I don’t plan on mentioning the name “Miley Cyrus” very much on this site, but when I found out that she performed a cover of “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1” with Wayne Coyne, I’m obligated to share that news. Stereogum has the video of that performance, as well as her cover of OutKast’s “Hey Ya”, both of which were a lot better than I expected. Also unexpected: the amount of times that Miley drops F-Bombs on her tween audience.
Stereogum also has an inside look at the making of the new Fucked Up album. I had recently been wondering about the status of the album, so it’s good to hear that it’s somewhat on track (less good to hear–the possibility that Stereogum may be reading my thoughts). It’s an interesting look at the band’s unusual dynamic, where everyone kind of does their own thing, and reading about the internal tension between vocalist Damian Abraham and guitarist Mike Haliechuk is pretty fascinating.
Finally, if you’re stuck in a meeting, I recommend that you read up on a couple of old interviews. The first one I have is an oral history of the making of the Wu-Tang Clan’s debut album Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) courtesy of SPIN. As one would expect with any story concerning the Wu, there’s tons of great anecdotes about various members, including the ODB. There is also a lot of revelatory discussion about the specific recording techniques that were used. And finally, in preparation for the new Beck album that will be released tomorrow (and our upcoming retrospective on his career so far), it’s worth checking out this old wide-ranging interview with Pitchfork about his career. You get a lot of insight into the early parts of Beck’s career and how he became an accidental superstar, and his attitude about the music business in general. Towards the end of the interview, you also get a feel for Beck’s recording philosophy and techniques.