The Cure frontman Robert Smith has unveiled a remix of Deftones’ ‘Teenager’. The new version of the White Pony track appears on Black Stallion, an upcoming double-LP celebrating the classic album’s 20th anniversary. Check it out below, along with the original.
“It’s amazing to hear Robert rework one of our songs and sneak his voice in there,” Deftones’ Chino Moreno said in an interview with NME. “If you’d have told me that when I was 15 years old, I would have lost my fucking mind and not believed a word you were saying. It was a dream.”
Black Stallion arrives on December 11 via Warner. It features remixes from producers and artists including DJ Shadow, Clams Casino, Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda, Squarepusher, Purity Ring, Blanck Mass, Salva, and others. Deftones recently released their ninth studio record, Ohms.
Miley Cyrus appeared on The Howard Stern Show last night (December 3) to perform a cover of Hole’s ‘Doll Parts’. Watch it below.
In 2020 alone, the pop singer has offered her take on songs by Hall & Oates, the Cranberries, Billie Eilish, the Beatles, and more. Her live renditions of The Cranberries’ ‘Zombie’ and Blondie’s ‘Heart of Glass’ also made it into the digital version of her latest album Plastic Hearts, which came out in late November. Cyrus’ seventh LP features guest appearances from Dua Lipa, Billy Idol, Joan Jett, and Stevie Nicks. Read our review of the album here.
100 gecs have dropped a new holiday song called ‘sympathy 4 the grinch’. The latest from Laura Les and Dylan Brady is a ska-influenced, anti-Santa banger that samples their own song ‘stupid horse’. Check it out below.
‘sympathy 4 the grinch’ follows 100 gecs’ collaboration with 3OH!3, ‘LONELY MACHINES’. The duo also contributed production to Rico Nasty’s new album, which is out today (December 4). Their remix album, 1000 gecs & The Tree of Clues, came out back in July.
Iggy Pop has shared a French language rendition of Elvis Costello‘s ‘No Flag’, a song from his most recent studio album Hey Clockface that includes a reference to Iggy and the Stooges. Check out ‘No Flag (en Français)’ below.
Iggy Pop talked about reworking the song in a Rolling Stone conversation between the two artists: “There’s a uniqueness to the French language,” he said. “No other language has vowels that sound like that. Learning a song that’s as quick as ‘No Flag’ took a month of practice because my lips weren’t used to those combinations…I [worked on it] for 40 minutes a day for about five weeks. You don’t want to do too much work on it at once or it’s not fun anymore.”
Costello responded: “You sound absolutely convincing in French. When I played your version to Muriel she said, ‘This is unbelievable. You’re so inside the song.’ Diana and I were both listening to it with tears in our eyes.”
Hey Clockface, Costello’s 31st studio album, came out in October. Iggy Pop’s most recent LP was last year’s Free.
Billie Eilish has shared a cover of The Beatles’ classic ‘Something’. The wistful rendition was recorded during a session for SiriusXM’s Alt Nation, where Eilish also performed stripped-back versions of ‘Ocean Eyes’, ‘Everything I Wanted’, and her latest single ‘Therefore I Am’. Listen to her take on the Abbey Road track below.
Eilish also picked ‘Something’ as part of her recent Apple Music show, saying: “I remember listening to this song when I was in love, or whatever, and yeah. This song really, once again, got me. I don’t know. I think that it’s such a well put song. I think the lyrics say something that I barely hear, and I feel like lots of people are saying something similar, but I feel like only The Beatles could say exactly this. It’s such a thing that we feel, it’s such a human feeling.”
Last month, Eilish performed ‘Therefore I Am’ at the American Music Awards. She also picked up four nominations for this year’s Grammy Awards: three for ‘Everything I Wanted’ and one for her James Bond theme ‘No Time to Die’.
Phoebe Bridgers appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon for a festive performance of her track ‘Savior Complex’. The live rendition, filmed at LA’s famed Magic Castle venue, comes a day after the singer-songwriter unveiled the music video for the Punisher single, which was directed by Fleabag creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge and starred Normal People actor Paul Mescal. Check out her performance below.
‘Savior Complex’ also appears on Bridgers’ new EP Copycat Killer, which features reworkings of four tracks from her sophomore album. She recently received four Grammy nominations, including Best New Artist and Best Alternative Album for Punisher, and shared a cover of Merle Haggard’s ‘If We Make It Through December’ to benefit the Downtown Women’s Center.
Maria Carey has enlisted Ariana Grande and Jennifer Hudson for a new version of her Christmas song ‘Oh Santa’, which originally came out in 2010. The new song, co-written with Grande and Hudson, was recorded as part of her Apple TV+ holiday special, Mariah Carey’s Magical Christmas Special. Check it out below, alongside a festive music video.
Earlier this year, Mariah Carey released her memoir The Meaning of Mariah Carey, which was later accompanied by a new album of rarities. Ariana Grande’s most recent album, Positions, came out in late October. Last year, it was announced that Jennifer Hudson would be portraying Aretha Franklin in an upcoming biopic.
The Weeknd has shared a new remix of ‘Blinding Lights’ featuring Spanish pop star Rosalía. Listen to the new version of theAfter Hours track below.
After Hours, the Weeknd’s most recent studio album, arrived in March. After receiving zero nominations for this year’s Grammy Awards, the Weeknd responded by calling the Recording Academy “corrupt”. Several artists, including Halsey, Drake, and others, have since spoken out against the Grammys.
Rosalía released her latest album, El Mal Querer, in 2018. Earlier this year, she joined J Balvin and Daddy Yankee on the remix of Sech’s ‘Relación (Remix)’ and collaborated with Travis Scott (‘TKN’) and Arca (‘KLK’).
In this segment, we showcase the most notable albums out each week. Here are the albums out on December 4th, 2020:
Rico Nasty, Nightmare Vacation
Rico Nasty has come through with her debut album, Nightmare Vacation. Following the rapper’s 2019 collaborative project with Kenny Beats, Anger Management, the 15-track LP features guest contributions from 100 gecs’ Dylan Brady, Gucci Mane, Don Toliver, Aminé, and Trippie Redd. “I look back at my tracklist like, not only did I overcome people trying to tell me what I should sound like, but I overcame a fucking pandemic and was still able to create it,” the Largo, Maryland native said about the album in an interview with W Magazine. “I think I’m on the cusp of being ready to just take shit head on, take it for what it is.” Nightmare Vacation includes the previously released singles ‘OHFR?’, ‘Own It’, ‘iPhone’, and ‘Don’t Like Me’.
Sigur Rós, Odin’s Raven Magic
Sigur Rós have returned with a new album called Odin’s Raven Magic, out now via Krunk/Warner Classics. Following 2013’s Kveikur, the project is an orchestral work that the band originally premiered at the Reykjavik Arts Festival in 2002. The 8-track record was made in collaboration with Icelandic music composer Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson, an ordained pagan leader, and previous collaborator Steindór Andersen. Speaking about the inspiration behind the project, Hilmarsson explained in a statement: “Hrafnagaldur Óðins [Odin’s Raven Magic] has lots of interpretation and implications that fire up the imagination… It’s a very visual poem, with images all about falling down, and a world freezing from north to south. It was an apocalyptic warning. Perhaps the people of the time felt it in their skins. Today, of course, Iceland is involved in environmental issues surrounding hydro-electric power and the destruction of the highlands. We are being warned again.”
Jordana, Something to Say to You
Jordana has released her sophomore album, Something to Say to You, via Grand Jury. Following the Kansas-based artist’s debut LP Classical Notions of Happiness, which received an expanded re-release back in March, Something to Say to You combines Jordana’s previously released Something to Say EP and the newly unveiled …To You EP. Speaking about the project in our Artist Spotlight feature, Jordana said: “Melvv [producer] and I definitely talked about how these EPs have two different atmospheres, where Something To Say is more vague and To You is more direct, but when they all come together, the atmospheres collide, with different emotions in a matter of minutes, throughout the album, with all of the different genres we touch.”
Joan of Arc, Tim Melina Theo Bobby
After a 25-year-career as a band, Joan of Arc have issued their final album, Tim Melina Theo Bobby, via Joyful Noise Recordings. Named after the four musicians that make up the band’s final lineup – Tim Kinsella, Melina Ausikaitis, Theo Katsaounis, and Bobby Burg – the album also features contributions from longtime collaborators Jeremy Boyle, Jenny Pulse, Nate Kinsella and Todd Mattei. Joan of Arc have released a total of 23 studio albums since they formed in 1997; their previous LP, 1984, came out in 2018. According to a press release, the new record was “the product of a band recognizing its run had reached its end, and was made knowing that this would be the group’s last.”
If you want to become a successful recording artist, you might think you need the most expensive equipment and access to a fancy studio, but this is not the case. These days, there are so many aspiring musicians creating and producing their own music from home. With the right tools and knowledge, it will be perfectly possible for you to put out a chart-topping hit or viral music video from the comfort of your bedroom. In fact, some of the best albums in history were recorded at home, including The Rolling Stones’ “Exile on Main Street” and “Nebraska” by Bruce Springsteen.
If you would like to create your own music and save money at the same time, here are a few essential steps in home music production.
Write songs
You can have all the best equipment money can buy, but if your music isn’t great, you will struggle to find success. Being a great artist is all about writing and performing high-quality music, so this is the step you should focus on. Listen to other great artists for inspiration and learn how to write lyrics and melodies. Have a listen through Rolling Stone’s 500 greatest songs of all time to learn from the masters.
Create a studio
Before you can start recording your songs, you will need to create your own home studio. Pick a room in your home that is most fit for this purpose. You may be limited by the size of your house or apartment, but try to choose a space that isn’t too cramped or noisy. If possible, pick a room with hard floors, as carpets can absorb the higher frequencies and distort your music. If you have the budget for it, there are some DIY jobs you can do to improve the acoustics of your room, but these aren’t essential. All you really need to do is set up your equipment in your studio and get to work.
Get recording equipment
Once you have your studio and a selection of great songs on paper, it’s time to start recording them. You need quality, reliable equipment, but you don’t have to spend a fortune. The basics of music recording are a good microphone, a computer, and some headphones. If you’re on a tight budget, you may be able to buy some of these items second-hand to save money.
Get editing software
Now that your songs are recorded, you will want to edit them digitally to make them sound as good as possible. There are countless software packages available to buy, with a wide range of prices and functionality. If you have an Apple computer, it will already feature a digital audio workstation called Garageband that you can use, or if you have a PC, you can install Logic Pro X on Windows.
Share your music
It will take a while to get your songs perfect, but once you do, you will want to share them with the world as soon as possible. Uploading them to Spotify is a great way to open them up to a wider audience, and you could also create a music video and post it onto YouTube. Make sure you share it on social media and ask all your friends and family to promote it to their networks too.
Rico Nasty
Sigur Rós
Jordana
After a 25-year-career as a band, Joan of Arc have issued their final album, 
