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A Selection of the Flat-Out Dirtiest Songs in the History of Music

By Tom Hawking on

The good folk at Dangerous Minds are great at unearthing amazing YouTube rarities, and they outdid themselves last week with a 1971 performance by Ike and Tina Turner, which goes down in history as one of the most subtly filthy live performances we’ve ever seen — it’s basically one long allusion to oral sex, with Tina spending most of her time doing very, very suggestive things to the microphone, and while Ike’s ophidian glare still gives us the creeps, he does make some glorious slurping noises into his own mic. The crowd clearly knows exactly what’s going on, sniggering throughout, and the whole thing’s a testament to just how filthy music could be, even in an era that was still comparatively conservative. Anyway, the spectacle got us thinking about our favorite dirty songs, the best of which we have shared after the jump. Don’t play these while your boss is around. Obviously. … Read More

Music

10 Women We Can’t Believe Aren’t in the Rock Hall of Fame

By Tom Hawking on

So, tonight is the grand induction ceremony for this year’s class of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees. You’ll forgive us if we don’t get too excited, though, as the whole Hall of Fame experience these days is as notable for who isn’t included as it is for who is — and, specifically, for the ongoing lack of female inductees. There are plenty of worthy male artists and (predominantly) male bands whose continuing absence is inexplicable — Brian Eno, Nick Drake, Pixies, The Smiths, The Cure, Television — but the picture for women remains truly depressing. About this time two years ago, Salon ran a story pointing out that less than 14% of inductees were women, a picture that hasn’t exactly improved since — Heart and Donna Summer finally god the nod this year, meaning that a whole 25% of this year’s inductees are women! There are still loads of great female artists who remain on the outside looking in, though; here are some of the best. … Read More

Pop Culture

10 Stars From Your Childhood Who Got (Too Much) Religion

By Jason Bailey on

“Nobody finds God on prom night,” Dennis Miller once joked — an insightful gag about the tendency of celebrities and other public figures to turn religious once their lives and careers are in a freefall, rendered doubly poignant by Miller’s subsequent turn from an equal-opportunity offender to a right-wing water carrier when the gigs dried up during the Bush years, but I digress. Point is, we’re big on ‘80s and ‘90s nostalgia around here, but as we look into the current whereabouts of celebs we remember from those years, we’re often surprised to find how many went and found God when the phone stopped ringing (or just before, which may or may not be a coincidence). After the jump, a brief selection of folks we remember from before they hit the Bible. … Read More

Music

20 Classic Female-Fronted Hip Hop Tracks

By Tom Hawking on

Oh, Rolling Stone. Sometimes you make it so easy. We try not to spend too much of our time nitpicking the amusingly out-of-touch pontifications of Jann Wenner’s empire, but occasionally something comes along that annoys us so much that it’s hard not to react. So it was recently, when the magazine’s editors came back from the mountain with stone tablets purporting to contain “The 50 Greatest Hip-Hop Songs of All Time.” In fairness, reading RS for hip hop recommendations is like reading Trucking Monthly for advice on bicycles, but even so, if you’re going to claim to make a definitive list, you don’t relegate Nas’s “NY State of Mind” to #31 (11 places behind 50 Cent’s risible “In Da Club”) — and, more annoyingly, you don’t make the mistake of including only three songs featuring female vocalists. … Read More

Music

10 of the Most Unspeakably Filthy Basslines in History

By Tom Hawking on

As of this week, Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea is 50, a fact that makes us feel a little older and a little grayer ourselves. But we also noticed that Mr. Balzary just about shares a birthday with… Ginuwine! Remember him? “Pony”? That video in the hillbilly club? That utterly filthy bassline? The cosmic coincidence got us thinking about some of the other naughty, naughty basslines from throughout the history of music — of all instruments, bass has the power to get the hips shaking, both on the dance floor and, y’know, elsewhere. We’ve selected some of our favorites, so let us know your suggestions, too. Just don’t do anything unspeakable in the comments section. … Read More

Music

The 10 Most ’90s Songs of the ’90s

By Judy Berman on

Just the other day, New Radicals’ 1998 one-hit wonder “You Get What You Give” came up in conversation, and it occurred to us that, over a decade into the new millennium, the music of the ’90s is starting to sound as dated as disco did when we were kids. From cultural references to Tonya Harding, Hanson, and white kids who desperately wanted to be gangstas to zeitgeist-y topics like Gen-X disaffection and sex education, there are just some songs that unmistakably evoke the decade. We’ve rounded up what we think of as the most ’90s songs of the ’90s after the jump; keep in mind that this isn’t a list of the best tracks of the era, just the ones that are clearly the products of its preoccupations. Let us know what you’d add in the comments. … Read More

Television

10 Awesomely ’90s Moments from MTV’s ‘House of Style’

By Jennifer Lewis on

Have you heard the news? MTV is reviving its ’90s-tastic House of Style, the show that brought you endless “supermodel” style tips from the likes of Kate Moss, Hanson, and, of course, host Cindy Crawford. The new Cindy won’t be announced until the MTV Video Music Awards on September 6th, a month before the show’s October 9th premiere, so we’ve decided to help you get psyched by rounding up 10 incredibly ’90s moments from the show’s incredibly ’90s archives — a trove that has just recently been posted online. After the jump, enjoy some excellent fashion advice from Will Smith, Salt-N-Pepa, Spice Girls, and more. … Read More

Music

Rock the Bells 2012 Line-Up Features Missy Elliott, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony

By Judy Berman on

After a few months of interchangeable summer festival lineup announcements featuring ’90s alt-rock reunions and trendy indie acts, it’s always refreshing to hear what traveling hip-hop celebration Rock the Bells is planning — and this year’s just-released roster doesn’t disappoint. The biggest news, as far as we’re concerned, is the return of Missy Elliott, who will appear alongside longtime collaborator Timbaland as “very special guests.” Also on the agenda is Bone Thugs-N-Harmony’s 20th anniversary reunion, for which they’ll play their classic 1995 album E. 1999 Eternal in its entirety. Other noteworthy bookings include Salt-N-Pepa, Kid Cudi, Nas, Wiz Khalifa, Ice Cube, A$AP Rocky, Deltron 3030, Slick Rick, Yelawolf, and just about as many Wu Tang members as you’ve come to expect from Rock the Bells. In 2012, the festival will visit three cities, hitting OS Events Center in San Bernardino, California on August 18th and 19th; Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California on August 25th and 26th, and PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, New Jersey September 1st and 2nd. See the full lineup after the jump. … Read More

Music

The Perfect Bands to Suit Your Every Obscure Mood

By Judy Berman on

Most pop songs are about love — falling in it, basking in its glow, getting sick of it, mourning its death, searching anew for it. Considering how much of our emotional energy is devoted to those things, this makes some sense. But what about feelings that have nothing to do with romance? How can those of us who prefer to treat our psychological excesses with music — rather than, say, talk therapy or medication — revel in nostalgia or beat an acute case of anxiety? We’ve made our prescriptions after the jump; be sure to take two, call us in the morning, and tell us what mood-music pairings you’d add in the comments. … Read More

Music

‘Greatest Women in Music’ Picks VH1 Will Surely Come to Regret

By Judy Berman on

As you may have noticed, we do a lot of a list-making here at Flavorpill. So we’re particularly sensitive to the idea that anything purporting to be a definitive countdown of the 100 Greatest Women in Music had better be pretty freaking solid. Now, VH1 has already narrowed the field somewhat for this five-part series, specifying that it will only celebrate acts that have made significant contributions in the past 20 years. In a way, that’s good news — we won’t have to freak out about Katy Perry outranking Janis Joplin. But that doesn’t mean the network has managed to entirely steer clear of choices that are somewhat embarrassing now and will undoubtedly be utterly humiliating in a decade or so. After the jump, we round up their silliest selections and most questionable rankings. … Read More