F

Flavorwire

Kim Gordon

Music

Great Musicians on the Concerts That Inspired Them to Make Music

By Tom Hawking on

If you aren’t already, it’s time to follow The Mountain Goats’ John Darnielle on Tumblr — his blog is as witty and entertaining as one might expect, and he updates it fairly frequently. In particular, it was interesting to see him recently post a photo of a very young version of himself at a Nick Cave show. It turns out he’s quite the Cave fan, and that seeing The Bad Seeds play on the tour in question was quite the formative experience on both Darnielle himself and on his nascent musical project. He’s not the first musician to be inspired to form a band after seeing a hero play live, of course — so here are some other recollections of great musical… Read More

New York

For Your Calendar: Sonic Youth Detox With Lee Ranaldo Band

By Jason Diamond on

It wasn’t exactly the day the music died, but for people who grew up thinking Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore’s marriage was an indestructible artifact from the glory days of the alternative 1980s and ’90s, Gordon’s revelation to Elle of what caused their marriage to crumble was pretty devastating: … Read More

Film

‘The Punk Singer’ Solves the Mystery — And Celebrates the History — Of Kathleen Hanna

By Jason Bailey on

AUSTIN, TX: Early in The Punk Singer, the terrific new documentary by Sini Anderson, Kathleen Hanna remembers being asked why she wanted to write. “Because nobody has ever listened to me, my entire life.” Her work burns with that kind of intensity, with an insistence that she — and the things she had to say — had importance, value, meaning. That same intensity is present in The Punk Singer, which is both a captivating personal story and a history of a moment — as the best rock documentaries are. … Read More

New York

John Cale Restores Nico’s Musical Legacy in All-Star Tribute

By Judy Berman on

[Ed. note: In honor of John Cale's mini-residency at BAM this week -- including an all-star tribute to Nico on Wednesday and performances of his 1973 solo album, Paris 1919 on Friday and Saturday -- Flavorwire New York has embarked upon a week-long celebration of all things Velvet Underground.]

With all the tribute albums and concerts (and art shows and dance parties, etc.) on offer these days, it’s easy forget that they can be more than just shallow attempts on the part of their organizers to cash in on a name more famous than their own. Last night at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the consistently thoughtful, uncompromising John Cale reminded me. Not only did he amass an appropriate and diverse set of musicians for Life Along the Borderline: A Tribute to Nico, but his clear-eyed and unsentimental celebration of his one-time Velvet Underground bandmate did what any worthwhile tribute should do — broadened and deepened our understanding of its subject. … Read More

Music

20 Brilliant Musicians on Why They Make Music

By Tom Hawking on

Here at Flavorwire, we’re constantly fascinated by the creative process and what drives people to be artists. In the past, we’ve looked into musicians discussing their songwriting process, and we’re similarly interested in what drives people to start creating in the first place. We’ve delved around and come up with a selection of quotes from our favorite musicians about how they got started on music, why it is they do what they do, and/or what they’re hoping to achieve with the creation of their art. The results are both revealing and fascinating.… Read More

Web

What’s On at Flavorpill: The Links That Made the Rounds in Our Office

By Alison Nastasi on

Today at Flavorpill, we visited Occupy Wall Street one year later. We spotted a Civil War-era Louis C.K. lookalike. We watched a Rocky Horror spoof featuring Ronald Reagan as Frank-N-Furter. We saw an alternate version of the Indiana Jones sword fight in Raiders of the Lost Ark.… Read More

Music

25 Intimate and Revealing Backstage Photos of Famous Musicians

By Tom Hawking on

We all know what our favorite musicians are like on stage — whether they’re shy or flamboyant, whether they’re chatty or businesslike, whether they’re funny or taciturn. But we also know that what we’re seeing on stage is ultimately a performance. Off stage, however, it’s a completely different matter, and thus backstage photography has always provided an interesting insight into the music world, particularly when the photos in question aren’t posed or contrived. We’ve pulled together a collection of such photos, images that seem to capture sides to performers that we rarely get to see, giving a glimpse of the person behind the persona — whether it’s a tearful Kurt Cobain slumped in a corner, Bob Marley playing soccer, or Lemmy reading a book (with nary a bottle of Jack Daniel’s in sight!), these are like all great photos in that they capture a moment in time and in doing so also capture some part of the subject’s personality. We hope you enjoy… Read More

Pop Culture

The Celebrity Couples We’re Most Inexplicably Attached To

By Emily Temple on

We were very upset this week to learn that one of our favorite celebrity couples of all time, Amy Poehler and Will Arnett, are getting a divorce after nine years of marriage. In fact, we were much too upset, considering the fact that we know neither party personally, and we know nothing about them as a couple other than what we surmise from photos and the odd interview. But some celebrity couples just have that effect on us — we find ourselves inexplicably attached to them, whether they just make so much sense together, or because they seem to represent some little corner of perfection all on their own. After the jump, we’ve put together a list of such couples, both present and (sadly) past. Click through to see who we chose, and let us know which celebrity couples fascinate you to no end in the comments. … Read More

Music

The 15 Albums You Need to Hear in September

By Tom Hawking on

You know summer is well and truly over when the humidity recedes, the days start getting shorter and the big album releases start coming thick and fast. Yep, it’s almost time for the September rush, and this year the crop is particularly good — so much so, in fact, that we’ve expanded our usual round-up of 10 albums you need to hear in the month to come to a bumper list of 15. As ever, we’ve also rounded up the rest of the month’s notable releases: the good, the bad, and the ugly. So tell us: what are you looking forward to hearing in… Read More

Music

Sonic Youth Officially on “Longterm Hold,” Readying Endless Reissues

By Judy Berman on

This is the way the most beloved indie rock band of the past 30 years ends: not with a banging farewell album but with a Lee Ranaldo interview and a load of reissues and live releases. As Pitchfork reports, Ranaldo confirmed in a conversation with BBC 5 Radio that Sonic Youth… Read More