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Pop Rock Nation

Category: News

music-news-from-breakups-to-the-lastest-buzz

  • New Music In Stores & Online 9/30/08: Robin Thicke, Ben Folds, T.I. & More!

    Talk about ending with a bang. This last day of September 2008 (which, if I’m not mistaken, is also the last day for Grammy eligibility for next year’s ceremony) brings out some big guns (I just realized I made a bunch of firearm references in a column that strongly features an artist who just got sentenced to jail for firearms possession… I swear it was unintentional). Nevertheless, there’s something for just about everyone in stores this week. Here’s what you have to look forward to :

    Robin Thicke “Something Else” : You know, a lot of folks like to say “I loved (name artist) when no one else liked them”. Robin Thicke is one of those artists I can say that about. The blue-eyed soul singer broke through two years back with his second album, “The Evolution of Robin Thicke”. Although he had to tone down his sound a little bit to get a hit, it was a pretty solid album. His third album, “Something Else” hits stores today and promises yet another collection of uptempo soul thumpers (like the first single “Magic”) and romantic ballads. Not bad for the son of Jason Seaver.

    Robin Thicke's "Something Else" hits stores today.

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  • FORTY-FIVE REVOLUTIONS PER MINUTE #5: Sex Duplex

    SNAKEFINGER  “The Spot” b/w “Smelly Tongues” (Ralph Records RR7805, 1978)

    “BUY OR DIE!!” screamed the 16th-of-a-page, black & white ad from the back pages of my beloved new issue of Crawdaddy.  Or was it Creem?  Circus?  Trouser Press!  Well who knows…time wipes that stuff out of your memory.  I do remember, after devouring a 3-page Burroughs interview, clipping the little coupon and sending a crisp dollar bill to Ralph Records in San Francisco.  For what exactly, I didn’t know.  But it arrived a few weeks later in a thick cardboard sleeve:  Buy Or Die #1 was Ralph’s first 4-song sampler, and it was pants-shittingly good.  But that’s a story for another time, when I grab it randomly from the big red cabinet.  In the meantime…

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  • Infatueighties: #84: “Emotional Rescue”

    The cover of The Rolling Stones' "Emotional Rescue" 45.
    The cover of The Rolling Stones

    “Tonight and every night…I will be your knight in shining armor…coming to your emotional rescue…”

    The fact that Mick Jagger intoned these words in a drawl that made him sound like Lurch from “The Addams Family” notwithstanding, “Emotional Rescue” is a slinky, sexy, funky jam that, to me anyway, was one of the Rolling Stones’ last excellent musical moments. Only “Start Me Up”, “Waiting on a Friend” and the majestic “Out of Tears” have come close since.

    Yeah, the song is more or less a shameless ripoff of 1978’s “Miss You”, but a) it’s not like the Stones haven’t been ripping their catalog off for the past 30 years anyway and b) if they’re gonna rip a song off, at least it’s one of their five best all time songs. Jagger’s falsetto here is killer.

    In a Falsettometer column, I showed the Thermo-Vision version (say that 5 times fast) of the video. Here is the “normal” (or at least the less Thermo-visioned) version. It’s much easier on the eyes. It’s also a HELL of a lot shorter. They cut out an entire verse. Oh well. Enjoy.