Jay Electronica made a surprise appearance today at Made in America, the music festival curated by his Roc Nation boss, Jay-Z. Below, you can watch footage of Electronica performing 'Exhibit A' and 'Exhibit C'.
During the set, Electronica explained that he wasn't planning to perform live prior to the release of his debut album, but couldn't turn down an invitation from Jay-Z or the chance to take the stage in Philadelphia, where he lived for years.
The inaugural Made in America music festival will webcast a number of this weekend's performances, including festival curator Jay-Z, Run-DMC, D'Angelo, Janelle Monáe, Miike Snow, Passion Pit, the Rick Ross-led Maybach Music Group, Odd Future, Santigold, DJ Shadow, Gary Clark Jr. and Dirty Projectors.
You can watch live on YouTube, and listen live on Pandora.
Saturday, September 1st:
02:00 ' Gary Clark Jr.
02:45 ' Prince Royce
03:30 ' Maybach Music Group
04: 15 ' Janelle Monáe
05:00 ' D'Angelo
05:45 ' TBD
06:15 ' Passion Pit
07:00 ' Dirty Projectors
07:45 ' Miike Snow
09:30 ' Jay-Z
* = EST
Jay Electronica wasn't the only surprise performance at the Jay-Z-curated Made in America festival. Kanye West and members of his G.O.O.D. Music label (Common, Big Sean, Pusha T) appeared during Jay-Z's headlining set on Saturday night, and performed tracks from their upcoming group album, including 'I Don't Like' remix, 'New God Flow' and 'Mercy', along with Kanye solo cuts 'Can't Tell Me Nothing' and 'Cold' and the Watch the Throne smash hit 'Niggas in Paris'. Watch footage ripped from the webcast below.
The G.O.O.D. Music group album is due to arrive on September 18th.
G.O.O.D. Music Setlist:
I Don't Like remix
Cant Tell Me Nothing
New God Flow
Cold
Ass
The Light
Mercy
Niggas in Paris
Consequence of Sound is proud to announce that it will serve as the new home of Rock It Out! Blog beginning Tuesday, September 4th.
Founded by former Fuse TV and Sirius Satellite Radio personality Sami Jarroush in 2008, the Rock It Out! Blog has emerged as one of the most watched and respected video blogs on the Internet. With nearly 50,000 subscribers tuning in each day, Sami reports on the latest rock music news headlines, introduces viewers to new and unsigned bands, and poses rock music queries of the day for viewers to debate. He's also interviewed a wide array of bands and artists, from The Kills' Alison Mosshart to Reggie Watts to Slipknot's Corey Taylor.
New Rock it Out! Blog episodes will be published daily on a brand new section of Consequence of Sound (see the preview below.) In addition, Sami has been made the Video Director of Consequence of Sound, and will be working to create new and original programming.
Make sure to follow Rock It Out! Blog on Twitter and Facebook, and subscribe to its YouTube channel.
Watch Sami discuss the partnership below:
The biggest differences between Centipede Hz and the band's earlier albums lie in tone. This is a band that can draw from gurgling synths and raga rhythms, from obscure Eastern European folk, Latin American psychedelic rock, and from packets of jam served with an airplane breakfast; which is to say, their tonal shifts are vast. While many of Merriweather's most successful songs felt festive to the point of indulgence, the successive, building layers on tracks like Centipede's celestial, Beach Boys-y 'Rosie Oh' seem to push deeper inward, much like Avey Tare's Down There. Their latest album may not be quite as viscerally dark as that record's production (the haunted house bridge on 'Mercury Man' hits closest), but Tare's solo claustrophobic musings still seem to be just as intrinsic, especially since Tare takes a large slice of the vocal spotlight. He doesn't bark as hard as he has in the past, but he still noticeably leaves Panda Bear's gliding, easily digestible moans on the sidelines.
Centipede Hz is upfront about its intentions of difficulty, announcing them with a tone equal parts self-aware and challenging. A mechanized voice opens the album' 'This is the new centipede FM'' followed by bursts of gritty, rhythmic noise. The song that unfolds, 'Moonjock', establishes the ensuing futuristic textures and reflective lyrical themes. Tare's discussion of road trips with his family is exactly the kind of bleary nostalgia for childhood ease that buoyed the band's early material. However, while tracks like Campfire Songs' blissfully eerie 'Doggy' left space for wonder, here synthetic wobbles bounce insistently and distractingly from ear to ear, pushing into discomforting territory.
The bigger hooks on Centipede Hz similarly distinguish themselves with crowded propulsion. The stuttering of the word 'let' in 'Today's Supernatural' is a fluorescent ear-worm backed by twisted versions of Tare's own voice and hand-pumped, organ-like warbles, building to an explosion that decimates everything. On songs like 'My Girls' or 'Derek' from Strawberry Jam, the joys of family and new growth seem to lie at the forefront of the songwriting process, leading to the overwhelming positivity that many felt from Merriweather. Then Tare's life took a dark turn, and it showed on the intensely personal Down There. Centipede, then, attempts to fight past that bleakness, finding a grayer area tinged with interior uncertainty. 'Monkey Riches' perfectly captures that questioning tone: Tare wonders aloud 'how I even wrote this song' as tides of concussive, rhythmic electronics pour over him. He's singing about existential uncertainty so smoothly that the cluttered instrumentation does as much insisting as the question itself.
This blend of musical hyperactivity and worried vocals continues, luring the listener into the album's anxious incertitude. The chilly, amorphous 'New Town Burnout' haunts in its squeak-bloop electronics and blurred backing vocals, Panda Bear's words fading into minor key echoes as the song closes.'Wide Eyed' marks Deakin's debut as a lead vocalist on a proper Animal Collective album, and he sounds similarly comfortable in both the darkness of life and his attempts at getting past it. 'I'm still finding what's sure/ And not getting lost in my mind/ I know I can try,' he croons over heavy bongos, washing away in its repetition before finding an answer, a common trope on Centipede Hz.
It's possible that some will have issues with the lack of a crossover mega-hit on Centipede Hz ' especially after the last album was soaked in that potential ' but that comes from an unfair place. Merriweather merits tons of 'modern masterpiece' discussion, but it's hard to believe that the band felt then (or feel today) that it's anything but the moment they had to make in that specific moment in their lives. And that's precisely how this album feels: another personal moment, another link in a chain leading into an as yet unclear ether. This link happens to be a little less certain, a little darker, but connected to all of the ones before it, and leading ever forward.
Essential Tracks: 'Monkey Riches', 'Wide Eyed', and 'Today's Supernatural'
Feature artwork by Steven Fiche:
546 days, 78 weeks, and 5.8 million albums sold later, Adele's 21 failed to make the top 10 of the Billboard charts for the first time since the album debuted at #1 in early March 2011, according to Billboard (via MTV). The album fell to #12 in this week's charts, putting an end to Adele's record-breaking streak of most weeks in the top 10 by a female artist. Only Bruce Springsteen's Born in the U.S.A. (84 weeks) and The Sound of Music soundtrack (109 weeks) spent a longer time in the top 10.
Below, you can watch the video for 'Rolling in the Deep' from 21.
On site at the United Center, Prince and Rebuild the Dream will offer opportunities to learn about, support, and take part in rebuilding vibrant and sustainable communities. Socially-conscious businesses, tech start-ups, entrepreneurs, and other innovators will offer specific tools that individuals and communities can use to improve their economic situation in the short- as well as long-term.'
