Music

Music

The best country song about a city will forever be Waylon Jennings' " Luckenbach, Texas," but when Noelle started singing "Taos," her ode to the New Mexico town, I had to rearrange a mental list of runners-up. Every Gillian Welch fan has their favorite songs, and while she and cosmic-folk guitarist extraordinaire David Rawlings didn't play mine (" Wrecking Ball," a beautiful autobiography of life in 1980s Santa Cruz), their set at the Masonic still felt like a big, warm embrace.

Poppy has unleashed the new single "Guardian," while also revealing the tracklist to her previously announced upcoming album Empty Hands, set for release January 23rd via Sumerian Records. The new song finds Poppy delivering melodic clean vocals over an industrial-metal guitar riff, making for a more radio-friendly sound than some of her extreme offerings, including the heavy recent single "Bruised Sky."

Portugal. The Man's fall tour hit NYC this week for a pair of shows: Terminal 5 on Wednesday night, and the considerably more intimate Music Hall of Williamsburg on Tuesday. They had promised "Explosive songs! Extended jams! Exclusive limited merch! Absolute mayhem!" for the smaller shows they added to this run, and they delivered on that in Brooklyn, bringing out Weird Al Yankovic for the final two songs of the set.

That clip, which saw Smith absolutely crushing the drums on the song after hearing it for the first time ever (minus the drum track), has amassed 28 million views since it premiered in 2023. Two years later, Thirty Seconds to Mars drummer Shannon Leto recently paid a visit to the Drumeo studio. Not only was Leto tasked with his own "For the First Time" challenge with the Alter Bridge song "Metalingus," he was also asked to play along to a drumless version of Red Hot Chili Peppers' "By the Way." It was during that latter performance that Chad Smith himself walked into the studio and quietly sat next to Drumeo host Brandon Toews without Leto noticing.

bouncing between residential hotels in Harlem and Midtown East - temporary lodgings close to the clubs where he played alto saxophone and pioneered bebop. But for the last four years of his life, Parker stayed in one place - the garden apartment of 151 Avenue B, on Tompkins Square Park, where he lived with his partner, Chan Richardson, and their children.

Spain, the Netherlands and Ireland will boycott the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest after Israel's participation sparked controversy. Israel will be allowed to take part in the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest. The decision was made after members of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) chose not to hold a vote on banning the country, despiteboycott threats from several broadcasters over the war in Gaza.

After working in music journalism for over 10 years, if there's one thing I've come away feeling it's a true hatred for making lists. The very process of having to pick 10 or 20 or 50 or 100 of the best songs or albums or whatever and make it sound definitive is annoying in itself. When you add the inevitable consternation from the readership, then it becomes even more untenable.

Larry Vuckovich celebrates his 89th year on the eve of his birthday, which is December 8! He will be playing with his favorite guitarist, Kai Lyons. Larry and Kai have been regularly expanding their diverse and wide-ranging repertoire. Besides the great jazz classics of top composers, they will cover seldom heard standards, great Latin and Brazilian pieces, World Music gems, and as always funky, boogaloo blues selections.

This all-Ravel recording by the Nash Ensemble was the final project of Amelia Freedman's extraordinary 60 years as artistic director, and it's a fitting farewell to the group's much-missed founder, who died in July. It includes all three larger chamber works plus the composer's own two-piano arrangement of his orchestral masterpiece La Valse: Alasdair Beatson and Simon Crawford-Phillips are a polished team in this, sounding wonderfully louche early on and then dispatching fistfuls of notes and long glissandos with seeming ease, all while catching the music's increasingly sinister nature.

Joe Aboud, a former major label executive and founder of 444 Sounds, says streaming platforms now see 100,000 to 120,000 new tracks uploaded every day - roughly 1.5 million a week. AI-generated tracks already make up nearly one in five uploads on some platforms, said Jeremy Morris, a media and cultural studies professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, raising concerns about royalty dilution and algorithmic bias.

When songwriter Patrick Irwin moved to Nashville last year, he was entering a lottery. Each day hundreds of sessions take place where writers create a song demo to pitch to a publisher. Publishers then share those songs with labels and managers, who may share those songs with the artists. Even if a major country star records ("cuts") the song, it still takes a stroke of luck for that song to become a No. 1 hit.

"I am not easy to surprise because I love to control every situation, and I had completely surrendered," she said. "I actually had never gone to Japan, which I did that purposefully. I wanted one place in the world that could be my special place that I saved for me."

Tickets for Australian indie rockers Vacations 2026 MATES Festival, happening at Knockdown Center on Saturday, June 20 with Girlpuppy, Mamalarky, Horse Jumper of Love, Alex Lahey, Thelma Plum, and Grentperez, are on BrooklynVegan Presale starting today (12/4) at 10 AM ET.

Grikstas reportedly told police that she, Poorstacy and their toddler checked into the hotel about a week before his death, sources told TMZ. She allegedly admitted the pair consumed drugs including cocaine and MDMA while the child was present in the room. According to Grikstas, she and Poorstacy argued throughout the night ahead of his death and accused one another of infidelity.

I had never been to Italy. This was a special moment, to get to go for the first time with probably the most famous Italian singer alive today. What a week, and I only had to sing twice! I'm used to Broadway, where we do eight shows a week, or being on tour and singing every other night, but I was able to relax and breathe.

An intimate house concert featuring soul-stirring melodies and exhilarating rhythms. Join us for a captivating evening of Indian classical music where melody and rhythm come together in perfect harmony. The concert features Amit Gud on Sarod, Avinash Bengeri on Flute, and Skanda Krishnan on Tabla - three accomplished artists who bring depth, emotion, and spontaneity to every note. Experience the lyrical conversation between Sarod and Flute, supported by the dynamic pulse of Tabla, as they explore the beauty of evening ragas through improvisation and interplay.

Over a pared-back post-punk beat, Simz details her life's genius plan, namely being free as I can. The first half is spent detailing the roadblocks she's faced in her quest, marching through them like a Marvel hero. Then, as if throwing her arm round a young apprentice's shoulder as she walks, she lays out her six-point plan for greatness with koans of wisdom such as: Never eat with the hyenas / Cause they will look at you as bones.

So many artists, so many songs, so little time. Each week we review a handful of new albums (of all genres), round up even more new music that we'd call "indie," and talk about what metal is coming out. We post music news, track premieres, and more all day. We update a playlist weekly of some of our current favorite tracks. Here's a daily roundup with a bunch of interesting, newly released songs in one place.

I started singing Diana to Chuck Berry when, suddenly, he stops me and says, That's the worst song I've ever heard in my life, go back to school.' Rather than slink away from such a pronouncement, however, Anka used it as a spur. Revenge is a motivator like you won't believe, the 84-year-old star said with an eruptive laugh the other day. I said to myself, I'm going to show him.'

I didn't aim the list to turn out this way, but four of the albums' leaders are women, and five (including three of those four) feature prominent female "sidemen." There's old and young, with the leaders' ages ranging from 38 (Sullivan Fortner) to 87 (Charles Lloyd), the rest widely spaced in between. Seven of the 10 albums were released by indie labels, four of them on labels that are also artist-owned (two on Pyroclastic, one each on Greenleaf and Yes).

A JOHN WATERS CHRISTMAS TOUR 2025John Waters is currently on his annual "A John Waters Christmas" tour where he both embraces and is repulsed by the holiday spirit in all its trashy, gaudy, music-filled glory. The tour hits NYC at City Winery on December 21 & 22. All dates: 12/03 - Vancouver, BC @ Rio Theatre 12/04 - Vancouver, BC @ Rio Theatre 12/05 - Palm Springs, CA @ Plaza Theatre 12/06 - North Hollywood, CA @ El Portal

Vocalist and songwriter Ren Geisick was the 2010 recipient of an Ella Fitzgerald Scholarship. That same year, Downbeat Magazine named her Outstanding Undergraduate Jazz Vocalist. Reisick completed her studies and released her debut album, Ren, Love Song in 2017. Her second album, The Place I Planned to Go was released in June 2025. But for this City Lights Theater show-celebrating its 11 th year-Reisick and her band get into the holiday spirit with an assortment of classic holiday music, blending traditional melodies with updated, contemporary arrangements that bring together jazz, Americana and blues.

"Although we have always remained friends with Jason, and honestly he and I are closer now than ever, this is our first 'announced' appearance together in nearly 20 years,"