photos by Andrew St. Clair

Raekwon shows potential groupies his current relationship status

What kind of oldies concert draws a huge audience in its 20s? Rock the Bells, the daylong hip-hop festival that came to Governors Island on Saturday. This year's Rock the Bells borrowed an idea from the indie-rock festival All Tomorrow's Parties, booking groups to perform watershed albums in their entirety.

Two headliners, Snoop Dogg and Wu-Tang Clan, largely complied with the assignment. Snoop Dogg brought along most of the guests from his 1993 album, "Doggystyle," made back when he was Snoop Doggy Dogg. The others - A Tribe Called Quest, KRS-One, Rakim and Slick Rick - went "veering off," as Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest put it, to play additional hits (which no one minded) or to plug more recent projects.

And then there was the wild card: Lauryn Hill, the singer and rapper formerly of the Fugees, appearing half an hour late. She hasn't released a studio album since "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill" in 1998, and she has recorded and toured only sporadically since then while raising five children. "I miss you," she told the crowd repeatedly. Partway through the set she pulled guests out of the V.I.P. section and onstage: Mary J. Blige, Alicia Keys, Jay-Z, Beyoncé, John Legend. They missed her too.
-[New York Times]

Continue reading "Rock the Bells @ Governors Island - pics (part 2) (Wu-Tang, Street Sweeper Social Club, Yelawolf, Slick Rick & more) "

Memorial Day Weekend officially opened the summer, and for those in the Pacific Northwest it also brought Sasquatch Music Festival (pictures from all three days are coming soon). Now the lineup for its Labor Day cousin, Bumbershoot 2010, has been announced. That fest, happening at Seattle, WA's Seattle Center September 4th-6th, will include headliners Bob Dylan, Mary J. Blige, Weezer, Hole, Rise Against, Neko Case, The Decemberists, J. Cole and "one more very special guest to be announced soon."

Tickets (including non-Mainstage 'economy' passes) are on sale now. The rest of the lineup (by day) for the seven-stage festival is posted below...

Continue reading "Bumbershoot 2010 lineup (Bob Dylan... Hole... Mary J Blige)"

Lilith Fair, which has been dormant since 1999, will reform this year for a North American tour this summer. Exact dates and venues are forthcoming, but the ongoing list of confirmed acts is impressive (though they won't all play every city). The lineup currently includes Beth Orton, Cat Power, Emmylou Harris, Erykah Badu, the Gossip, Grace Potter and The Nocturnals, Heart, Indigo Girls, Janelle Monae, Ke$ha, La Roux, Lights, Loretta Lynn, Mary J. Blige, Metric, Miranda Lambert, Norah Jones, Rosie Thomas, Sarah McLachlan, Serena Ryder, Sheryl Crow, Tara MacLean, Tegan and Sara.

New York City is one of the tour's confirmed stops. The rest of those and the fest's so-far lineup are below...

Continue reading "Lilith Fair 2010 (Cat Power, Norah Jones, Tegan & Sara, Janelle Monae, Metric, Grace Potter, Gossip, Erykah Badu, Beth Orton, Sia, many more)"

AC/DC @ The Izod Center (more by Ryan Muir)

If anyone had any doubt that touring is where the money is in the music business, a quick look at the top Moneymakers for 2008 should hammer the point home.

Regardless of genre, retail sales or radio play, each of the 20 acts on Billboard's Moneymakers list toured in 2008. (Taylor Swift mostly opened for Brad Paisley but doesn't get credit for that revenue). For almost all of them, touring generated the most revenue. And in a year when recorded-music sales declined yet again, many earned more at the box office than ever before. [Billboard]

Continue reading "the list of musicians who made the most money in 2008"

An Evening with Jay-Z, January 19, 2009 8PM (kepkanation)

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- With George W. Bush all packed up and out of the White House, and Barack Obama ready to move in, hip-hop has never felt more patriotic. And the huge theme for Obama's inauguration weekend has been Young Jeezy's "My President." On Monday night, in the town nicknamed "Chocolate City," Jay-Z drove his audience wild with his new verse for the song's remix.

The show at the Warner Theatre was billed as the "Concert on the Eve of Change," but the crowd welcomed a very familiar Hov game-plan: knock 'em with his own hits and those of his big-name guests.

After "Brooklyn Go Hard," Jay informed D.C. that he was ready for a long night." [MTV]

The Beastie Boys also played a show in the same town on Monday night.

Jim Jones recently turned himself in to the NYPD after he fought with a friend of Jay-Z.

A snippet of video from the Jay-Z show below...

Continue reading "Jay-Z helped welcome Obama last night @ Warner Theater"

On a stage outside a North Philadelphia theater where some of the greatest R&B artists once performed, Jay-Z and other members of the hip-hop elite exhorted 10,000 young people yesterday to become part of history by voting for Sen. Barack Obama.

A throng of energized young people, many of them Temple University students, gathered in front of the historic Uptown Theater on Broad Street about 1 p.m. to hear rappers Jay-Z and Sean "Diddy" Combs and singer Mary J. Blige urge them to cast ballots for the senator from Illinois.

"I need y'all to be really, really quiet for this. I need you to really understand what I'm telling you," Jay-Z said. "Rosa Parks sat so Martin Luther King could walk. Martin Luther King walked so Obama could run. Obama's running so we all can fly." [Philadelphia Inquirer]

Beyonce and Russell Simmons were at yesterday's event too. More pictures at Barack Obama's Flickr account.

In semi-related news, Jay-Z's successor at Def Jam commited suicide over the weekend.

The 7th Annual Jammy Awards are happening tonight (May 7) at the The WaMu Theater at Madison Square Garden (jam bands + grammys = jammys), and some people seem to think Phish are going to reunite and play since they're being honored at the shindig. Even more interesting should be the scene outside the venue as Phish fans make their way to the theater while Jay-Z and Mary J Blige fans find their way into the much larger venue in the same building.

And with all of that going on under one roof, I guess anything could happen.....

Continue reading "Phish & Jay-Z will meet again (sort of/maybe) @ MSG tonight"

Kanye West & Jay-Z backstage, March 22, 2008 (Rolling Stone)

tonight in NYC & NJ
* Nick Lowe @ Maxwell's
* Robyn @ Grand Ballroom (where Nick Lowe played last)
* RJD2 @ Bowery Ballroom
* Chris Rock @ theater @ MSG
* Tribeca Film Festival day shows
* Tragedy is @ Knitting Factory
* The Muggabears @ Cake Shop (later)
* Nellie McKay @ Rubin Museum of Art
* Scout Niblett & Holy Sons @ Europa
* Ministry & Meshhuggah @ Irving Plaza
* Stars of the Lid @ Wordless Music Series
* Dufus CD release show @ Cake Shop (free)
* Mary J Blige & Jay-Z @ Madison Square Garden
* The Hold Steady & the Virgins @ Webster Hall
* Brazilian Girls and NOT Spank Rock at Studio B
* Dragons of Zynth @ the Bronx Museum of the Arts
* Awesome Color, Tall Firs & Knyfe Hytes @ Glasslands
* Vivian Girls, Abe Vigoda, Fiasco and Woods @ Silent Barn

We're giving away tickets to Monday's Rock n ROFL. Rock n ROFL is sponsored in part by The Sound of Young America.

Jay-Z and Mary J Blige recently appeared on Letterman together. Two videos from that below...

What else?

Continue reading "What's going on Friday?"

Tickets for the three previously-sold-out Jay-Z/Mary J Blige shows at MSG will be back on sale Saturday at 10am.

One (sold out), two (sold out), three... Jay Z & Mary J Blige - May 2nd @ MSG, tickets ($199.75, $129.75, $99.75 & $69.75) on sale March 7th at 10 am.

Kanye West is still only playing one.

"An in depth look at the very disturbing truth behind some of mainstream music's most 'popular' celebrities and their occult practices" below....

Continue reading "Jay-Z & Mary J, a 3rd NYC show at MSG, Kanye, the occult"

Continue reading "Jay-Z & Mary J Blige add 2nd NYC show @ MSG"

The Ace of Spades was free-flowing as Jay-Z, Lebron James, and Jason Kidd packed the VIP section of New Orleans hot-spot Generation Hall Saturday night for a star-studded party. The night started off with an exclusive dinner where A-Listers like Gabrielle Union, Beyonce, Brandon Jacobs and Mark Cuban all attended. [Complex]

Continue reading "Jay-Z & Mary J Blige add NYC show, Tour, presale"

Mary J. Blige and JAY-Z announced today that they will embark on a historic 25-date North American co-headlining tour. The "Mary J. Blige & JAY-Z: Heart of the City" tour marks the first time in more than 15 years that an African American male/female bill of this stature have co-headlined a national concert tour.

Continue reading "Jay-Z & Mary J Blige - initial 2008 Tour Dates"

Cat Power live on WNYC

I mentioned seven posts ago about how Thao Nguyen ran into Cat Power at a radio station, and then in the last post I posted Thao's radio broadcast, and now here's Cat Power's. Cat Power (Chan Marshall) was also recently seen watching Radiohead with Feist and Mary J Blige.....

Continue reading "Cat Power on WNYC & enjoying Radiohead on Jools Holland"