Highlights this month include Megan Thee Stallion, Kevin Drew from Broken Social Scene, Vashti Bunyan and Devendra Banhardt, Busta Rhymes, Brittany Howard, Amos Lee, Cleo Sol, and Cold War Kids. [Spotify]
This is close to final, so I can share it now… the playlist for my next book: (almost) every song mentioned in the text! It’ll take longer to listen to than to read… [Spotify]
And the book itself: [Amazon] [Hachette] [Google Books] [IndieLite]
“Technically, Giddens is the boss. She’s the Silkroad artistic director, a job handed directly to her by Yo-Yo Ma, who founded the organization in 1998 and headed it for its entire history before stepping down a few years ago. This current program was her idea. Still, she is the one taking suggestions, instructions. She’d have it no other way.” [Spin]
“‘We saw André playing his flute in the airport! We saw André playing the flute on Abbott Kinney [Boulevard]!” ‘I felt like: damn, they’re always just catching me noodling around.’ Sure, he has a film crew with him today, but usually ‘I’m just trying to go to Starbucks! I like to walk, I like to hike and I love playing. So I just never stop.’” [The Guardian]
‘Years ago, when Shirley MacLaine wrote “Out on a Limb,” I thought, “Oh, this woman is bonkers. This is so ridiculous, talking to trees. What other bullshit is she going to come up with?” In my opinion, she was right on all of it. So, yeah. I started talking to trees about 15 years ago, more than that maybe, when the tree next door was going to be cut down. I went over and started talking to the tree about it, and I said, “Are you okay? How are you feeling about this?” Tree says, “Well, I’d rather be cut down with a ceremony than fall on somebody’s house.” So I started these ceremonies and banging on drums. The neighbors were tolerant. “Do you have any requests?” I asked the tree. He said, “Yes, when I’m down, put a blue blanket over my stump.” And I said, “Sure, why?” He said, “Well, I’ll think it’s the sky.”’ [Interview]
“We've got loads of songs there in pieces’: Ray Davies reveals he's recorded ‘about 20’ new Kinks songs with brother Dave.” [LouderSound]
“This year should have been straightforwardly successful for Brown, one of the US’s most distinctive rap voices: a career-galvanising sixth solo album…. But the 42-year-old has also been navigating a new relationship with fame, creativity and the swirl of drugs, alcohol and wild behavior that have defined his public image for the past 10 years.” [The Guardian]
This was already linked in this newsletter before Shane died. R.I.P. to both him and Kirsty. [NYT]
“The battle against the expansion of open-net farming is concentrated now in a village called Seyðisfjörður in the east of the island. The protesters have run out of money, so Björk is releasing a single to raise funds.” [The Guardian]
“Among the revelations here: a curbside Springsteen holding a boombox like a briefcase; Clemons and the late organist Danny Federici nuzzling each other in a studio; Springsteen donning the sequined leather jacket belonging to Goldsmith, his then-girlfriend, who notes wryly in her intro that this coat now hangs in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame…” [Billboard]
“Drink more beer”: the lesson from a now-closed small club in New Orleans. [My Spilt Milk]
Film/TV
“Coyote vs. Acme is almost certainly worth more to Warner Bros. Discovery as a $30 million tax write-off than it would be as a streaming picture. Would that movie generate $30 million in new sign-ups? Are they going to lose $30 million in angry cancellations because a movie they never heard of featuring a second-tier cartoon character and a second-tier action star isn’t going to get made? Of course not. The problem with streaming is most individual pieces of hashtag content make no real dent in the bottom line either way. It’s nearly impossible to disaggregate what works and generates revenue and why outside of truly monumental hits like Stranger Things or Game of Thrones.” [The Bulwark+]