Madonna hasn’t quite figured out Instagram
A few Photoshopped Instagram images of the likes of Martin Luther King Jr and Bob Marley was all it took for social media users to beg the pop icon to reconsider her actions, and maybe leave anti-racism campaigners out of the marketing strategy for her new album, Rebel Heart. According to Peter Robinson – who this week wrote about how the control queen lost her touch when media went social – the new tunes aren’t half-bad either. If you’re reading, Madge, more of the music and less of the African American tourism (anyone remember when she called her white son “dis nigga”?).
Sia’s Elastic Heart video wasn’t universally loved
The Australian singer-songwriter found herself in the eye of a media storm over a video featuring actor/paper-bag-wearer Shia LaBeouf and 12-year-old dancer Maddie Ziegler. Ziegler starred in Sia’s hugely successful Chandelier video, but her appearance alongside a grubby-looking LaBeouf here was interpreted as a child abuse/paedophilia trigger by some viewers. Sia apologised on Twitter, and as of Friday afternoon the video has been viewed almost 14m times.
Danny Brown is going from rap to lit
Detroit rapper Danny Brown wants to get “Seussy” and write a children’s book dedicated to his daughter, according to a radio interview he gave to Triple J in Australia on Monday. This has the potential to be wonderful, tugging at father-daughter heartstrings and displaying Brown’s gift for rhyme all at once. However, given his lack of experience in the literary world, it could be a disaster. Thankfully there’s always a plan B: maybe Brown could rap the words and sell it as a limited-edition single instead.
Morrissey loves himself a spot of matador-goring
Mozza doesn’t hold back on judgment of those he deems cruel to animals, and last weekend made his disdain for a bullfighter crystal-clear. According to his fansite, True to You, he “felt delight” to see bullfighter Karla de los Angeles gored in a Mexico City bullring. Here’s the rest of the short blogpost, and remember, this is a man who once equated eating meat with paedophilia. He cares not for your opinions.
“Who is Paul McCartney?” tweets are the gift that keeps on giving
If events following Kanye West and Paul McCartney’s New Year’s Day collaboration taught us one thing, it’s to treat every online comment with an ounce of suspicion. A handful of people jokingly posted tweets pretending not to have heard of Paul McCartney, and were taken seriously by so many publications. A special nod goes to news station NBC Charlotte for taking pop-culture commentator Desus Nice at face value, below.
#PEAKCAUCASITY https://t.co/t3V8EzNbJ6
— Desus Nice (@desusnice) January 5, 2015
We might have reached peak Beyoncé
It’s been great, guys, but it feels like it’s time to retire Beyoncé-based humour. Saturday Night Live essentially closed that chapter last year with its brilliant “Beygency” spot but the dregs keep coming in in 2015. Behold: the below cutesy song, referencing a series of hackneyed jokes about Beyoncé being inhumanly beautiful/talented. An underwhelming dud from the generally funny people at comedy network Above Average.
Thom Yorke probably didn’t make $20m from his last album
The Radiohead frontman’s solo album Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes came out via filesharing protocol BitTorrent last year. According to BitTorrent, it was downloaded 4.4m times, which was quickly calculated by various people on the internet as representing a £13.2m ($20m) profit for Yorke. It turns out things are not that simple, however, and he’s staying tight-lipped about the number of downloads that were the full album rather than the free bundle many estimates were based on.
An internet-famous 11-year old made a terrifying music video
If the idea of little girls screeching at each other and the sight of a K-Mart shop horrifies you, approach this Sophia Grace video for Best Friends with caution. Grace earned fame with several Ellen DeGeneres Show appearances after her home video performance of Nicki Minaj’s Superbass went viral in 2011. Now she’s getting blogged about on feminist site Jezebel. Welcome to the big leagues, young one.
The Wu-Tang Clan have picked an auctioneer for their “art” album
The story of the rap collective’s album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin moves on: an online auction house has now been confirmed to sell the only copy of the album that they’re making. If this thing leaks, they’ll be gutted.
.@WuTangClan to sell one-of-a-kind album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin through art auction house http://t.co/1KJ9pWkxm2 pic.twitter.com/LdKde42Onq
— Pitchfork (@pitchfork) January 7, 2015
Kid Rock adores being politically incorrect
The rap-rock-country-jock declared some strong opinions about everything from weed-smoking to gay marriage in an Observer as-told-to article that pinged all over the web last week. The key thing we learned from it? Kid Rock’s exactly the sort of guy you’d expect Kid Rock to be.
