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      ‘This Is the Life’ Review: A Valuable Part of Hip-Hop History

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘This Is the Life’ Review: A Valuable Part of Hip-Hop HistoryAva DuVernay’s 2008 documentary, now streaming on Netflix, is a personal love letter to a slice of Los Angeles’s 1990s hip-hop scene.Medusa is one of the hip-hop artists featured in Ava DuVernay’s 2008 documentary “This Is the Life.”Credit…ArrayFeb. 23, 2021This Is the LifeNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Ava DuVernayDocumentary1h 37mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.Ava DuVernay’s 2008 debut feature, the documentary “This Is the Life,” is a refreshing portrait of a 1990s California hip-hop subculture that thrived separately from gangsta rap. DuVernay’s documentary, now available to stream on Netflix, is a personal project. She performed as part of the rap duo Figures of Speech at the Good Life Cafe — a South Central Los Angeles health food cafe that became a mecca for the underground rap community.Throughout the ’90s, the modest space’s open-mic nights fostered a bevy of young, raw, untainted lyrical voices telling stories of everyday life in L.A. DuVernay combines performer interviews with VHS footage and audio clips of their shows to retell a magical period in the hip-hop scene.In its intertitle graphics and visual typography, “This Is the Life” often mirrors VH1’s “Behind the Music” documentaries. When staging her interviews, however, DuVernay imprints unique compositions onto the familiar music-doc style by using the respondents’ spacious surroundings to frame them. To paint the cafe’s milieu, she identifies the institute’s stalwarts, such as supportive fans lovingly referred to as “Jean in the front row” and “Big Al.” Not only does DuVernay feature the cafe’s Black male M.C.’s like Abstract Rude and Chillin Villain Empire, she underscores the white, Latino and female artists who also appeared on the Good Life stage.[embedded content]The venue’s traditions are also outlined: No leaving gum on the floor; no leaning on the paintings; avoid the phrase “wiggidy wiggidy” in freestyles; and no profanity — meant to ensure a clean space and substantive rhymes. Audiences at the Good Life wanted to hear idiosyncratic freestylers using distinct techniques to tell unique stories. Rappers who failed to meet crowd expectations, in scenes akin to an amateur nightat the Apollo, were booed off the stage. In recalling the night the rapper Fat Joe bombed at the cafe, DuVernay creatively soundtracks the audio from the event over a time lapse of a chalk artist sketching the scene.Word of mouth inspired record deals for some Good Life performers. Jurassic 5, for instance, became gold record-certified in Britain. By 1994, the cafe had built such a reputation that artists like Ice Cube and Bone Thugs-n-Harmony came to listen. And it is claimed (by the rapper Abstract Rude) that those artists incorporated the underground style into their work. When DuVernay plays the Good Life M.C. Myka Nyne’s verse on Freestyle Fellowship’s “Mary” (1993) next to Bone Thugs-n-Harmony’s “Tha Crossroads” (1996), it’s a difficult assertion to dispute.Outside of the film’s director, however, few from the Good Life became household names. But in the illuminating “This Is the Life,” DuVernay not only fills in an important formative gap in California’s hip-hop history, she displays the inventive eye that would later lead to her future cinematic successes.This Is the LifeNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. Watch on Netflix.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Jay-Z Sells Half of Ace of Spades Champagne to LVMH

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyJay-Z and LVMH, Two of the World’s Biggest Brands, Go Into BusinessLVMH will acquire half of Armand de Brignac, Jay-Z’s Champagne line known as Ace of Spades.Feb. 22, 2021, 6:55 a.m. ETBeyoncé and Jay-Z way back in 2015.Credit…Sam Hodgson for The New York TimesWhen Jay-Z clicked into a video call last week with Philippe Schaus, the chief executive of LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton’s drinks business, the Zoom backgrounds told the story.Jay-Z spoke from a partly covered terrace of his Los Angeles home, wearing a casual sweater, accessorized by the outdoor living room and greenery around him. Mr. Schaus was in his office in Paris, wearing a suit, accessorized by shelves of elaborate drinks bottles behind him.The topic: the news that LVMH would acquire half of Armand de Brignac, Jay-Z’s bubbly brand. (Most people call it Ace of Spades, after its bottle’s branding.)The deal gives Jay-Z the organizational support and distribution power of a global drinks “machine,” as Mr. Schaus called it, while LVMH gets the cool clout and lifestyle marketing savvy of a pace-setting Black cultural leader at a time when the luxury sector’s racism is under particular scrutiny.Neither side would disclose the financial terms of the transaction. But if Jay-Z’s lyrics can be considered appropriate journalistic sourcing (it’s very probable they shouldn’t be), half of Armand de Brignac was valued in 2018 at $250 million. “I’m 50 percent of D’Ussé and it’s debt-free, 100 percent of Ace of Spades, worth half a B,” Jay-Z rapped on “What’s Free,” the Meek Mill track. (D’Ussé is the cognac brand that Jay-Z owns with Bacardi.)They were, however, more than happy to talk about their new relationship.“We were always looking to grow this brand,” said Jay-Z, “and this happened very naturally.”Mr. Schaus, who manages a Champagne portfolio for Moët Hennessy that includes Dom Pérignon and Krug, gushed right back. “In your understanding of the world of tomorrow, we believe you created a new consumer for Champagne,” he said, beaming at Jay-Z through the computer.Jay-Z in the presence of Moët (and Robert De Niro) at a gala in 2016.Credit…Rebecca Smeyne for The New York TimesIt’s not the most obvious time to invest in Champagne, amid a health pandemic that has kept bottle-service dance-club partying to a minimum in a world with little to celebrate. But then, LVMH is not just buying a new drinks brand: It’s buying cultural know-how and entree into markets not traditionally served by some of its brands.“We have to catch up somehow,” said Mr. Schaus on the Zoom call. “So this relationship will inject us with some better understanding of the market of tomorrow.”LVMH first attempted to access “the market of tomorrow” in 2019 when it teamed up with Rihanna to create the Fenty high fashion line — which was also, as it happened, when it first met Jay-Z. (Rihanna is represented by the management arm of Roc Nation, Jay-Z’s entertainment and sports company.) Though operations of Rihanna’s line were suspended less than two weeks ago, the Champagne partnership signals a strengthening of larger ties to the greater Jay-Z universe.The Ace of Spades deal was initially discussed in the summer of 2019, when Jay-Z hosted a lunch at his house for Bernard Arnault, LVMH’s founder and chairman, and Alexandre Arnault.The younger Mr. Arnault is the third of Bernard Arnault’s five children. He is, at 28, an increasingly visible force at LVMH. He became chief executive of Rimowa, the LVMH-owned German luggage brand, in 2017 at only 24; was the family member who accompanied his father when President Trump cut the ribbon on a new Louis Vuitton factory in Texas; and was recently named executive vice president of product and communications at Tiffany, which LVMH acquired in a $15.8 billion deal last year.He and Jay-Z are good friends who speak on the phone once a month or more. “I’ll send him a photo of something going on with me or he’ll send me a photo,” Jay-Z said. “It’s super natural, super chill. I view him as a person of high integrity. Always keeps his word, very punctual. These are some of the qualities I have myself.”Alexandre Arnault at his apartment in Paris in 2018.Credit…Julien Mignot for The New York TimesJay-Z at his office in Los Angeles in 2020.Credit…Renell Medrano for The New York TimesThe investment from LVMH, which has an all-white leadership team, gives Jay-Z an increased presence in an old, elite, European industry.“Just the idea of this partnership is a signal to a more diverse way of looking at things,” Jay-Z said of LVMH.“We have a long way to go,” Mr. Schaus said.Jay-Z’s cultural and business connection to Champagne is longstanding. He had been a fan of Cristal, helping to elevate it to an aspirational brand among hip-hop fans. But then, in 2006, an executive with Cristal’s parent company made comments to The Economist about the rap world’s patronage: “We can’t forbid people from buying it. I’m sure Dom Pérignon or Krug would be delighted to have their business,” he said.Jay-Z called for a boycott of Cristal and, that same year, he bought Armand de Brignac with a partner. He rebranded the product Ace of Spades, redesigned the bottles, and marketed it as a key element of the Jay-Z lifestyle, with a reveal in the “Show Me What You Got” video. He kept the brand mentions alive in 2014’s “We Made It Freestyle,” the year he purchased the remainder of the line.Though Champagne as a business suffered during the pandemic, Jay-Z said the market has recovered from its initial sharp drop-off in revenue and shipments in 2020, and has settled at a deficit of 20 percent.Both businessmen hope the “superluxury” sector may be first to recover, said Mr. Schaus. A bottle of Ace of Spaces can set you back between $300 to $64,999, for a 30-liter Midas bottle.Wealthy people have been affected the least in the current climate, Mr. Schaus said, and “will go back to enjoying and showing their pride in what they are and what they have achieved.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Prince Markie Dee, Founding Member of Rap Trio Fat Boys, Dies at 52

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyPrince Markie Dee, Founding Member of Rap Trio Fat Boys, Dies at 52The group’s lighthearted rhymes and winning comedic approach helped speed hip-hop’s absorption into pop culture.From left: Prince Markie Dee, the Human Beat Box and Kool Rock-Ski of Fat Boys. “Wipeout,” the group’s collaboration with the Beach Boys, was their biggest hit.Credit…David Corio/Redferns, via Getty ImagesJon Caramanica and Feb. 19, 2021Prince Markie Dee, who as a member of the trio Fat Boys released some of hip-hop’s most commercially successful albums of the 1980s and helped speed the genre’s absorption into pop culture, died on Thursday in Miami. He was 52.His death was confirmed by Rock the Bells, a SiriusXM station where he had been a host. No cause was given.In the mid-1980s, Fat Boys were among hip-hop’s best known groups; their 1987 album “Crushin’” went platinum and featured a collaboration with the Beach Boys, “Wipeout,” that was their biggest hit, reaching No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100. That year, the group starred in a full-length comedy, “Disorderlies.”Hip-hop was just beginning to become accepted into the mainstream of American pop culture, and the group’s lighthearted rhymes, accessible dance routines and winning comedic approach made them effective ambassadors on hits including “Jailhouse Rap,” “Stick ’Em” and “Can You Feel It.” Some of their songs were about food and played on their image as harmless heavyweights.Prince Markie Dee was born Mark Anthony Morales on Feb. 19, 1968. He formed the Disco 3 in the early 1980s along with Darren (the Human Beat Box) Robinson and Damon (Kool Rock Ski) Wimbley, friends from the East New York section of Brooklyn. They won a 1983 talent show at Radio City Music Hall and were signed to a management contract by the show’s promoter, who suggested they change their name to Fat Boys.Their size became their gimmick, their calling card and their accelerator. Their manager once organized a promotional contest in which fans could guess the group’s collective weight.The group released seven full length albums; in addition to their platinum “Crushin’,” three went gold. In 1984, Fat Boys appeared on the Fresh Fest tour, the first hip-hop arena tour. Four years later, the group recorded a new version of “The Twist” with Chubby Checker. The trio also appeared in the films “Krush Groove” and “Knights of the City” before breaking up in the early 1990s. Mr. Robinson died in 1995 at age 28 after he fell off a chair while rapping for friends and lost consciousness.Mark Anthony Morales also hosted “The Prince Markie Dee Show” on LL Cool J’s Rock the Bells channel on SiriusXM radio.Credit…Robin Marchant/Getty ImagesPrince Markie Dee released a pair of solo albums in the 1990s, the first of which spawned the hit single “Typical Reasons (Swing My Way).” At the same time, he was beginning to work as a songwriter and producer for Uptown Records, collaborating with Father MC and Mary J. Blige. He helped write and produce Ms. Blige’s 1992 breakout hit “Real Love” and worked on her debut album, “What’s the 411?” He also worked on songs and remixes for Destiny’s Child, Mariah Carey and others.Information about survivors was not immediately available.Later in his career, Mr. Morales was a radio personality at WMIB-FM and WEDR-FM in Miami and on SiriusXM. But he was best known for being one of the Fat Boys when the group’s songs were seemingly everywhere.“I would be walking and all of a sudden I would hear music ricochet off the walls,” the rapper Fat Joe wrote on Instagram, recalling how Fat Boys’ beatboxing — “huh huh huh ha huh” — was “the first song they would play at the block party to summon you to appear.”He called Mr. Morales “a great guy, a legend and pioneer.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Dawn Richard Honors New Orleans Second Lines, and 7 More New Songs

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThe PlaylistDawn Richard Honors New Orleans Second Lines, and 7 More New SongsHear tracks by 24kGoldn, Amythyst Kiah, Lil Yachty and others.Dawn Richard’s new single “Bussifame” is a preview of her April album “Second Line.” Credit…Alexander Le’JoJon Pareles, Jon Caramanica and Feb. 19, 2021, 10:53 a.m. ETEvery Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.Dawn Richard, ‘Bussifame’[embedded content]Dawn Richard gives “Bussifame” four syllables — as in “Bust it for me” — when she chants it in her new single, a preview of her April album “Second Line.” The video, released on Mardi Gras, opens with someone dancing to a (sadly uncredited) New Orleans brass band’s second-line beat. Then the track itself begins, with Richard and her dancers wearing pointy, futuristic costumes outside the giant graffiti on a derelict former Holiday Inn. “Feet move with the beat/Bussifame, second line,” she chants, huskily, in an electronic track that’s closer to house than to second line, but just keeps adding levels of perky syncopation. JON PARELESAmythyst Kiah, ‘Black Myself’“Black Myself” starts out as a blunt catalog of stereotyping and discrimination — “You better lock the doors as I walk by/’Cause I’m Black myself — before affirming Black solidarity and self-determination in its final verse. The song was already a bluesy stomp when Amythyst Kiah first recorded it with the folky all-star alliance Our Native Daughters; now she revisits it with a fuller studio production, reinforcing its distorted guitar with more effects, more layers and a bigger beat, adding extra clout. PARELESMichael Wimberly, featuring Theresa Thomason, ‘Madiba’Over a stuttering bass line, plinking balafon and wah-wah-drenched guitar, the gospel vocalist Theresa Thomason offers an unflinching tribute to Nelson Mandela, lingering on the struggles he endured and vowing to carry his legacy forward. “Always looking left, always looking right/Always defending the people’s truth/We’ll never forget you,” she sings. The song comes from “Afrofuturism,” the latest album by the percussionist and multi-instrumentalist Michael Wimberly, who recorded it with a diverse group of musicians from across the world. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO24kGoldn, ‘3, 2, 1’24kGoldn’s version of hip-hop is, in essence, pop-punk coated with just the faintest layer of R&B — which is to say, exceedingly pop. His latest single, which arrives while “Mood,” his recent No. 1 with Iann Dior, is still at No. 5 on the Hot 100, is taut, angsty and extremely efficient, a fait accompli of hybrid pop. JON CARAMANICALil Yachty featuring Kodak Black, ‘Hit Bout It’Lil Yachty, KrispyLife Kidd, RMC Mike, Babyface Ray, Rio Da Yung OG, DC2Trill and Icewear Vezzo, ‘Royal Rumble’Three or so years ago, you would not have pegged Lil Yachty as destined to be one of hip-hop’s more versatile talents. And yet here he is, fast rapping over a nervous beat on “Hit Bout It,” a strong duet with the fresh-out-of-jail Kodak Black. That comes less than two weeks after “Royal Rumble,” a posse cut of (mostly) great Michigan rappers full of the non sequitur tough talk that’s been defining that scene for the last couple of years, and which Yachty has an affinity (if not quite aptitude) for. Focus instead on great verses from the stalwart Icewear Vezzo and the up-and-comer Babyface Ray. CARAMANICAMahalia featuring Rico Nasty, ‘Jealous’A sample of flamenco guitar curls through the insinuating, two-chord track of “Jealous” as the English singer Mahalia and the Maryland rapper-singer Rico Nasty casually demolish male pride. “Im’a do what I want to baby/I won’t be stuck without you baby,” they nonchalantly explain, as Mahalia flaunts her wardrobe, her car, her “crew” and her indifference. “Unless you got that heart then you can’t come my way,” she sings, staccato and unconcerned. PARELESChris Pattishall, ‘Taurus’For his debut album, the rising pianist Chris Pattishall reached back 75 years to revisit Mary Lou Williams’s 12-part “Zodiac Suite.” The result is neither overly nostalgic nor newfangled and gimmicky. Pattishall’s “Zodiac” is a startling achievement precisely because of how deeply — and personally — this old material seems to resonate with him. Pattishall has said that he is particularly drawn to Williams because of the way she seemed to hopscotch between atmospheres and registers within individual compositions, without sacrificing a sense of narrative. That’s borne out on his album’s very first track, “Taurus” (Williams’s own star sign), which starts with a passage of ruminative piano before a quick acceleration, with Pattishall leading his quintet into a swirling, bluesy refrain. RUSSONELLOAdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Taylor Swift’s New Old ‘Love Story,’ and 12 More Songs

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThe PlaylistTaylor Swift’s New Old ‘Love Story,’ and 12 More SongsHear tracks by Dua Lipa, Nicky Jam and Romeo Santos, R+R=Now and others.Taylor Swift has released a new version of her 2008 hit “Love Story” as the first of the songs she is rerecording from her first six albums.Credit…Chris Pizzello/Invision, via Chris Pizzello/Invision/ApJon Pareles, Jon Caramanica, Giovanni Russonello and Feb. 12, 2021Updated 2:22 p.m. ETEvery Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.Taylor Swift, ‘Love Story (Taylor’s Version)’[embedded content]As the first official release of her rerecorded back catalog, “Love Story,” from Taylor Swift’s 2008 album, “Fearless,” is a savvy pick. Not only is it one of her most beloved hits, but it also means that the first new-old lyric we hear the 31-year-old Swift sing is, “We were both young when I first saw you” — an immediate invocation of the past that subtly reframes the recording as a kind of tender love song to her 18-year-old self. Swift is more interested in impressive note-for-note simulacrum than revisionism here, though sharp-eared Swifties will delight in noticing the tiniest differences (like the playful staccato hiccup she adds to “Rom-e-oh!” on the second pre-chorus.) When Swift first announced her intentions to rerecord her first six albums, skeptics wondered if the whole project was just an uncomfortably public display of personal animosity toward her former business partners, and the songs’ new owners. But Swift has so far brought a sense of triumph, grace and artistry to the endeavor, and in doing so has begun the process of retelling her story on her own terms. It’s better than revenge. LINDSAY ZOLADZRebecca Black featuring Dorian Electra, Big Freedia and 3OH!3, ‘Friday (Remix)’Let’s say you want to rewrite your past. Write it over, like an old hard drive. Take a thing that made you well known, and reclaim it. Send a message to the people who robbed that thing of the pleasure and satisfaction it brought you. Sure, you could do a note-for-note rerecording that serves primarily as a middle finger to equity investors. Or perhaps you could take the Rebecca Black route. It’s been around a decade since “Friday,” her debut single, made her an early casualty of social media cruelty. But Black has been releasing music steadily, and quietly, for the last few years, and recently she’s been inching back into the spotlight as a reliably charming presence on TikTok. Musically, she’s found her footing as an outré eccentric with sturdy savvy, an ideal approach for — and a natural position for — someone who’s been chewed to pulp by the internet. Hence, the reclaiming of “Friday,” with a chaotic, loopy, joyful, meta-hyperpop remix with Dorian Electra, Big Freedia and 3OH!3, all produced by Dylan Brady of 100 gecs. The original song became an ur-text of outcast misery. How wonderful to hold it tight all these years, and just wait for your band of misfits to come along. JON CARAMANICADua Lipa, ‘We’re Good’Dua Lipa is at her cheekiest on “We’re Good,” a bonus track from the new deluxe “Moonlight Edition” of her 2020 album, “Future Nostalgia”: “We’re not meant to be, like sleeping and cocaine,” she croons. OK then! The video is, similarly, full of irreverent, not-sure-it-all-quite-lands humor, as a tank of imperiled lobsters are saved from becoming dinner by … the Titanic sinking? Thankfully the song itself is pretty straightforward and fun — a sassy, slinky kiss-off that’s more reliably buoyant than that doomed luxury liner. ZOLADZNicky Jam and Romeo Santos, ‘Fan de Tus Fotos’“Fan de Tus Fotos” finds the smooth reggaeton star Nicky Jam and the bachata superstar Romeo Santos both longing for the same woman, crooning one come on after another. Santos, in particular, is vivid, singing (in Spanish), “I’m your fan looking for a ticket/for a concert with your body.” In the video, both are office drones obsessed with the same supervisor, who metes out two punishments for their workplace insubordination — she fires them (bad), then finds more direct ways to boss them around (ummmmm … not bad?). CARAMANICACherry Glazerr, ‘Big Bang’Clementine Creevy, the songwriter who leads Cherry Glazerr, has moved well beyond the lean, guitar-driven rock of her recent past. “Big Bang” is a negotiation with an ex who’s still in the picture: “I still call you when I need escaping,” she admits, only to insist, “I don’t wanna make you my lifeline.” Her mixed feelings play out over a stately march that rises to near-orchestral peaks. Is she arguing with her ex or with herself? JON PARELESDeath From Above 1979, ‘One + One’What happens when post-punks grow up? The guitar-and-drums duo Death From Above 1979 has one answer: a hard-riffing embrace of happy monogamy and proud fatherhood. “One plus one is three — that’s magic!” The drums still pound and skitter, and the guitar still bites, while the nuclear family is reaffirmed. PARELESR+R=Now, ‘How Much a Dollar Cost’The pianist Robert Glasper and the alto saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist Terrace Martin played important roles in the making of Kendrick Lamar’s “To Pimp a Butterfly,” and they’re also at the nucleus of R+R=Now, a contemporary-jazz supergroup that works in conversation with hip-hop and R&B. (It also includes Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah on trumpet, Derrick Hodge on bass, Taylor McFerrin on synthesizer, and Justin Tyson on drums.) When the group performed at Glasper’s Blue Note residency in New York in 2018, Lamar’s “How Much a Dollar Cost” was part of the set. That show was released today as a live album; on the Lamar cover, without an M.C., the fiery interplay between Adjuah and Martin takes over storytelling duties. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOMatt Sweeney and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, ‘Hall of Death’What could have been a country waltz becomes, instead, a hyperactive scramble of distorted Tuareg guitar riffs and three-against-two cross-rhythms. The weary voice and haunted lyrics of Will Oldham (Bonnie “Prince” Billy) are backed not only by Matt Sweeney but by the unstoppable Mdou Moctar Ensemble — which includes their songwriting collaborator Ahmoudou Madassane on guitar, from Niger. The track winds up, unexpectedly, as something like a love song. PARELESLil Tjay featuring 6lack, ‘Calling My Phone’Lightly resentful sad boy R&B from Lil Tjay and 6lack — Lil Tjay sounds depleted, while 6lack sounds like he never takes his sunglasses off when he looks you in the eye. CARAMANICAKaty Kirby, ‘Portals’Katy Kirby’s voice is modest and breathy, with a few unconcealed cracks, as she muses over a shaky relationship in metaphysical terms: “If we peel apart will we be stronger than before/we had formed ourselves together in a temporary whole?” She’s accompanied by calm, steady, basic piano chords in the foreground, while chamber-pop co-conspirators open up creaky mysteries around her. PARELESLucy Gooch, ‘Ash and Orange’The composer and singer Lucy Gooch layers her keyboards and vocals into enveloping reveries. “Ash and Orange” relies on organ-toned synthesizer chords, distant church bells and countless choirlike overdubbed harmonies for a song that evolves from meditation to an open-ended quasi-confession — despairing? forgiving? — from overlapping voices: “In my heart, in my head, I’ve tried.” PARELESMark Feldman, ‘As We Are’Fluidly spiraling up the violin’s neck, then dashing and plucking and scraping back down in a rough swarm: that’s the sound of Mark Feldman — unflinching and unconstrained as always — in a solo rendition of Sylvie Courvoisier’s “As We Are.” Later he lets the piece’s off-the-grid melody carry him into a stretch of intense improvising. This track opens Feldman’s engrossing new album, “Sounding Point,” his first solo violin LP in over 25 years. RUSSONELLOBrent Faiyaz featuring Purr, ‘Circles’In “Circles,” the producer and singer Brent Faiyaz ponders identity, purpose and eschatology: “Did I forget who I am? Chasing gold?/Only heaven knows if you can truly win in the midst of a world that’s gon’ end.” Nothing is reliable: not the computer-shifted pitch of his voice, not the loop of plinky tones behind him, not the beat that’s sometimes interrupted, not even whether it’s one song or two. For its last 47 seconds, the track changes completely, turning into retro soundtrack rock as, in the video, Faiyaz leaves the studio gloom, climbs into his sports car and drives off. PARELESAdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Jay-Z, Foo Fighters and Mary J. Blige Among Rock Hall Nominees

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyJay-Z, Foo Fighters and Mary J. Blige Among Rock Hall NomineesSeven of this year’s 16 nominees are women, including the Go-Go’s, Dionne Warwick, Kate Bush, Carole King, Chaka Khan and Tina Turner.Jay-Z in concert. He’s on the list of nominees for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame released Wednesday.Credit…Brian Ach/Getty Images North America, via (Credit Too Long, See Caption)Feb. 10, 2021Foo Fighters, Jay-Z, Mary J. Blige, Iron Maiden and the Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti are all first-time nominees for the 36th annual Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, the hall announced on Wednesday.They lead a group of 16 nominees, including several who have received nods at least twice before: Devo, LL Cool J, New York Dolls, Rage Against the Machine and Todd Rundgren.After many complaints that the hall’s hundreds of inductees over the years have been overwhelmingly white and male, this year’s ballot is its most diverse yet. Seven of the 16 nominees are female acts, and nine feature artists of color.Women on the ballot include the Go-Go’s and Dionne Warwick — both receiving their first nods — along with Kate Bush, Carole King, Chaka Khan and Tina Turner.This year’s induction ceremony is planned for the fall in Cleveland, home of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and Museum.To some extent, the latest crop of nominees extends a pattern that has taken hold over the last half-decade or so, with a handful of alt-rock heroes and rap gods as all-but-guaranteed sure things; Foo Fighters and Jay-Z have just crossed the hall’s eligibility threshold of 25 years since the release of their first commercial recordings. Dave Grohl, the leader of Foo Fighters, is already in the pantheon as a member of Nirvana, class of 2014.From left, Chris Shiflett, Rami Jaffee, Taylor Hawkins, Dave Grohl, Nate Mendel, and Pat Smear of Foo Fighters. The band only recently became eligible for induction.Credit…Kevin Winter/Getty Images for IheartmediaA few recycled names from previous years’ ballots give a sense of the advocacy projects among the Hall of Fame’s secretive nominating committee. Rundgren, the eclectic singer-songwriter and producer whose solo career goes back to the early 1970s, has been nominated in each of the last three years; Rage Against the Machine, the agitprop rap-metal band whose planned reunion tour last year was disrupted by the pandemic, has been nominated three times over the last four cycles. LL Cool J has now gotten a total of six nods.Iron Maiden, whose lightning guitar riffs and demonic imagery helped shape heavy metal in the 1980s, has been eligible since 2005.But this year’s nominations also include some surprises. Kuti, the Nigerian bandleader and activist who melded James Brown’s funk with African sounds to create the genre of Afrobeat — and was introduced to many Americans through the 2009 Broadway musical “Fela!” — would be the first West African honoree. (Trevor Rabin, a member of Yes, which was inducted in 2017, is from South Africa.)And the hall’s nominating committee — a group of journalists, broadcasters and industry insiders — has clearly made an effort to highlight some of pop music’s many deserving women. The pressure to do so has been mounting for years. In 2019, the critic and academic Evelyn McDonnell tallied the 888 people who had been inducted up to that point and found that just 7.7 percent were women.Mary J. Blige performing in New Orleans. She’s on the list of hall of fame nominees for the first time. Inductees will be announced in May.Credit…Amy Harris/Invision, via Associated PressWhen Janet Jackson and Stevie Nicks gave acceptance speeches that year, they called on the institution to diversify its ranks. “What I am doing is opening up the door for other women to go, like, ‘Hey man, I can do it,’” Nicks said.If chosen, King and Turner would join Nicks as the only female artists to be inducted twice; King was admitted in 1990 with her songwriting partner, Gerry Goffin, and Ike and Tina Turner joined in 1991.The nominations will be voted on by more than 1,000 artists, historians and music industry professionals. The hall will once again enter a single “fan ballot” based on votes collected from members of the public on the hall’s website, rockhall.com. Inductees are to be announced in May.In December, the Hall of Fame and Museum announced plans for a $100 million expansion, which would increase the footprint of its museum by a third.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      The Music Lost to Coronavirus, Part 2

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Coronavirus OutbreakliveLatest UpdatesMaps and CasesSee Your Local RiskVaccine InformationWuhan, One Year LaterAdvertisementContinue reading the main storyPopcastSubscribe:Apple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsThe Music Lost to Coronavirus, Part 2Remembering Fred the Godson, Adam Schlesinger and Cristina.Hosted by Jon Caramanica. Produced by Pedro Rosado.More episodes ofPopcastFebruary 5, 2021The Music Lost to Coronavirus, Part 2January 31, 2021Olivia Rodrigo and ‘Drivers License’ Aren’t Going AnywhereJanuary 19, 2021Inside the Bull Market for Songwriting RightsJanuary 7, 2021How Zev Love X Became MF DoomDecember 23, 20202020 Popcast Listener Mailbag: Taylor, Dua, MGK and MoreDecember 15, 2020Taylor Swift’s ‘Evermore’: Let’s DiscussDecember 9, 2020The Best Albums of 2020? Let’s DiscussNovember 29, 2020Saweetie, City Girls and the Female Rapper RenaissanceNovember 18, 2020Who Will Control Britney Spears’s Future?November 10, 2020Ariana Grande, a Pop Star for the Post-Pop Star AgeOctober 22, 2020  •  More

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      Cardi B’s Gleefully Relentless ‘Up,’ and 12 More New Songs

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThe PlaylistCardi B’s Gleefully Relentless ‘Up,’ and 12 More New SongsHear tracks by Bomba Estéreo, SG Lewis, Flock of Dimes and others.Cardi B barely offers listeners a chance to catch their breath on her new solo single, “Up.”Credit…YouTubeJon Pareles, Giovanni Russonello and Feb. 5, 2021, 11:48 a.m. ETEvery Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.Cardi B, ‘Up’[embedded content]On “Up,” her first solo single in several years, Cardi B’s preferred method of annihilating the haters is oxygen deprivation — her flow is so relentless that for nearly three minutes she doesn’t offer listeners a single moment to catch their breath. “Big bag bussin’ out the Bentley Bentayga/Man, Balenciaga Bardi back,” she raps with rapturous alliteration, before running that tongue twister back again, in case you didn’t catch it all the first time. “Up” is a homage to the steely Chicago drill sound that Cardi grew up on, and it also finds her reuniting with DJ SwanQo, who worked with her on the hardest-hitting song on “Invasion of Privacy,” “Get Up 10.” (He co-produced “Up” with Yung Dza.) Her tone is a bit more gleeful than the drill influence would suggest, and there are of course some classically comedic Cardi punch lines here, but the ravenous way she digs into this beat is serious business. LINDSAY ZOLADZSG Lewis featuring Nile Rodgers, ‘One More’Choices, chances. SG Lewis sings about the ways an encounter at a party could go: Will it evaporate amid distractions, or will continuing the conversation for just one more song and lead to romance? Either way, it’s a dance party, and the guitar scrubbing away at complex chords over the neo-disco beat belongs to the disco and dance-pop wizard Nile Rodgers. JON PARELESSia and David Guetta, ‘Floating Through Space’How far has the pandemic lowered the bar for triumph over adversity? “You made it another day, made it alive,” Sia sings over David Guetta’s echoey, synthetic adaptations of a Caribbean soca beat. It’s computerized happiness for a worldwide predicament. PARELESMiss Grit, ‘Grow Up To’Miss Grit is the alias of Margaret Sohn, a Michigan-born New York transplant who, like St. Vincent, is equally enamored of both textured guitar distortion and crisp, clean melody. (When Sohn was a student in NYU’s music technology program, she briefly considered a career in making effects pedals.) Miss Grit’s self-produced second EP, “Impostor,” is a confident and searching meditation on that psychological scourge Impostor Syndrome and her outsider status as a Korean-American growing up in the Midwest. But the single “Grow Up To” is more of an abstraction — albeit a hypnotically catchy one. Beneath a vocal with a hazy, deadpan cool that recalls Mary Timony, Sohn retraces the melody line with her guitar, snaking and sparking like a lit fuse. ZOLADZBomba Estéreo featuring Okan and Lido Pimienta, ‘Agua’Folklore, mysticism, nature and electronics converge in “Agua,” the first single from an album due in April by the Colombian group Bomba Estéreo, joined by Toronto-based expatriates: the Colombian singer Lido Pimienta and the Afro-Cuban vocal duo Okan. Voices harmonize to chant the four ancient elements — “Agua, tierra, aire, fuego” (“water, earth, air, fire”) — over traditional-sounding drums, handclaps and bird calls; then the synthesizers appear, blipping and arpeggiating, as Pimienta and Bomba Estéreo’s Li Saumet sing and rap about being inseparable from the natural world. PARELESFlock of Dimes, ‘Two’“Can I be one? Can we be two?” Jenn Wasner asks on her stirring new single “Two.” The song — and its colorful, playfully choreographed video, directed by Lola B. Pierson and Cricket Arrison — is an exploration of the simultaneous needs for individuality and intimacy within a romantic relationship, but it also reflects the multiplicity of Wasner’s musical output. With her collaborator Andy Stack, she’s one-half of the band Wye Oak, while as a solo artist she releases music under the name Flock of Dimes. “Two” is driven by an irregular beat (Wasner recently joked on Twitter about her penchant for “odd time signatures”), as if to mirror the hesitant questioning of its lyrics. Even when she’s being somber or ruminative, Wasner has a touch of gallows humor, as when she muses memorably, “We’re all just wearing bodies like a costume til we die.” ZOLADZAlan Braufman (Angel Bat Dawid remix), ‘Sunrise’A slow, billowing, rafters-raising saxophone melody — distinctly in the spiritualist free-jazz tradition of Albert Ayler — becomes just one element in a digital swarm in this remix of a tune by the saxophonist Alan Braufman, from his 2020 quintet album, “The Fire Still Burns.” With the young multi-instrumentalist and composer Angel Bat Dawid at the controls, the track begins as a saxophone reflected upon itself, bouncing around the walls of an electronic prism; that leads into a steady, clipped, electronic beat, somewhere between deep house and ambient music. A veteran of New York’s jazz loft scene of the 1970s, Braufman only recently resuscitated his public career as a musician. “The Fire Still Burns,” featuring an intergenerational cast of side musicians, was a triumphant claim to artistic vitality, at age 69. This Dawid remix is another indication of what it means to stay engaged decades on, bringing the tradition ahead. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOVic Mensa featuring Wyclef Jean and Chance the Rapper, ‘Shelter’“I’ll be your shelter,” Wyclef Jean promises, sometimes in a sweet falsetto and sometimes with hoarse vehemence, over mournful, syncopated guitar chords. But the track, even with hints of hope at the end, is an elegy, and raps by Vic Mensa and Chance the Rapper matter-of-factly set out how many people aren’t sheltered from disease, poverty and racism: “Hospital workers in scrubs with no PPE/But they got money for riot gear,” Mensa observes. PARELESH.E.R., ‘Fight for You’How’s this for building anticipation: H.E.R.’s new song was nominated for a Golden Globe a day before it was even released! The soulful “Fight for You,” from the soundtrack of the upcoming Black Panther drama “Judas and the Black Messiah,” strikes an appropriate balance between period-pic scene-setting and up-to-date cool, as lyrics like “all the smoke in the air, feel the hate when they stare” draw unfortunate parallels between past and present. ZOLADZJimmy Edgar featuring 24hrs, ‘Notice’The producer Jimmy Edgar has far-flung connections. He has collaborated with producers including Sophie and Hudson Mohawk and rappers like Danny Brown. The Atlanta rapper 24hrs sing-raps assorted phrases in “Notice,” but all the action is in the track: viscous bass tones stopping and starting, little whistling interjections, double-time boings and swoops and tinkles. There’s a slow, determined push forward, but at any given moment, it’s impossible to predict where it will land. PARELESArchie Shepp and Jason Moran, ‘Wise One’You can hear history coursing both ways, future sloshing up against past, as the pianist Jason Moran and the saxophonist Archie Shepp revisit John Coltrane’s “Wise One.” When Moran pulls an arpeggiated rumble into a rhythmic flow, or splashes a fistful of high notes onto the keyboard behind Shepp’s high warbling cry, it’s almost impossible to say whether the younger pianist is guiding his elder down a new path, or following his lead. Shepp became a Coltrane apostle more than half a century ago, and it was Trane who brought Shepp to Impulse! Records, helping him build a reputation as one of the leading jazz innovators of the 1960s. Moran came up decades later, idolizing them both. Shepp and Moran’s album, “Let My People Go,” is out now — only the latest in a long history of memorable piano-sax duet albums by Shepp, including ones with Mal Waldron and Horace Parlan. RUSSONELLOVampire Weekend, ‘40:42’ remade by Goose and Sam GendelEver conceptual, Vampire Weekend called on musician-fans to remake “2021,” a minute-and-a-half ditty about relationships and the passage of time (“Copper goes green, steel beams go rust”) from its 2019 album “Father of the Bride.” There were conditions: Each remake was to last exactly 20 minutes and 21 seconds, to be combined for an EP entitled (do the math) “40:42.” Both acts rose to the occasion. Goose, a methodical jam band from Connecticut, did a live jam, on video, with clear landmarks of Minimalistic stasis, playful crosscurrents and dramatic, attentive buildups. Sam Gendel, a saxophonist who has worked with Ry Cooder, Perfume Genius and Moses Sumney, came up with multiple, Choose-Your-Own-Adventure scenarios: breathy woodwind chorales, abstract modal drones, electronic meditations and loops, cozy fireside acoustic session, raucous jazz finale. Musicians delight in working with limited parameters and leaping beyond them. PARELESAdvertisementContinue reading the main story More