and that was pretty much it. After Eight remains one of those distinctly ’80s novelty curios, and prices for CD copies of it are ridiculously overpriced. Still, you can nab the album off of iTunes these days. Taco did continue his career after this, but no one cared by the time his second album came out. It seems like the public didn’t need new versions of “Winchester Cathedral” or other pap such as “Opera Rap.” Yeah…”Opera Rap.”

And just to remind you how deeply serious Taco was when it came to puttin’ on his ritz, I’ll leave you with with this image from the back cover of this album:

Artists, Pop