EMINƎM

Marshall Bruce Mathers III (born October 17, 1972), better known by his stage name Eminem (often stylized as EMINƎM) and by his alter ego Slim Shady, is an American rapper, record producer, songwriter and actor. Eminem's popularity brought his group, D12, to mainstream recognition. As well as being a member of D12, Eminem is also one half of the hip hop duo Bad Meets Evil, with Royce da 5'9". Eminem is one of the best-selling artists in the world and is the best selling artist of the 2000s. He has been listed and ranked as one of the greatest artists of all time by many magazines including the Rolling Stone magazine which has ranked him 82nd on its list of The 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. The same magazine has declared him The King of Hip Hop. Including his work with D12 and Bad Meets Evil, Eminem has achieved ten number-one albums on the Billboard 200. He has sold more than 42 million tracks and 41 million albums in the United States, and nearly 90 million albums worldwide.

Eminem quickly gained popularity in 1999 with his major-label debut album, The Slim Shady LP. That first album, The Marshall Mathers LP and his third major album, The Eminem Show, all won Grammy Awards, making Eminem the first artist to win Best Rap Album for three consecutive LPs. The Marshall Mathers LP is also considered one of Eminem's best and most successful albums. Eminem then went on hiatus after touring in 2005. He released his first album since 2004's Encore, titled Relapse, on May 15, 2009. In 2010, Eminem released his seventh studio album Recovery, which was an international success. Recovery was also named the best selling album worldwide of 2010 joining The Eminem Show, which was the best seller of 2002. Eminem won Grammy Awards for both Relapse and Recovery, giving him a total of 13 Grammys in his career. Eminem has named Masta Ace, Big Daddy Kane, Newcleus, the Beastie Boys, Dr. Dre, Tupac Shakur, AZ, Nas, and Ice-T amongst others as his influences.

Eminem has opened other ventures since the beginning of his success. He founded his own record label, Shady Records with his manager Paul Rosenberg. He also has his own radio channel, Shade 45. Eminem began an acting career in 2002, when he starred in the hip hop drama film 8 Mile in which he won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, becoming the first rap artist ever to win the award. He is also set to star in the 2013 films Shady Talez and Have Gun, Will Travel. He has also made cameo appearances in The Wash (2001), Funny People (2009) and television series Entourage.

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

EMINƎM

The Beastie Boys

The Beastie Boys are an American hip hop group from Manhattan/Brooklyn, New York City. Currently consisting of MCs Michael Diamond, known as Mike D (vocals, drums) and Adam Horovitz, known as Ad-Rock (vocals, guitar), with turntablist Mix Master Mike. Founding member Adam Yauch (aka MCA; vocals, bass, double bass) died May 4, 2012.

Formed as a hardcore punk band in 1979 by Yauch and Diamond, with drummer Kate Schellenbach and guitarist John Berry, the band appeared on the compilation cassette New York Thrash, before recording their first EP Polly Wog Stew, in 1982. After achieving moderate local success with the 1983 experimental hip hop 12" Cooky Puss, the group transitioned to hip hop in 1984 and released a string of successful 12" singles. The Beastie Boys toured with Madonna in 1985 and a year later released their debut album Licensed to Ill. The group sold 22 million albums in the United States and 40 million albums worldwide, making them, according to Billboard, "the biggest-selling rap group" since 1991.

The Beastie Boys are one of the longest-lived hip hop acts worldwide and they continue to enjoy commercial and critical success more than 25 years after Licensed to Ill. In 2009, the group released digitally remastered deluxe editions of their albums Paul's Boutique, Check Your Head, Ill Communication and Hello Nasty. Their eighth studio album, Hot Sauce Committee Part Two, was released in 2011, and received positive reviews. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in April 2012, "just the third rap group to enter the Hall, after Run-D.M.C. (2009) and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five (2007)." The following month, MCA died of cancer of the parotid salivary gland.

The Beastie Boys came together in 1979 as a hardcore punk band. The band supported Bad Brains, the Dead Kennedys, the Misfits and Reagan Youth at venues such as CBGB, A7, Trudy Hellers Place and Max's Kansas City, playing at the latter venue on its closing night. In November 1982 the Beastie Boys recorded the 7" EP Polly Wog Stew at 171A studios, an early recorded example of New York hardcore.

On November 13, 1982, the Beastie Boys, consisting of band members John Berry, Michael Diamond (Mike D), Adam Yauch (MCA) (a.k.a. Nathanial Hörnblowér), and Kate Schellenbach (later of Luscious Jackson), played Philip Pucci's birthday for the purposes of his short concert film of the Beastie Boys, Philip Pucci's "Beastie". Pucci held the concert in Bard College's Preston Drama Dance Department Theatre. This performance marked the Beastie Boys’ first on screen appearance in a published motion picture. Pucci's concept for “Beastie” was to distribute a mixture of both a half dozen 16mm Bell and Howell Filmo cameras, and 16mm Bolex cameras to audience members and ask that they capture the Beastie Boys performance from the audience’s own point of view while a master sync sound camera filmed from the balcony of the abandoned theater where the performance was held. The opening band for that performance was “The Young and the Useless”, which featured Adam Horovitz (Ad-Rock) as their lead singer. A one minute clip of "Beastie" was subsequently excerpted and licensed by the Beastie Boys for use in the "Egg Raid on Mojo" segment of the "Skills to Pay the Bills" long form home video released by Capitol Records. “Skills to Pay the Bills” later went on to earn the Recording Industry Association of America’s (R.I.A.A.) gold sales award for selling more than 500,000 copies.

John Berry left the group in 1983 (later forming Thwig, Big Fat Love, and Bourbon Deluxe) and was replaced by Adam Horovitz, guitarist of The Young and the Useless (who had become close friends with the Beastie Boys at this point). The band also recorded and then performed its first hip hop track, "Cooky Puss", based on a prank call by the group to Carvel Ice Cream in 1983. It became a hit in New York underground dance clubs and night clubs upon its release.

Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys

Tulisa Contostavlos

Tula Paulinea "Tulisa" Contostavlos (born 13 July 1988), often known mononymously as Tulisa, is a British singer-songwriter and actress. She is best known for being a member of the now defunct Camden-based hip hop group N-Dubz, with her cousin Dappy and their friend Fazer formed in 2000 and together releasing three studio albums before announcing their hiatus in 2011. Contostavlos is currently a judge on the The X Factor and mentored the "Groups" category in her first year including Little Mix, the first ever group to win the competition to date. Contostavlos will release her debut solo album in the summer of 2012. On 16 March 2012 during a Twitter dispute with her cousin and bandmate Dappy Contostavlos announced that N-Dubz had in fact split up and were not taking a break as stated in 2011.

Contostavlos was born in Camden Town, North London, to an Irish mother, Anne Byrne (who, with her three sisters, was a member of the 1980s band Jeep) and a Greek Cypriot father, Steve Contostavlos (part of Mungo Jerry). When Tulisa was five, her mother, who has bipolar disorder and schizoaffective disorder, was sectioned under the Mental Health Act. Contostavlos' father left the family home when Tulisa was 14 years old. She said that she was brought up in a 3 bedroom house and experienced a lot as a teenager: violence, depression, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, anorexia nervosa, mental health issues, financial difficulties and bullying.

At thirteen she was very emotional. She revealed that she twice tried to kill herself as a teenager and also used to self-harm to try to help her cope with everything she was going through. With support from her uncle, N-Dubz's former manager, Byron Contostavlos, at age 14 she enrolled at Haverstock Secondary School, later attending Quintin Kynaston School in St John's Wood, but she didn't sit her GCSE examinations.

Tulisa Contostavlos

Tulisa Contostavlos

Tulisa Contostavlos

Tulisa Contostavlos

Tulisa Contostavlos

Tulisa Contostavlos

Norah Jones

Norah Jones (born Geethali Norah Jones Shankar; March 30, 1979) is an American singer-songwriter and occasional actress. In 2002, she launched her solo music career with the release of the commercially successful and critically acclaimed album Come Away With Me, which was certified a diamond album in 2002, selling over 20 million copies. The record earned Jones five Grammy Awards, including the Album of the Year, Record of the Year, and Best New Artist. Her subsequent studio albums, Feels Like Home, released in 2004, Not Too Late, released in 2007, the same year she made her film debut in My Blueberry Nights, and her 2009 release The Fall all gained Platinum status after selling over a million copies and were generally well received by critics. Jones' fifth studio album, Little Broken Hearts was released on May 1, 2012.

Jones has won nine Grammy Awards and was Billboard magazine's 60th-best-selling music artist of the 2000–2009 decade. Throughout her career, Jones has won numerous awards and has sold over 40 million albums worldwide. Billboard named her the top Jazz artist of the 2000–2009 decade, establishing herself as one of the best-selling artists of her time.

Born in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York, Jones is the daughter of Indian sitar player Ravi Shankar and American concert producer Sue Jones. She is the half-sister of Grammy nominee Anoushka Shankar. After her parents' separation in 1986, Jones spent her childhood with her mother in the Fort Worth suburb of Grapevine, Texas. She attended Colleyville Middle School and Grapevine High School before transferring to Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas. While in high school, Jones sang in the school choir, participated in band and played the alto saxophone. At the age of sixteen, with her parents' consent, she officially changed her name to Norah Jones.

Jones always had an affinity for the music of Bill Evans and Billie Holiday, among other 'oldies'. She once said, "My mom had this eight-album Billie Holiday set; I picked out one disc that I liked and played that over and over again."

She began singing in church choirs and took piano lessons as a child. She still attends church. She considers herself spiritual and appreciates the rituals of her church but does not consider herself the religious type.

She attended Interlochen Center for the Arts during the summers. While at high school, she won the DownBeat Student Music Awards for Best Jazz Vocalist (twice, in 1996 and 1997) and Best Original Composition (1996).

Jones attended the University of North Texas (UNT), where she majored in jazz piano and sang with the UNT Jazz Singers. During this time, she had a chance meeting with future collaborator Jesse Harris. She gave a ride to a band playing at the university whose members happened to be friends of Harris. He was on a cross-country road-trip with friend and future Little Willies member, Richard Julian, and stopped to see the band play. After meeting Jones, Harris started sending her lead sheets of his songs. In 1999, she left for New York City. Less than a year later, she started a band with Harris, which made her famous.

Norah Jones

Norah Jones

Norah Jones

Norah Jones

Norah Jones

Norah Jones

John Lennon

John Winston Ono Lennon, MBE (9 October 1940 – 8 December 1980) was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founder members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. With Paul McCartney, he formed one of the most celebrated songwriting partnerships of the 20th century.

Born and raised in Liverpool, Lennon became involved as a teenager in the skiffle craze; his first band, The Quarrymen, evolved into The Beatles in 1960. As the group disintegrated towards the end of the decade, Lennon embarked on a solo career that produced the critically acclaimed albums John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Imagine, and iconic songs such as "Give Peace a Chance" and "Imagine". After his marriage to Yoko Ono in 1969, he changed his name to John Ono Lennon. Lennon disengaged himself from the music business in 1975 to devote time to his infant son Sean, but re-emerged in 1980 with a new album, Double Fantasy. He was murdered three weeks after its release.

Lennon revealed a rebellious nature and acerbic wit in his music, writing, drawings, on film, and in interviews. Controversial through his political and peace activism, he moved to New York City in 1971, where his criticism of the Vietnam War resulted in a lengthy attempt by Richard Nixon's administration to deport him, while some of his songs were adopted as anthems by the anti-war movement.

As of 2012 Lennon's solo album sales in the United States exceed 14 million units, and as writer, co-writer or performer, he is responsible for 25 number-one singles on the US Hot 100 chart. In 2002 a BBC poll on the 100 Greatest Britons voted him eighth, and in 2008, Rolling Stone ranked him the fifth-greatest singer of all-time. He was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987 and into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994.

John Ono Lennon

John Winston Ono Lennon, MBE

John Ono Lennon

John Lennon - Imagine

Edward Simon

The New York City Jazz Record just published my review of "Danny Boy," pianist Edward Simon's latest album.

Here's the opening half:

Venezuelan pianist Edward Simon writes on the inside flap of Danny Boy that he had never played Irish music before this recording. He explains that the “simplicity and beauty” of the music “resonated deep within” him. With that in mind, it is a shame that only the first and last pieces - the title track and “She Moved Through The Fair” - are Irish songs, because they are some of the loveliest on the album. 

Simon opens the title track playing, slowly and pensively, with bassist Philip Donkin. Until drummer Stephen Keogh enters eight or so bars in and this becomes a straight-up piano trio album, the song brings to mind Hank Jones and Charlie Haden’s wonderful duo recording of hymns and folk songs, Steal Away. Based on that opening snippet, you get the sense that this could have been a different album - a more focused one.

Read the whole thing here.

The next review I'm writing for the paper will be of "Echoes of Indiana Avenue," a recently unearthed Wes Montgomery record. Haven't received it in the mail yet, but I look forward to listening.

Louis Armstrong, Carnegie Hall, New York, N.Y., ca. Apr. 1947

Over at Business Insider, you'll find a little slide show I put together which showcases the jazz photographs of the great William P. Gottlieb. All 1,600 of his photos are now being featured on Flickr, courtesy of The Library of Congress.

If you haven't done so already, you should check them out. Most of the images that you have in your head of jazz in the late '30s through to the late '40s were probably taken by Gottlieb. As I say in the introduction to the slide show, jazz, and jazz photography, would not be the same without him.

The night before I wrote that introduction, I happened to have started Geoff Dyer's great book, "But Beautiful: A Book About Jazz." In an introductory section to the book, called "A Note on Photographs," Dyer writes, toward the end: "The best jazz photographs are those saturated in the sound of their subject." I loved that quote, even if it's not true.

So much so that I put it into my introduction.

the same friend that suggested the michael vetter LP/7" remind me of the bodin / johnson 'semikolon' LP. to tell you the truth i wasn't a fan of bodin's works. with only but a couple of exceptions his works never attracted me. on the other hand i always liked johnson's works. not perhaps as much as of other text sound artists but a lot.

when i received this 1965 LP recorded of a radio play in the swedish radio i admit i had the shit out of me. not as freaked as someone might believe but it's a gorgeous amazingly structured work that nails you down while listening. ever since i bought it became one of my most beloved and favest text sound classics of my collection. hope it works the same for you!

record infos here (wav upload side per side rip)
LP infos here

semikolon