Bieber's Best

As Long As You Love Me Came Out Over The Summer. I Had Heard It Before. This Morning I Listened To It And As Long As You Love Me Grooved Its Way Right Into My Brain. I Back To Back To Back'd The Video. As Long As You Love Me I'll Be Your Silver I'll Be Your Platinum I'll Be Your Gold Is A Golden Line. You're My Hallelujah Is A Rose Golden Line. The Production Value On The Video Is Feature Presentation And If You Hate Fun You Can Just Stick Around Until The End When Mr. Blonde Goes HAM On Biebs For Being His Daughter's Silver Platinum Gold.


JV
I Love Love

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Macklemore & Ryan Lewis - Same Love

Macklemore dropped this song today as a sampling of his new album, "Heist", which will be released on October 9th. He's also coming to Boston on November 15th, which I am 100% going to.

Same Love.

I can't get over Mary Lambert in it, she kills it. She keeps me warm.

peace
jb

Frank Ocean: Channel Orange

Frank Ocean is one of the first major hip hop artists to announce having a same-sex relationship.
He is a member of OFWGKTA.

He released his new album, 'channel ORANGE', on iTunes a few days ago and you can stream the whole thing off his Tumblr here.

I could jam to this for a long time.


jb

#SummerJams

Super Hipster Edition.

This one's for the ladies; one of my favorite new bands in LA is a trio of sisters called Haim.  They're the best chick-band I've heard in a long time.  Still unsigned, they just released their first music video this morning (audio much better than video):



I've seen them 4 times in LA and had the pleasure of working with them when they opened for Portugal the Man at one of venues that I'm occasionally employed by: super humble, funny girls with a good appreciation for the art they're making and the fans they're gathering.  When I saw them in March, they had their parents (both musicians) come onstage and play a cover. In April, Ryan Adams did a guest spot.

They haven't gotten much radio play in the US yet, but they're on the charts in the UK and were Band of the Week  a few months ago in Vogue.  They received critical acclaim after appearing at South by Southwest in March.

And their EP is available for Free Download.  That's fucking sweet.

I first heard about them because the lead singer dates guitar-virtuoso Blake Mills (formerly of Dawes) and did a duet with him for the "Chimes of Freedom" album (a compilation of Bob Dylan covers that raised money for Amnesty International):



So check them out now, get on the bandwagon while they're still relatively unknown, and then you can sound like a hipster when they get signed and start popping up on traditional media.  Download their free EP: I promise they'll be stuck in your head instantly and leave you wanting more.

-DMc, West Coast Correspondent

#SummerJams

Double edition.

Summer is upon us!  I know some of you have probably heard "Anna Sun" on the radio by now, and I expect a big push leading up to Walk the Moon's major label LP release on June 19 (the day after some of you see them in Boston).

Here's another band who's EP is very promising and name is fucking awesome: Imagine Dragons.



I've heard the lead single "It's Time" getting some airplay recently, although I actually prefer a remixed version by Penguin Prison, an awesome electro-pop band that I told Rob & Mel to see back in April. You can download that remix HERE. Also, you should definitely check out Penguin Prison's album from last year, because it's fantastically fun.

Another new band that's definitely getting radio play is Of Monsters and Men:



They're like, from Iceland, which is cool.  Also, I love a band that has both male & female lead vocals.

So listen for those two #SummerJams as you hit the beach!

-DMc, West Coast Correspondent

Long Time Sun Shine

I recently heard this Weezer song, and I really liked it, so I did a little research, cause that's how I roll.

Rivers Cuomo wrote "Longtime Sunshine" in 1994, though it wasn't released until 2007.  Of his inspiration Cuomo said, "I started longing for the safety, peace, quiet, simplicity and family structure of my New England childhood. I thought back to one of my favorite memories, lying in the bottom bunk, my brother in the top, in our bedroom in our farmhouse in Eastford, Connecticut, in the hot, hot, summer, 7, 8 p.m., sun still up, but having to go to sleep because it's our bedtime, one of those big box fans blowing, and my parents, Ma and Steve, sitting at our bedside, singing an old hippie song to us, to calm us down and ease us into sleep, "May the Longtime Sun Shine Upon You." 

YouTube won't let me embed the Weezer track so click here to listen, or if you roll with Spotify, here.

Also the old hippie song, "May the Longtime Sun Shine Upon You" is pretty sweet too, as a folky lullaby. It's actually an old Irish blessing that's become a mantra of sorts, set to many different melodies. This one is my favorite:



-av
Longtime fan of Sunshine
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Early #SummerJam Prediction

Prepare to hear this song everywhere.



It was originally released independently two years ago, on an excellent LP called "I Want I Want!" which you can no longer get anywhere.  Why? Because they signed to RCA, and major record labels are pricks.  RCA has re-released "Anna Sun" on EP, with a full length forthcoming.

Also thanks to RCA, "Anna Sun" is now finding it's way onto major (read: Clear Channel) radio stations.  It's a shoo-in to be massively overplayed this summer, much like "Pumped Up Kicks" last year.

I don't really mind though.  I saw Walk the Moon live a few weeks ago in LA, and they tooootally rocked. Awesome live energy.  They paint their faces for shows (like in the video) and so do many of their fans (mostly cute girls).  I think that's kinda fun.  Just sayin'.

On a personal note, the lyrical content of the song reminds me fondly of our college party houses on Main St & Grey St, of Allen Court in Boston, and of HouseHouse, where I lived for my first year in LA.

I hope you all enjoy hearing this song a million times this summer, and I hope their new album still has some of their other awesome songs, like this one:



-DMc, West Coast Correspondent

PS, Walk the Moon plays April 5 on Jimmy Fallon.

PPS, See you all soon!

The Radio

Hit PLAY
I love this song. I heard it at work. We have a radio going all day, until I turn it off near the end of the day and its glorious. I usually turn it on in the morning to kiss108 and then the channel gets changed each time someone is close enough to the knob for the rest of the day. It keeps it lively and I still get to hear rolling in the deep a few times a day. Everyday I'll hear an awesome song like secret agent man, or turn the page, or runaway and silently thank The Radio for the next 4 minutes of not paying attention I'll be doing. Recently this song came on. It was love from the beginning. Its "upside down" by Diana Ross and shes killing it. The lyrics get a little weird in the verses. You won't notice until the fifth time you're listening to it and thinking about how cool Disco probably was.

-jv
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Queen Madge hates Hydrangeas, ok?!

Divas usually make their mark with outlandish clothes, hair, shoes and behavior. Once established that behavior or look eventually becomes ordinary to us. At this point Gaga wearing pants is more interesting than Gaga naked. And this may not be the moment to say this, but I was completely captivated by Lady Gaga's performance at the VMAs monologue included. If you haven't watched it, get on it now, because that is commitment to a performance and she is absolutely a genius.

That being said it's kind of refreshing to see Madonna using her status as a queen diva by doing something rude and having people love it. For example, whispering in a fake British accent about hating the kind of flowers some fan just gave you, next to a microphone.


And then, after getting a lot of press about this, she posted an apology. Or did she?


That's my girl.

Also, another way to be a diva: Stand still and bring the house down. Observe:

Get More: 2011 VMA, Music, Adele

-av
Diva Liaison

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Vinny Pumps Up his Kicks

Vinny from the Jersey Shore is the luckiest guy in the world.

The cast of the Jersey Shore is pretty easy to break down. The Situation is a character same as Ronny, the muscley doofus. J-Woww used to be a fox and Snooki is a delightful mess. DJ Pauly D has a tanning bed in his house, his blowout hasn't moved for five seasons. Angelina and Sammi are real,,, real annoying. Angelina may have been the only Italian in the house other than Vinny. Deena came later and peaks every episode in the opening when she asks if we "like the boobs?"

Vinny got super lucky. He is not a character and he doesn't have a blowout. The word on the street about Vinny is that he won DJ Pauly D away from the Situation, wears Young and Reckless shirts, smiles almost constantly and direct from Snooki, he has a horsedick. Vinny is by far the most fun cast mate, DJ Pauly D obviously is my second favorite and even his beard is better looking than Ron. Vinny seems to be enjoying himself more than anyone else.

And not only when he is on the show. It seems that sometimes he gets together with his cousins and puts on a dance show. Watch out for when a cousinette in pink walks off screen to talk with her mom for a second.



-jv
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The Adventures of Rain Dance Maggie

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Music - More Music Videos

I'm into it.
-jv
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#SummerJams

Fuck Watch the Throne.

OK, Just kidding.  It's good and I know you're probably all listening to it.  There are some great tracks (My favorites are "Who Gon Stop Me" and "Why I Love You"), and the production value is outstanding.  Although it's not as good as either Jay or Ye's most recent solo projects.

But there was a rap duet album that dropped earlier this summer with much less masturbatory hype.

Hell: The Sequel is by Eminem and Royce da 5'9," who call themselves Bad Meets Evil.  I have never listened to Royce before this, probably because his name is fucking retarded, but apparently he is an awesome rapper. 

More importantly, this is the best thing Eminem has done since 2002.  His past few solo albums haven't been nearly as good as the pantheon records that he was dropping when we were teenagers.  The Slim Shady LP was a game-changer and The Marshall Mathers LP and The Eminem Show are two of the best rap records ever released.  Remember that Eminem?  With the scathing lyrics, mind-blowing flow, and complete irreverence for social taboos?  He's back:



That's some classic Em right there.  Who else would rap about having anal sex with Nicki Minaj?  Yes, apologies to the ladies, but Slim Shady is still as misogynistic as ever and there are numerous rhymes about domestic violence.  I feel like I'm in 7th grade listening to my portable CD player with big, shitty headphones.  There are some more mature tracks on the album, where they talk about the growing gap between the rich and poor...but I'm also totally feeling this song about taking lots and lots of drugs:



Anyway, now that Lil Wayne and Drake have announced that they too will be doing a duet album, it seems like this trend of rap cross-breeding will continue to produce sexy new sounds.  I'm totally OK with it.

-DMc, West Coast Correspondent

Spotify is the Tits.

I know I haven't posted any #SummerJams in a while, but that's about to change.

Imagine if iTunes and Pandora fucked and made a digital-music-streaming baby, which made it super easy to listen to almost any song or album by almost every artist you can think of, in a matter of seconds, any time you want, FOR FREE.  Wouldn't that be awesome?

Well they totally did it.  Spotify has been blowing up all over Europe for the past few years, and now it's available in the US.  If you don't have it yet, all you have to do go HERE, request an invite (which they send you basically immediately), and download the free version.

It will sync with your iTunes, making all of your current music library available while you're using it, and you will be able to search for whatever the hell you want to listen to at any given moment, stream it instantly, and create playlists with it.  You can access your Spotify account (and playlists!) from any computer that has the program installed (and since it's free, that pretty much means any computer).

There's also a version for $10/month that lets you access your playlists when your offline and, more importantly, on your mobile device.  I don't have the premium version yet, but if I ever get an iPhone, I will definitely upgrade.

The cherry on top?  You can sync to Facebook and share playlists.  As in, your friends will be able to see/access your playlists, you will be able to check out theirs, and you can collaborate on joint playlists.

So go get it.  To make it worth your while, I'll try to post more music recommendations over the next few days, which you'll be able to check out freely and easily now!


-DMc, West Coast Correspondent

The OTIS video explained

When Jay-Z and Kanye met up to discuss the OTIS video, it went like this:

Jay-Z: I think we should get a flag.
Kanye: Lets get the biggest flag ever and wear white shirts. Maybe sometimes I'll wear red pants.
Jay-Z: I think Aziz Ansari is funny.
Kanye: Lets get Aziz and put him in a blue suit. But not let him talk. He'll be like our bitch.
Jay-Z: Lets make the car a Maybach.
Kanye: Lets start the video with us cutting a Maybach apart and then driving around a cool Thunderdome version of a Maybach.
Jay-Z: Lets get Beyonce , my wife, in it.
Kanye: Lets get four white girls and put them in green in the backseat.
Jay-Z:   ...
Kanye: And the best part will be when I say "I write my curses in cursive."
Jay-Z: You get me.
Secret bff handshake

Or something like that. 


-V
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FreeSol, getting Justin Timberlake Back into [Musical] Action

 Justin Timberlake keeps saying he hasn't quit the music biz, and I believe him. As soon as people start doubting he just does a feature on someone else's song and once again we're panting after him.

This time around we have Free Sol to thank for it. According to wikipedia, they are a progressive rap, rock, soul band from Memphis, same as Justin! He saw them perform live and signed them to his baby record company. Today JT tweeted this video for "Hoodies On, Hats Low" which he directed. He's in the video too; occasionally echoing the main guy, whisper singing, and stylishly walking, almost dancing. It's very clearly his asthetic though, from the coloring to the movement, once he's in the video it becomes a Justin video, because it's so in line with his style. Just the way the whole group walks forward and bounces on the "low," screams JT, in a very good way.

I can't stop listening to it. Give it a whirl:




 -av

p.s. in my opinion this song is way more fun than anything I've heard of Watch the Throne, which is all of it. 
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Adam Levine's Greatest Hits

Adam Levine is a sex machine. Obviously.  I heard Harder to Breathe  in high school and have loved every song with Adam Levine since. Because every song with Adam Levine is at least awesome and most are amazing.

Kiwi is ridiculous. The whole album "It won't be soon before long" is WICKED FUCKING GOOD, Kiwi is the best song on it. Kiwi is the sexiest song I have ever heard.


 I Can't Lie from Hand's All Over is an almost perfect song. Right from the beginning Adam Levine comes in and immediately starts singing better than almost anyone else can. And then the song just keeps getting better.


Stereo Hearts is the kind of infectious immediately stuck in your head and you love every second of it song that Adam Levine is constantly a part of. When Adam Levine sings he just fucking kills it every time, which I appreciate. 


These are my favorite Adam Levine songs right now this morning at any other point it could have been any of the million singles from Songs about Jane or Hands all Over or even "Moves Like Jagger"  which is an awesome song even though it is a little silly and it got pulled into the downward spiral that was Christina Aguilera's wardrobe during The Voice, she looked awful all season.
-jv
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this is for the ladies

This song was just shown to me last night, and it is, quite frankly, badass, unbelievably sexy, and filled with so much independent-women pride and power that I may have to start every day listening to it, at least for a while.

Thank you Beyonce, for reminding me in only 4 minutes and 51 seconds, that girls run the world. If I ever start to forget it again, I'll just hit replay.

Now I wanna go dance.

also, teachers at my school are the best.
-lab

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The Civil Wars

This morning I was watching REAL Sports with Bryant Gumbel and when that was over I ended up at the VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown. I tried to remember the name of the VJ who did the Countdown when I was really watching it alot. Probs the summer of 2003ish. All I could remember was it sounded like "Aamer Alleem" Google was smart enough to tell me it was Aamer Haleem.

The song "Barton Hollow" by the Civil Wars, who I had never heard of and instantly respected because of the cool name, was number eleven on the Countdown. The song is awesome, totally more then enough reason to turn off the Countdown and attack YouTube and Wikipedia.

I found out that The Civil Wars are made up of Joy Williams and John Paul White. They got together in 2008 in Nashville. The band was featured on Grey's Anatomy in 2009 and has been on the rise for a while. I like how their videos are them in Jack White costumes, and I mean that in a good way I love Jack White.

This is the song that was featured on Grey's Anatomy "Poison and Wine"



And this is number eleven itself "Barton Hollow"


And this is "Falling Slowly" by Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová because its amazing


Also, while I was watching REAL Sports with Bryant Gumbel I saw a story about Ann Wolfe who is known for delivering what might be the most devastating knockout punch ever.

-jv
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Maria Aragon: YouTube sensation for actually being good.

There's a little girl at the end of an HTC commercial who sings two lines of a song that gets stuck in my head every time. I tried finding the song and found the original, which is "Wavin' Flag" by K'naan, and not really what I wanted. Eventually I found the video i was looking for, Maria Aragon.

I guess I'm a little tardy for this party. In February, her cover of Born This Way, went viral. Within a month, she was joining Lady Gaga on stage to duet on the song. Mother Monster is a little choked up about it too, she's so nice.

Anywho, here's the original video I looked for. The last three minutes is her talking, so don't watch it, but she's pretty good for a ten year old, and her version of the song is way sweeter than K'naan's in my humble opinion.



In other internet sensation news, Katy Perry's video for Last Friday Night is terrific and features too many cameos to even talk about, except I will say Hanson makes an appearance as the house band, which makes it a pretty sweet party.

-av

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#SummerJams

Technically this one was a late-spring-jam (April).

But it hasn't gotten much airplay, though it's been critically well-received, so there's a chance you missed TV on the Radio's latest album Nine Types of Light.

You should check it out:



Is that Hootie and the Blowfish!? Not even close.  More like a black Beck.  And Nigerian-born, Pennsylvania-raised, NYU-grad Tunde Adebimpe's lyrics are the tits:



It's electro-soul with some funky-ass horns for good measure.  I've been listening to this album like crazy recently: there's a ton of emotion in the songs, intelligent (and occasionally scathing) lyrics, and great beats.  There is even a dubstep-esque track on Nine Types of Light ($9.99 on iTunes), if you're into that sort of thing.  If you like what you hear, TV on the Radio's previous albums are also worth checking out (especially Dear Science).

Also, they released music videos for every song on the album.  That's pretty cool.

I'm going to try to see them at the Hollywood Bowl later this summer, and you can catch them in Boston, at the Bank of America Pavilion on September 6, with Broken Social Scene.

Sadly, their bassist Gerard Smith died of lung cancer 9 days after this album was released.  RIP.

Hope the summer's treating you all well.  More music still to come...

-DMc, West Coast Correspondent