Black Friday isn’t just for buying flat-screen TVs anymore, thanks to Record Store Day coordinating a flood of special vinyl releases to hit stores on the day after Thanksgiving. This year’s crop includes discs from Paul McCartney (a new “Say Say Say” 12″ featuring, of course, Michael Jackson); David Bowie (a release of Earthling on translucent green vinyl); Spoon (a…

Bob Dylan‘s label Columbia has partnered with Genius to present graphic visualizations of how some of Dylan’s classic lyrics evolved. Using the multiple takes available on Dylan’s forthcoming Bootleg Series box set focusing on the years 1965-66, Columbia staff have created GIFs that show how Dylan’s lyrics for songs like “Desolation Row” and “One of…

David Bowie has confirmed that his 27th studio album will be released on his 69th birthday: Jan. 8, 2016. Blackstar will contain only seven tracks: “long, jazzy jams mixed with the kind of driving beat pioneered by Seventies German bands Can and Kraftwerk,” according to a “Bowie insider” contacted by the Times of London. The album’s first…

Ending months of speculation, leaks, and rumors, Adele has made it official: her next album, which will indeed be titled 25 as previously speculated, will be released on Nov. 20 (as, also, previously speculated). Lead single “Hello,” with accompanying video, was released very early on Friday morning in the U.S. (That’s a slightly more convenient time in…

Singer Cory Wells has died, of undisclosed causes, at age 74. Wells was a founding member of Three Dog Night and one of the band’s three lead vocalists. “Cory was an incredible singer,” said bandmate Danny Hutton, “a great performer, he could sing anything. Cory was like a brother in so many ways. We had been together since 1965 and…

Aerosmith drummer Joey Kramer is opening a “Rockin’ and Roastin’ Cafe & Restaurant” at a ski resort town in Maine, and the planned menu items make unsubtle reference to the new restaurateur’s musical history. Among the items announced so far: “Janie’s Got a Bun” and “Livin’ on a Wedge.” (Boston Magazine) Adele has shared an update on…

On Sunday night the the Treasure Island Music Festival in San Francisco, Lauren Mayberry of CHVRCHES joined The National for a performance of the National song “I Need My Girl.” (Pitchfork) After covering Taylor Swift‘s album 1989 song-for-song, Ryan Adams sat down with Swift for a conversation about the differences between their relative interpretations of the material. (Rolling Stone) Don…

Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, the Minnesotan production duo behind Janet Jackson‘s new album Unbreakable, surprised Jackson by joining her onstage Friday night in Inglewood, California. They were on hand to congratulate Jackson (and themselves) on the news that Unbreakable debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200, making it Jackson’s seventh chart-topping album. (Billboard) Phil Lesh of the Grateful Dead revealed…

Patti Smith was at Dominican University in River Forest, Illinois to talk about her new memoir when a fan named Noreen Bender walked up and handed Smith several items that had been stolen 36 years ago—possibly when a truck containing some of Smith’s touring equipment was stolen in Chicago in 1979. Bender said a friend gave her…

Marlon James, a professor at St. Paul’s Macalester College, has won the prestigious Man Booker Prize for a novel that explores the attempted assassination of Bob Marley. Though the novel is a work of fiction, the assassination attempt that inspired the book actually happened, when gunmen stormed Marley’s house in 1976 and shot the reggae legend,…