Run-DMC’s School of Thought

www.newyorker.com

Darryl (DMC) McDaniels dropped in on his old Queens elementary school to talk music with second graders, who weren’t too sure who he was.

How Willie Nelson Sees America

www.newyorker.com

On the road with the musician, his band, and his family.When Willie Nelson performs in and around New York, he parks his bus in Weehawken, New Jersey. While the band sleeps at a hotel in midtown Manhattan, he stays on…

Acid Blues (Slight Return) – The American Scholar

The music of Jimi Hendrix continues to strike a chord

For David Byrne, Talking Heads was about making emotional sense — not literal sense

www.npr.org

Enlarge this image "I really enjoy writing the songs and performing and the other things that we do," David Byrne says of his work in Talking Heads. Jordan Cronenweth/Courtesy of A24 Jordan Cronenweth/Courtesy of A24 Talking Heads founding member…

‘We didn’t think Back to the Future sounded plausible – or good’: Huey Lewis and the News on The Power of Love

www.theguardian.com

‘I told the producers I didn’t know how to do a song for a film – and added that, frankly, I didn’t fancy writing one called Back to the Future. They said, “No problem, just give us one of your songs”’

The Gales of November remembered

www.anxietyshark.ca

This is the beauty of the song, the heart of it in those who lost their lives in service of building a world many believed they never belonged to, as if they are men out of time.

Essay by Patti Smith: Art Rats in New York City

www.newyorker.com

In 1967, I stepped out of the Port Authority bus terminal with a plaid suitcase. My desire was to become an artist. Perhaps I lacked the necessary skills, but I had the willingness to develop them, for I believed in…

Ozzy Osbourne Obituary: For the Back Street Kids

pitchfork.com

Ozzy Osbourne, who rose to fame as the lead singer of Black Sabbath, has died at the age of 76, two weeks and a couple of days after playing his final…

The Paradox of Music Discovery, the Spotify Way

The Atlantic

A new book explores the company’s commitment to shaping what its users hear.

Before He Formed Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Page Played a Prom in Ohio

The New Yorker

Back in 2021, I wrote an essay about the great musicians who, surprisingly, had performed at my high school, in Kansas City, in the nineteen-sixties: the Crystals, the Drifters, Booker T. & the M.G.’s, Ike & Tina Turner.

The Bangles, One of the Biggest All-Female Bands, Want to Reclaim Their Legacy

The first time Susanna Hoffs and the Peterson sisters sang together and their voices blended, the frisson was unmistakable. “We knew we had something,” Hoffs said. “We created a band in that moment.” Hoffs, 66, beamed at the memory, sitting in her kitchen on a late January afternoon.

How Jukeboxes Made Memphis Music

Oxford American

Nashville is where you go to make a hit that sounds like everyone else. Memphis is where you make a hit that sounds like no one else.

The Nineteenth-Century Banjo

JSTOR Daily

The banjo has a complicated status in American entertainment culture. Sure, it may be Kermit the Frog’s favorite instrument, but more often than not, it’s the butt of jokes that make it seem like the gawky nerd of instruments.

The Origin Story of “Stop Making Sense”

The New Yorker

When it first opened in theatres, in the fall of 1984, “Stop Making Sense,” directed by Jonathan Demme and starring the rock group Talking Heads, was quickly recognized as one of the finest concert films ever made.

How a Chain-Snatching and a Vegas Beatdown Led to Tupac’s Murder

In the adrenalized aftermath of a Mike Tyson prizefight in 1996, a black BMW carrying the rapper Tupac Shakur pulled up to a red light just off the Las Vegas Strip, thrilling the women in the car next to him. Open this article in the New York Times Audio app on iOS.

Ten Thousand Cattle for Our One Thousandth Post

The Library of Congress

It’s hard to believe, but this is the 1000th published post here at Folklife Today! In our not-quite-ten years of existence, our dedicated crew of bloggers at the American Folklife Center and the Veterans History Project has published research articles, guided readers to fabulous collections, cele

David Crosby’s Cosmic Americana

The Atlantic

“We’re going to do kind of a science-fiction story, if you’ll bear with us,” David Crosby said on August 18, 1969, as his band Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young began playing their song “Wooden Ships” at Woodstock.

When Sammy Hagar almost replaced Jerry Garcia in The Dead

Far Out Magazine

The friendship between Bob Weir and Sammy Hagar is one of the stranger relationships in the world of music.

I Ain’t Got Nothing But Time

Oxford American

Seven factorial—that is, seven times six times five, etc.,—is 5,040. Ten is not much larger than seven, but ten factorial is 3.6 million—seven hundred times larger… I think of that in connection with Pedro.