Billboard's New Chart is Smart Like a Velocirapotor (Watch out, Kids!)
Here's a round-up of music stories we're reading this week, clever girl.
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Print ArticleNews Roundup: Harlem Shakes and Pela Break Up, Jay-Z Has No Idea Who Lil Mama Is, and Counting Crows Are Playing for Free in Central Park
--This weekend saw a rash of New York band breakups, according to Brooklyn Vegan. Avant-twee Brooklyn quintet (and sometime Voice contributors) the Harlem Shakes have called it quits, maybe (get your sourcing game up, Viggo!). And sad sincere erstwhile local quartet Pela have definitely broken up. The announcement: "It is with great sadness that we write you today. Pela's collective journey has come to an end. Over the past 2 years we've faced tremendous obstacles. We recorded an album twice, had a falling out/legal battle with our old label, fired 2 managers, had a big record deal fall through, and Billy had a hand injury followed by a foot injury." Then they say thank you.
Live: The Harlem Shakes' Avant-Twee Utopia
Harlem Shakes
Piano's
Wednesday, May 6
The knock -- OK, one of the knocks -- on Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist is its portrayal of the Lower East Side as a relentlessly precocious, shiny, happy fantasy-land where beautiful people prance about listening to Bishop Allen and saying impossibly witty things and finding themselves and whatnot. No grit, no blight, no consequence, no danger. Harlem Shakes, cute name and all, often evoke this somewhat unseemly utopia -- blithely merry melodies, toy-store percussion, a vague children's-librarian vibe -- but with just enough knowing melancholy to undercut it. Yeah, the anthemic bummer "Strictly Game" has that line about making lemons into lemonade, but its chorus is a splendidly odd and biting sing-a-long:
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