Wilco’s new video for “Dawned on Me” combines some of the things dearest to our hearts: Jeff Tweedy and old black-and-white Popeye shorts. It’s a clip that’s both fun and visually interesting, not to mention the first hand-drawn Popeye cartoon that’s appeared in the last 30-something years. But Wilco is far from the first band to hit upon the idea of including animation in their music videos. Cartoons in videos stretch back from the days of a-ha’s “Take On Me” through Björk and Radiohead. After the jump, check out ten of the best animated music videos we’ve ever seen — tell us about your personal favorites in the comments.

Read More »

1. Apparently Amy Winehouse’s father was unhappy with Jean Paul Gaultier’s catwalk tribute to the late singer, which took place last night in Paris. “We’re proud of her influence on fashion but find black veils on models, smoking cigarettes with a barbershop quartet singing her music in bad taste,” he reportedly told The Sun. “It portrays a view of Amy when she was not at her best, and glamorizes some of the more upsetting times in her life. That’s upsetting for her family.” [via NME]

2. After meeting Radiohead at a music festival in Poland, minimalist composer Steve Reich is planning to premiere a new work at London’s Southbank Centre that is based on two of the band’s songs, “Everything In its Right Place” and “Jigsaw Falling Into Place.” Look for the piece to debut in March 2013. [via P4K]

3. Lana Del Rey has purchased the rights to the 2010 album that she recorded back when she was still Lizzie Grant, and she’s planning to re-release it this summer. [via Vulture]

4. A new $803 million complex designed by starchitect Renzo Piano that is supposedly “broadly reminiscent of the Acropolis” is set to go up on the site south of Athens that was home to the 2004 Olympics. The ambitious project will include a national library, opera house, and a 42-acre park. [via The Architect's Newspaper]

5. Live Earth founder Kevin Wall is helping to launch the inaugural Tadasana Festival, a new three-day yoga event that will take place in Santa Monica over Earth Day Weekend. Along with over 100 yoga classes and workshops, the festival will feature performances by world music artists like Karsh Kale, Hassan Hakmoun, Cheb i Sabbah, and Vishal Vaid. [via Billboard]

Bonus Buzz: NASA’s Incredible New High Resolution Photograph of Earth

Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg (who was just arrested after border control agents found marijuana on his tour bus — shocking we know), The Black Keys, and Radiohead are amongst those headlining Coachella this year. Harlem rapper Azealia Banks nabbed herself one of the first official spots at the California music and arts festival just days ago. Other acts have been revealed via Twitter in the weeks leading up to today’s Facebook announcement. Bon Iver, Arctic Monkeys, At the Drive-In (they hinted at their participation in a Tweet today, about breaking their 11-year silence) … who are you missing in this lineup slated for a double weekend celebration, on April 13-15 and April 20-22 at the Empire Polo Club in Indio? [via Stereogum]

You might remember that we posted a couple of very, very early Radiohead demos a couple of months back — the songs dated from 1986, when the band were still called On a Friday and Jonny Greenwood was just Colin’s 15-year-old little brother, rather than the crazily innovative guitarist we know today. Well, another track from the same tape surfaced online over the weekend, and again, it makes for fascinating listening. It goes by the rather non-PC title of “Fat Girl,” and reveals that that mid-’80s era Thom Yorke was a very big fan of The Smiths. It’s available for your listening pleasure after the jump — let us know what you make of it. (According to the uploader, this is the last track she’ll upload from the tap — boo.)

Read More »

Today at Flavorpill, we recalled 2011′s biggest band beefs, two of which involved Bon Iver. We met the entire Nintendo family, in a piece of deviantART that depicts all of its countless major characters. We watched a bizarre pair of elderly Christian twin sisters perform a pantomime to Radiohead’s “Street Spirit.” We discovered that Kelly Clarkson is a Ron Paul supporter, and also that she’s so educated about the Republican presidential candidate that she hadn’t realized he’s been accused of homophobia and racism. We laughed out loud at this spot-on faux flyer for Every New Year’s Eve Club Night Ever. We cringed our way through Salon critics’ discussion of “The Very Worst of 2011.” We enjoyed The Rumpus’s wide-ranging interview with Adrian Tomine. We were only occasionally stumped by this cool 1980s film alphabet poster, which doubles as a movie-geek quiz. We read that obligatory year-end think piece about the end of rock ‘n’ roll. And finally, we broke in our 2012 calendar with the news that Portlandia will make its second full episode of Season 2 — the one devoted to Battlestar Galactica – available to Facebook fans January 1st. Sounds like the perfect New Year’s Eve hangover cure to us.

It’s been a good season for Radiohead completists. Only a month ago, a pair of demos surfaced from back in 1986, when they were still called On A Friday. Now, NME alerts us that yet another rarely heard Radiohead track has appeared online. Called either “How Do You Sit Still” (the more appropriate title) or “Putting Ketchup in the Fridge” (the one we prefer) and dating from the early ’90s, it’s definitely a Pablo Honey throwback. The song is a slow-building rocker that works itself up to an epic crescendo in its last minute or so, full of driving guitars and classic Yorkean angst. While it may not impress the Kid A fans out there, it certainly stands up to the band’s other early material. Check out “How Do You Sit Still”/”Putting Ketchup in the Fridge” after the jump.

Read More »

Last week we stereotyped you by your favorite books, and this week it’s time to apply a bumper edition of our gratuitous generalizations to the world of music. Our stereotyping posts have become something of a tradition at Flavorpill, but still, here’s our obligatory disclaimer: this is an entirely tongue-in-cheek exercise, so don’t get all offended — and also, as ever, several of our favorite records are on here, and we’ll totally own up to all the stereotypes that apply to us. Anyway, with that said, here are 50 albums that keep cropping up on end-of-year lists and the sort of people that like them. Read More »

1. Celebrated journalist, lifelong contrarian, and staunch atheist Christopher Hitchens has died from complications of esophageal cancer at the age of 62. “I personally want to ‘do’ death in the active and not the passive,” he wrote in his recent memoir Hitch-22, “and to be there to look it in the eye and be doing something when it comes for me.” Read an anecdote-filled eulogy by his friend Christopher Buckley over at the New Yorker.

2. Radiohead guitarist Ed O’Brien says that the band is rehearsing “four or five new songs” to play at their live shows next year in a world tour that includes 10 dates in North America and five shows across Europe. [via NME]

3. Christian Bale, who in China promoting his new film The Flowers of War (the most expensive Chinese film ever made), was forcefully prevented by government-backed guards from visiting Chen Guangcheng, a blind activist currently living under house arrest. [via NYP]

4. Phil Spector, who is currently serving 19 years to life for the 2003 murder of actress Lana Clarkson, is asking the US Supreme Court to review his 2009 conviction, claiming that the judge violated his constitutional rights by providing his opinion on expert testimony. [via Zap2it]

5. Have you seen the promo for the new Lifetime Original that features Rob Lowe as accused murderer Drew Peterson? You’re welcome.

Bonus Buzz: The Best Ron Swanson Food Quotes

1. Chewbacca is making a non-singing guest appearance on the Christmas episode of Glee. Why? According to Matthew Morrison, there’s “a special within the episode that’s a throwback to the Star Wars holiday special and the Judy Garland Christmas special.” [via THR]

2. Martin Scorsese has revealed that his next film project will be a long-delayed adaptation of Shusaku Endo’s novel Silence, a story which focuses on a group of Jesuit missionaries in 17th century Japan. [via Slashfilm]

3. This image of Viggo Mortensen on the cover of New York Times Magazine has us convinced that he would have made a much better Benjamin Button than Brad Pitt. [via Best Week Ever]

4. Can you picture Jason Stackhouse having a one night stand with Zooey Deschanel’s awkward New Girl character Jess? Neither can we (unless there was some V involved), but it looks like it will be happening in an upcoming episode of the show. [via Vulture]

5. It has been announced that Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood will compose the score The Master, Paul Thomas Anderson’s upcoming film that’s believed to be based on the life of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. Given how well this creative pairing worked for There Will Be Blood, we can’t wait to hear what Greenwood comes up with. [via Collider]

Bonus Buzz: Baby Chameleons Are Adorable

When established artists decided to lend their talent to the music world, the creations that result from the collision of egos and imaginations are often mind blowing. From Pablo Picasso’s costumes for an avant garde ballet by Erik Satie to Andy Warhol’s management of the Velvet Underground, we’ve rounded up some of our favorite artist and musician collaborations. How did Salvador Dalí and Alice Cooper meet? How did the world survive? Read on to find out and drop us a comment if you think we missed any biggies. Read More »