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Morning folks! Did you enjoy day two of American Idol like us? (Like it matters—you watched it, and that's all that Fox cares about.) More on that later, but first let's start the day catching up on the music mix.
Did You Hear?
:: Taylor Swift has reportedly written a 350-page novel and is also looking into penning her memoirs. Sorry, Taylor, I'ma let you finish, but Charles Dickens wrote one of the best books of all time. [Ocean Up]
:: Katy Perry and Avril Lavigne are the new acne-free faces of ProActiv, which apparently uses Photoshop as an ingrediant. [Just Jared]
:: Whisper House, Dunkan Sheik's second musical after the Tony-winning Spring Awakening, opened last night in San Diego. And it will probably get to Broadway before Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark does. [Spinner]
:: Guy Ritchie has started his own music label, Punchbowl Recordings. Madonna's laughing at you all the way from Live Nation, dude. [Paste]
:: The style evolution of Rihanna: from clothed to not-clothed. [Celebuzz]
Behind the jump: did one particular rapper accurately predict the death of hip-hop?
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Highlights
The Morning Mix: Taylor Swift Soon To Be On Your Coffee Table As Well As Your iPod
6:02 AM on Thu Jan 14 2010 by Becky Bain
News
Kanye West’s ‘VH1 Storytellers’ Features Songs From An Album Grammy Doesn’t Care About
12:50 PM on Fri Dec 4 2009 by Becky Bain
It’s obviously too little and too late for Kanye West to repair his public image among Grammy voters, but Yeezy may just be taking his first step forward (and it’s a tiny one) on the road to redemption—or at least the road to reminding people that he can do more than rant. West is releasing a two-disc CD/DVD his VH1 Storytellers from last February, featuring never before seen performances and a Q&A. (Did we say he can do more than rant? Oops. We hope that O.J. shout out in particular made the DVD.) In any case, Kanye’s visit to the Storytellers stage was taped long before September’s VMAs, so it comes off like a postcard from a simpler time. More »
Headlines
Coldplay Bassist Takes Break From Coldplay To Create Coldplay-like Music
3:08 PM on Tue Nov 24 2009 by Becky Bain
Coldplay may be on a “break,” but justlikethat the band’s bassist, Guy Berryman, has emerged with a side project: Apparatjik (which we’ll probably pronounce incorrectly every single time), which plans to move swiftly—the band has already e-mailed its first song to select fans and is aiming to release its debut album next week. Some break. More »
Lists
“Paste” Makes A Very Tasteful Illinoise
11:00 AM on Tue Nov 3 2009 by Maura
Yesterday, Paste released its list of the 50 Best Albums Of The 2000s, and the list was topped by none other than Sufjan Stevens’ Illinoise, which honestly seems like it was released way longer ago, so established has he become in the indie-rock firmament. Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, the Arcade Fire’s Funeral, Radiohead’s Kid A, and Bright Eyes’ I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning rounded out the top five. Full rundown after the jump, but first, a few reactions.
THE GOOD: Hey, look, Stankonia! At No. 8! Three places beneath… Bright Eyes. Sigh.
THE BAD: Instead of noting the male-white–breadiness of the list—because that is, after all, the way of Paste, and you can’t expect them to change their stripes just for the sake of a mid-autumn pageview-generation ploy—I’m going to zero in on one totally questionable choice. Namely, the selection of M.I.A. albums on the list. Arular (No. 10) and not Kala? Really? I mean, Arular is fine, but Kala is kinda next-level. Is it because of the (admittedly unfortunate) Timbaland track?
THE WHAAAA? Dear Paste fact-checkers: Not for nothing, but Radiohead’s In Rainbows was not entirely “self-released,” as you claim. I know that would screw up the “it changed everything with its revolutionary pricing methods” that serves as the angle for your gushing write-up of the record. Pity that you muffed the opportunity to write about something so (yawn) groundbreaking by regurgitating a tired, half-true spiel. More »
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Wilco (The Irresistible Journalistic Construct)
12:00 PM on Wed Jul 1 2009 by Maura
Yesterday Wilco’s new album was made available for purchase, and the double-whammy of it being titled Wilco (The Album) and having its first single be called “Wilco (The Song)” proved to be too much for some writers out there to resist. After the jump, a selection of Wilco (The Parenthetically Assisted Reactions) that have appeared over the past few days, rated on a scale of zero to two camel humps in honor of the album’s cover: More »
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“Paste” Throws A Hail Mary Pass
2:30 PM on Wed May 13 2009 by Maura
Rumblings about Paste being in financial dire straits started over the weekend, and the news that the magazine will soon launch an appeal for readers to donate money to its cause–in exchange for downloads from the mag’s marquee artists, and, of course, the continued survival of the publication–would seem to confirm suspicions that the economic crunch–not to mention the music industry’s hard times–has adversely affected yet another music-related media outlet. More »
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Annie Clark Gets Into Her Role
10:00 AM on Tue May 5 2009 by Maura
Our look at the closing lines of the week’s biggest new-music reviews continues with a roundup of reactions to Actor, the second full-length by St. Vincent: More »
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What Happens To An Album’s Pre-Release Cycle In An Era Of Leaks, Low Sales, And Dead Magazines?
11:00 AM on Thu Apr 23 2009 by Lucas Jensen
One of the main reasons for album leaks is the nature of the traditional press cycle. Press outlets–in particular, print outlets–have what’s called a “lead time,” a reasonable (but sometimes unreasonable) amount of time necessary for them to have the record in order to cover it around its release date. The industry standard is three months, but it can vary based on frequency of publication. And as print media tries to compete with online media for timeliness, some outlets have demanded even longer lead times–which, of course, means more time for a record to be out there, and more time for it to leak. Preventive measures like watermarking can help, but in a big office, it can only take one unscrupulous writer or an intern who didn’t know better to screw the whole thing up. More »
News
Headlines: John Mellencamp’s Son Has His Dad’s Fighting Hoosier Spirit
12:00 PM on Fri Apr 17 2009 by Maura
The new format has inspired me to experiment with our content-delivery techniques a bit. Join me after the jump for a rundown of headlines on John Mellencamp’s kid, Sean Combs’ career and name changes, and Paste’s continued experimentation with the whole “getting people to pay for things to read” idea! More »
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Bat For Lashes Creep Toward The Pop Life
10:00 AM on Tue Apr 7 2009 by Maura
Our look at the closing lines of the week’s biggest new-music reviews continues with a roundup of reactions to Two Suns, the second album by Bat For Lashes, which comes out in the U.S. today:
