Earlier this week, we had the privilege of hearing the new Atlas Sound record. Our professional opinion thus far is that the album is really good, and it got us thinking about how much more we like Bradford Cox’s solo project than his work with Deerhunter. Anyway, this in turn got us thinking about other cases where we’ve enjoyed a musician’s side project more than their “real” band. We’ve pulled together a selection of our favorites after the jump, and for these purposes, we’re calling anything formed while the musician was still in their former band a side project (so Sebadoh count, but a band like, say, New Order doesn’t). Anyway, as ever, we’d love to hear your suggestions.
Here at Flavorpill, we can hardly wait for Ringer, the new TV series on the CW that has Sarah Michelle Gellar playing the dual role of estranged twins who are both entangled in high-stakes intrigue. In our anticipation of the show’s premiere tomorrow night, we started thinking about other memorable twins — both real and fictional — in pop culture. Our top 10 are after the jump; add yours in the comments.
One of the most depressing things about the whole sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll mythology is how persistent and pervasive it remains in 2011. We don’t buy into hands-over-ears “Just say no” sanctimony here, but equally, there’s something sad about the fact that musicians still buy into Baudelarian mythology about drugs driving creativity. Equally, however, there’s the uncomfortable fact that plenty of musicians have a) made great music while on drugs and b) made mediocre music after going clean. Here at Flavorpill, we have a theory about this — that musicians’ drug-taking coincides with the early stages of their career, and they often get clean at about the same stage they run out of ideas. But clearly, this isn’t always the case — so join us after the jump as we put this theory to the test by looking at ten artists who’ve been very, very bad, then eventually got clean, and evaluate their work before and after the change. The results are… interesting.
In her new book Girl Power: The Nineties Revolution in Music, Marisa Meltzer takes readers on a journey from the moment when Tobi Vail first transfigured the word “girl” to “grrrl” all the way to the current cultural supremacy of all things Miley. As she explains in the preface: “The story of girl power kicks off with riot grrrl, but this isn’t a book just about riot grrrl, or even the nineties. It’s also a book about how everything that happened afterward was just as, if not more, important: how an underground movement trickled up from punk-rock utopias to teen girls’ bedrooms around the world.”
To celebrate its release, we asked Meltzer to provide a list of the most essential female artists from the ’90s — the decade that birthed the girl power revolution. Chime in with your own music heroes in the comments.
, Marisa Meltzer takes readers on a journey from the moment when Tobi Vail first transfigured the word “girl” to “grrrl” all the way to the current cultural supremacy of all things Miley. As she explains in the preface: “The story of girl power kicks off with riot grrrl, but this isn’t a book just about riot grrrl, or even the nineties. It’s also a book about how everything that happened afterward was just as, if not more, important: how an underground movement trickled up from punk-rock utopias to teen girls’ bedrooms around the world.”
