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Manuel Gagneux (Zeal & Ardor) Returns as Birdmask, Premieres Music Video for New Song “Set Me on Fire”: Stream
Zeal & Ardor frontman Manuel Gagneux has revived his long-running solo project, Birdmask, and is premiering the music video for new song “Set Me on Fire” exclusively via Heavy Consequence. Birdmask is Gagneux in his own creative element. Although some of the atmosphere and experimental ideas of his metal outfit Zeal & Ardor are present here, Gagneux embraces a varied spectrum of sounds — “pop-rocked-bliss” as he calls it. Most notably, his soaring vocals remain right up front. “I’ve had this song ready for a couple of years now but being preoccupied with other projects kind of forced me to leave it on the back burner,” Gagneux says. “I feel like it’s about time to let it out. In the time between then and now I was lucky enough to tour the world with a different project, score ...
Get the New Zedd-Centric Experience Inside of This Video Game
Earlier in July, Zedd released his first new music of the year, and now that same song is soundtracking a new Zedd-centric experience inside of Minecraft. Released Monday (July 27), the “beat saber” game Beat Craft 2 lets players keep the beat along with the song in order to clear the level. The beats in question belong to “Funny,” the new single from Zedd and vocalist Jasmine Thompson that explores the humor found in the aftermath of a broken relationship. And while the music has a playful tone, it was delivered with sincere intentions. “I believe I finished the song in late February, but it has been difficult to find an appropriate time to release “Funny” given the difficult state the world is in,” Zedd said in a recent Twitt...
Grammy.com Readers Are Split About the Grammys’ New ‘Progressive R&B’ Category Name
Response was about evenly divided between the one positive response and the other two, which were negative or neutral. The Grammys announced on June 10 that they were changing the name of their best urban contemporary album category to best progressive R&B album. Most observers welcomed the change. “Urban” was the buzzword in R&B for a number of years, but many now see the term as dated and perhaps racially insensitive. On June 5, Republic Records announced that it was banning the term. The name change was fair-game for a quickie poll, including this one which turned up in an unexpected place—the Recording Academy’s own site, Grammy.com: “What do you think about the Best Progressive R&B Album category name change?” The tartly-phrased choices: It’s a step in the right...
Joe Jonas & Sophie Turner Welcome Their First Child Together
Congratulations to Joe Jonas and Sophie Turner, who have welcomed their first child together! “Sophie Turner and Joe Jonas are delighted to announce the birth of their baby,” the couple said in a statement to Billboard. Acccording to TMZ, the baby girl arrived on July 22, and is named Willa. The couple kept things pretty quiet throughout the Game of Thrones actress’ pregnancy, never offering a statement to confirm they were expecting, though she was spotted out and about with a baby bump. On Friday, after Taylor Swift dropped her new album Folklore, fans speculated that she may have sent the couple a baby gift. On the song “Invisible String,” she sings, “Cold was the steel of my axe to grind/ For the boys who broke my heart/ Now I send the...
Jason Derulo Performs ‘Savage Love’ Poolside for ‘Good Morning America’ Live Music Video: Watch
Jason Derulo cooled off by the pool during his steamy “Savage Love” performance Saturday (July 25) as part of Good Morning America‘s Summer Concert Series. The song behind the dance that took TikTok by storm is a strong contender for a top summertime anthem by the way a half-shirtless Derulo dressed up the visual, with guys and girls in swimsuits dancing until the sun comes down. His “Savage Love (Laxed – Siren Beat)” collaboration with New Zealand producer Jawsh 685 (real name Joshua Stylah) already topped the Official U.K. Singles chart (dated July 10). “Josh had this sound that was going crazy,” Derulo said about Jawsh 685 during a GMA interview. “It was on TikTok, right? But how do we take him and formulate him i...
Porno for Pyros to Reunite for 2020 Lollapalooza Stream
Lollapalooza was forced to cancel the 2020 festival due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but organizers announced a creative workaround for fans craving live music. The free Lolla 2020 livestream, airing from July 30 to Aug. 2 exclusively on YouTube, will feature over 150 archival and original performances and appearances — including the first major reunion in over two decades from Porno for Pyros, the post-Jane’s Addiction band fronted by Lollapalooza founder Perry Farrell. The four-day event will feature past headlining slots from Paul McCartney, OutKast, LCD Soundsystem, Arcade Fire (marking the 10th anniversary of their 2010 LP, The Suburbs), Metallica, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Chance the Rapper, Run the Jewels, Lorde, Alabama Shakes, Ellie Goulding, Tove Lo, and Hinds, among others. Origina...
Rep. John Lewis Crosses Edmund Pettus Bridge One Last Time
Source: Lynsey Weatherspoon / Getty The Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala. was the site of the violent incident known to many as “Bloody Sunday,” and the late Rep. John Lewis was among many who took the brave stance that day. The heroic congressman was honored with a final crossing of the bridge, with his casket drawn by a horse carriage in a somber but fitting tribute for a man who risked all for the good of the nation. Lewis, who represented Georgia’s 5th Congressional District, passed away on July 17 after battling pancreatic cancer. As it should have been, Lewis was properly honored by his peers in Congress and to those connected to the ongoing battle for civil rights. Instrumental in the fight for equal voting rights for all, Lewis was a young activist who was front and center in the...
U.K. Rapper Wiley Gets Twitter Account Suspended For Antisemitic Posts
Source: Ollie Millington / Getty All of a sudden, more and more people have felt emboldened to profess their racism and antisemitism on social media and in daily life (doesn’t take a genius to wonder why), and unfortunately British rapper Wiley has become the latest public figure to show his true colors on Twitter and got his account suspended for it. According to Variety the U.K. rapper went on an antisemitic Twitter tirade over the weekend in which he compared the Jewish community to the Ku Klux Klan (huh?) and suggested that Jewish people are given preferred treatment when they’re locked up in prison. The “Wearing My Rolex” rapper’s tweets were so shocking that his manager, John Woolf, decided to drop the self-proclaimed “Godfather of Grime” as a client. Taking to his Twitter page to an...
Nelly Performed Debut Album ‘Country Grammar’ In Its Entirety On MelodyVR
Source: MelodyVR / MelodyVR Nelly’s game-changing debut turned 20 in June, and he celebrated it in the biggest way possible during these COVID-19 times. The St. Louis native performed the project from the intro to the outro for his die-hard fans. On Saturday (June 25), the Grammy Award-winning Hip-Hop icon performed the entirety of his hit debut album Country Grammar for the first time ever exclusively on the virtual reality platform MelodyVR. The rapper born Cornell Haynes was backed by a live band as he took everyone back to when he single-handedly put Missouri on the Rap map. “To be [celebrating] the 20th anniversary of one of the few diamond-selling albums in all of Hip-Hop is crazy, because the game has changed so much,” he said. “We gonna run this from top to bottom.” Nelly opened th...
The Struggle Files: Doja Cat Gets COVID-19 After Thumbing Nose At Virus
Source: Getty Images / Getty Doja Cat has been holding a few bags of Ls this year, and another one was just recently collected. The rapper and racist chat room enthusiast revealed she’s contracted COVID-19 after initially mocking the disease online. Earlier in the year, the “Say So” star likened COVID-19 to being nothing more than a glorified remix of the flu, which we need to remind folks is also a potentially life-ending condition. During one of her infamous Instagram Live sessions, Doja Cat wasn’t about to take coronavirus all that seriously despite rampant rising numbers and deaths nationwide and globally. What made matters worse was Doja’s defiant IDGAF attitude that turned most heads. In a new radio interview with Captial XTRA, Doja revealed she had a bout with COVID-19 recently and ...
How Alessia Cara Sat on the Floor and Made a Difference on Her New EP
Alessia Cara spent last summer finding strength in pain. She gravitated further toward the melancholic pop tracks she’s known for, harnessed all the negative emotions she remembers feeling at the time and twisted them all into the bubbly six-track concoction, This Summer; her third release and first nontraditional project, created entirely on tour. And this (actual) summer hasn’t been much different. The Grammy-winning singer-songwriter returned July 17 with This Summer: Live Off the Floor, an acoustic reimagination of last year’s emotive EP, complete with recording sessions done mostly on a studio floor, a full band — credited entirely on the project’s cover art like some of her favorite vintage jazz records — and an overarching charitable cause behind it. [embedded conten...
Watch Bono and the Edge Cover Led Zeppelin’s ‘Stairway to Heaven’
On Sunday, St. Vincent shared a video of herself “fumbling through” a cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven.” But she wasn’t the only one inspired to tackle the 1971 rock classic. U2’s Bono and the Edge also posted a video cover of “Stairway,” a song they’ve played four times on tour, to salute their road crew. “There’s one annoying aspect of an Irish crew that has to be said,” Bono says in the clip. “Wherever you go in the world, whatever venue you’re playing — whether it’s the Olympia or 3 Arena or Madison Square Garden — you walk into the venue and it’s a big moment, and you’ll hear a song that we said, ‘We’ll never, ever play this.’ And that’s right, ‘Stairway To Heaven.’ These professionals believe they play this better than the band. And you know, it might be tru...
