Basslines and Protest Signs is Brett Callwood’s column looking at the intersection of music and politics. This week highlights the importance of Anti-Flag.
Radiohead fans benefitted this week from a scumbag’s plot to extort money from the band. Guitarist Jonny Greenwood posted a message to Instagram a week after the unreleased material was leaked online. “We got hacked last week – someone stole Thom’s minidisk archive from around the time of OK Computer, and reportedly demanded $150,000 on threat of releasing it. So instead of complaining — much — or ignoring it, we’re releasing all 18 hours on Bandcamp in aid of Extinction Rebellion. Just for the next 18 days. So for £18 you can find out if we should have paid that… Read more »
Here’s a list of the artists we need to hear more of—and the single album they did put out is why.
Nobody should have to feel like 5th grader Delanie Marcotte does. Listen. I’ll be the first admit; life isn’t easy… and middle school / high school and even college can be the hardest times of our lives. Socially – are you kidding me? Like come on. We all FREAKED out those first couple weeks of high school. I remember my parents making me go to as many different pre-events as possible, just so when I went to high school I knew at least some people when I showed up and walked the hallways. Having at least someone to nod to… Read more »
A symbol of overcoming changes and setbacks, With The Punches’ debut full-length establishes the band as one that will not succumb to the challenges they’re faced with but instead will conquer and grow from them.
British public broadcaster BBC’s Radio 1 has cut out the word “faggot” from an old Christmas hit in a move the mother of the song’s late performer branded “ridiculous.” In “Fairytale of New York,” released 20 years ago by Irish band the Pogues and singer Kirsty MacColl, she sings “You scumbag, you maggot/You cheap lousy faggot” as her character in the song argues with one sung by Pogues frontman Shane MacGowan. MacColl died in 2000 when she was killed by a speedboat off the coast of Mexico. The song is a perennial favorite in Britain around Christmas time, and is… Read more »
Who can forget that scene in Fast Times At Ridgemont High where Phoebe Cates takes off her red bikini top to the tune of “Moving In Stereo” by The Cars, delighting pubescent boys all over the world, not to mention Judge Reinhold. It seems that the antics of Jeff Spicoli and co. rubbed off on some that weren’t even born when the movie came out. Take Massachusetts rockers Damone for instance, who have named their band after the concert ticket scalping weasel character in the flick, and take to the stage to the very Cars tune Judge Reinhold waxed the… Read more »
Following last year’s greatest hits album, International Superhits, Green Day will further anthologize their history with Shenanigans, a compilation of B-sides and rarities, due in July. With Green Day celebrating a ten-year anniversary, singer Billie Joe Armstrong reflected on the band’s history last November. “We weren’t trying to keep up with the times – we weren’t trying to make a rap/metal record to keep up with today’s youth or whatever,” he said. “We did what we wanted to do, and people happened to like it, and we’re really grateful for that.” Among Shenanigans’ tracks are “Rotting” and “Desensitized,” both B-sides… Read more »
Once a punk rock outcast who was locked up in a psych ward, Iggy Pop is now a celebrity, a Reebok model who rubs shoulders with the cream of society. But his elevated status does not stop him from noticing the absurdity of the situation, as he told Reuters in a recent interview: the kid raised in a Michigan trailer park is often the center of attention at various phoney-baloney shindigs. “Occasionally I’ll go to one of these VIP affairs or parties, and I always sorta look around thinking, ‘My God, how shallow and crass these people are! Not like… Read more »
