Masked Swedish rock band Ghost became the first hard rock act in four-plus years to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with SKELETÁ (Loma Vista), which shifted 86,000 copies last week to far surpass albums by SZA, Kendrick Lamar and Sabrina Carpenter. It’s the biggest opening-week haul for a rock, hard rock or…
For the man who once sang, “That was my ass you saw bouncing next to Ludacris,” Oh Smokey may come across as a more mature affair. For almost two decades, Eef Barzelay (who often records under the moniker Clem Snide) has written mordantly funny songs that thread the needle between the heartbreaking and the profane….
The first time the members of Goose realized that some of their heroes noticed what they were doing happened one night on the road in 2019. They were in the van, driving overnight back home to Connecticut, as keyboardist Peter Anspach plugged his headphones into the Apple Music show Time Crisis with Ezra Koenig. More…
Lady Gaga drew an estimated 2.5 million fans last night (May 3) to a free show on Rio de Janeiro’s Copacabana Beach, breaking Madonna’s record for the most-attended concert by a female artist in history set on at the same venue last year. The set list hued closely to what Gaga performed last month at…
Sabrina Teitelbaum, a.k.a. indie rock musician Blondshell, is a big Replacements fan. From her home in Los Angeles, she tells me that the song “Androgynous”—from the band’s seminal 1984 album Let It Be—was a really important song for her growing up. “I remember hearing it for the first time…especially as a queer kid…it was such…
Name Andy Bell More from Spin: R.E.M. Revisit ‘Radio Free Europe’ For New Benefit EP Pet Symmetry Goes ‘Big’ The Evolution of Blondshell Best known for Being the frontman for Erasure, for wearing stilettos and dresses, for forgetting the words. Current city London. Really want to be in I would be in Mallorca, it’s my fun palace, my…
Jazz guitar has always been a dynamic art form, adapting to new styles while staying rooted in tradition. From the early swing and bebop pioneers to today’s fusion innovators, guitarists have expanded the instrument’s role with complex harmonies, unconventional rhythms, and modern technology. Today, jazz guitarists face the challenge of honoring tradition while embracing new…
When Ed Sheeran unearthed dozens of 2015 gems from his old phone earlier this week — ahead of his aptly named new single, “Old Phone” — he included a handful of never-before-seen photos of Taylor Swift, whom he has been close friends with for more than a decade. Among the uploads of Swift — which include a…
R.E.M. have assembled a new, five-track EP centered around their classic 1981 single “Radio Free Europe” to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the original Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty broadcasts. It also comes ahead of tomorrow’s (May 3) World Press Freedom Day. The project is led by a new remix of the song by previous R.E.M….
“Hard to be happy when the world is getting heavy.” This line arrives during the refrain of the final song—“Big Doink”—but honestly, it summarizes the world’s need for Pet Symmetry’s latest album, Big Symmetry. Sure, it was born out of a different year’s tough times—namely 2021’s COVID pandemic and the interruption it inflicted upon touring—but…
