Lara Downes, with her father in San Francisco, ca. 1975. Courtesy of the artist hide caption
We last spoke to pianist and Amplify co-host Lara Downes in March , when she announced her Rising Sun Music project, through which she would release an EP every month for as long as she could keep it up. The goal: to resurface and revivify classical works by Black artists.
"It gets very frustrating," Downes explains of her motivations for the project, "to always be looking up at a lineage that doesn't reflect you. So as a person of mixed race, it became very personal at first. And then, it became a story that I really wanted to tell, because it's a story that changes another story: it changes the story of what is classical music, but also the story of what is American history."
She's really examining all the different moods of this song – from a feeling of tender reverence to a playful kind of swing, which then leads to a very expansive resolution.
Lara Downes : This is an arrangement of another song that I think a lot of people will know. First, the original...
It's one of the most important songs of the Civil Rights Era. Cooke wrote it after he and his entourage were turned away from a whites-only hotel in Louisiana. So, it was an expression of something deeply personal for him, but at the same time it sums up so much about the collective Black experience in America. So I asked my friend, the arranger Jeremy Siskind, to put together a solo piano version for me:
Lara Downes : I'm trying to be very intentional about bringing together various traditions of music from the Black experience, to show that it's all connected. This is a tree with many branches.
Rebecca Black Was Here: "Friday" singer's new music is truly great
Significantly, both the song and video for "Personal" work as a symbolic signal of Black's transition from her amateur-hour early days to the fully formed pop artist she's become. The first 30 seconds feature generic synths and a heavily Auto-Tuned verse, as though calling back to the hoary, unimaginative studio trickery that first brought the world's attention upon her. In the video, Black is lounging on a bed in heavy makeup and glammed-up boudoir wear, as she rolls her fingers across endless, identical lines of pill bottles, like a Valley Of The Dolls fever dream. But then, a jarring bass thrum kicks in, Black's natural voice doubles with its digitally manipulated counterpart, and a menswear-clad Black, hair loose and unkempt, dances down a flight of stairs, grabs a bedazzled chainsaw, and cuts loose with dance-like-no-one's-watching bravado. It couldn't be a more apt metaphor if she digitally morphed the younger her into this new self.
Now, Black has collected "Girlfriend," "Personal," and four other, equally catchy tracks as Rebecca Black Was Here . The results suggest a singer who has incorporated the many parts of herself into a cohesive—if happily messy and unstructured—whole. There are exuberant, Charlie XCX-evoking numbers ("NGL"), aching torch songs ("Blue"), and soak-in-your-feelings grooves ("Worth It For The Feeling"), all of them capable of going toe-to-toe with any contemporary pop hit currently sitting on the charts.
Black is refusing to call this an "album" or an "EP," instead terming Rebecca Black Was Here a "project." When The A.V. Club reached out to ask why, she responded: "This project for me kind of fell in several different places that made neither 'album' nor 'EP' really fit the best. And honestly, the word 'project' was what I'd also referred to it as from the get-go and throughout the process of creating it—so it's just what stuck, and made sense to me the most." That might seem eye-rolling to those who prefer simple terms and clear categories, but for an artist who had to spend her formative years stuck in the "one-mistake wonder" box with everyone else who stumbled into fame through a much-derided fluke, resisting categorization makes all the sense in the world.
Alex McLevy is a writer and editor at The A.V. Club, and would kindly appreciate additional videos of robots failing to accomplish basic tasks.
British music exports reach a record high - BBC News
Dua Lipa, Coldplay and The Beatles helped the British record industry earn £519.7m overseas last year, the highest figure on record.
Export revenues for music grew by 6% compared to 2019, aided by the "explosive growth of music streaming", said record label association the BPI.
One in 10 tracks streamed globally hail from the UK, with 300 British artists receiving 100 million streams or more.
The club anthem was streamed 1.62 billion times in total, while her Brit Award-winning album Future Nostalgia was the 10th best-seller of the year.
Harry Styles' second record Fine Line did even better - emerging as the world's fifth best-selling album of 2020.
Despite these achievements, there were no British artists listed among the year's top 10 biggest-sellers across all formats - raising questions about the UK's ability to create global superstars in an increasingly competitive marketplace.
Instead, the list was topped by Korean pop band BTS, with the rest of the acts coming from North America - including The Weeknd, Billie Eilish and Taylor Swift.
According to the BPI, the UK is still the largest exporter of music in the world, after the USA - but its share of the global market has dropped from 17% in 2015 to 10% last year.
However, with the exception of Dua Lipa's album, 2020 was relatively quiet for major new releases from British artists. This year could play out very differently - with Adele, Ed Sheeran and Coldplay all working on new albums.
Diana Ross says 'Thank You' in new music after 15 years | Reuters
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61st Grammy Awards - Show - Los Angeles, California, U.S., February 10, 2019 - Diana Ross performs. REUTERS/Mike Blake
LONDON, June 17 (Reuters) - American singer Diana Ross expresses her gratitude in new single "Thank You" released on Thursday, the title track from her first studio album in 15 years.
Ross, the former lead singer of Motown Records' hugely successful group the Supremes, recorded the songs in her home studio during the COVID-19 pandemic. The album is described as "a powerful, inclusive musical message of love and togetherness".
"This collection of songs is my gift to you with appreciation and love. I am eternally grateful that I had the opportunity to record this glorious music at this time," Ross said in a statement.
The album "Thank You" will be released in the autumn. It is Ross' first studio album since 2006's "I Love You".
Reuters, the news and media division of Thomson Reuters, is the world's largest multimedia news provider, reaching billions of people worldwide every day. Reuters provides business, financial, national and international news to professionals via desktop terminals, the world's media organizations, industry events and directly to consumers.
Inside the music: The story of the fast rise and quick fall of Mikaela Mayer's teenage metal band
MIKAELA MAYER WAS backstage at a concert in Colorado waiting for her friend. It was 2018, before Mayer had become a world champion, before she started to become more of a face of women's boxing.
A man approached her and her best friend, Ginny Fuchs, also a fighter, and started offering boxing advice. Watching from the side was the person who brought them backstage to begin with, and all Nita Strauss could do was laugh.
"This guy starts talking to them, like, 'You got to lead with your left,'" Strauss said. "I'm like, 'Oh my God.' They were so classy, like, 'Oh, we know.'"
Before Mayer became a boxer, an Olympian and a world champion , she was a musician. Before she fought in front of international crowds and had fans chanting her name in pro fights, she craved the energy of being on a small stage during Warped Tour as a bassist in Lia-Fail, a hardcore metal band. Together, she and Strauss traveled the country, sometimes playing the early, early set on a show in front of bartenders and random stragglers.
Had things gone differently with Lia-Fail, Mayer may not have left the band. She may not have found boxing and instead might have made music a career like Strauss, who is Cooper's tour guitarist. She also fronts her own band, Nita Strauss, and is considered one of the best guitar players in the world.
"We don't see each other a lot. She's busy," Mayer said. "I went to see her perform, and we had breakfast and did a hike and she was off."
"That experience, showing me this world at such a young age and having no fear and going after something that people thought was crazy," Mayer said. "It kind of trained my mind to be a risk-taker, right?"
How a music store owner is dealing with stalling supply and steep demand
Adam Levin is the general manager of Chuck Levin's Washington Music Center, a family-owned store in Wheaton, Maryland. He said the store has been busier than ever because of the pandemic.
At the start of the lockdown, Levin said he was worried that the store wouldn't survive the pandemic. He said he told the other managers to cancel any orders for expensive stuff because he didn't know if anything would sell.
Levin said that guitars, keyboards and recording equipment have been flying off the shelves during the pandemic.
“What we realized was that everyone’s stuck at home, there’s only so much Netflix you can watch. There’s only so much video games you can play. People that hadn’t played in a while wanted to play something," he said.
Demand grew so much, Levin had to send employees back into the warehouses to start shipping equipment out while he was running customer service from home.
However, gear began to sell faster than the store could replace it. Levin said the instruments in higher demand, like guitars, have to be finished and tested by hand to make sure every facet of the product works. When factories overseas began to shut down, due to the pandemic and the recent semiconductor shortage, Chuck's had less and less gear to sell. Now, Levin said, his team is ordering as much as they can in bulk because shipments have slowed down so much.
Demand hasn't slowed down since the store reopened, either. Now that more venues are presenting concerts, school music programs are meeting in person again and professional musicians are going back on tour, music stores like Chuck’s are seeing an even bigger strain on the little inventory they can get. Levin said there are back orders now that probably won't be filled until next year.
The shop “became kind of like a playground because we were open,” Levin said. “You don’t go hang out at the grocery store, but you’ll come hang out here. And that was kind of cool. That, you know, maybe people weren’t going to come in and buy something that day, but they just had to get out of their house."
Music Agent Matt Galle Joins CAA - Variety
After months of rumors, music agents Matt Galle, Mike Marquis and Rachel Pestik have joined CAA ’s Music Touring department, the company announced Wednesday.
Galle most recently served as a member of Paradigm Talent Agency’s Music Executive Leadership Group. A 12-year veteran at that company, Galle’s client roster over the years has included Shawn Mendes, Bruno Mars, My Chemical Romance, Halsey, FUN., Janet Jackson, Missy Elliott, Kesha, Gucci Mane, T-Pain, Taking Back Sunday, Lauv, Austin Mahone, Andy Grammar, Alec Benjamin, Why Don’t We, and Charli XCX. It was not immediately clear which artists will be coming to CAA with the new team members.
He is also the Founder and CEO of Photo Finish Records (PFR), an indie label created in 2006, which includes electronic-pop act Shaed. In 2000, he co-founded the Kenmore Agency in Boston and also co-founded the Bamboozle Music Festival, which ran from 2003 to 2012.
Marquis was most recently a Music Agent at Paradigm and COO at Photo Finish Records. He has worked with artists including Bleachers, All Time Low, and Bishop Briggs, among others. Marquis is also a partner in this summer’s Sad Summer Festival.
Rachel Pestik comes to CAA from Paradigm, where she worked with music acts such as Hayley Kiyoko, Of Monsters and Men, Taking Back Sunday, and Muna, among others.
“We are honored to have Matt, Mike, and Rachel join the team here at CAA. Many of us at CAA have worked with Matt for almost 20 years, beginning from his early days at the Kenmore Agency,” said CAA Co-Head of Contemporary Music Darryl Eaton. “We’ve always been impressed with his vision, his eye for identifying emerging artists, and his deep passion for the talented musicians he represents.
Our entire group is excited and energized by Matt, Rachel, and Mike joining us to collaborate and further build out our incredible Music department.”
2021 Latin Music Week Returns to Miami: Dates | Billboard
"We couldn't be more excited to bring the world's biggest celebration of Latin music, Billboard Latin Music Week, back to Miami," said Julian Holguin , president of Billboard . "After a trying year, both artists and fans are eager to engage in music's unique ability to represent diverse voices and bring people together. We know that this year's festivities will encourage attendees and viewers to experience Latin culture, revel in generation-defining music and connect with one another like never before."
Billboard Latin Music Week's talent lineup and schedule will be announced in the coming weeks, and registration will open soon. For more information, and the latest updates, visit BillboardLatinMusicWeek.com
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