Just one month away, The 55th Annual Grammy Awards is spanning out to be the most anticipated awards show of 2013. According to the Grammy's Twitter handle, the first round of performers for music's biggest night were announced and include Mumford and Sons, Taylor Swift, and Rihanna. The guys from fun., and The Black Keys will be performing for the first time as well.
Fun. and Mumford & Sons are two of six artists this year who lead with six nominations and are both up for the Best New Artist award. Two-time Grammy winners The Black Keys nabbed five noms while five-time Grammy Award winner Rihanna and six-time Grammy winner Taylor Swift each scored three nominations. Safe to say this is a solid line up of musical talent and will be the key ingredient of the overall night, however, we're still crossing our fingers that an electronic music act could earn a spot in the coveted Grammy performance line up. Hey, we can only hope, right?
This weekend, Saturday Sept 29th through Sunday, September 30th,The Global Citizen Festival will invade New York City's Central Park in an effort to erase extreme poverty once and for all.
The open-air concert will host some of the world's hottest acts including Neil Young with Crazy Horse, Foo Fighters, Band of Horses, and the Black Keys. But it's more than just a music lovers festival. This advocacy concert will celebrate the progress already made in fighting extreme poverty, secure financial commitments for tackling extreme poverty and disease, and mobilise thousands of ambassadors for change. We'll unite around a simple yet powerful idea: that by giving every child a chance to thrive, our generation can end extreme poverty.
Lollapalooza offers an incredible and diverse bill of artists. It is one festival that truly caters to just about every type of music lover. With so many incredible sets, it was hard to pick our favorites, but here are a few of the major standouts that made trekking the bad weather and heat worth it!
Passion Pit
This outfit from Boston, MA stunned with a heart-on-its-sleeve set. Front man Michael Angelakos delivered a sincere and powerful performance. The band delivered a non-stop, passionate and energetic performance. A definite highlight.
The inaugural Catalpa Festival, a truly unique musical experience, hits Randall's Island July 28th and 29th. There will be plenty of emphasis on site artistry, interactive experiences, and experimentation --not to mention over 40 performers! Musical genres are diverse, including blues, rock, hip hop, electronic, reggae, and indie. There will be art installations, bespoke event structures, and more.
Artists include, The Black Keys, Snoop Dogg, Asap Rocky, AraabMuzik, Zola Jesus, Girl Talk, Cold War Kids, Matisyahu, Felix da Housecat, City and Colour, The Sheepdogs, Hook 'n' Sling, My Pet Dragon, just to name a handful.
What are you doing July 28-29th from 1pm to 11pm that is more exciting than seeing huge acts like The Black Keys and Snoop Dogg, chowing down on culinary masterpieces and partaking in something that shoots out 30ft fire balls as DJs take over from within? Nothing.
Taking place on Randall's Island, Catalpa's full lineup is yet to be announced but is already touting acts like TV on The Radio, aforementioned Black Keys and Snoop Dogg, City and Colour, The Big Pink, AraabMuzik, Felix Da Housecat, Fort Atlantic and more. When festival goers aren't rocking out to great music, they can check out an array of attractions; and even those are unique.
With all the recent hoopla surrounding Coachella 2012 (specifically, the digital resurrection of Tupac), one begins to ponder what other shenanigans are in store during festival season. Summertime truly is the season of festivals: beer & wine fests, food expos, but most importantly, music fests. There’s Bamboozle, Warped Tour, Lollapalooza, Bonnarooo, Electric Daisy, and a cornocoupia of other niftily named musical celebrations.
The official lineup for this year's Lollapalooza Festival has been announced! Taking place on August 3 - 5 in Grant Park, Chicago, this year's festival is sure to be one for the record books.
Artists include The Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Black Keys, a recently reunited Black Sabbath, Jack White, Florence + the Machine, At the Drive-In, Bassnectar, The Shins, Avicii, Justice, The Weeknd, Sigur Ros, a recently reunited Afgan Whigs, M83, Frank Ocean, Nero, Die Antwoord, Tune-Yards, SBTRKT, The Walkmen, Sharon Van Etten, The War on Drugs, Twin Shadow, Toro y Moi, Wale, Zed's Dead, Childish Gambino and many more! For the full lineup, click here.
Get your tickets here, but hurry up, they'll sell out quick!
The Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival gives 40,000-60,000 ear-eager music fans a yearly opportunity to experience both music and art in one place. Atop the scattered stages you can find an abnormal yet effective line-up of musical artistry. Seeing a neighborhood cafe act lead into Erykah Badu was normal. The purgatory that lies between mega stardom and small-town-nobody is suddenly erased. Nor are any rules of artist seniority enforced. Divas mix amongst us normal folk, all egos aside, in the attempt to give awaiting fans what they're spending the weekend in San Francisco for: pure, raw musical talent. It didn't matter how many albums the artist sold --it only mattered if they were good. And to my surprise there weren't any "not so good acts" at this year's festival, which was held at the Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.