Music

Twenty-eight years ago today (Jan. 31, 1993), Garth Brooks took his turn at one of the most coveted performance slots of all time: singing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl. But according to former NFL executive director Don Weiss' book, The Making of the Super Bowl: The Inside Story of the World’s Greatest Sporting Event, fans filling the Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena, Calif., as well as the 91 million people watching from home, were unaware of how close the Oklahoma native came to not taking the stage.Brooks had filmed...

It was after 1 a.m. by the time Sophie arrived onstage to close out PC Music’s SXSW showcase in March 2015, but you’d have been playing yourself if you left before her set. PC Music was one of the hottest topics of discussion in Austin that year — a mysterious, mischievous U.K. dance music collective that was either reinventing pop or destroying it, depending on whom you asked. Devoted ravers and curious passersby alike filed into the Empire Garage that Thursday night to see what SoundCloud jesters like A.G. Cook...

Eleven years ago today (Jan. 31, 2010), Taylor Swift made musical history: It was on that date the then-20-year-old became the youngest country artist, and, at the time, the youngest act of any genre, to ever win Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards.Swift received the honor for her sophomore album, Fearless, which was released in 2008. The record, which to date has sold more than 8 million copies worldwide, was co-produced by Swift along with Scott Borchetta and Nathan Chapman."I just hope you know how much this means to me," a...

System of a Down premiered their new video for “Genocidal Humanoidz” Saturday following a charity livestream to provide humanitarian aid to Armenians affected by the conflict over the disputed area known as Nagorno-Karabakh. A mix of live performance and animation, the visual features System of the Down playing their first new song in 15 years amid animated imagery of war-torn townspeople banding together to fight off the demons that have invaded. The video was directed by SOAD’s Shavo Odadjian and Deep Sky Animation’s Adam Mason. Prior to Saturday’s livestream, System...

The states of Florida and Georgia are known for their oranges and peaches, respectively, and that's almost how Florida Georgia Line got their name. As this installment of Taste of Country‘s You Think You Know Country? series reveals, the country hitmakers almost named themselves Orange Peach."We lived together for two years in Nashville and were hanging out in the hall and decided to take this music thing seriously and wanted to represent where we came from," Brian Kelley says. "Orange Peach was an early suggestion, then it got moved to Florida Georgia Line."Kelley...

Sophie, the avant-pop artist who produced singers like Madonna and Charli XCX and released the acclaimed 2018 album Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides, has died at the age of 34. The Scottish-born musician’s record label, Transgressive, confirmed Sophie’s death. “Tragically our beautiful Sophie passed away this morning after a terrible accident,” the label wrote. “True to her spirituality she had climbed up to watch the full moon and accidentally slipped and fell. She will always be here with us. The family thank everyone for their love and support and request...

Twenty-one years ago, on Jan. 30, 2000, Faith Hill had the distinct honor of opening Super Bowl XXXIV at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta by singing the National Anthem.Hill's version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" is widely considered to be one of the greatest Super Bowl anthem performances of all time. The vocalist took a leisurely approach to the song, stretching out each lyric for maximum impact as bagpipers and then an orchestra backed her up.She ended the song holding out the last lyric ("And the home of the brave") using...

A rare demo recording of Black Sabbath’s “Heaven and Hell,” the first song the band wrote after Ronnie James Dio replaced Ozzy Osbourne in 1979, has surfaced online. On the track are Dio, founding Sabbath members guitarist Tony Iommi and drummer Bill Ward, and bassist Geoff Nicholls, who joined the group in 1979 after founding bassist Geezer Butler quit the group for a short time. Nicholls, whose estate posted the recording Thursday to mark the fourth anniversary of his death, later moved over to keyboards and played with the band...

Eric Church fans literally hacked his website in search of information about his upcoming album, Heart & Soul. Thankfully, he doesn't mind.Per the Tennessean, days before Church revealed the news about his seventh studio album(s), fans flooded his website in an attempt to find a script for his Outsiders radio show on SiriusXM and a sneak peek at his new music. Instead, they found plans for his upcoming album Heart & Soul and began to spread the news across social media.Surprisingly enough, Church was actually pleased that his loyal fans were the first to know about the three-part project."We...

Paul Stanley’s Soul Station has released a new live performance video for their cover of the Five Stairsteps “O-o-h Child.” The clip finds the Kiss rocker and his 15-piece ensemble band in a cavernous warehouse space performing the timeless soul hit with plenty of aplomb and joy. “’O-o-h Child’ is a song of optimism and hope,” Stanley said in a statement. “I think we could all use some words about things getting ‘brighter’ and a time when ‘we’ll walk in the rays of a beautiful sun.’ You can see the...

Thirty-three years ago, on Jan. 29, 1988, Randy Travis achieved a new career milestone: It was on that date that the singer-songwriter earned his first double-platinum album, signifying sales in excess of 2 million copies, with his disc Always & Forever.Always & Forever, Travis' sophomore release, came out in 1987 and spawned four No. 1 singles, including "Forever and Ever, Amen" and "I Told You So." It stayed at the top of the country charts for several weeks that year and the next, becoming the year-end No. 1 album in 1988.Warner Bros. RecordsAlways...

Hipgnosis Songs Fund, Primary Wave, and other firms are on a shopping spree for high-profile music catalogs, snapping up publishing rights from songwriters ranging from Bob Dylan to Stevie Nicks to Neil Young. But Diane Warren, who’s been writing hits for 37 years, from DeBarge’s “Rhythm of the Night” to Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” to Toni Braxton’s “Un-Break My Heart,” says she has no intention of selling her songs to anyone. Merck Mercuriadis, founder/CEO of Hipgnosis and a music-biz lifer, is well aware that Warren isn’t...

Nickel Creek and I'm With Her member Sara Watkins' forthcoming new album is for families. Under the Pepper Tree finds the Grammy-winning musician revisiting the music of her childhood and reimagining it in her own way.Due out on March 26, Watkins' new record features 15 songs for listeners of all ages. In addition to two original tracks, the project features classics such as "When You Wish Upon a Star," Roy Orbison's "Beautiful Dreamer" and the Beatles' "Good Night." When she announced the album on Wednesday (Jan. 27), Watkins premiered her version...