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Television

10 Amazing, Shocking Unscripted Moments From ’90s MTV

By Tyler Coates on

Though the channel debuted in the early ’80s, MTV really found its groove in the ’90s when it still balanced music coverage with its burgeoning original reality, comedy, and animated programming. Because we can’t resist looking back fondly on the wild and wacky on-air incidents that shaped our adolescence, here are ten mind-blowing moments from MTV’s second decade that make us pine for those halcyon off-the-wall… Read More

Music

The Best Advice to Women in Music from Female Musicians

By Alison Nastasi on

Examining the statistics concerning women in professional, creative fields can be a depressing endeavor. A recent study from the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University indicated that only 9% of directors of the top 250 grossing Hollywood films in 2012 were women — a number that actually increased 4% since 2011, but still shows the scales are heavily tipped.

The same study applauded the number of women working in the indie film sector, which is a trend that runs parallel with female-fronted bands or solo music acts. Looking at the industry at large, only eight of last year’s top female earners ranked among the world’s 25 highest-paid musicians. The reasons are complicated, and the results can be disheartening, which is why we wanted to collect some of the best advice that female musicians had for their fellow artists — like the tongue-in-cheek list Pretenders frontwoman, Chrissie Hynde, wrote to “chick rockers” that we spotted on Dangerous Minds.

See what wisdom women have offered each other as they navigate a male-dominated industry, share their artistry with the world, and try to stay positive and inspired, after the jump. … Read More

Music

Watch Liz Phair Exact Revenge in Badass New Music Video

By Judy Berman on

As she’s spent the past several years demonstrating, Liz Phair basically does whatever she wants these days. (And even if Exile in Guyville is the only album of hers you appreciate, we’d argue that she’s still earned that right.) So, this week she feels like releasing a video for “And He Slayed Her,” from her two-year-old novelty album/attack on the music industry, Funstyle. And you know what? Despite all the abuse that she took for that record, this is a very good thing. “And He Slayed Her” is probably the best song on the album, and the video is unspeakably badass. Phair is equal parts sexy and deadly, tearing through the desert in a vintage car, bent on exacting some unexpectedly brutal (but also pretty funny) revenge. Although the video seems to be about a romance gone bad, we’d be remiss not to point out, as Stereogum did, that the song’s title famously sounds a whole lot like “Andy Slater,” the name of a Capitol executive who refused to release Phair from a contract. … Read More

Music

10 Criminally Underrated ’90s Songs

By Judy Berman on

In typical NME fashion, the magazine has caught on to ’90s nostalgia a few years after the rest of the music media and released its list of the top 100 songs of the decade. Aside from a few unmistakably British flourishes (Pulp’s “Common People” edging Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” out of the #1 spot, McAlmont & Butler’s “Yes” in the top 10), there are few surprises. No one can deny the excellence of Radiohead’s “Paranoid Android” or Daft Punk’s “Da Funk,” but we’re getting sick of seeing the same songs honored over and over when there are so many other equally great tracks to celebrate. We’ve done just that below, rounding up a handful of criminally underrated ’90s songs that you may have forgotten over the years. Since there are literally thousands of tracks that also deserve a place on this list, we hope you’ll add your suggestions in the comments. … Read More

Books

Literary Mixtape: Lady Chatterley

By Emily Temple on

If you’ve ever wondered what your favorite literary characters might be listening to while they save the world/contemplate existence/get into trouble, or hallucinated a soundtrack to go along with your favorite novels, well, us too. But wonder no more! Here, we sneak a look at the hypothetical iPods of some of literature’s most interesting characters. What would be on the personal playlists of Holden Caulfield or Elizabeth Bennett, Huck Finn or Harry Potter, Tintin or Humbert Humbert? Something revealing, we bet. Or at least something danceable. Read on for a cozy reading soundtrack, character study, or yet another way to emulate your favorite literary hero. This week: D.H. Lawrence’s most controversial heroine, the lovely Lady Chatterley. … Read More

Music

The 10 Best Breakup Albums of All Time

By Tom Hawking on

If you’re in any way a regular Flavorwire reader, you’ll probably have noticed that we’ve been quietly beside ourselves for several months now at the prospect of a new Spiritualized album. Sweet Heart Sweet Light is finally here, but we’ve spent the intervening weeks listening to a whole lot of the band’s back catalog — including, of course, their 1997 classic Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space. Aside from being one of our favorite albums ever, Ladies and Gentlemen… is one of the best breakup records you’ll ever hear, its conception coinciding with Spiritualized main man Jason Pierce parting ways with keyboard player Kate Radley. Having the record on constant rotation led us to wallowing in some of our other favorite breakup albums — so here are ten of the best. … Read More

Music

15 Songs to Soundtrack Your Quarterlife Creative Crisis

By Judy Berman on

Jobs (or the lack thereof). Bills. Personal drama. Existential angst. It’s hard out there for 20-something creative types, struggling to make ends meet and still find enough hours in the day to work on our own personal projects. For the most part, here at Flavorpill, we tend to keep a positive attitude about balancing the stresses of our daily existence with the creative pursuits that make life worth living. But every once in a while, we can’t help but get sucked into the vortex of a mini-quarterlife crisis. And we’re pretty sure we’re not alone. Since music is at once the best catharsis and the best inspiration to get out of our own heads, we’ve compiled a list of 15 songs that feel your pain — including a few that might just help you get back to kicking ass. … Read More

Music

25 Incredibly Depressing Non-Emo Songs

By Judy Berman on

Here’s a groan-worthy headline for you: “What Comes First: Depression in Teens or Emo Music?” In what may be an unconscious echo of Nick Hornby’s oft-quoted High Fidelity query, “What came first, the music or the misery?”, NPR’s health blog presents a new study that found teens who listen to a lot of music tend to be depressed. Cue hysterical parents, swooping in to confiscate those My Chemical Romance CDs and replace them with — what, Sartre’s Nausea?

Now, it’s totally obvious that depressing songs pre-date emo’s breakthrough to the mainstream by a couple hundred years. But we thought this would be a good excuse to remind hysterical types that just because kids are dying their hair pink and black doesn’t mean the music teenagers like is any darker now than it was before. Listen to 25 of the most depressing non-emo songs we can think of after the jump, and suggest your own additions in the comments. … Read More

Music

10 Essential Bad-Girl Anthems

By Judy Berman on

We will never cease to be amazed by Robyn, even though we have kind of lost track of how many albums she released last year (15? 32?). Now, she’s found the time to work with Savage Skulls and Douster on a wonderful video for the song “Bad Gal” (which was a bonus track on Body Talk Pt. 2). It is weird and great and we love it.

“Bad Gal” got us thinking about all the other immortal bad-girl anthems we’ve rocked out to over the years. There are many. But the ten we’ve listed after the jump are our favorites. Leave your picks for what we left out in the comments. If we get enough great suggestions, we’ll round up ten more songs next week. … Read More

Music

Pitchfork’s (Middle-Aged) Girl Problem

By Paul Hiebert on

Liz Phair has a new album out, and Pitchfork gave it a 2.6 out of 10. That’s bad. Dismal, even. In April, Courtney Love’s resurrected band Hole didn’t do much better with Nobody’s Daughter — their album scored a 2.9. We know the music criticism website is infamous for having high standards, but these grades seem outright punitive.

Perhaps we’re paranoid, but does Pitchfork have something against women over 40? Has a blend of ageism and sexism crept into their reviews, or are they just brave enough to spurn complacent records and give them the grade they deserve? To indulge our suspicions, we compared some of Pitchfork’s album reviews of artists in this demographic with the averages found on the review-aggregate website Metacritic. Check out our findings, along with Pitchfork’s harshest criticism leveled against each member of this random group of mature women, after the jump. … Read More