Florence and the Machine

Hanni El Khatib Is Sexy, Raw, and Dangerous

Don't call it a sell out

Will Long.Live.A$AP Be the Biggest Houston Rap Album of 2013?

[Ed. Note: The following post ran on the music blog of the Voice's sister publication Houston Press on Jan. 23. We rerun it here re: relevant to our interests.] By Nathan Smith There are a few things you should know about A$AP Rocky. He's a pretty motherfucker. His new album, Long.Live.A$AP, is a ... More >>

A$AP Rocky Lights Up The City

Harlem's crack-slinging bad boy cleans up, puts New York rap back on the map

Ten Big Deal Albums We're Hella Excited For

Hey: Albums! In case people still care about these things, here's a batch of potentially interesting releases arriving in the coming weeks and months:

Avicii - Radio City Musical Hall - 9/26/2012

Avicii Radio City Music Hall Wednesday, September 26 Better than: The Rockettes In the promo video for last night's Avicii show, 52,171 viewers found the producer/DJ walking through the Times Square venue that he would soon play and sitting in the seats around which his fans would soon dance. "I m ... More >>

Closing The Colony: A Visit To Times Square's Shuttering Sheet Music Outpost

In some ways, the Friday before last looked like business as usual at Colony Records, the venerable Theater District music-and-sheet-music retailer that recently announced its impending closing after 64 years of operation. At the counter, Warren Tesoro, an employee for 25 years, asked a middle-aged ... More >>

Maya Jane Coles: Say Her Name

The DJ spins into Electric Zoo

Six Superlative Summer Shows

Our music critic's picks for the season's hottest concerts

Florence and the Machine

Brave: Unmanageable Heiress

The rare family film about courage that actually has some

Florence and the Machine

Portraits Of South By Southwest: La Sera, Santigold, Blood Orange, And The Men

In Waste Of Paint, our writer/artist team of Jamie Peck and Debbie Allen will review goings-on about town in words and images. This week, we packed up our paint and headed down to Austin for the annual hurricane of musical adventure that is South By Southwest. I feel both like I just got to the jam ... More >>

Getting the Drop on the Hammerstein with the Cosmic Opera

Turntables are nice, but aerialists are even nicer

How Not To Write About Female Musicians: A Handy Guide

​Maybe it's all that misguided Year of the Woman chatter that dominated year-end roundups, or the slow, agonizing creep of Fashion Week, or the coming apocalypse, but hoo boy has there been a lot of terrible writing about female musicians in the past few weeks. The latest offender is the New Y ... More >>

Karl Lagerfeld: Greeks Are Disgusting, Russian Men Are Ugly

As the guest editor of Metro World News for one day, Karl Lagerfeld proved to be a sort of cross between Andy Warhol and the guy who tweeted dumb stuff about the David Beckham underwear ads. Thanks to this Metro World News link, we have the following Lagerfeld emissions -- and bear in mind that the ... More >>

Live: Avicii Pumps (And Pumps) The Crowd At Lavo

​Avicii Lavo Saturday, January 21 Better than: Sensory deprivation. Anthropologically it was worth it; logistically a lot less so. Arriving to Lavo, on East 58th Street, at 11:45 on Saturday night is risky enough—it's a high-end bottle-service superclub, the kind dance snobs tend to a ... More >>

Live: VH1 Brings Out The Divas At The Hammerstein Ballroom

via VH1​VH1 Divas Celebrates Soul Hammerstein Ballroom Sunday, December 18 Better than: Whatever Ryan Seacrest is going to cook up for VH1 Soul. Last night's VH1 Divas taping existed both as a performance and self-contained, 24-hours-out advertising opportunity for its broadcast. (Tonight at ... More >>

Live: The Creators Project Brings Florence, Justice, And Lots Of Art To DUMBO

Benjamin Lozovsky​The Creators Project October 15-16 Better than: A representative of the Intel Corporation laboriously explaining to me the superiority of their microprocessors. If you're suspicious that The Creators Project is all just a way for the Vice Empire to class up its image beyo ... More >>

SONIC BOOM

Artists and musicians take over DUMBO

Radio Hits One: Raising The Bar For "YouTube Platinum"

Justin Bieber and Ludacris: Congratulations. A lot of people watched your video.​On August 28, MTV will throw the 2011 installment of its Video Music Awards, honoring achievements in the art form that used to make up the majority of its programming. While it's all too tempting to note the iron ... More >>

Live: Washed Out Play Against Type At The Bowery Ballroom

Washed Out, Grimes, Blood Orange The Bowery Ballroom Monday, July 11 Better than: Trillwave? To any musician with an audience, it's been clear for ages—probably dating back to when Dylan went electric—that to change your entire instrumental vocabulary is one of the biggest risks you c ... More >>

This Weekend In New York: Florence Welch And A Perpetual Sweat Machine

​ In Waste Of Paint, our writer/artist team of Jamie Peck and Debbie Allen will review goings-on about town in words and images. This past Saturday was Debbie's birthday, and what better way to spend one's birthday weekend than with punk rock, cheap beer, and a nice, intense, purifying shvitz ... More >>

The Voice: The Dominance Of Javier, The Rise Of Vicci

via RickeyVicci Martinez performs "Dog Days Are Over."​I wish Game of Thrones was still on. It isn't. But hey, The Voice is still on! On last week's show, it seemed pretty obvious which four singers would make it through and which ones wouldn't. On Team Cee Lo, for instance, it was absolutely ... More >>

EV Grieve Reflects on the Lessons of CB3 Meetings, Superdive, and the East Village as a "Foodie Tourist Trap"

EV Grieve​Although EV Grieve is first and foremost a neighborhood blog dedicated to covering "things that you may or may not be interested in about the East Village and other parts of New York City," we turn to it on a daily basis for restaurant and bar news. In addition to chronicling the c ... More >>

SummerStage Announces Its Massive 2011 Lineup

​As the winter thaws out, more summer concerts are showing up on the calendar's horizon. Today, the City Parks Foundation announced the schedule for this year's SummerStage, which takes place from June 7 to September 2 in parks all around the city, with the mainstage happening at Central Park. ... More >>

The 10 Best Original Songs From 21st Century Films

Earlier today, the National released a video for the song "Think You Can Wait," from the "quirky" Paul Giamatti film Win Win. The video is a misguided combination of film dialogue transposed over a staged performance (the YouTube comments have already begun trashing it, and Matt Berninger's voice ... More >>

Q&A: Sasha Grey on Auto-Tune, Her Band aTelecine, and Her Favorite Sexytime Music

Courtesy VICE BooksFrom Neu Sex Sasha Grey is one of the most famous porn stars of our generation, and perhaps the first to achieve true crossover success, with starring roles in Steven Soderbergh's The Girlfriend Experience and HBO's Entourage. You probably know her by name, face, and maybe even v ... More >>

Live: Jamie xx Thrills Cool And Uncool Kids Alike At Le Poisson Rouge

Not trying hard because he doesn't have to. CRED.​Jamie xx Le Poisson Rouge Tuesday, February 22 Better Than: Spending my night surrounded by twenty-somethings making out to "Islands." Here's who we expected to show up for last night's Jamie xx show at Le Poisson Rouge: black-shrouded scenes ... More >>

The Fame Cookie: 2011 Grammy Awards Live Blog

It's the return of the most talked-about Grammy Awards live blog--a collection of quips, blips, and arguably insightful observations that dares to match the actual Grammy telecast in terms of pure spectacle and Justin Bieber mentions. Please join our hosts Tom Breihan and Ryan Dombal below, and keep ... More >>

2010: The Year In Music Photos

​The year in music, circa 2010, started at the Cake Shop, with a shred-down to the New Year courtesy of Siren Festival MVP-to-be Marissa Paternoster and her band Screaming Females. After a tour through the NYE fetes of the Lower East Side and Williamsburg, that night ended amidst a marathon sh ... More >>

Was 2010 The Best Year For Music Ever? The Final Chapter: Katy Perry Is A Bad Feminist But We Are All Vulnerable Somehow

This has been Sound of the City's year-in-review rock-critic roundtable, an amiable ongoing conversation between five prominent Voice critics: Rob Harvilla, Zach Baron, Sean Fennessey, Maura Johnston, and Rich Juzwiak. We're sad to see it go. Sleigh Bells frontlady Alexis Krauss, you deserved your ... More >>

Five Takeaways From The 2010 Grammy Nominations

Behold, the future of music.​The Grammy Awards are a bit of a punchline in music nerd circles, a place where, say, MGMT battles Hall & Oates for a trophy that will inevitably be won, and then dropped on the ground, by the more telegenic and industry-saving Taylor Swift. The Grammy voters hate ... More >>

Live: Florence The Machine Bring Their Drumsticks/Magic Wands To Terminal 5

"OK, I might actually be a witch." Pics by Rob, more below.​Florence and the Machine Terminal 5 Monday, November 1 Better Outfits Than: The costumes everyone else wears on Halloween. I refuse to see any more Harry Potter movies unless Florence Welch joins the cast, traipsing around Hogwarts ... More >>

MTV's Video Music Awards Had Me Gaga

​Every year, MTV pretends it's still a music channel and gives awards to the videos it shows in the middle of the night between NyQuil commercials. Fortunately, the VMAs are riveting nonetheless, the entire community assembling to lip-synch a song and screech out an acceptance speech. Rather ... More >>

The Bieber Bowl: The 2010 MTV Video Music Awards Live Blog

Just how awkward will the awkwardly staged moment between Kanye West and Taylor Swift be? Will Eminem deign to smile? Which uncomfortable pop star will B.o.B choose to bring up on stage with him? And how will your hosts, Pitchfork's Ryan Dombal and eMusic's Sean Fennessey, make it to midnight withou ... More >>

David Byrne and Fatboy Slim Pay Homage to Imelda Marcos

This Weekend! Ted Leo, Screaming Females, Sundelles, Arms, Sea Monsters, MiniBoone, The Trombone Festival, Doveman, Mirror/Dash, Wild Babies, Twin Sister, and Balún

TedLeo.comTed Leo loves popcorn more than you​Everyone's favorite "goddamn American hero," Ted Leo, will be chord-chugging tonight at the Fillmore with Screaming Females. Though if you've been offended by his karaoke criticism, you can always check out mindlessly ecstatic lo-fiers the Sundelle ... More >>

Week in Review: Those Guys Could Bring the Funk

Alison, one of many CMJ street fashion stars shot by Sam Horine. Find the rest here.​In the week Jay-Z made it all about him, we made it all about Jay-Z, from the first deplorable word that he'd be attempting to demoralize the Phillies at Yankee Stadium all the way though his overshare-y and u ... More >>

Live: Florence and the Machine Feed on the Spotlight at Bowery Ballroom

Florence and the Machine Bowery Ballroom Tuesday, October 27 Toward the end of her first official New York City show, London's Florence Welch worked a little bit of Fever Ray's "If I Had a Heart" into the beginning of her tune "Blinding". While I have no doubt Welch's love of the enigmatic Swede ... More >>