Music Features

“It was another day at the office,” Ken Mansfield says, recalling the Beatles‘ impromptu rooftop concert in January 1969. There’s not even a hint of sarcasm in his voice. The group staged the gig atop Apple Records’ London office at 3 Savile Row, 50 years ago today, with the intention …

As the lead singer of L.T.D. in the second half of the Seventies and then a solo act with more than a dozen R&B hits, Jeffrey Osborne has enjoyed his fair share of commercial glory. But pop music tends to reward youth, so like many older singers — Osborne is …

A kaiju-sized Scorpion is chasing Drake. Wait — why is that yellow Lamborghini flying? Is Aubrey Graham is now performing on top of a great white shark, like OVO got a contract to design a new SeaWorld? These are some of the questions you might have watching Gibson Hazard‘s latest …

The first thing Jon Batiste does when he wakes up each morning is write. It’s a exercise called Morning Pages, and Batiste has been doing it every day for several months now: three pages of handwritten free-writing to clear his mind and help open himself up to creativity before he …

There comes a moment in every Metallica gig lately where guitarist Kirk Hammett and bassist Robert Trujillo take the spotlight for themselves. It’s listed officially on the band’s set lists as “Kirk/Rob Doodle” – a sort of open-ended “they’re gonna do whatever they want” – and it’s allowed them to …

In mid-2015, Andrew Hozier-Byrne was living out what seemed like any musician’s dream. The Irish singer-songwriter’s independently released breakout single “Take Me to Church” sparked a U.S. label bidding war, skyrocketed to Number Two on the Billboard Hot 100, and, much to his surprise, entrenched itself on pop radio for …

For four days earlier this year the Black Madonna vanished, slipping away between sets at Coachella and an appearance at Guadalajara club Bar Americas.In the turmoil and chaos of a life packed with travel, Facebook posts and Instagram photos, one of the most influential and respected DJs currently on the …

It’s lunchtime, and Amanda Shires is at Puckett’s, a local barbeque joint in Leiper’s Fork, Tennessee, spooning heaps of sugar into her large cup of iced tea. Somehow Shires – a Nashville-residing Texan – got stuck with the unsweetened variety, and that simply will not suffice. So Shires, in a …

Being raised in a home of Orthodox Faith had its pros and cons for me. My parents raised me in the faith that they truly believed would lead to me having my best life (and afterlife) – Mormonism. Being a Mormon is not a part time religion. It is your …

Everybody who’s seen Slayer live has a tale to tell. Some are like war stories: There’s the time fans ripped the seats out of New York City’s Felt Forum, lit them on fire and threw them at the stage. And the Denver concert where the audience got so manic that …