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Your Favorite Musicians’ Favorite Musicians

By Emily Temple on

Here at Flavorpill, we’re into music. And like any group of music nerds with access to the Internet, we like garnering suggestions from people we trust about the best bands out there. So who better to suggest some great musicians than, well, some great musicians? After all, they should be experts on the subject. Here, we’ve compiled a list of our favorite musicians’ own favorite musicians for your listening — and obsessing — pleasure. After all, if you live, breathe and sleep Frank Zappa (as yours truly admits to doing for a spell in her teenage years), now you know which bands to listen to, just to, you know, complete the experience. Of course, just like us mortals (and probably even more so), musicians’ favorite bands change with their mood, the season and what they ate for lunch, so consider the following a snapshot, or in at least one case, just what John Darnielle would say in front of a firing squad. Ah, obsession. … Read More

News

The Morning’s Top 5 Pop Culture Stories

By Caroline Stanley on

1. Will Ferrell is headed to The Office for four upcoming episodes this season; he’ll play a branch manager from the home office who is just as inappropriate as Michael Scott. [via Deadline]

2. “At this point, Stephen [Malkmus] does not write songs for Pavement anymore, or songs in the Pavement mindset. I… Read More

Books

Literary Mixtape: Lolita

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. Last week we heard a snippet of Humbert Humbert’s musical tastes, so just to be fair, we thought we’d investigate the other side of the coin. This week: Dolores Haze, better known as Lolita herself. … Read More

News

The Morning’s Top 5 Pop Culture Stories

By Caroline Stanley on

1. Patti Smith won a National Book Award last night for her fantastic memoir Just Kids, and in her acceptance speech urged the crowd “never abandon the book, no matter how much we advance technologically.” Jaimy Gordon surprised many by winning the fiction prize for Lord of Misrule, which is set at a rundown horse… Read More

Music

MySpace Live Streaming Matador's 21st Birthday Party

By Caroline Stanley on

If you’re reading this, then odds are you’re not in route to Matador Records’ epic 21st birthday bash at the Palms in Vegas, where an amazing lineup of bands who have worked with the indie rock label — Sonic Youth, Pavement, Girls, Spoon, Belle & Sebastian, New Pornographers, and Superchunk, among others — will perform for three nights straight. Each evening’s show will be live streaming on Matador’s MySpace page, and will re-air again the following morning. Click through to check out the lineup, and plan your viewing accordingly. … Read More

Music

10 of the Funniest Indie Rock Songs

By Judy Berman on

Indie rock is often ironic or sarcastic or absurd — but truly funny indie songs can be hard to find. That realization struck us recently, while listening to “Our Riotous Defects,” from of Montreal’s fantastic new album, False Priest. Against a P-Funk backbeat, frontman Kevin Barnes deadpans the story of his relationship with a “crazy girl,” in hilarious details like, “as punishment, you killed my beta fish, just threw it out the window” and “I participated in all your protests, supported your stupid, little blog, got a Bowflex, wore color contacts to match your dresses.” In celebration of this track, we present this list of 10 more indie songs to make you laugh out loud. Because even the sullenest of hipsters has to laugh once in a while. … Read More

News

The Morning’s Top 5 Pop Culture Stories

By Caroline Stanley on

1. There’s something weird happening on Twitter this morning that will cause you to auto-retweet the problem-causing code anytime you mouse over the page. We recommend that you use mobile.twitter.com until it’s fixed. [via Boing Boing]
2. In case you missed it, Pavement played “Gold Soundz” on last night’s episode… Read More

Music

Pic of the Day: Pavement’s Original Slanted and Enchanted Demo

By Judy Berman on

Considering the troubles that divided Pavement in the first place, their long-running reputation for erratic live shows, and the deeply held belief that theirs is first and foremost a for-the-money reunion, we went into last night’s Williamsburg Waterfront performance with low expectations. But you know what? Stephen Malkmus, Bob Nastanovich, Spiral Stairs, and the gang kept it together long enough to bring down the house, playing every one of their best songs and bantering as though they were actually having a good time together. In celebration of this unexpected triumph, we bring you a photo of Pavement’s original Slanted and Enchanted demo tape. After the jump, those of you who don’t already have it memorized can check out the final album’s track list for comparison. … Read More

Music

Perfect 10: The Ancient Albums Pitchfork Thinks Are Flawless

By Laurie Kamens on

We think the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main St is one of rock’s most perfect albums. So it was no surprise that Pitchfork crowned the reissue with the coveted 10.0 rating, a rarity for a site so critical its top-rated album of 2009, Animal Collective’s Merriweather Post Pavilion, only scored a 9.6.

We couldn’t remember the last time an album was so highly rated by Pitchfork, so we scoured their archives to put together a list of the 10 most recent album releases and re-releases to earn a 10. Mostly, we found reissues that were at least 15 years old, recorded by such unknown artists as The Beatles and Neil Young. And that makes us wonder whether any of the new music kids are making these days will ever measure up to the classics, even in the eyes of critics roughly their own age. Do you agree with Pitchfork, or do you think they’ve overlooked more recent perfect albums? … Read More

News

The Morning’s Top 5 Pop Culture Stories

By Caroline Stanley on

1. Gary Numan (along with a slew of other British musicians), might not make it to Coachella because of the volcanic eruption. [via Brooklyn Vegan]
2. HBO has snagged the rights for three new docs from Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney: Freakonomics, My Trip To Al-Qaeda, and his untitled Eliot Spitzer project. [via The… Read More