The Beastles, Boston-based dj BC's well-received (but ultimately unauthorized and subsequently yanked offline) Beatles-Beastie Boys mash-up, is now fully available online. In memory of Adam Yauch, Bob Cronin (dj BC's alter ego) has decided to face any potential legal wrath from publishing companies and repost The Beastles and its 2006 followup, Let It Beast.
Chart fandom makes strange bedfellows. Six months ago, if you'd asked me what act I'd root for in a head-to-head chart battle between pop princess Katy Perry and electrodance goofballs LMFAO, I'd probably have picked Perry, whose song catalog includes at least one or two gems. Her current hit, "Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)," isn't one of her best—it's nowhere near as well-crafted as "Teenage Dream" or "Hot N Cold"—but it's a charming, goodtime trifle, and marginally less stupid than LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem."
Now? I'm rooting for the goofballs over the princess all the way.
LMFAO's single (which, to be honest, has kinda grown on me) is the last firewall standing between Perry and her fifth Hot 100 No. 1 from Teenage Dream. Were "Friday" to hit that mark, Teenage Dream would tie a record that has so far only been reached by one album: Michael Jackson's Bad. Perry and her people are trying to hit that mark by cheating... or, to be fair, by taking advantage of a legal but shady tactic.
The phrase "the calm before the storm" appears in virtually every chart-related story this week. That's because the latest edition of the Billboard 200, which covers sales from the week ending May 22, is topped by Adele's 21. That album is No. 1 for the ninth and (presumably) final week before Lady Gaga's monster Born This Way makes its foregone chart-crushing debut.
But, come on now... "calm"? For chart-watchers, industryites and Gaga fans, I'd say the storm is already happening.
A meta-discussion has been raging all week around just how many copies Gaga's album will sell in week one, and whether all of the downloads she's racking up should count. Amazon's jaw-dropping decision to sell Born This Way for the unprecedented full-album price of 99 cents has not only engendered controversy—so much that Billboard's editor felt compelled to respond to some angry Britney Spears fans—it's rocket-fueled Gaga's sales.
The music business spikes the football over its gradually improving sales the same week a certain U.K. chanteuse completes her conquering of the U.S. pop charts. Coincidence? Maybe not.
The omnipresent Adele takes control of Billboard's Hot 100 this week; "Rolling in the Deep" finally evicts Katy Perry and Kanye West's five-week chart-topper "E.T." from the penthouse. Digital sales of 294,000 (not her best week, but off only 2% from her prior high), plus big jumps at radio that make "Rolling" the third-most-played song in America, give Adele the Hot 100 win. That's matched by Adele's continued dominance on the Billboard 200, where 21 spends its seventh week atop the list. She easily fended off another two weeks of challengers. Her Mother's Day-week sales total of 155,000 tops the No. 2 debut of the Beastie Boys' Hot Sauce Committee, Part Two by more than 27,000 copies.
No doubt, it's been a good week for Adele: Her move on the Hot 100 makes her the first British lass to top the premier U.S. song chart since Leona Lewis's "Bleeding Love" in 2008; her performance on Tuesday's Dancing with the Stars was widely praised; and Glee covered "Rolling in the Deep."
Today is the 30th anniversary of John Lennon's death. His senseless murder on December 8th, 1980 was hard to sort out at the time--"the anonymous eating the famous like a cannibal feasting on testicles," as Robert Christgau wrote in these pages--and not much easier to parse now. In memory of the world's most loved Beatle, we're reprinting below the eulogy that ran in the Voice just days after Lennon's death. "I've never been one to hobnob with the stars," Christgau wrote then, "but who could resist John Lennon?" Good question.
So Beatles-on-iTunes day is almost over. We all survived. No sales records were broken -- in fact, Dr. Luke would like to point out that Ke$ha remains atop the charts. And yet the day was a rousing success in terms of Twitter Comedy -- join us now as we survey the best of the #beatlesasMP3s hashtag, a pun-filled wonderland concocted by friend-of-SOTC Eric Harvey and propped up by friends old and new. There can only be one winner, of course, but here are your finalists:
So the Beatles catalog is now available on iTunes. This is, contrary to your attempts to be contrary, A Big Deal. You may naturally (and not unreasonably) assume that everyone in the world already owns all the Beatles songs they'd ever care to own. You are mistaken. The iTunes chart run destined to result will probably not take on Michael Jackson proportions, but we can hope at least that Ke$ha will be conceding to "In My Life" for the foreseeable future. Let us pause for a moment, though, to consider the lesser lights of the Beatles catalog -- those tunes that will probably not set the charts aflame $1.30 at a time. We can safely assume that Katy Perry has nothing to fear from the following:
The Blueprint: 427,000 units. The Blueprint 2: The Gift & the Curse: 545,000 units. And now, eight years on, Jay-Z closes out the trilogy by splitting the difference at 476,000. It's an easy #1, by most counts Jay's 11th, which pushes him past Elvis for most solo artist #1s in history. Standing in his way for the overall record? The Beatles, who have 19--good luck with that, Jay--and who, incidentally, outsold him again this week: the band moved a combined 626,000 records since last Tuesday, mostly--but not entirely--on the strength of two new box sets. As for Raekwon's Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. 2? 68,000, a more than respectable debut at #4, though probably not what people hoped for when Rae briefly overtook Jay on the iTunes charts late last week. [Billboard]
--Kings of Leon have announced a 30-plus date fall victory-lap supporting last year's Only By The Night. The tour includes a September 12 stop at the Izod Center in East Rutheford, New Jersey. Meanwhile, Only By The Night has been certified platinum by the RIAA, with more than a million copies been shipped to the record stores that still exist.
--After a thrilling noise-filled set at Siren, Built to Spill will return to New York October 12th and 13th at Webster Hall and October 14th and 15th at the Music Hall of Williamsburg. Tickets are on sale now. The band's currently mixing their new album, There is No Enemy.
--One King to another: New York congressman Peter King released a YouTube video in which he calls Michael Jackson a "pervert" and a "low life." Released on the Fourth of July, King begins by praising "cops, firefighters and teachers," but quickly moves to his less-than-remorseful point: "Let's knock out the psychobabble, this guy was a pervert, was a child molester, he was a pedophile." King adds, "He was a pretty good singer, did some dancing." We didn't win lottery tickets to the memorial service either, but you don't see us making a scene.
--Courtney Love trashed her hotel room at the Inn on Irving Place. The Post reports that 44-year-old Love, while in New York with daughter Frances Bean Cobain, caused $5,000 in damages to her room and left behind "used needles and feminine hygiene products." She also flooded the floor for good measure.
-- Rihanna: R&B superstar, aspiring tattoo artist. The "Umbrella" singer took a shot at inking during a visit to New York's East Side Ink last week when she inscribed the letter "R" onto staff members' bodies. Now she's in trouble. The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene is investigating the incident, with the Health Department telling TMZ, "Only licensed tattoo artists can administer tattoos in the city according to the City's Health Code. We are sending someone down to follow up on this."
--Legendary rock manager Allen Klein died on Saturday at age 77 after a long battle with alzheimers. The Newark, New Jersey-born former accountant founded the ABKCO Music & Records label in New York in 1961. His clients included Sam Cooke, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Klein was known for his ruthless negotiating style, and was involved in more than 40 lawsuits with clients by 1972. His short tenure managing the Beatles in 1969 infuriated Paul McCartney, which many cite as a key reason for the band's breakup. Pete Townshend once called him "the awesome rock-leech Godfather." Klein kept an altered verse from the 23rd psalm on his desk, which read: "Though I walk in the shadow of the valley of evil, I have no fear, as I am the biggest bastard in the valley."
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