Flying Lotus has shared a graphic animated video for "Ready Err Not", which the artist says is by "one of [his] favorite animators of all time", aka David Firth. In the video, Flying Lotus gets his head chopped off in a spooky house, among other gruesome things that could only happen in a spooky house. The animation is graphic and NSFW, so viewer discretion is advised. Just in time for Halloween!
"Ready Err Not" is off of Lotus' recent album, You're Dead! .
Kendrick Lamar's "i" appears in the NBA on TNT intro for the 2014-2015 season, and tonight Lamar performed it at the NBA's Opening Week concert in honor of LeBron James' return to Cleveland. The "Coming Home Concert" took place outside of Cleveland’s Quicken Loans Arena. Watch Lamar perform the song for a huge crowd of NBA fans below.
Watch a mini-documentary on Kendrick Lamar at Pitchfork Music Festival:
Photo by Tom Spray
PJ Harvey has recorded a cover of Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds' "Red Right Hand", the song from the Bad Seeds' 1994 album Let Love In , for the BBC TV drama "Peaky Blinders". Listen to it below via Faster Loud.
Harvey was commissioned after "Peaky Blinders" received criticism for seeming "too American". Speaking to NME , the show's music producer Flood claimed:
"We're trying to make it feel much more European and British and PJ fits that bill perfectly," he said. "I phoned Polly up and she was very interested. We're trying to deconstruct all of Polly’s material and then weave it through, it’s very cutting-edge and modern."
PJ Harvey was recently awarded an honorary degree from Goldsmiths, University of London. Her last studio album was Let England Shake in 2011.
Mac DeMarco stars in a goofy video sketch called "Backer", directed by Cole Kush. He plays a character named Dave Fuck who is a "backer", as in, it is his job to help drivers back up their cars. However, he turns a seemingly menial task into something more poetic, exploring his dreams and realizations. (The image, above, is from an animated dream sequence.)
Mac shared the clip on Twitter with the following hashtags: "#anotherdocumentary #tinypenisman #colekushnerhugepenis #backthatshitup".
Read our Cover Story on Mac DeMarco.
Watch Pitchfork.tv's Mac DeMarco doc:
Recent episodes of "South Park" have been fixated with Lorde, whom they've asserted is not actually a New Zealand teen but a middle-aged man in drag. It's all love, though: In an interview with New Zealand's TV3 News, the real, non-cartoon Lorde sang a few seconds of "I Am Lorde Ya Ya Ya", the song "she" sings on "South Park". Watch a clip below, via Consequence of Sound, and watch the full interview here.
In the interview, Lorde said, "I was thinking, 'Yeah he has a moustache... I mean I have a moustache, but is it that prominent?' But it was someone's dad pretending to be me. We actually, in my hotel room, went 'Ya ya ya ya ya I'm Lorde! Ya ya ya!' for like an hour, because that's why they do on the episode."
And the original "South Park" video:
Radiohead's Phil Selway was a guest last night on "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon", performing "It Will End With Tears" with The Dap-Kings (they of Sharon Jones) as his accompaniment. The song is off his recent album Weatherhouse . Watch the performance below.
Grimes wrote an essay for the upcoming Rookie Yearbook Three (a Rookie Magazine publication that's on sale October 21) that was recently excerpted for Elle Magazine . In it, she discusses her career as a businesswoman in music, in addition to lending some pointers on how to manage stress, fatigue, working partnerships, and the creative impulse as a touring musician. Read the Elle excerpt in it's entirety, below.
Grimes, writing for Rookie Yearbook Three:
Something I didn’t realize when I started making music was that any entrepreneurial endeavor involves hiring people, creating a company, and becoming a businessperson. So, while you may know me as a musician, in practice I am also a boss. I’m the CEO of two companies, Grimes Creative Corp and Fairy Tour Corp, and I just started Roco-Prime Productions with my brother. This is simultaneously very cool and very stressful. I’m definitely not the best or most experienced boss. I’m also a young, female boss, which can present a very particular set of practical and emotional challenges. Here, I’ve compiled a list of things that have been useful to me while I’ve been figuring out how to be in charge, in the hope that some of them might help any of you who are doing what I’m doing (aka learning as you go).
• You will never hear more people tell you that you’re wrong than when you’re succeeding. After my album Visions came out, I spent a really long time freaking out because people were telling me that in order to take “the next step” in my career, I would have to become a much better “musician,” that I’d need a backing band, etc. I now realize that (a) none of those people have music careers, and (b) I wasted a lot of time trying to do things I was told were “important for every professional musician” to do, without realizing that as a fan, I am far more interested in things that I’ve never seen before. The point is, listening to haters is pointless. People are judgmental about everything—often because they feel threatened. Ignore them. I think this applies to any business or creative thing, because tomorrow’s world will not look like today’s. Doing something different is probably better than doing the same things that other people do.
• Jump rope. It is the most efficient way to get cardiovascular exercise in any kind of weather, without going to a gym. Exercise is very important if you’re dealing with depression or anger issues—and any job in the entertainment industry will cause both.
• Stop working when you’re tired—but don’t get lazy. I sometimes boomerang between working for 22 hours in a row, and then collapsing and realizing that I don’t have to adhere to a fixed schedule and watching every episode of The Sopranos. I would not suggest this system. Schedules are amazing: eight hours of work, eight hours of sleep. The other eight hours are fair game. (I have not mastered this one, but when I can get it going I’m a lot more productive.)
• Hold on to your work. Once upon a time, Elvis Presley wanted to record a cover of Dolly Parton’s song “I Will Always Love You,” but on the condition that she sign over half of the publishing royalties—money the songwriter gets whenever someone plays or performs their song in public—to him. Dolly said no, and many years later Whitney Houston sang “I Will Always Love You” in a movie, and it became probably one of the most memorable (and lucrative) songs of all time. So it’s very important to maintain ownership of your intellectual property. Copyright everything. DO NOT FORGET TO DO THIS. There are so many ways you can get screwed if you don’t copyright your work. Conversely, treat your collaborators with respect and give credit where it is due.
• Be nice to the people you work with. It is of utmost importance to treat people with kindness, because you want them to work hard and care about the thing you are building together. However, in order to get things done, sometimes you need to be mean. I’m really bad at this, but you absolutely need to let people know when something is unacceptable, or they’ll keep doing it and you’ll resent them and it creates bad vibes.
• Read/watch biographies of people you admire. I’ve learned more from this one practice than from anything else, really. Also, if you’re around someone who does what you want to do, ask them questions and watch them work.
• Bette Midler once said, “I firmly believe that with the right footwear, one can rule the world.” I used to try to wear heels, and it was a disaster. Now I always prioritize comfortable shoes. Also, avoid wearing white: Busy people don’t have time to change clothes very often, and white gets dirty fast (unless you are Olivia Pope). Just find one or two things that look cool that you can also sleep in.
• Avoid dating someone who does the same job as you. If you do end up doing that, make sure they don’t resent your success and that you don’t resent theirs.
• Try to date someone who is good at cooking. It will save time.
• If you are tired and you need to be peppy, drinking a bit of straight hot sauce really works.
• Keep a pen and paper beside your bedside table. Good ideas often come as you’re falling asleep, and you won’t remember them in the morning.
• Just because someone has more qualifications than you doesn’t mean they’re better than you. We live in the age of technology, so you can Google anything you don’t know how to do. The only thing you can’t Google is how to be creative and unique. Your thoughts have more value than a degree or a parent in the same field or whatever. I always think about my grandfather, who became an engineer with only a seventh grade education. It’s a very cliché thing to say, but nearly anything is possible if you set your mind to it.
• Really, the most important thing is eliminating self-doubt. This is basically impossible for me, but I’ve found that if I act like a boss, I can convince myself that I am a boss when I need to be one. I copy things that I’ve seen politicians and actors do; I make eye contact with people; I try to keep my shoulders back and my head high; I gesticulate wildly and sometimes take long pauses (silence can be very intimidating). I try to act like I’m powerful, onstage and off. I am often treated with disrespect, but I respond as respectfully as I can, because it makes trolls look stupid when you don’t stumble. As time has gone by, I’ve noticed that the crappy people have been phasing out and I’m surrounded more and more by people I trust, and with whom I share mutual respect—which, by the way, breeds real confidence.
Photo by Erez Avissar
Alice Glass, one-half of Crystal Castles, has announced on Facebook that she is leaving the band. Said Glass in her post:
I am leaving Crystal Castles.
My art and my self-expression in any form has always been an attempt towards sincerity, honesty, and empathy for others.
For a multitude of reasons both professional and personal I no longer feel that this is possible within CC.
Although this is the end of the band, I hope my fans will embrace me as a solo artist in the same way they have embraced Crystal Castles.
-Alice
Crystal Castles began as producer and multi-instrumentalist Ethan Kath's solo project in 2003. Named after She-Ra's dwelling in the cartoon series "He-Man and Masters of the Universe", Crystal Castles completed their roster when Kath met singer Alice Glass in 2005. The two recorded a few 7" and 12" demos, including the popular "Alice Practice", which was a demo of Glass testing out a microphone, before releasing their debut LP, Crystal Castles , in 2008. The band released another self-titled album, Crystal Castles, in 2010. Their last record was III , which came out in 2012.
Read our interview with Crystal Castles.
Watch Crystal Castles' video for "Plague":
Haim and Stevie Nicks participated in a joint interview at Nicks' Los Angeles home for The New York Times' T Magazine. While there, they did a cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Rhiannon" together. Listen to it below.
The chat features Nicks giving Haim advice about life and fame. At the end, she presents all three Haim sisters with gold chains featuring gold moon pendants.
Read our Guest List interview with Haim.
Today Ariel Pink debuted three new songs from his upcoming pom pom LP while performing live on WYNC's Soundcheck . The new songs are called “Dazed Inn Daydreams,” “Jell-o,” and “Four Shadows”, and you can listen to them in the above.
In the interview that follows each performance, Pink also discusses the making and context of the new record. (He calls it "a new confusion of sorts".)
Pink's pom pom is out November 11 via 4AD.
Read our Update with Ariel Pink.
Watch Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti perform on Pitchfork.tv:
Pharrell has shared a teaser for his forthcoming video for the Daft Punk-featuring single, "Gust of Wind", which was released earlier this year on his album, Girl . It's a brief clip that's long enough to show Pharrell's hat approaching two giant, unmistakable helmets. Watch it below.
Read our Interview with Pharrell here.
"Gust of Wind":
A$AP Rocky has premiered a new song called "Multiply" on his website. The track features Juicy J and contains some very A$AP lyrics, among them: "I'm the muthaf**king LORD of this Fashion shit/ Don't I deserve just to brag a bit?" as well as the line, "Come to Harlem of you've never seen Baghdad".
The video was directed by A$AP Rocky and Shomi Patwary, and takes place in New York City. It also features an inordinate amount of middle fingers in the air. Watch it below.
"Multiply":
Last Friday, Thom Yorke released a new album, Tommorow's Modern Boxes , through what he called "an experiment" via BitTorrent bundle. In the statement that announced the album, (which was a surprise that harkened to Beyoncé's sudden album drop at the end of last year,) Thom Yorke said: “If it works well it could be an effective way of handing some control of Internet commerce back to the people who are creating the work.” He also called his BitTorrent bundle "a self-contained embeddable shop front".
Today, Tommorow's Modern Boxes has been downloaded over 1 million times. This number includes free downloads of the single and video for "A Brain in a Bottle" as well as paid downloads of the entire album.
Tommorow's Modern Boxes can be downloaded here.
Watch the video that accompanied Thom Yorke's "A Brain in A Bottle":
Fiona Apple has shared a new song called "Container" for the forthcoming TV show The Affair, Consequence of Sound reports. Produced by Apple's frequent collaborator Blake Mills, the single will soundtrack the show's opening montage. Listen to it below.
Sarah Treem, the show’s executive producer, said:
“Fiona Apple has been my favorite songwriter since I was sixteen. I am honored and humbled that she has chosen to lend her talent to our opening title sequence. If our show can approach one tenth of the depth and complexity of her song, I’ll be very happy.”
Check out Fiona Apple's upcoming tour dates with Blake Mills here.
"Container":
Grimes, aka Claire Boucher, has shared a behind the scenes look at the music video for "Go", which came out back in August. The footage is pretty straightforward—there's makeup being applied to a dancer, Boucher and collaborator Blood Diamonds mean mugging in between takes, and a lot of wordless walking around the desert—but you do get to see Boucher attempt to pick up a sword that will not be picked up. Check it out below.
Watch Grimes perform "Genesis" at Pitchfork Music Festival:
In his latest episode of his web food series "Fuck That's Delicious", Action Bronson eats his way through New Orleans with his cousin. In the video, Bronson rides a fanboat, eats his share of fried chicken and lamb, watches the Little Freddie King Blues Band play, and learns about swamp fruit. Watch the episode below via Munchies.
Previously, Bronson has taught us how to make guacamole and educated us about "white trash bruschetta". He's also concocted a Baklava milkshake and learned how to make Albanian pastry from his aunt.
Watch Action Bronson in an episode of Pitchfork.tv's "Over/Under":
