F

Flavorwire

Tori Amos

Music

Great Albums With Embarrassingly Bad Cover Art [NSFW]

By Tom Hawking on

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Mosquito is officially on the shelves, and our first impressions of the record haven’t changed much: we rather like it. The cover art, though… well, that’s an entirely different matter. We’re sure there’s some reasoning behind adorning the sleeve with a lurid pink giant mosquito sinking its proboscis into the ass of a baby (a baby with green lipstick on, we hasten to add), but until we know what it is, the album is going straight to the top of our list of great albums saddled by awful cover art. Here are some of the… Read More

Music

The Most Hilariously Bizarre Commercials Starring Musicians

By Tom Hawking on

If you’re a brand seeking some measure of credibility with the kidz, the concept of getting a musician to flog your product for you makes perfect sense — the only problem is how you go about doing so without making it look like a crass commercial cash grab that will arouse only contempt in your target audience. This dilemma has led to some pretty bizarre advertisements over the years, some successful, some rather less so. Anyway, in light of the glut of such adverts recently (in the last month or so, there have been recent ads starting Billy Corgan, Wayne Coyne, and Tyler, the Creator) we thought we’d round up some of the weirdest we could find, both past and present. … Read More

Music

The Most Beautiful Song Lyric Tattoos We’ve Ever Seen

By Tom Hawking on

Song lyrics are clearly a popular choice for tattoos, but the vast majority of lyrical quotes are pretty much plain old script tattoos. We have nothing against this, but it’s interesting to see tattoos where lyrics are combined with an artistic flourish, so we’ve gathered some examples of truly beautiful work that we thought we’d share with… Read More

Music

10 of Music’s Weirdest Sources for Samples

By Tom Hawking on

This week sees the release of The Marriage of True Minds, the new album by Matmos, and as much as anything, this means that we’re excited to spend hours on end picking over where on earth all the sounds on the record in question come from. The Baltimore-based duo have long been some of the music world’s foremost exponents of sampling all sorts of weird and wonderful sources for the sounds they use, and in celebration of the arrival of their new record, we thought we’d look at their weirdest moments, along with some other artists who’ve specialized in finding samples in strange places. … 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

Hipster Glasses, Facebook, and a Kiki: A Skeptic's Guide to Pop in 2012

By Rohin Guha on

With only days left until the end of 2012, the Internet is full of best-of essays and lists and embeddable Spotify playlists that reaffirm critics’ and tastemakers’ street credit and perpetuate the myth that most people writing about music actually have any kind of significant impact on the way that pop music is created, packaged, and sold. I won’t bore you with such gas. Instead, here are some fun superlatives that summarize the world of pop this year, for those of you who may not have kept up with this realm. These are undeniable touchstones — meaning that should you, as esteemed people with ears, have scruples with this list, it would behoove you to make an appointment with a qualified audiologist post-haste. Otherwise, read! Click! Dance! … Read More

Pop Culture

What Flavorpill Staffers Are Thankful for This Year

By Flavorwire Staff on

If your family is anything like ours, then the most important part of today’s Thanksgiving meal — you know, aside from totally dominating bingo — will be going around the table and having each person say what they’re the most thankful for. It probably goes without saying that we’re very grateful to have such lovely and engaged readers who choose make Flavorwire part of their daily routine. But beyond that, in the spirit of the holiday we’ve decided to share some of Flavorpill staffers’ “cultural thank-yous” with you. Do us a favor, and keep this list going in the comments — we’d love to know what books, films, albums, TV shows, etc, had the biggest personal impact on you this year! … Read More

Music

20 Brilliant Musicians on Why They Make Music

By Tom Hawking on

Here at Flavorwire, we’re constantly fascinated by the creative process and what drives people to be artists. In the past, we’ve looked into musicians discussing their songwriting process, and we’re similarly interested in what drives people to start creating in the first place. We’ve delved around and come up with a selection of quotes from our favorite musicians about how they got started on music, why it is they do what they do, and/or what they’re hoping to achieve with the creation of their art. The results are both revealing and fascinating.… Read More

Music

Tori Amos Live at (le) Poisson Rouge: 20 Years of ‘Little Earthquakes’

By Russ Marshalek on

In 1992, singer/songwriter/pianist/force-of-nature Tori Amos released her debut album, Little Earthquakes, and began a slow subversion of music and mind. I’ll take a second and note that, yes, I’m aware this wasn’t her actual debut record, but if we get into discussing Y Kant Tori Read I’m quite certain the bounce rate on this post will skyrocket.

At the time, it felt like a moment. In retrospect, it feels like a movement. To paraphrase David Byrne’s awkward-as-hell introduction of Amos on the ill-fated live music television show Sessions at West 54th, while her contemporaries were strapping on the loudest guitars, she hauled out a giant piano. It’s easy, in today’s musical landscape, to miss exactly how revolutionary this is. Certainly Amos wasn’t the first woman to ever sit at a piano, sing, and have that song played on the radio. At the time Little Earthquakes was released into the world, the radio was filled to the brim with angry-at-best, disaffected-at-worst flannel-clad shaggy dudes. This isn’t to say there weren’t women making noise, but to be taken seriously as “important” you needed to be a Bratmobile or a Bikini Kill, with an outspoken political agenda as loud as your guitar (or, yes, yes, Kate Bush. I see you there, anonymous commenter). … Read More

Music

The 15 Albums You Need to Hear in October

By Tom Hawking on

After a bumper month in September, the good news is that there’s a heap more good albums due in October — especially tomorrow, which is shaping up as one of the busiest/best release dates of the year. Hurrah! As we do every month, we’ve devoted ourselves to poring over the release schedule and separating the proverbial wheat from the chaff and all such things. There’s also a roundup of everything else that’s out, encompassing the good, the bad, and the Barbra Streisand. What are you looking forward to hearing this month,… Read More