INTERVIEWS
Giveon Is Ready to Wake You Up
It’s release week for Giveon, and just as he jokes, things feel theatrical. As he sits in a director’s chair on Zoom like a movie star, he’s surrounded by white flowers and an enormous cardboard image of his album cover for Give or Take. “It’s feeling like a film rollout,” he laughs. His observation is fitting. While his debut–released on June 24– isn’t going to earn Giveon any IMDB credits, the baritone-voiced ballad-churner’s first full-length project has all the ingredients of a music blockbuster. The anticipation, for one, is there. Fans have been waiting for a Giveon record since he was introduced to the world with his feature on Drake’s “Chicago Freestyle” in 2020, as he released his first two EPs Take Time and When It’s All Said and Done. There’s a concept there, too, he says. The a...
Regina Spektor Is On Her Own Hero’s Journey
Regina Spektor still waits for inspiration to strike. The singer-songwriter, who is about to release her first album in more than half a decade, explains that she isn’t the sort of person who sits herself down at the piano when she doesn’t feel like she has something to say. She’s often struck by peers and friends who have developed different types of discipline, people who craft songs with the skill of someone assembling furniture, but her process has always been much more organic. “It’s like somebody screaming at a fish pond for 10 minutes and then like putting in their their fishing rod,” she tells Consequence of trying to force herself to write. “Where are all the fish? Well, maybe you shouldn’t have brought a megaphone to this.” Home, before and after, the name of Spektor’s eight...
A Deep Conversation With Jeff Bridges
On the other end of the phone, I heard the gravel-toned voice belonging to 72-year-old beloved, legendary actor, musician, and philanthropist Jeff Bridges. All it took was his “Good morning!” to conjure the image of him behind the wheel of a well-worn country pick-up truck, waving, as he ambles up my make-believe driveway toward my sprawling, somewhere-out-West front porch. The truck bed, loaded with bushels of peaches. Or explosives. Or both. Bridges has been through the ringer the last two years. In October 2020, he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and then, after successful chemotherapy treatments, spent five weeks in the intensive care unit after a near-death bout with COVID-19. He eventually recovered and returned to work. He’s currently playing Dan Chase, an ex-CIA officer o...
How Only Murders in the Building’s Music Supervisors Perfected the Needle Drop
It’s hard to think of an element of filmmaking that is as simultaneously critical and hidden as music. It is the unassuming link that binds a film together from moment to moment; it is the final piece of the puzzle that makes the whole experience that much more cohesive; more emotional; more impactful. So what is the key to curating the perfect soundtrack or score? Patience? Determination? For music supervising power-duo Bruce Gilbert and Lauren Mikus, the secret to success is enjoying the work, and having the most fun as possible. In fact, Mikus describes the perfect project as, simply: “a fun conversation,” and the approach seems to work for them: The two have overseen, both individually and as a team, music featured in an impressive catalog of films and TV shows, including, but certainl...
Coheed and Cambria’s Claudio Sanchez on Channeling The Weeknd, Getting His ‘Broadway On’
At one point during my Zoom call with Coheed and Cambria’s Claudio Sanchez, I fumble my words so heavily that our conversation grinds to a halt. Not because of awkwardness. The Coheed and Cambria mastermind remains one of the world’s most reliably affable rock stars: smiling widely, entertaining my nerdy questions about his synth-stacked home studio, punctuating every other sentence with a stoner-friendly laugh. The real reason I’m flummoxed: Even after listening to this band’s music for two decades, I have literally no idea what sub-genre shorthand to use during a question. (“Prog-metal-emo-power-pop” doesn’t exactly leap off the tongue.) Even crazier, the band’s upcoming 10th LP, Vaxis — Act II: A Window of the Waking Mind, expands beyond even that broad description, flirting more o...
Hazel English and Day Wave on The Perks of Collaborating With Your Friends
Both Hazel English and Day Wave have had a busy couple of weeks. Last Friday (June 17th), Hazel English released a new EP, the dreamy and nostalgic Summer Nights, and this Friday (June 24th), Day Wave will release his first album in five years, Pastlife. However, the pair of releases come at a very different point in each artist’s career — whereas Day Wave (the project of Oakland musician Jackson Phillips) has been a major proponent of the dreamy bedroom pop that is unavoidable on TikTok these days, Phillips has been very deliberate about taking these five years to hone his sound and arrive with a fully-formed sophomore LP. Meanwhile, Hazel English — the project of Australia-to-California musician Eleisha Caripis — has been hard at work over the last couple years, releasing her brilli...
The Kills Are Ready to Roar
At the old Mayan Theatre in downtown Los Angeles, fans are wound up for a smoldering night of jagged, turbocharged punk and deep blues. The Kills have come to reignite the present and reflect on their past amid the room’s angular, pre-Columbian temple decor and packed dance floor. At stage left is singer Alison Mosshart, with a mane of startling platinum, wailing to the riffs of “Murdermile,” a bleak tune from 2005. She grabs her mic stand and snaps her head forward and back, convulsing to the raw bursts of guitar from her creative soulmate, Jamie Hince, now blasting through his amplifiers. Together, Mosshart and Hince pause between riffs to growl and purr, “It’s a train wreck/You got me on the wrong track, honey.” This is only their third night back in the spotlight since 2019, part of a ...
How Terry Grant Thrives Being an Actual One-Man Band
Some forms of self-expression are inherently collaborative, and others are clearly a solo effort. How many photographs or paintings were made by more than one person? But music is usually, to a greater or lesser degree, a team effort. Even artists who compose and arrange alone usually then work with a producer and engineer, or bring in studio musicians to flesh out their ideas. But not Terry Grant, known as More Ghost Than Man. That name, unsurprisingly, says Grant, comes from a lingering sense of alienation. “I suppose I’ve always felt a bit out of place in most situations. Like I’m there but I don’t belong, and if I just stand still long enough, everyone will forget that I’m even there. The name came from that feeling. Plus, I thought it sounded cool. I should probably talk to someone,” ...
How Terry Grant Thrives Being an Actual One-Man Band
Some forms of self-expression are inherently collaborative, and others are clearly a solo effort. How many photographs or paintings were made by more than one person? But music is usually, to a greater or lesser degree, a team effort. Even artists who compose and arrange alone usually then work with a producer and engineer, or bring in studio musicians to flesh out their ideas. But not Terry Grant, known as More Ghost Than Man. That name, unsurprisingly, says Grant, comes from a lingering sense of alienation. “I suppose I’ve always felt a bit out of place in most situations. Like I’m there but I don’t belong, and if I just stand still long enough, everyone will forget that I’m even there. The name came from that feeling. Plus, I thought it sounded cool. I should probably talk to someone,” ...
Foals Preview 2022 Mad Cool Festival Set: “It’s a Great Vibe Playing in Spain”
Listen via Spotify | Google Podcasts | Radio Public | RSS Mad Cool Festival goes down from July 6th to 10th in Madrid, Spain, and the lineup is truly stacked: amidst headliners like Metallica, Jack White, Muse, Florence + The Machine, The Killers, alt-J, and more, Mad Cool will host major performances from Glass Animals, The War On Drugs, CHVRCHES, Two Door Cinema Club, Carly Rae Jepsen, Deftones, Modest Mouse, and many others. Related Video Set to grace the stage on Thursday, July 7th are British rock trio Foals, who also celebrating the release of their excellent seventh album, Life Is Yours, today (June 17th). The band’s new album is destined for a late-night dance party — perfect for a music festival; it will fit Mad Cool’s unforgettable atmosphere well. Foals ...
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Inspired by Dance Music Greats, Maurya Sevak Aims to Make His Own Impact [Q&A]
Inspired by some of the electronic music greats, Maurya Sevak is on a mission to make his own impact on the genre. Hailing from Toronto, the surging DJ and dance music producer recently released his latest single, “Horizon.” Blending progressive house with elements of trance, the electrifying track emanates from Sevak’s love of music by artists like David Guetta and Armin van Buuren. He says he was “utterly mesmerized” by those dance music pathfinders—specifically their performances at the iconic Tomorrowland festival in Belgium. And with their music serving as a catalyst, the young beatsmith is working diligently to carve his own sound. We caught up with Sevak to discuss his direction, favorite music production tools and more. EDM.com: Tell us about...
Inside the Origins of “EDM” With the Man Who Coined the Term—And Transformed It Into a Global Movement
It was a Tuesday night in London when Richard James Burgess found himself on the doorstep of Blitz for the very first time. He was dressed in ripped jeans and a t-shirt, surrounded by people with “amazing clothes and amazing hair.” Unbeknownst to Burgess at the time, that door was, in reality, a gateway that would ultimately lead him to coin the term “electronic dance music” in 1980. It landed him at the forefront of a sonic revolution—one marked by experimentation and a desire to “electrify” the acoustic instruments of the heyday. And it all started out with a drum set and a dream. Richard James Burgess is now the President and CEO of The American Association of Independent Music. c/o American Association of Independent Music Born in London and raised in New Zealand, Burgess was drawn to ...
