It’s been impossible this week to escape the nonstop coverage of the Virginia Tech massacre and, apparently, Houston rapper Lil’ Flip couldn’t either, so he went and rapped about it to a direct sample of Cyndi Lauper’s “Time after Time.” The first pop culture response to the tragedy–at least that we know of–Flip’s track (streaming on XXL.com and Flip’s Myspace page) is incredible because despite being heartfelt, he still manages to unsubtly give himself props for even thinking up the idea.
Time for another installment of the Coulda-Shoulda-Woulda Files, where we raid our archives in search of a lost gem. More »
Gilbert Cruz here, and I’ll be filling in today for Idolator’s wonderful Associate Editor Maura (whom I’ve never met and–seeing as how everyone writes these things from home–I probably never will. Hi, Maura!). More »
No better way to sign off from a busy day of blogging than with a rant. So you know what really chaps my hide? Ticketmaster! Yeah, very original, I know. But, having worked in media for several years now and having rarely gotten myself on a concert guest list–unlike the majority of music writers I know, including this site’s regular editors (well, I did get on maybe once, but I was the plus-one, not the one to be plussed). So I’ve had to deal with the likes of Ticketmaster from time to time, what with their fees and their charges and their evil fees and charges.
I was thinking about this today after reading this article about Ticketmaster suing eBay, claiming that StubHub (which eBay owns) has “induced artists’ representatives or promoters to demand tickets from Ticketmaster’s venue clients as part of a deal to bring an act or sports team to a location.” Confusing, huh? I’m not even sure I understand that last sentence. Even more confusing (and disconcerting) is that Ticketmaster may actually have a case here against eBay. There’s something wrong with that. Ticketmaster shouldn’t be able to sue anyone. Ever.
Last night, we got the chance to check out Chuck Brown–the “Godfather of Go Go music”–at NYC’s Joe’s Pub; Brown was there to promote next week’s We’re About the Business, his first CD of new material in several decades. More »
Shortly after we posted about Lil’ Flip’s half-touching, half-“WTF?” tribute to the Virginia Tech victims, an eagle-eyed commenter alerted us to an earlier, more tasteful in-memoriam freestyle by Chinese-American rapper Jin (who, unlike Lil’ Flip, is not pushing a recently released album). More »
-In a couple weeks, we’ll all be tired of reading about Mr. Scruffy here and his band (Will-Call, or something like that?). Until then, here’s some older stuff, some you may know, some not. [popheadwound] -A smart look at the decline of the mixtape scene in the post-Juice, post-CD world. More »
Sure, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s geek-fest ode to crappy quality, sticky-floored shlock was a bomb at movie theaters, but it’s been a hit on our iPods–particuarly the soundtrack to Tarantino’s half, Death Proof. More »
