Music Diary

Back in July I wrote about Manchester Orchestra putting up their Simple Math song for free as part of the release of their excellent album of the same name. Now they are back with a new way to connect with their fans – by doing a remix version of the song Virgin incorporating sing-alongs from fans! Here are some details from their site: Help Us Sing “Virgin” As the year is coming to an end we wanted to take a minute to thank you ALL. Simple Math is truly an album for the fans and we wanted to give something…

If there is something Google knows, it is how to do ‘free’ – never before has a company made so much by charging so little. So as they simultaneously try to crank up their niche Google + ‘social network’ and also their late entry also-ran music ‘service’, the immediate tool they pull from their bag is ‘free’. In this case what is free is a live EP of Coldplay. Here is the description: This EP was recorded in a Spanish bullring during an American Express Unstaged event that saw nearly 20 million live streams on YouTube, and it pretty much…

Bad Meets Evil is a pseudo-duo including Royce da 5’9? and Eminem, first heard on the song of the same name from The Slim Shady LP in 1999. The duo have recently gone back into the studio and popped out another EP, this one featuring Bruno Mars in a generic pop-rap-combo song that is all the rage these days. For other examples, see pretty much anything with Bruno Mars in a supporting role, anything at all with Pitbull, BoB and so on. The song that has gotten the greatest amount of attention is ‘Lighters’, which as I mention features Bruno…

I have mentioned the musical sub-genre Dubstep before, and the practitioners including Daft Punk, Deadmau5 and Skrillex. My son is a MASSIVE fan of this style of music, so I have become more aware of it than I would otherwise. It is hard to describe the musical style to someone who hasn’t heard it, but from his bio at AllMusic they say he “combines the Benny Benassi and Deadmau5 styles of electro with the over the top samples and giant noises of acts like the Chemical Brothers and Fatboy Slim.” Here is the official video for his biggest hit, Scary…

Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis has been a touchstone in the ‘what is jazz’ debate for more than three decades now. After growing up in a jazz family – his father is pianist Ellis Marsalis – Wynton came up through the ranks with Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers and then did a stint with Herbie Hancock’s VSOP before striking out on his own. Soon Wynton was simultaneously winning Jazz and Classical Grammy Awards, and record labels were signing jazz artists to recording contracts again. He has maintained a high profile – and been very vocal with his opinion of music –…