web analytics

Pop Rock Nation

Blog

  • First Look – Eminem’s Not Afraid

    It looks like Eminem may be back. At least let’s hope so.

    A couple weeks ago, Eminem’s “comeback” single hit iTunes and had people saying, “Eminem is back.” I’m not sure how many times you can go the comeback route, especially after the entire theme of his last album Relapse was that he had his life together again.

    But there was something odd about that album. And the oddness wasn’t even that it was terrible. It seemed really forced, as if he didn’t want to record it but had to in order to make his label happy or something like that.

    I told anyone who’d listen how bad that album was so that they wouldn’t make the same mistake that I did and purchase it. It wasn’t really Eminem. It was him on auto-pilot.

    But the Eminem heads out there claimed that it was greatness. I think Entertainment Weekly gave it an A. But listen to Not Afraid. Marshall Mathers himself says that his last album wasn’t good. It wasn’t him.

    The real question is: Do you believe him?

    Check out the new video and decide for yourself.

  • First Listen – Kanye West’s Power

    Kanye West
    I was in Las Vegas over the weekend and right when I touched down, my twitter feed was a buzz (a tweet?) with blasts that Kanye West’s new song Power was fire. The comments were all similar and talked about how Kanye was back.

    My first thought was that I liked his segue into heartbreak pop, 808s & Heartbreak. While I thought the album was a bit inconsistent, it was also courageous, honest, and real. The dude’s heart was broken and he was expressing himself.

    I do look forward to the Kanye we saw on his first three near classic albums. But I also hope that he continues to be creative and different.

    My main man Big Money Mike hipped me to the song earlier today and I do have to say that it’s pure Kanye and tells me that Good Ass Job is going to be everything we expect and more.

    The background chants in the early mixes I heard overwhelmed his voice, but this new mixed version evens it out.

    Check out NahRight for the latest version of the song which hits iTunes next week.

    Photo of Kanye West shared via Wikipedia via the GNU Free Documentation License

  • Gaga Says She May Have Opened For Michael

    Lady Gaga says she was asked to open for Michael Jackson on the singer’s 50 date London concert series.  Speaking with CNN’s Larry King, Gaga looked beautiful, sounded charming and probably won over more middle America fans than if she had played a shopping mall while scarfing a smoothie.

    “I guess I can speak about it now,” Gaga told King. Later she told King there was talk about different opening acts doing duets with Michael.

    The singer also said that some of her fascination with death and other macabre images comes in part from watching iconic performers like Jackson be “destroyed” internally or “by the media”.

    The comparisons to Madonna are inevitable, but Gaga is accomplishing what Madge did at a much younger age.  She is in that magic zone of age–still only 24–and seems to handle all audiences well.   Theatrical and witty, she has charmed Queen Elizabeth and Larry King, two paragons of established oldsters, while retaining incredible popularity and credibility in music circles.

    Just 22 when The Fame was released, she mixes musical and marketing skills like few ever have.   There’s every reason to believe that Gaga could still be a relevant entertainer in 2040 or even 2050.

    How’s that for today’s deep thought as you ponder what a Gaga / MJ duet would have sounded like?