This Week In Music - New Foo Fighters, The Roots, Black Coffee, Neil Young, Vampire Weekend, J Dilla, Eric Church, MGK, and a New Folk Playlist
Back with another music dump from everything that happened not just this past week, but the week before as well. (I wasn't able to get one up last week with the scheduling process, but now with football over you can expect one of these every Sat or Sun going forward.)
I know not everybody is into folk music but here are some gems for those that are -
And a new "New New" playlist-
Here's what happened the last couple weeks
POP
- Machine Gun Kelly played SNL this weekend and received a ton of hate which I don't think could have been less warranted.
MGK opened with an energetic performance of "My Ex's Best Friend," rocking out with his pink guitar alongside his backing band.
For his second performance, the bleached-hair star slowed things down with the emotional "Lonely," a song about his late father, who died last July.
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I've been on the record as a big MGK fan. I think people hate him for his look or his attitude and immediately discount his music because of that. Which sucks because they're missing out on really good music. The kid is extremely talented.
- The Weeknd performed at the Super Bowl for Pepsi's half time show. The performance received mixed reviews. Seemed some people absolutely loved it, some hated it. I was in the middle, which I guess is the worst you could hope for as the NFL or Pepsi.
- Little Hurt dropped a new track "Messed Up" off his new EP Every Second
ROCK
- The Foo Fighter's finally released their newest album, Medicine At Midnight after teasing us for a year. It's not bad, not great. Not what we've come to expect from Dave and the boys, especially after a year of holding off on dropping it, but I'll never complain about great artists putting out new material.
Fun story behind the album's making -
For the band’s follow-up to 2017’s Concrete and Gold, Dave Grohl wanted to make, “our David Bowie’s Let’s Dance record.” To do so, they set up shop in an old abandoned house in Encino, California. But the recording process didn’t go as planned. As Grohl told Mojo (via NME), he began to suspect the house was haunted. He recalled,
“When we walked into the house in Encino, I knew the vibes were definitely off but the sound was fucking on. We started working there and it wasn’t long before things started happening. We would come back to the studio the next day and all of the guitars would be detuned. Or the setting we’d put on the board, all of them had gone back to zero. We would open up a Pro Tools session and tracks would be missing. There were some tracks that were put on there that we didn’t put on there. But just like weird open mic noises…
It got to the point where I brought one of those Nest cams that I still have at home, for when my kids would sleep in their cribs. I set it up overnight so we could see if there was anyone there or anyone was coming to fuck with us. At first, nothing. And right around the time we thought we were ridiculous and we were out of our minds, we started to see things on the Nest cam that we couldn’t explain. Then when we found out about the history of the house, I had to sign a fucking non-disclosure agreement with the landlord because he’s trying to sell the place. So, I can’t give away what happened there in the past but these multiple occurrences over a short period of time made us finish the album as quickly as we could.”
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They also released a new video for "No Son Of Mine"
- Vampire Weekend dropped 42:42 EP, Featuring New Remixes of “2021”
- Death From Above 1979 Announce New Album Is 4 Lovers, Share “One + One”
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- Hayley Williams released another solo album,
She also hand-delivered a super fan her new song “My Limb”
The Paramore leader drove a CD and one of her Sanctuary Candles to the home of her Nashville neighbor Carly Butler. “I hope she doesn’t think I’m coming to murder her,” Williams said. “Or I hope she does, I don’t know.” In a storm of giggles, she made the delivery into Butler’s mailbox and drove off honking the horn.
- Faith No More, Stone Sour, Lagwagon members have formed a new group, "Dirty O’Keeffe", and dropped “Brick or Bullet”
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- Alice Cooper celebrated his 73rd Birthday with a new song, “Social Debris”
- Neil Young announced an unreleased 1982 album Johnny’s Island and a new film Trans: The Animated Story
Young has announced a pair of projects centered around his 1982 album Trans. The first is the unreleased LP Johnny’s Island, recorded with the Trans band in 1982, and the second is a new film entitled Trans: The Animated Story.
- The National’s Matt Berninger joined Julia Stone on a new record taken from Stone's St. Vincent-produced album Sixty Summers, “We All Have”
- Peter Framptonannounced a new covers album, and released a cover of Radiohead’s “Reckoner”
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- The Killers unveiled a deluxe edition of one of the most underrated albums of last year, Imploding the Mirage. The expanded effort is highlighted by “C’est La Vie”, a completely new song that stands apart musically from the rest of the original album. There’s also an acoustic rendition of the single “Blowback”, as well as a “Wasatch Style” reworking of “Caution”.
RAP
- The Roots announced a deluxe reissue of Do You Want More?!!!??!, and share an alternate mix of “Silent Treatment”. The deluxe re-release of Do You Want More?!!!??! will be available digitally and in three-LP and four-LP formats. A 24-page booklet about the original record — often considered one of the best jazz-rap albums in history — comes with all versions.
Back in 2019, it was reported that a number of Do You Want More?!!!??! master tapes were lost in a massive fire at Universal Studios. The following summer, the hip-hop world mourned the death of Roots co-founder Malik B.
- Megan Thee Stallion dropped a new song with Bobby Sessions “I’m a King” featured in "Coming To America 2"
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- Freddie Gibbs and ScHoolboy Q teamed up for a new track, “Gang Signs”
- J Dilla’s classic solo debut album, Welcome 2 Detroit, was released 20 years ago this month. To commemorate the landmark LP’s anniversary, BBE has released Welcome 2 Detroit — The 20th Anniversary Edition box set.
- Cardi B dropped a new single titled “Up”
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- Vic Mensa collaborated with Chance The Rapper and Wyclef Jean on a new record, “Shelter”
- Polo G released “GNF (OKOKOK)”
EDM
- Idris Elba and Inner City teamed up again for a soul house collaboration, "No More Looking Back"
- Black Coffee dropped his new star-studded "Subconsciously" LP. And it's a smash.
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- David Guetta and Sia reunited for their 10th collaboration, "Floating Through Space"
- Louis The Child and singer/songwriter BabyJake released their new single “Somewhere Else”
- Martin Garrix dropped a new track featuring Tove Lo titled "Pressure"
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COUNTRY
- Monster couple weeks for Eric Church (yeah, you're gonna keep hearing about him - not gonna apologize) as he dropped another song off his upcoming TRIPLE album release in April. As a songwriter, his fingerprints are all over songs, even on collaborative efforts. But "Heart on Fire" he wrote alone while in the NC mountains. Joanna Cotten - world's best backup singer - is always a treat on a Church track. Also, Church fans hacked his website in search of album release news. They found info on the new albums and announced it before Church could. He's ok with it, "They end up breaking the news, which is hilarious to me… I love the passion."
He also sang the National Anthem at the Super Bowl along with Jazmine Sullivan
As well as a new single on which he slows it down with "Lynyrd Skynyrd Jones"
He also gave an amazing interview on Apple Music Country's Today’s Country Radio with Kelleigh Bannen
- Despite his fuck up, Morgan Wallen's recent new album you can say is hot, shattering streaming records for country with 240M streams during its debut week. What makes it better? He released two new bonus tracks.
- Jimmie Allen and Brad Paisley collab on "Freedom Was a Highway"
- Miss your annual visit to Stagecoach (and/or Coachella)? Well, you're gonna miss it again. Canceled. If we only had a vaccine… oh wait we do, but we don't - ya know - have them in our arms yet. Digression…
- Brandi Carlile does a hell of a cover of "Take Me Home, Country Roads". That John Denver is not full of shit, and neither is Brandi.
- My man Luke Bryan dropped a couple new tracks "Country Does" and "Down to One"
- Brother Brothers - just a couple of identical twins making their way through the music industry. See you in the comments about Sister Sisters.
h/t Augie