Latest Stories
Most recently published stories in Beat.
8EEZ Playlist: Foreigner
Hello, I've been waiting for a reader like you. Nyuk, nyuk! My buddy Oates and I have received many a positive response for this blog series and we appreciate the feedback and certainly hope to be entertaining you with more artists' playlists — lord knows, there's absolutely no shortage!
By Carlos Gonzalez8 years ago in Beat
Pvris — All We Know Of Heaven, All We Need Of Hell: Album Review
Lead singer Lynn Gunn marches through a destructive atmosphere, she fights against the droves of demons which rack her brain, and she tries to overcome the strips of darkness which pummels the light. She’s damaged, there’s no doubt, but she’s an angel, shifting between rooms filled with love and hate. And on new record All We Know Of Heaven, All We Need Of Hell, Pvris quiver the spines, their output is of struggle, but redemption comes. Gunn sings with pride, she pushes her bellows like red alerts, and she has written lyrics of her broken past, a past blotted in fear.
By Mark McConville8 years ago in Beat
Album Review: Bobaflex 'Eloquent Demons'
Bobaflex has just issued their latest album, Eloquent Demons, the follow up to 2015's Anything That Moves and their first for new label Thermal Entertainment. It's the group's eighth album overall since their Mason, West Virginia origins which date back to 1998; a long and often painful band history that includes various lineup and label changes and even label bankruptcies among other various temporary setbacks.
By John Parks8 years ago in Beat
The Great Plagiarism Debate
Poor Ed Sheeran. You’d think that after seeing his bezzy mate Sam Smith wrangle with Tom Petty over the similarities between "I Won’t Back Down" and "Stay With Me", he might be more inclined to ensure his own musical integrity. Yet here he is, now dealing with his own lawsuit after being taken for a cool $20 million by the songwriters of Matt Cardle’s 2011 hit "Amazing", who claim Ed’s chorus for his 2014 number 1 hit, "Photograph", is a “note-by-note copy.”
By Nic Perrins8 years ago in Beat
Caffeine & Dexedrine
It may seem wildly improbable now, but the coolly piratical, perma-addled septuagenarian and epitome of rock & roll decadence who’s also known to the Inland Revenue as: "Mr Keith Richards" (don’t say that last bit too loud or he may have a flashback and decamp to the tax haven and sunny enclave of Villefranche-sur-Mer again!), was once a frothy cappuccino away from being a "mod!" Clearly what was once the underground had now gone over ground, and so artists who had formerly led the way in this new cultural melting pot had been reduced to merely followers in the modernist slipstream; hoping to catch a scintilla or more of its noble newness and shine.
By Rahman the Writer8 years ago in Beat
My Top Ten Sad Songs
We all have our favourite songs that get the tears going, and there's no real set playlist of songs that work for everybody. The songs I'm going to list here are my personal top ten favourite songs to listen to whenever I feel like having a good cry.
By The Wordy Birdy8 years ago in Beat
Paramore: Altering Of Styles. . Top Story - September 2017.
Pop punk has become somewhat swollen. It has many bands under its weighty arms. It gathers up many acts and spits them out into a state of failure. Many acts fizzle out or imitate, spearheading their music but cascading off into a fight for survival. But, there’s one band which shredded the rule book and blossomed into a colossal mainstay. That group is Paramore, an act flamboyant when they arrived on the scene in 2005 with their debut opus All We Know Is Falling.
By Mark McConville8 years ago in Beat
8EEZ Playlist: Pet Shop Boys
Hello, one in all in Boogie Wonderland. Another request from my friend Calvin "Oates" Cherry is to cast the spotlight on one of the most influential new wave/dance/pop duos to come out of the UK. Neil Tennant, vocals/keyboards/guitar, and Chris Lowe, vocals/keyboards, both formed in London and derived their name from a few friends that worked at a pet shop near the borough of Ealing.
By Carlos Gonzalez8 years ago in Beat
Darkness Then Salvation
If, like me, you are keenly attuned to the gloriously gnarly sturm and drang of the mighty Killing Joke, and the plethora of interesting non-band projects that trail in their white-hot wake, then the last 18 months or so have been a particularly fecund period.
By Rahman the Writer8 years ago in Beat
Ten of the Dopest Most Head-Splitting Dubstep Tracks that I Know About
I don't know if you've ever listened to dubstep music, ragastep, rapstep, dubtrap, trap, trapstep, or #bass music in general, or if you've been listening since you were knee-high to a duck. One thing I can tell you is, there's little point in presenting my opinions about "goodness" or "bestness" as facts, because the truth is — or at least it should be — as Jack Black sings: "it doesn't matter if it's good. It only matters if it rocks."
By Aulos.Media8 years ago in Beat
8EEZ Playlist: Duran Duran
Hello, music lovers of the world! Another spotlight by me and my best bud, Oates, is on a popular music act from the 1980s UK invasion. They were a five-man band out of Birmingham, England (the line-up has changed since) who mixed it up with glam, punk, new wave, disco, rock and yes, even hip hop, and haven't flinched ever since!
By Carlos Gonzalez8 years ago in Beat
Beyoncé Organizes BeyGOOD Houston Relief Effort in the Aftermath of Hurricane Harvey
Singer and megastar Beyoncé has followed through on her vow to provide significant assistance, which will go toward the disaster relief efforts in Southeast Texas in the wake of Hurricane Harvey's aftermath.
By Victor Trammell8 years ago in Beat
