Alternative Music
Boston Calling 2022 Photo Gallery: Metallica, Avril Lavigne, Nine Inch Nails, & More
Despite looking nothing like the festival that was first announced back in May 2021 — or even what was detailed in January of this year — Boston Calling 2022 did indeed happen, and we have the photos to prove it. Unfortunate circumstances, positive COVID tests, and severe weather warnings meant a number of artists on the original lineup never took the stage. It also meant that Nine Inch Nails performed a rare double-header, topping both Friday and Saturday night. So the festival may not have been exactly what fans were expecting when they first bought tickets, but if you were able to look past all the unavoidable misfortunes, there was still more than enough to make for a successful Memorial Day Weekend event. With performances from Metallica, Run the Jewels, HAIM, Avril Lavigne, Weezer, M...
Pink Floyd Join TikTok
Someone must have tipped Pink Floyd off to TikTok’s knack for re-popularizing decades-old music, because the band has officially joined the platform. In addition to uploading their catalogue to TikTok’s sound library, allowing fans to use their music in their own videos, Pink Floyd have also made an account of their own, where they promise in a statement to post “unique video content.” The band’s account launched today, May 30th, in accordance with the 50th anniversary of the day they entered the studio to start recording The Dark Side Of The Moon. Despite its reputation as a dancing app, a good chunk of TikTok’s 1 billion+ users tend to soundtrack their videos not with Hot 100 pop, but classic rock and alternative. In 2020, a viral video launched Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” back into the Bil...
Norm Macdonald’s Posthumous Nothing Special Is Unlike Any Other Comedy Performance — Review
It’s hard to imagine a comedy set like Norm Macdonald’s latest and last. Nothing Special, a title that manages the Norm-like feat of simultaneous irony and honesty, was recorded at Macdonald’s home, without an audience, during the pre-vaccine pandemic days of 2020. It’s performed in the style of a webcast; MacDonald has a microphone, but he’s sitting down, focusing mostly on his face, as if Zooming into his own special. The press materials boast that it was done in “one take,” which is both impressive, in that Macdonald appears to do 55 minutes of comedy more or less extemporaneously without any breaks for laughs, and obvious, in that he’s occasionally interrupted, by a ringing phone or a barking dog. The comic had been preparing material for his next Netflix special, but, as very few peop...
Even Jon Voight Is Calling For Common Sense Gun Control: “This Is Mental”
Jon Voight has released a statement in the wake of the Uvalde, Texas elementary school mass shooting calling for stricter gun laws in the US. “Oh, how my heard bleeds for all those lost,” he began the video posted to his Facebook page in front of an American flag. “My soul cries. We must do something about these horrors that are taken out on innocent beings. Humans who each have lives, and years of life that they’re supposed to live. They’ve been taken down by insanity.” The outspoken Republican and father of Angelina Jolie later went on: “There should be proper qualifications for gun ownership. Proper testing. One should only own a gun if they’re qualified and schooled. It’s not about left, right, guns, no guns. This is about brains that are dysfunctioning. This is mental. This is not abo...
The Band’s Robbie Robertson Pays Tribute to Ronnie Hawkins: “The One Who Made This All Happen”
Rockabilly legend Ronnie Hawkins, who served as a mentor of The Band, died Sunday, May 29th at the age of 87. Hawkins’ wife told CBC that her husband passed away following a long illness. “He went peacefully and he looked as handsome as ever,” Wanda Hawkins said. Though a native of Arkansas, Hawkins experienced the majority of his success after relocating to Canada in the early 1960s. At one point, his band, known as The Hawks, featured Levon Helm, Robbie Robertson, Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, and Garth Hudson– who would later go on to form The Band and back Bob Dylan. Advertisement Related Video “He was our mentor. He taught us the rules of the road,” Robertson wrote of Hawkins in a tribute published to Instagram. Robertson went on to describe Hawkins as “the godfather” and “the one who m...
Johnny Depp Rocks Out with Jeff Beck As Jury Deliberates Defamation Case
As he awaits the results of his defamation trial against Amber Heard, Johnny Depp hit the stage with Jeff Beck in Sheffield, UK on Sunday night. Depp joined Beck to perform for a cover of John Lennon’s “Isolation,” which they previously released as a studio recording in 2020. The two also teamed up for covers of Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” and Jimi Hendrix’s “Little Wing.” Watch fan-captured footage below. Though he appears unfazed on stage, Depp is no doubt eagerly awaiting the verdict of his aforementioned defamation trial against ex-wife Amber Heard. After closing arguments were heard on Friday, the case is currently in jury deliberation, with a decision expected as soon as Tuesday. Advertisement [embedded content] [embedded content] [embedded content] [flexi-common-toolbar] [...
Sidhu Moose Wala, Popular Punjabi Singer and Politican, Shot Dead
Sidhu Moose Wala, a well-known Punjabi rapper-turned-member of India’s Congress party, has been shot and killed. He was just 29 years old. According the Hindustan Times, Moose Wala was murdered by unknown assailants in Jawaharke Village in the Mansa District on Sunday. The gunmen fired at least thirty rounds into the Moose Wala’s vehicle, killing him and another person, and injuring at least one other man who was traveling with him at the time. Punjab’s chief of police blamed the shooting on a rivalry between Moose Wala’s manager and a Canadian organized crime group. The attack reportedly occurred just one day after the Punjab police force scaled down security protection for over a hundred public figures, including Moose Wala, in an effort to redirect resources elsewhere. As Rolling Stone ...
Why the Stranger Things Season 4 Villain Is the Show’s Best Yet
[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for Stranger Things, Season 4, Episode 7, “Chapter 7: The Massacre at Hawkins Lab.”] One of the biggest challenges faced by any storyteller, not just the folks behind Netflix’s Stranger Things is how to structure your reveals: Delay things too long and without enough explanation, and the viewer gets frustrated. Tell all too early, or drop one too many clues, and you’ll just annoy people. But while there are multiple secrets at the center of Stranger Things Season 4, Volume 1 (as we’re referring to the first seven episodes released over Memorial Day weekend), one of the most exciting aspects of the season is the fact that there’s one answer which unites nearly all of them. Season 4 of the Netflix hit splits up into largely four narratives: Fir...
Nine Inch Nails Treat Boston Calling to Second Headlining Set of Deep Cuts
Nine Inch Nails took the stage at Boston Calling on Saturday night for their second of two headlining sets. After filling in for Foo Fighters on Friday night, Trent Reznor and co. served as a last-minute replacement for The Strokes on Saturday (a member of The Strokes tested positive for COVID, leading to their cancelation). Whereas Friday night’s set was packed with hits, Saturday leaned heavy in material not normally heard during a festival performance. Notably, NIN dusted off the With Teeth track “Every Day is Exactly the Same” for only the third time since 2006. They also played “Mr. Self Destruct” from The Downward Spiral; “The Day the World Went Away” from The Fragile; “Wish” and “Last” from the Broken EP; “Sin” and Terrible Lie” from Pretty Hate Machine; “Letting You” and “Echoplex”...
Kate Bush, Talking Heads & The Cramps Featured on Stranger Things Season 4 OST: Stream
The first installment of Stranger Things Season 4 dropped this week, and along with it came an appropriately ’80s-tinged soundtrack. Stranger Things: Soundtrack from the Netflix Series, Season 4, Volume I is available to stream below. The Season 4 Stranger Things soundtrack was once again compiled by show creators The Duffer Brothers and music supervisor Nora Felder. Along with classics like Talking Heads’ “Psycho Killer,” The Beach Boys’ “California Dreamin’,” and KISS’ “Detroit Rock City,” the Season 4 soundtrack includes a new version of Journey’s “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)” remixed by Bryce Miller and Alloy Tracks. Yet the most exciting soundtrack inclusion — at least to star Winona Ryder — may be Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill.” “I’ve been obsessed with her since ...
Metallica Take Over Napa Valley with BottleRock Set and Late-Night Covers Show: Recap, Photos + Video
Napa, California’s BottleRock Festival finally returned after a two-year absence this weekend, and with Metallica headlining day one on Friday (May 27th), it got off to head-banging start. As they usually do, the legendary metal band made the show an event for their fans, making sure that they would have maximum Metallica intake. One of the bands that performed prior to Metallica’s headlining set was Bastardane, a hard-rock trio that includes James Hefield’s son Castor on drums. Although the band has a thrash metal influence, they have their own unique sound that seemed to get a seal of approval from the Metallica fans watching the show. Also approving was James himself, who could be seen behind the wings of the stage watching and nodding along, but soon he would be on a much bigger stage....
Bob’s Burgers: The 50 Best Original Songs
When you’re watching an average episode of Bob’s Burgers, there are some fixtures of the programs you can always count on seeing: Series regulars like H. Jon Benjamin and Kristen Schaal, the conversational style of the dialogue, the burger-based puns. But just as prominent in this animated comedy are musical numbers. Though they’re not featured in every episode, Bob’s Burgers has frequently made time for individuals in its eclectic cast to break out into song. The members of the Belcher family and their friends and neighbors have such outsized personalities, it only makes sense that they’d only be able to express their emotions through similarly larger-than-life ditties. Across over 230 episodes, Bob’s Burgers has delivered countless memorable tunes, which makes it seemingly impossible to ...
