R&B in the ‘90s was an explicit departure from the soul music of old. In the ‘80s, Marvin Gaye yearned for sexual healing over soft bongos and congas that felt as harmless as it was seductive. In the ‘90s, hypersexuality was the status quo, and sexual healing became just bumping and grinding over thanks to […]
Bill Withers left behind a handful of mellow-soul hits — “Ain’t No Sunshine,” “Lean on Me,” “Lovely Day” — that fit any mood like a turtleneck and wore into the creases of oldies radio stations. Yet who knew they’d be so versatile as to be coverable by (respectively) a heavy metal band, a Christian rap […]
As a genre-blurring bassist in multiple genres, Stephen Lee Bruner a.k.a. Thundercat is bored to tears by virtuosity for the sake of it. “[For me], it’s about writing songs instead of attacking a moment and trying to say everything at once,” he told Bass Player in 2020, citing his influences as Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins, […]
Despite Ellis Marsalis, Jr. being the paterfamilias of jazz’s most elite dynasty, he never ruled his house with an iron fist. “My father never put pressure on me,” Wynton Marsalis, one of four jazz-practitioning sons along with Branford, told The New York Times Magazine in 2004. “The house could fall down and everyone would be […]
At least here in the Northeast, one of the biggest appeals of the songwriting team of Adam Schlesinger and Chris Collingwood was how much of a role the New York Tri-State area played in the music they created together as Fountains of Wayne. And why there’s been such an enormous outpouring of love and sorrow […]
Week of April 4th Pearl Jam debuts at #1 with their new album Gigaton. If you haven’t read our history on Pearl Jam’s discography, check it out here! It should surprise no one that the mighty Pearl Jam’s single Dance of the Clairvoyants lands at #2. Variety writes, “the angry and sometimes experimental Gigaton might be […]
Hi all! As we get through these challenging times, I want to share some good news with you. The last two weeks (March 16-29) have been the biggest weeks ever for contributions to the Discogs Database! Last week’s numbers show that the Discogs Community have broken all previous records; 34,716 new releases submitted to Discogs […]
How Miles Davis Embraced Studio Technology and Rewrote the Jazz Rulebook Throughout its early history, jazz depended on in-the-moment interactions made by human beings in real-time. As the 1960s wore on and The Beatles and The Beach Boys crafted lush, multilayered studio works that couldn’t be replicated live, America’s Music remained the stuff of physical […]
When I was growing up, my Aunt, who was only 13 years older than me, was obsessed with the Peanuts cartoon strip. The walls of her room had a trim going around the top of the walls, adjacent to the ceiling, of index card-sized favourite tableaus, featuring any assortment of Charlie, Snoopy, Linus, and the […]
Prince once said that Kandace Springs “has a voice that could melt snow.” The music legend heard Springs’ cover of Sam Smith’s “Stay With Me” online in 2014 and invited her to perform with him at Paisley Park for the 30th anniversary of Purple Rain, becoming a mentor to the young singer and pianist. That alone […]
