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Kanye Goes A Capella at Facebook, Twitter HQ
07.28.10
When looking for a way to promote his new record Kanye West must have just turned on a computer. West chose Facebook and Twitter headquarters to put on a couple of a capella performances of what we can only assume are a few tracks off of his upcoming album. Some raw YouTube clips show a suit-clad West up on a table animatedly tearing through songs for some camera phone-wielding staff members. One power track in particular called Mama’s Boyfriend, stole the show with Kanye feeling the need to so elegantly warn those in attendance, “I’m sorry there’s a lot of use of the ‘N’ word but I’m allowed to use it.” If there were any doubts about this record being a change from 808s & Heartbreak, they’re all gone now. Watch him go at it here, or read his blog post about the performance. In other Kanye news, the rapper told his followers on Twitter that the title of his album won’t be Good Ass Job as was expected, although he left us hanging on the new name.

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Bits & Pieces
Lady Gaga: Facebook Monster
07.05.10
In the last year Lady Gaga has become a cultural phenomenon and this past weekend we were given another taste of just how huge she has become when the singer became the first living person to rack up 10 million fans on Facebook. Gaga, who by Tuesday morning had already reached 11 million fans, is only surpassed by five entities in fan totals: the late Michael Jackson, as well as Family Guy, the Mafia Wars game, Texas Hold’em Poker and Facebook itself, the latter of which she is set to pass within the summer. The mother monster posted a short video message on her Facebook profile, saying “Thank you so much for all your love and support and for sticking by me through the fame, and the fame monster… Become my friend on Facebook!” To join her massive fan-base, check out Gaga’s profile here.

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Bits & Pieces
Reznor Scores Fincher Facebook Flick
07.02.10
At first glance it doesn’t seem like the most intriguing or epic of movies: a film all about the founding of Facebook. But add in the fact that Trent Reznor of the Nine Inch Nails is writing the movie’s entire score, and that it’s being directed by Se7en, Fight Club and Zodiac mastermind David Fincher, and this flick just got a little more exciting. On the Nine Inch Nails website Reznor wrote that he was planning on taking some time off after a hectic 2009 full of touring, but then he was approached by Fincher and hopped aboard the project. Now the score, and the movie, are near completion, and Reznor called the film “really fucking good. And dark!” The Social Network, notably starring Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake, opens October 1st. Peek the teaser trailer here.

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Bits & Pieces
Film, Facebook & Fresh music: Reznor, Reznor and more Reznor
05.06.10
Much like the fan helmed NIN flick This One Is On Us, a new loyalist film is reported to surface wearing the title Nine Inch Nails: [after all is said and done]. The film, shot in HD and recorded in 5.1 surround sound will take the viewer through NIN’s final show from last September at L.A.’s Wiltern Theatre. The flick does not have an official release date but will be available online for free.
In other Trent news… The sultan of symphonic strange has taken his recently surfaced How To Destroy Angels project, with wife Mariqueen Maandig and partner in crime Atticus Ross, to Facebook’s shores. Now that HTDA’s debut single A Drowning, up for grabs on Amazon and getting around like a hooker on wheels, Reznor is taking to the group’s Facebook page to answer your questions. The outfit recently posted a message saying “We’re experimenting with Facebook’s ability to host a Q&A type scenario here. If you have a question, post it here and we will check in from time to time (and MAY even answer some!)”. Does anyone else think Trent is reminiscent of a sixteen year old girl when it comes to social networking? Meh… In any case check HTDA’s six-song, self-titled EP this summer, along with a tentative full-length released next year.

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Bits & Pieces
Trent Reznor and The Mrs. Team Up for a Project
04.28.10
Nine Inch Nails may have thrown in the towel but it seems Trent Reznor has remained in the ring. Teaming up with his wife/former West Indian Girl frontwoman Mariqueen Maandig, Reznor returns with a new outfit dubbed How To Destroy Angels. Seemingly titled after a 1984 effort by experimental industrialists Coil, Reznor & Maandig have gone through all the proper social networking arteries; with a website, Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, and Vimeo accounts up and running. However we still know very little about the new endeavor aside from a forthcoming eponymous EP slated to drop this summer. However I wouldn’t worry too much in the way of updates on the group as Twitter talk Trent has most likely tweeted 627 times since you’ve begun reading this article.

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Feeling Cornered...
Throwing Tethered Stones
04.26.10
by Lit Hardway

It seems as of late the music industry is filled with people who have only shitty things to say of others… You know, more than usual that is. Joni Mitchell recently roared with opinion when she went on record saying “Bob [Dylan] is not authentic at all. He’s a plagiarist, and his name and voice are fake. Everything about Bob is a deception.” And of course we recall M.I.A.’s expressive disdain for pop heavyweight Lady Gaga as she publicly announced, “People say we’re similar, that we both mix all these things in the pot and spit them out differently, but she spits it out exactly the same…None of her music’s reflective of how weird she wants to be or thinks she is.” I have a great idea. How about everyone shuts the fuck up! In what way, shape, or form, is it Joni Mitchell’s problem whether or not Bob Dylan’s “real” or not? Pssst Joni, ‘member your little synthesizer break down in the 80s? No? Well we do. Meanwhile M.I.A. spares no breath in challenging Lady Gaga’s flashy sense of strange; while releasing music videos like Born Free, showcasing an amount of graphic and violent footage that surpasses necessity and dips well into good ol’fashion shock value. In all fairness Mitchell along with M.I.A. are notable artists, who seemingly insult other artists who they believe are not meeting certain expectations simply because of the amount of pride they put into their own work. However doesn’t the sheer immaturity of insulting your peers simply via your own opinion ring as childish and cheap anyways? In a time where bullshit, money and Facebook run our lives, is it fair for anyone to criticize anyone’s motives or intentions? Especially in the music industry. Be careful how hard you toss those stones ladies & gentlemen… There may be strings attached.
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Bits & Pieces
No Name Change, ‘Courtney Love’ Lives On
04.22.10
It seems we’ve all misunderstood Courtney Love and are out to get her once again. Shortly after an interview where Love explained she would now be going by her birth name Courtney Michelle, announcing “Courtney Love is dead”, the rocker’s spokesperson released the statement, “She’s not changing her name, unless it’s to Courtney Love Mellencamp or Big Baby Jesus”. Love’s people say the comment was apparently taken out of context (most likely through slurring breaths), despite NME’s video footage of Courtney Michelle Harrison Love Cobain saying, “The name Courtney Love feels like I’ve outgrown it. It was really, really fun to be Courtney Love for a long time, and then it became an ass-pain.” In related news… Interviews with Courtney should be simpler. Like what’s one plus one, and point out the US on a map for us. For anyone that would rather hear Courtney sing rather than talk shit, click the ‘like’ button on Hole’s Facebook page and stream Nobody’s Daughter for free.

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Bits & Pieces
Bloc Party’s Kele Okereke Goes Solo
04.06.10
Bloc Party fans get to bloggin’ as frontman Kele Okereke has announced his debut solo album, The Boxer. Helmed by Spank Rock producer XXXChange and said to be an installment in electronic pop, June 21st in the UK and June 22nd in the U.S. will mark the launch of Kele’s debut effort. And with Okereke’s usual audio haunt on hiatus, he’s had plenty of time to set himself up, as his latest project is already outfitted with a website, blog, Twitter account, MySpace, and Facebook page. In a recent press release for The Boxer, Kele was quoted saying “The key for the sound of the record was to take things as harsh and as physical as I could make it. The reason for going there was that these are the sounds that make me the happiest in the world.” Look for Kele hitting the European tour circuit in May and his album’s first single Tenderoni dropping June 14th.

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Feeling Cornered...
Learn Your Craft
02.22.10
by Lit Hardway

Two 18-year-old guitarists walk into a dingy diner. Their tight jeans and fitted coats concluded a complete rockstar look. The taller of the two announces that he just can’t continue playing guitar till he gets a new rig. The other replies that he won’t touch his strings till they’re wound into a new axe. What’s wrong with this picture? Everything! Me thinks the impostors doth protest too much! Does it take a brand new three thousand dollar digital camera to take a good rock photo? Does a talented drummer require a kit born of exotic wood and hand crafted precious cymbals to keep a perfect soulful beat? Digital evolution has brought us to an impasse ‘tween creative musical minds and the “Rockband revolution”. Somewhere along the way, possibly around the birth of MySpace or the spawn of the almighty Facebook, new musicians have been able to “look” more and more professional with less and less work. But does any of it sound good? Like any machine gun plan, not all efforts can be a miss. It seems however that a staggering amount of new musicians equate the price and quality of their gear with their prowess as… well… musicians. What happened to the love of being able to make music? Now, expensive hardware, complicated digital systems and robotic tuning are adorning the tools of mediocre “musicians”. Learn to play that perfect chord with your imperfect guitar. Keep that pulsating groove going strong with your warped bass. Whatever you do, don’t let shiny finishes, slick knobs and LED lights rule you before you’ve learned your craft. Remember, a great pool player can win on a slanted table, using a bent cue.
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Feeling Cornered...
Texting at the Rock Show
02.15.10
by Lit Hardway

We possess all the technological communication prowess one race can handle, and yet we find nothing better to do with it than text, tweet and Facebook? And one of the most irritating consequences to rear its ugly head thanks to these social networking advances is texting at the rock show. Standing at the back of a venue watching half of a 2000 person crowd spend most of the show looking down while texting, talking to a friend beside them while texting, or of course tweeting every single little occurrence throughout the night. “OMG—@ show and totally stepped in gum”, “LOL—This totally weird guy just tried to talk to me”, “HAHAHA—OMG I didn’t think she would show up here”… FUCKIN’ TWEET!!! Are you kidding me?! Are the plaster headed hipster idiots of today really so full of shit they can pay $25 for a show, stand with their back to the stage, texting and talking over the music for the better part of 2 hours? Extra, extra… This just in… If I’m talking about you, you should know you’re fuckin’ ridiculous. Why are you here?! Came to the show just so no one could say they were there and you weren’t? Needed to fit in so badly you thought you’d piss away $30 to text and act like a popped collar douche bag for a night? Well congratulations dumbass, you’ve succeeded in pissing me and many other people off. Its 2010, we all text, we’re all busy, but maybe at a show keep it to a medium. Would it be so hard to pretend there’s a band playing their hearts out for your benefit?
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Bits & Pieces
Rage Against the Machine Announce First Details of UK ‘Victory’ Gig
02.11.10
Los Angeles rap-rockers Rage Against the Machine have announced the first details of the free concert they are planning in the UK to thank UK fans for sending them to the much coveted ‘Christmas Number One’ spot in the charts. As previously reported, British couple Jon and Tracy Morter started a Facebook group urging the public to buy copies of the 1992 Rage song Killing in the Name instead of the manufactured pop of Simon Cowell’s winning X Factor single. In the end, Killing in the Name beat the Cowell sponsored single by about 50,000 sales, with the band promising to repay the British public’s support with a free show. This show is now set to happen at London’s Finsbury Park on Sunday June 6th, 2010 with tickets to be issued by lottery. In a poke at Simon Cowell, the show is to be dubbed The Rage Factor, and fans can enter the lottery for tickets at theragefactor.co.uk. (more…)
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Bits & Pieces
Save the Date and Dress in Black for Johnny Cash
02.05.10
February 26th would have seen Johnny Cash, the legendary man in black, turn 78. As we previously reported, this date will also mark the release date of the final installment in the American Recordings series, American VI: Ain’t No Grave. To mark the occasion, Cash’s fans are being encouraged to wear black and post photos of themselves doing so on a special Facebook group to win a copy of the Unearthed boxset.
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Bits & Pieces
OK Go Appeal to Fans in Order Get Round Label’s Restrictive Video Content Deal
02.02.10
OK Go, the band that brought us such memorable hits have appealed to their fans to help them get around a deal that their label EMI made (along with the three other beleaguered and cash-thirsty majors) with Google back in 2006. The deal, renewed in 2009, means that bands’ video clips posted solely on YouTube and MySpace cannot subsequently be posted elsewhere, with the four majors receiving at least 50% of ad revenue coming from the streaming of those clips. Now, as we all know, the nature of way music is consumed changes at staggering speed, and it is well known that bands (and especially their labels) benefit from the reposting of videos on blogs and social media sites such as Facebook. As such, fans of OK Go were recently dismayed to find that their re-posting of the band’s videos on their Facebook walls and blogs were removed, and wrote angrily to the band to protest. So what solution have the chaps in OK Go suggested? Well, in the true anarchic spirit of rock ‘n roll, the band have chosen to thumb their noses at their employers, and encouraged their fans to re-post the videos anyway. (more…)
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Bits & Pieces
Billy Bragg Set to Withhold Tax in Protest at Excessive Bank Bonuses
01.19.10
English folk singer and seasoned political activist Billy Bragg has written a letter to British chancellor Alistair Darling, published in The Guardian, stating his intention to withhold his tax for the year should Darling not take steps to curb the bonuses set to be paid by the Royal Bank of Scotland to its staff. Bonuses are estimated to be in the realm of £1.5 Billion, after the bank last year posted what amounted to the worst losses in British financial history. The Bard of Barking, a veteran of the 1980s Red Wedge campaign, expressed that he was “no longer prepared to fund the excessive bonuses of RBS investment bankers,” informing Darling in no uncertain terms that “Unless he acts to limit them to £25,000, I shall be withholding my tax payment on January 31.” He is hoping that many of his fellow countrymen may also feel the same way, and a Facebook group, NoBonus4RBS has been established so that anyone wishing to express their support for his campaign can do so. Bragg will be aiming to emulate the exploits of British couple Jon and Tracy Mortimer, who in a feat of Facebook people-power, managed to persuade the British record buying public to snub Simon Cowell’s The X-Factor single and send L.A. rap-rockers Rage Against the Machine’s Killing in the Name to the UK’s venerated Christmas number one spot.
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Bits & Pieces
Dan Deacon Update: Facebook Post Explains Painful Ordeal
11.16.09
As previously reported, after cancelling a few shows due to back pain, which was later revealed to be acute sciatica, Dan Deacon has cancelled the remainder of his US tour. A few statements from his manager clued fans in to the situation, and now Deacon has posted a message on Facebook, explaining things a little further. “about a week ago i started to feel a rather uncomfortable pain in the back of my left leg. at first it was only present when i was sitting but as time went on it started to get more and more painful when standing and eventually it hurt at all times, even when laying down. on wednesday evening the pain had come to a peak and it was impossible to bear and it was frightening, since i had no idea why this was happening.” He goes on to say, “i bit the bullet and went to the ER, not knowing where else to go. they gave me some pain killers which helped to bring down the level of the throb. it was a bummer way to end a really awesome tour. everything was going really well and it was one of the most fun tours i had been on. i’m sure my back/leg will be back to normal soon after getting it properly checked out, working it out and getting some much needed rest. hopefully the 5 shows will be rescheduled ASAP.” Plans to reschedule the cancelled dates are in the works, but details are not yet known. The official cancelled dates are as follows: Troy, NY Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (November 13), Worcester, MA Clark University (November 14), Ithaca, NY Ithaca College (November 15), Purchase, NY SUNY Purchase (November 16), Baltimore, MD The Ottobar (November 18).
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Bits & Pieces
Foo Fighters To Play Facebook Show?
10.29.09
All Foo fans alert! Foo Fighters are slated to play a show live on Facebook! That’s right kiddies, the rock heroes will be performing at the Studio 606 complex in California, while having the whole sorted affair broadcast live on Facebook. The show in question will air at 2am (GMT) on Saturday October 31st, Halloween for those of you living under a rock, and for any further details visit the band’s Facebook page. Make sure to also keep an eye out for FF’s Greatest Hits which is set to drop on November 2nd.
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Bits & Pieces
Movie About Facebook to Star Justin Timberlake
09.23.09
Kevin Spacey likes this.

Justin Timberlake is gearing up to play Sean Parker, co-founder of Napster and founding president of Facebook in a new movie The Social Network. Apart from the acting talents of Timberlake, the film is set to feature Jesse Eisenberg (Adventureland & The Squid and The Whale), as well as the executive-producing skills of Kevin Spacey. The script, which is said to focus on the effects of Facebook’s quick success on those involved in its formation, was penned by The West Wing scribe Aaron Sorkin.
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Bits & Pieces
T-Pain’s Auto-Tune Comes To iPhone?!
09.05.09
So you you’ve been sitting there wondering, “Hey, how can I sound like T-Pain?” Oh, you haven’t? Well the boys at Smule thought you were as they’ve introduced the new iPhone app dubbed I Am T-Pain. T-Pain expressed to Rolling Stone that there’s two main things people recall when they hear his name, “I have top hats and there’s Auto-Tune”, and although T may be selling himself a little short, Auto-Tune definitely is one of his claims to fame. For $2.99 you too can croon with the buzzy swagger of Pain as the actual software used in studio has been harnessed and jammed into yet another useless iPhone application. Save your recording for your own enjoyment or post it to Facebook so your friends can share the Pain. In the words of the hip hop singer, “In two years people are gonna be performing onstage with the iPhone. ‘Cause I got so many ideas that we can just keep upgradin’, upgradin’, and upgradin’.” Wow… that’s good news?
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Bits & Pieces
Ladyhawke Plays Show For One To Fight For Skin
06.18.09
Announcing an upcoming show for one, Ladyhawke commits to a one-off charity gig to support the fight against skin cancer. That’s right folks, the New Zealand femme has decided to perform an individual event on August 26th 2009 for one single person and their chosen guest list in aid of the SunSmart Skindividual campaign. To get to be the lucky numero uno, simply visit the causes networking site Skindividual, where participants are encouraged to utilize other social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook or MySpace, to build a guest list of their own. The participant who comes up with the biggest list will be awarded the show for one, along with their guest list pals of course. “Your skin is a pretty major part of what makes us who we are, so it’s something we should take extra care in protecting – particularly since skin cancer’s a growing problem in the UK,” commented Ladyhawke.
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Concert Reviews
Katy Perry @ Metropolis – 03.31.09
04.06.09
With a band clad entirely in white, a stage adorned with gigantic fruit and a “Katy” cat staring down the crowd with glowing blue eyes, the Californian girl kisser Katy Perry made the Metropolis stage her trampoline, bouncing her way through songs that made the night’s patrons squeal, clap and sing. (more…)
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