How is it that in this day and age Maxim can assign a star rating to it–without actually listening the album?
The review of Warpaint–the new album by The Black Crowes in the March issue of Maxim. The writer who has not listened to the album since advanceCDs were not made available wrote what appears to be an offensive assessment anyway, quoting “it hasn’t leftChrisRobinson and the gang much room for growth.”
The magazine gave the album a two and a half star rating although the writer nor the editor could have heard more than one song (the single “Goodbye Daughters of the Revolution”).
When questioned for an explanation, the magazine described the review as “an educated guess preview.” which is prettypoor.
Black Crowes manager Pete Angelus said, “Maxim’s actions seem to completely lack journalistic integrity and intentionally mislead their readership. When confronted with the fact that they never heard the album they are claiming to ‘review’ in their music section–with a star rating, no less–they attempt to explain that it was an ‘educated guess.’ In an email correspondence, Maxim went on to state: ‘Of course, we always prefer to (sic) hearingmusic, but sometimes there are bigalbums that we don’t want to ignore that aren’t available to hear, which is what happened with the Crowes. It’s either an educated guess preview or no coverage at all, so in this case we chose the former.’”
Angelus also stated, “It speaks directly to the lack of the publication’s credibility. In my opinion, it’s a disgrace to the arts, journalism, critics, the publication itself and the public. What’s next–Maxim’s concert reviews of shows they never attended, book reviews of books never read and film reviews of films never seen?”
For those of you who like to lift the veil on music and our understanding of it, you might fancy sourcing a copy of the latest issue of New Scientist magazine as they are doing a music special for this month. If you don’t fancy shelling out then you can see one of the articles for free on their web site here.
They are running a few music related articles with the following titles:
Are animals naturally musical? (subscription only)
The illusion of music (subscription only)
Flexible scales and immutable octaves (subscription only)
Music special: Singing in the brain (subscription only)
Five great auditory illusion (free to view)
If this has wetted your intellect then you can’t really go far wrong by giving wikipedia a read. Musicology is the best page to start from as you can then browse to the music psychology, music sociology etc etc pages.
After a bit of Googling we also managed to find this pdf file on music which is really an ebook and is titled Music and Dance as a Coalitional Signaling System.
If that isn’t enough for you then you probably want to be taking a degree on the subject!
“You know, I haven’t seen Scott in awhile. I wish him the best and there’s no hardfeelings at all. We just kind of moved on and I’m very proud of what we did.”
According to certain sources Columbia Records has set 26th March 2008 as release date for The Offspring’s follow-up to there 2003album “Splinter”. However, the band have yet to confirm this information or announce a release date for this.
Previously announced, The Offspring will start with a tour of Australia in February and headline Soundwave Festival. This will be the band’s first performance together in three years.
“There is nothing in me that wants to go in there and do new music. How are you going to deliver it? How are you going to get paid for it if people can just get it for free?
“The recordindustry doesn’t have a f*cking clue how to make money. It’s only their fault for letting foxes get into the henhouse and then wondering why there’s no eggs or chickens. Every little college kid, every freshly-scrubbed little kid’s face should have been sued off the face of the earth. They should have taken their houses and cars and nipped it right there in the beginning. Those kids are putting 100,000 to a million people out of work.”
Led Zeppelin were due to have their first concert in 19 years after their split in 1980 at London\’s 02 Arena on the 26th of November. This has now been pushed back to December.
\”I didn\’t just come down on my hand, I came down on other parts of my body as well. But of course it was the hand that had a bit of an injury to it,\”
\”It\’s got a fracture in the little finger of the lefthand, which is a nuisance because it\’s really needed. It\’s just going to take a little while for it to heal, that\’s all.\”
\”It\’s not permanent damage. I\’vebrokenfingers before, a lot worse than this.\”
Indie Blog Heaven
On the heels of Jimmy Page hurting his finger, thus having to cancel Led Zeppelin’s reunion show, NME have came up with a nice list of other odd rock injuries.
Blogovich
“When they unite, you’ve got the key members,” Page told Sun Media (Canada) the other day. “You can’t play it any better, as they’re the people who actually played it and wrote it in the first place . . . ”
Sound and Vision
The Legendary Band’s Original Albums Available for the First Time at All Online Music Retailers November 13
One Way Street
As someone who grew up with the band’s music, I have a primer for you kids looking to buy some Led Zep on iTunes.
Radiohead have however been inundated with complaints about the low bit rate of the download, some customers paying over the odds, out of the kindness of theirhearts and received the album at 160kbps. The finalblow was delivered with rumours that the band will be releasing the album on cd with extra songs! Causing outrage with manyfans saying they are being forced to buy the album twice.
Other Blogs About Radiohead’s In Rainbow: Mostly Muppet writes:
So yeah, a completely new, professionally-produced album from one of the world’s most innovative and respected bands and you can pay nothing for 10 mp3s (that’s what I did).
We Made This writes:
It’s not often in this media-saturated, webbed up world that someone can pull something off that is (more or less) a complete surprise.
The Parish writes:
Yes, I will be downloading Radiohead’s new project today
The Recording Industry Association of America has won a court battle over copyright infringement settling in their favour for $220 000. This is one of the biggest ever fees and the woman was accussed of sharing only 24 songs.
Furthermore, the penalty was issued without any hard evidence other than the IP address being used. This will now set a precedent meaning they will be more likely to pursue cases like this in court rather than just settling.
Illegal downloading is growing at an enormous rate, up 60% last year alone. This settlement is just a drop in the ocean compared to the vast sums of lost revenue. So it’s a good bet that after this victory the RIAA will be seeking out more cases to pursue.
Blog Posts About This Story Infoshop News writes: “A jury of twelve ordinary Americans from the defendant’s home state didn’t think the penalties were excessive.” In fact, they chose the amount of the penalty, given the fact that the record company plaintiffs left it to the jury to decide what was appropriate. Makes it kind of tough for the defendant and certain commentators to argue that the penalties are so excessive as to be unconstitutional, doesn’t it?”
Teresacentric writes:
In the case of Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas, Thomas, a single mother of two, was sued for 220,000 thousand dollars. Does this seem fair to you?
Marcs Opinion writes:
RIAA Bankrupts a SINGLE MOM with a 220,000 dollar fine for sharing 24 songs online makes the RIAA look more like a bully than a helpful particapant that they were initially intended to be in place for
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