All posts by msmith

Fans Brought Their Own Pyro — And A Lot Of It — To System Of A Down’s South American Shows

I don’t have any firsthand experience organizing pyrotechnics for big stadium shows, but I know enough to know that you’ve gotta be careful with those. Maybe that’s why System Of A Down didn’t bring any of their own pyro on their recent South American tour, which wrapped up in Sao Paolo last week. But their fans are going viral online now for doing the exact opposite, bringing fire and explosives aplenty themselves.

Divisive Metal-ish Band Sleep Token Score First #1 Album With Even In Arcadia

Andy Ford

If you’re lucky enough to have never heard a Sleep Token song before, allow me to give you some context: They’re an anonymous British band who, by blending unexceptional metalcore with lots of nauseating soulful-white-boy vibrato, have become one of the most popular and defining heavy bands of the 2020s. They just put out their fourth full-length offering — that’s what they call their own records! — titled Even In Arcadia, and regular Stereogum contributor Eli Enis wrote such a scathing pan of it that I had to listen for myself just to see if it was really that bad. Eli’s right. It’s really that bad. And yet, Even In Arcadia is currently the #1 album in America.

Watch Dua Lipa Cover Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky” In Lyon

Madison Phipps

On her ongoing Radical Optimism world tour, Dua Lipa’s been doing a fun little thing where she covers a surprise song by an artist native to the country she’s performing in. It started in Australia with covers of  AC/DCNatalie Imbruglia, Kylie Minogue, and INXS, before paying homage to Lorde and Crowded House in New Zealand and flexing her Spanish in Spain. Now she’s in France, and in Lyon Friday night, she did a faithful rendition of Daft Punk’s 2013 smash “Get Lucky.” She honestly sounds great singing Pharrell’s part, and it reminds me just how natural it feels when she does the whole disco-house thing. Watch her cover below.

Soundgarden Members Tease Unreleased Album On Eighth Anniversary Of Chris Cornell’s Death

Rick Diamond

Eight years ago today Chris Cornell died at 52 following a Soundgarden show in Detroit. Since then, the band’s surviving members — who reunited in Seattle not too long ago — have been involved in some legal disputes with the frontman’s widow Vicky Cornell, including issues with unpaid royalties and the rights to some unfinished songs. But the two parties have been reconciling some of those issues recently, and now it looks like we might get to hear some of that unfinished music sometime soon.

Watch MJ Lenderman & Friendship’s Dan Wriggins Cover Bruce Springsteen Amid The Boss’ Campaign Against Donald Trump

Bruce Springsteen is currently on tour across the pond right now, and he kicked off his run of UK dates by doubling-down on his distain for his home country’s current administration. “My home, the America I love, the America I’ve written about, that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent, and treasonous administration,” the Boss told his Manchester crowd. Once word traveled back to the US, Donald Trump took to his Truth Social site to call Springsteen a “dried out prune of a rocker” whose “skin is all atrophied,” which might be one of the most hilariously hypocritical claims ever emitted from the rotten trash chute that is his mouth. Anyway, Trump’s latest hissy fit has already made for good press for Springsteen, and MJ Lenderman tipped his hat Saturday night with a cover of “Darkness On The Edge Of Town” at his Philadelphia show.