Photo Credit: Soul Culture

UK singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran is back with two music videos for new single “Drunk” — an official music video and a fan montage video. The official music video lives up to the song title and features Sheeran getting drunk with his pet cat. It’s sort of hilarious — in an odd way — which seems to be Sheeran’s MO lately when it comes to music videos. Anyone remember the music video for “Lego House” featuring Rupert Grint?

Meanwhile, the fan montage video was compiled by Sheeran’s cousin Murray Cummings and features a load of footage from the singer’s past tour.

Check out both music videos for Ed Sheeran’s “Drunk” after the jump.

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Carrie Underwood took to YouTube to announce her new single “Good Girl,” which will be featured on the country superstar’s fourth studio album. She also posted a promotional shot for “Good Girl,” which shows a smoking hot Carrie vamping for the camera.

For the single, Underwood teamed up with previous collaborators Chris DeStefano and Ashley Gorley to create what’s rumored to be an “upbeat, kick butt” track. “Good Girl” officially hits airwaves on February 23rd and given past success, it’s pretty safe to bet it will be a hit.

According to The Boot, Underwood’s yet-to-be-titled album will feature “darker material” than her past efforts — something I’m dying to hear. Hope she has some slit-your-wrist ballads up her sleeve as well.

Check out Carrie Underwood’s message to fans announcing “Good Girl” after the cut. Anyone excited for new music from Carrie? I sure am.
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“Bad Girls”, the newest track from firecracker fem-cee and musical innovator M.I.A., is set to debut on Monday, January 30th at 2:30 p.m. EST via Pitchfork.

The track was recorded in Miami and produced by Danja (Timbaland, Diddy, Madonna, Nelly Furtado, Pink). Given Danja’s involvement thinking it could be M.I.A.’s return to her more hip-hop/pop based roots, but then again, you never know. The single will be available officially on Tuesday, January 31st via digital retailers.

M.I.A. will also premiere the official music video for “Bad Girls,” directed by Romain Gavras (M.I.A. ‘s “Born Free” and JUSTICE’s ”Stress”), via VICE’s Noisey YouTube channel on Friday, February 3rd.

Illustration by Elaine S.

Lisa Hannigan. Her name may not ring any loud bells but, deep in the recesses of most folksy-singer/songwriter-loving people’s minds, a faint tinkling echoes. You know you know her, but from where? Might I suggest you go back and take a listen to Damien Rice’s landmark debut ‘O’?. Hear the ever-present female vocal? How it perfectly compliments and sits alongside Rice’s? That, ladies and gentlemen, is Lisa Hannigan.

Fast-forward almost a decade and Hannigan has long-since parted ways with Rice. Over the last few years her followers have watched this shy artist take her first tentative steps into the spotlight as a solo-act and it has been quite the transformation. Indeed, having finally caught her live show late last year (23rd of December), my companion for the evening (my younger sister who had seen her a few years prior) pointed out how much more assured Hannigan was. Here’s a video I took of one of her encore numbers, “O’ Holy Night” (on the ukelele), that’s well worth a watch.
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Bridget B of Front Row or Die stops by The Round Table to share her review as The Fray get personal with fans during their iHeart Radio show at the P.C. Richard & Sons Theater in New York City on Friday, January 20th. Without further ado….
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Photo Credit: Bridget B

The Fray is a band that everyone knows, and I think that everyone loves. It’s easy to lump them into popular music, and we all know that Grey’s Anatomy sure helped them do that, something I’m not proud of, but they manage to write haunting melody’s with dramatic lyrics, and mix that in with one of the smoothest raspy voices I’ve ever heard and you get pure magic.

On Friday January 20th, I had a chance, along with 200 other people, to see the Fray perform a small acoustic set downtown in Tribeca at the P.C. Richard & Son Theater. I rushed out of work as quickly as I could and got a third row center spot. The set, which is simultaneously webcast through z100, began at 7 and The Fray launched into a very acoustic set.
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Photo Credit: Fiona-Apple.com

It’s been over seven years since Fiona Apple released a new studio album (Extraordinary Machine), and while there have been rumors of new music coming for over a year now, fans (including myself) started to give up hope. However, it looks like a new album by Ms. Apple is actually on the way this time as Epic Records CEO L.A. Reid posted a Tweet confirming that new material from Fiona will be released soon.

Reid’s initial tweet read, “Lots of good music coming from @Epic_Records in the next few weeks. Stay tuned music fans. Welcome back Fiona!” He went on to clarify to a Twitter follower, he said, “YES Fiona Apple!”

File this one under believe it when I see it… or hear it… but still I want to be optimistic a new project will see the light of day from Ms. Apple. Until then, we’ll always have the memories of her previous three albums and her 2011 collaboration with Jon Brion on the Buddy Holly tribute album.

Source: Pitchfork

The Big Pink have a new album out, if you missed it, entitled Future This. I like the synth, the hard airiness of the drums, the rumble-bass, the shimmering chords and droning leads … but I still can’t decide if I like The Big Pink.

Why?

“Stay Gold” has everything I look for in a shoegaze-type thing; just like “Dominoes” reminded me of my all-time favorite shoegaze track, Chapterhouse’s “Pearl.”

And yet … is there anyone else out there who has no reason not to love The Big Pink, but just can’t commit? Am I afraid of shoegaze commitment? Am I stuck in the 90′s?

F.
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Illustration by Elaine Snowden

Okay, so call me cynical or even jaded but, with singers of a certain genre of music (pop), I have come to expect that they’ve had a LOT of help with vocals in the studio. Unless I’ve seen them live I just assume that most artists on the Top 40 have been auto tuned to within an inch of their lives. Now, I’m not saying that this was my expectation arriving at Christina Perri’s sold-out Olympia Theatre gig, but I did think she’d be drowned out by her band a bit. Boy, was I ever wrong…

Whether wielding her acoustic guitar, sitting down to the piano, or simply conducting the fervent Dublin audience, Perri was a delight to listen to (and watch). Eschewing fancy stage-production, Perri went the Kelly Clarkson route and relied mainly on lighting and her voice to carry the show. The setlist, consisting mainly of tracks from her platinum-selling (her label presented her with the disc backstage before the show) album Lovestrong., kept everyone bouncing and singing along for the entire ninety-ish minutes. I wasn’t terribly fond of her cover of Roy Orbison’s “Crying”, but new track “Crazy” was a resounding success.

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Kelly Clarkson brought her Stronger tour to New York City last night to a sold out crowd at Radio City Music Ha. In just about over an hour and 30 minutes, the Grammy-award winning artist proved, once again, that she can sing any song.

And sing she did — everything from the country mega hit “Don’t You Wanna Stay,” which has earned Clarkson a Grammy nomination, to a Florence and The Machine cover of the haunting indie pop “Heavy in Your Arms,” to Barbara Streisand’s Broadway hit “My Man,” and of course her own brand of pop hits, which spanned the course of her 10-year career and included everything from “Trouble With Love” to “Since U Been Gone” to “Because of You” and of course modern day “Mr. Know It All” and “What Doesn’t Kill You (Stronger).”

But I’d argue one of the night’s best and brightest moments was when the singer opted to tribute the late Etta James by performing a moving rendition of “I’d Rather Go Blind” over the frequently performed “At Last.” Of course she did, right? Much like James, Clarkson sings pain from a place where it’s real. She’s not simply telling a story with words, she’s making you feel them with every note. It was one of those rare moments where you have to pause and not only recognize Clarkson’s masterful vocals, but also applaud her for daring to go there with raw emotion so soon after James’ death. I’m not one to be moved to tears, but at that moment — it was pure beauty — not to mention, that is one of my favorite songs of all-time.

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Photo Credit: Newsone.com

Legendary R&B/Blues singer Etta James has died at the age of 73 due to complications of leukemia.

The fiery singer’s career spanned over 50-years and gave us timeless tunes as “At Last,” “I’d Rather Go Blind,” and “All I Could Do Was Cry.” But more than that, the singer influenced dozens of contemporary singers ranging from rockers like Janis Joplin to power balladeers like Celine Dion, Christina Aguilera and Beyonce. It was Beyonce who portrayed the singer’s tumultuous life in the 2008 movie Cadillac Records, which detailed her battle with drugs.

Sad loss for music today — but let’s honor Etta in the only way we can — through her music. Listen to “At Last” and my personal favorite “All I Could Do Was Cry” after the jump.

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