• Maxim apologized to the Black Crowes, earned a shrug from Nas, confused the hell out of the folks at CNN, and got one writer talking to the newspapers. • Can we please get a break from having to write all these obituaries? It’s really starting to bum us out. More »
So while Maura’s off at SXSW or Margaritaville or wherever the hell she’s going this spring, I’m being sent to Myrtle Beach in June for the opening of the Hard Rock Park, the long-awaited rock-themed amusement park brought to you by the Cafe people. More »
Because it’s Friday afternoon, Maura’s left me to fend for myself a la Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitters Dead (complete with sink full of unwashed dishes), and the fact that it’s the kind of week where this starts looking like a juicy story, it’s time to reach for that all-purpose space-filler: songs… More »
So it turns out that the video for Paula Abdul’s new single “Dance Like There’s No Tomorrow” has actually not been “rejected” by MTV. MTV will actually break Paula’s heart on Monday, unless the network decides to be perverse/spite a gun-jumping blogosphere. More »
ARTIST: Jay-Z and Mary J. Blige
TITLE: “You’re Welcome”
WEB DEBUT: Feb. 28, 2008
Bringing together a genre no one listens to anymore with a sport no one watches anymore, Al Jourgensen, frontman for unkillable industrial-rockers Ministry, has written the new “fight song” for NHL team the Chicago Blackhawks. More »
A few gossip blogs are claiming that Little Jonathan Winery is actually the brainchild of one Lil Jon, so get out your pimp cups, etc., etc. Now, it’s nothing new for musicians to head into the grape fields in search of new revenue streams (especially given all the problems Jon’s label, TVT, has… More »
Bookended by a cameo from a Justin Timberlake profiling in Cazals and white leather, the gleeful new video for Gnarls Barkley’s “Run” is a tribute to a beloved but short-lived teevee hip-hop dance party, at least according to one Idolator reader left irate by certain lazy comparisons to American… More »
And now a brief correction regarding our post about the Roots’ “75 Bars (Black’s Reconstruction)” below: “The ‘bass’ on 75 bars is actually tuba. More »
Ed. note: Chris “dennisobell” Molanphy, our resident chart guru, looks at the upward, downward, and lack of movement on this week’s Billboard charts:
* OK, so one of these acts is, like, president of the United States and the other the president of American Samoa. I’ll get to the White Stripes later…
Yesterday on Idolator, Maura brought up a subject I’ve been downplaying here since 2008 began: mediocre pop-rapper Flo Rida’s depressing death grip on Billboard‘s Hot 100. Mostly, I’ve avoided a deep discussion of his T-Pain-assisted No. 1 smash “Low”–now in its 10th week atop the chart, matching last winter’s run by Beyoncé’s “Irreplaceable”–because there’s not much to tell. Its sales have been massive since fall, it has led in radio airplay since mid-January, and no single has seriously challenged it for No. 1 all winter.
But as Maura noted, we’ll have to pay mind to Mr. Rida now that his followup single, the Timbaland-assisted “Elevator,” is making a fast break up the chart. The thought that “Low” would be succeeded by another Flo Rida song is enough to make one swear off Billboard forever.
Don’t despair. There are a lot of ways for this story to play out, and I’d say it’s less than 50-50 that Uncle Flo will succeed himself at the top. Let’s run down some scenarios.
