Nile Rodgers will succeed Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff as chair of the Songwriters' Hall of Fame, the organization announced on Monday. "I will try and serve with all my heart. I hope I can make you half as proud of me as I am to even sit in the room with you who've done so much for the furtherance of composition," said Rodgers, who was inducted in 2016. (NPR)

Rodgers was inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year — but in the form of a committee-named Award for Musical Excellence, presented last year after Rodgers' band Chic was featured 11 times on the ballot without being voted in. (The Atlantic) "I feel like somebody put me in the lifeboat and told my family they can't get in," he said when that award was announced. (Rolling Stone)

Remembering Alan Longmuir

Bassist Alan Longmuir, a founding member of the Bay City Rollers, has died in his native Scotland after falling ill on vacation, at age 70. Despite their name (chosen after a dart thrown at a map landed on Bay City, Mich.), the band were Scots who were always more popular in the U.K. than in the U.S., but who nonetheless enjoyed great success here, best-known for their 1975 chart-topper "Saturday Night." Longmuir left the band in 1976, saying he was too stressed to continue. Ultimately, the band sold over 100 million records worldwide. (New York Times)

German controversy over musicians boycotting Israel

A movement to boycott Israel has been slowly but surely gaining traction in the music world, with Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters leading a charge that's led to artists including Lorde avoiding the country in protest of its treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories.

That boycott is making waves in Germany, where in the wake of World War II, concerns over anti-Semitism are perpetually acute. Young Fathers, the acclaimed British hip-hop group, were dropped from an arts festival last month due to their support of the movement; when protests ensued, including a threat by Laurie Anderson to pull out of the festival, the group was re-invited...but they declined to re-book, and will be skipping the event.

Meanwhile, Waters is trading barbs with the mayor of Munich, who criticized the bassist in a statement published after a recent show in that city. The mayor accused Waters of "anti-Semitic boycott campaigns against Israel," notes the New York Times.

To no avail, Waters asked that the statement be retracted.

Smashing Pumpkins house show shut down

The recently-reunited Smashing Pumpkins threw a house show on Thursday at the L.A. house where their "1979" video was filmed in the mid-1990s. As Billboard reports, though, the neighbors called the cops.

Citing loud noises and an influx of cars taking up all the street parking, neighbors complained, eventually forcing the police to get involved. Fortunately, the band was able to finish their set, but their planned "Cherub Rock" encore didn't pan out.

Billy Corgan later apologized for "the disturbance of our nihilistic noize."

Bey gets stranded

There aren't many stars who can execute grand plans as consistently as Beyoncé, so fans in Warsaw were astonished when Bey got stranded on a floating stage after her Saturday show with Jay-Z. The platform, which was supposed to lower her back down to the main stage, stopped about ten feet above where it was supposed to. Crew members ultimately came and brought her very carefully down using a ladder. (Paper)

Meanwhile, the Carters have announced that their collaborative album Everything is Love will come out this Friday on CD. Vinyl collectors, sorry, you'll still have to wait. (Pitchfork)