It's not for me to instruct someone to go hit someone else, but if I can say something that makes everyone laugh at these guys, it empowers the right people and diminishes the right people. | | | | Depeche Mode's Dave Gahan at the Lyceum, London, Nov. 15, 1981.
(David Corio/Redferns/Getty Images) | | | | |  | “It's not for me to instruct someone to go hit someone else, but if I can say something that makes everyone laugh at these guys, it empowers the right people and diminishes the right people.”
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| | rantnrave:// A majority of Americans say it's harder to stay informed these days "due to the plethora of information and news sources available," according to a new GALLUP/KNIGHT FOUNDATION poll. The paradox of too many options. Too much noise. Or, as a certain monarch once said, too many notes. Or maybe some of those Americans, like the monarch, don’t know how to listen for the right notes. That poll popped up in my inbox as I was still absorbing this fascinating essay by writer/musician/record-collector JAMES JACKSON TOTH, who finds himself so overwhelmed by easily available music that he's able to absorb none of it. The paradox of getting everything you wanted. "I started noticing that my brain was no longer retaining song titles," he writes. "All music was becoming Muzak." Is this an unavoidable effect of the streaming age, or just a natural effect of getting older? Fifteen-year-olds can still listen to a DUA LIPA single or a CHILDISH GAMBINO album over and over again and immerse themselves in its cellular structure as easily as 15-year-olds in 1998 could get lost in an OUTKAST album, right? Or are they fighting streaming overload, too? Or does time not matter to them so just bring it all on and who cares? Toth decided to devote his 2017 to listening to one, and only one, album per week, to get to know it inside out, to get to appreciate the album art, the studio musicians, the drum sounds, the hook on track 17, everything. Slow cooking, meet slow listening. It was, it turned out, easier said than done. But what was to blame: SPOTIFY? ADHD? The world? His 39th birthday? AUTECHRE? Can he—can you—stop and smell a single rose anymore? Can you tune out the noise? Can you tune your brain to hear the exact number of notes you want to hear?... MARISSA MOSS isn't the first writer to expose "Country Radio's Dark, Secret History of Sexual Harassment and Misconduct." But her four-month investigation, landing in ROLLING STONE in the wake of the #METOO movement, provides a horrifying clarity into how men who hold the keys to radio airplay are preying on women—musicians as well as record company employees—who need that airplay. A handful of female artist/victims are named along with a number of anonymous sources. Many of the radio programmers go unnamed, too. They should be named. But the burden to do so shouldn't fall on the victims. There are people at labels, in radio and in management who know this is going on. People who continue to do business with these guys and send young women their way. Will *they* speak out? Will they name names?... The final episode of THE COMBAT JACK SHOW... The first episode of JEFF MILLS' six-part radio series on space exploration, which he is both hosting and scoring (!) in partnership with NASA (!), airs at 9 am ET today, here... That time BUDDY HOLLY asked DECCA RECORDS to give him back his songs, and taped the phone call. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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 | Rolling Stone |
| Scores of women looking for radio play and professional opportunities say they've been subjected to harassment during station visits, conventions. | | |
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 | NPR Music |
| In the streaming era, music fans have access to more music than they could ever consume. Is there any way to slow things down? | | |
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 | GQ |
| An oral history of fighting back against Nazis. | | |
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 | The Ringer |
| The former Fifth Harmony member has the biggest album in the country. Was her group just a launching pad, or something more essential to pop music? | | |
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 | The New York Times |
| The Cranberries singer fascinated the world, but her success meant something special in Ireland. | | |
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 | Aquarium Drunkard |
| In his book "The New Analog: Listening and Reconnecting in a Digital World," Damon Krukowski of Galaxie 500 and Damon & Naomi casts a widescreen lens on the digital landscape, in search of the answer to the question "What elements of the analog world should we hang onto as we navigate the digital?" | | |
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 | Billboard |
| Billboard examines the prospects of TDE becoming a huge force in the move industry. | | |
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 | Noisey |
| A talk with the retired NASCAR driver about how discovering The Dangerous Summer shifted his musical gears. | | |
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 | The Atlantic |
| Pop is now as political as it was in the ‘60s, the author Dorian Lynskey says. | | |
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 | Cocaine & Rhinestones |
| Doug Kershaw is the most famous Cajun musician in history. His brother, Rusty, is not, though you may be more familiar with his work than you realize. | | |
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 | British GQ |
| GQ recalls the time we gate-crashed Tehran's underground nightlife. | | |
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 | Complex |
| We talked to people in the know to see what trends are up next, and they're predicting smarter lyrics, aggressive beats, and more women. | | |
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 | DJBooth |
| "If the goal of punchlines is indeed to subvert audience expectations, then perhaps the best way to do this in 2018 is to skip them altogether." | | |
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 | Royalty Exchange |
| Last year was a transformative one for both Royalty Exchange and the music business at large. | | |
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 | Dazed Digital |
| Patty Schemel on living with Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain, ending up homeless and overcoming addiction. | | |
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 | NPR |
| Gospel singers look back at the legacy of choirmaster Edwin Hawkins, who passed away on Monday, Jan. 15. | | |
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 | Fact Magazine |
| Over the last few years, obscure Japanese ambient classics like Hiroshi Yoshimura’s "Green" and Midori Takada’s "Through The Looking Glass" have surged in popularity. Lewis Gordon investigates the phenomenon, talking to the record collectors and vendors in the US, UK and Japan that helped inform a new wave of interest. | | |
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 | National Sawdust Log |
| Flutist, composer, bandleader, and teacher Nicole Mitchell is midway through a stint as artist-in-residence for New York's Winter JazzFest. She talks about her upcoming projects projects, her creative path, and her aspirations both in and beyond music. | | |
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| DJBooth |
| Professionalism in songwriting doesn’t come with a stamp or certificate telling you that you’ve made it from amateur to pro. Just ask Spree Wilson. | | |
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 | Trench |
| The UK driller has plans to take his South London street tales global. | | |
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 | YouTube |
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