No big new albums were out last week, so "older" albums took a chance to rise to the top of Billboard 200 chart. Roddy Ricch’s 'Please Excuse Me for Being Antisocial' returned to No. 1 on the American albums chart for a third nonconsecutive week, after earning a little under 95,000 equivalent album units with vast majority of 92,000 SEA in units (streaming equivalent albums). Billie Eilish climbed to the No. 3 spot with her album 'When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?' sold in 62,000 equivalent album units, thanks to her big night at the Grammys. Eminem’s 'Music to Be Murdered By' falls to No. 2 with 89,000 equivalent album units in its second week.

Andy Gill, founding member and guitarist of the highly influential Gang of Four, has died aged 64. "Andy’s final tour in November was the only way he was ever really going to bow out; with a Stratocaster around his neck, screaming with feedback and deafening the front row" - his current band said on Facebook. The surviving members of the original Gang of Four lineup also released a statement - "we fondly remember the good times when the four of us wanted to change the world. Andy was our brother. We made a lot of great noise and art together. We had a few drinks. We traveled the world and made friends. We made people dance, and think, and laugh, and love".

"A spine-tingling collection of traditional songs, artfully reinterpreted for contemporary ears and concerns" - Telegraph says in a review of Sam Lee's new album. It was produced by Suede's Bernard Butler, with guest vocals from the Cocteau Twins’ Liz Fraser, and it's title 'Old Wow' is Lee’s phrase about the enduring power of nature. The Guardian chose it as their latest Folk album of the month - "Butler has produced Old Wow like a soul record, full of space and warmth. But this treatment fills Lee’s clear, precise diction with a stark, longing quality. Add a sleepy Sunday-morning John Martyn jazz vibe... and the effect is exquisite". The Observer likes it as much - "It’s a daring piece of chamber folk".

Toronto rapper untradition raps to himself in a mirror in an isolated cabin in this stark black and white video. Director Devon Little set 'FEBRUARY' in the wilderness without a soul in sight, with plenty of whiteness, and small amount of threatening blackness. The song by the blues/jazz/funk/hip-hop maestro features freeform jazz production and frenetic sax melodies.

A nice punky song 'M1A1' buy the Gorillaz, featuring slowthai and Slaves, with the cartoon band members showing up in the video; Nicolas Jaar revived his Against All Logic alias and has shared a song 'Alucinao', a collaboration with FKA twigs, song is tagged as "grimeton" (probably a portmanteau of "grime" and "reggaeton); Peter Bjorn And John released a jazzy pop song 'Drama King'; old school hip-hop house is full again - Method Man and Redman feature on a Gang Starr remix of 'Bad Name'; producer Daniel Avery and Nine Inch Nails synth wizard Alessandro Cortini have announced their new collaborative album with a new song 'Illusion of Time'; Royde Da 5'9'' proves he's in fine form with 'I Don't Age'; “Murderfolk” artist Amigo the Devil has released a new Tom Jones cover 'Delilah', on banjo; underground rapper Aesop Rock is back with a new single 'Rogue Wave'.

Many young rappers have died in the past few years. Mac Miller died in 2018 aged 26 of a cocaine-fentanyl overdose, Lil Peep died at 21 in 2017 of accidental fentanyl and Xanax overdose. Juice WRLD died late last year after a drug-induced seizure. XXXTentacion was killed in 2018 aged 20 in a robbery. In March 2019, Nipsey Hussle was shot dead outside his Los Angeles clothing store. What can be done to stop this?

'American Utopia' began as a David Byrne album, it was then turned into a Broadway musical, and now movie director Spike Lee is adapting a feature-length film version. “Pinch me. This couldn’t have worked out better for this project” - Byrne commented on the project. 'American Utopia', the album, came out in 2018, and the musical opened in October 2019 with Byrne joined onstage by 11-piece mobile ensemble playing songs from the album, other tracks from his solo catalog, and Talking Heads material. The movie is coming out this year.

Michael Stipe was on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert where he talked about his new photography book 'Out Interference Times', and how he felt the need to create art again, inspired by the eco-activists, so he made two new solo songs - 'Your Capricious Soul' and 'Drive to the Ocean'. He also described an occasion from late 90s when he told Donald Trump to "shut up" at a Patti Smith concert because he was talking too loud.

"The artist on stage has never sounded more at home" - Pitchfork says about the newest Destroyer album, giving it it's Best new music banner (grade 8.5). The P gives instructions on how to listen to 'Have We Met' - "you don’t relate to a Destroyer song so much as you find yourself mysteriously pulled inside of it, drawing connections and finding meaning on your own". The Quietus loves the album also - "in these murky and menacing melodies, creating the aural equivalent of a murder-mystery TV mini-series, Bejar's transition from songwriter to musical dramatist is complete".

Small venues are important not only to touring musicians and gig-goers, but also to the fabric of our culture and to the future of young talent, NME writes in a lovely article about the Independent Venue Week (being held till February 2 in the UK, and one week in July in the US). “I was playing in places like this for about 10 years” this year’s Independent Venue Week Ambassador Anna Calvi tells NME - “I wasn’t confident when I first went out and started singing in a three-piece punk band. Over those 10 years, I became much more of a singer and completely changed the style of music that I wanted to make. You have to play live to find out what turns you on”. So, long live small venues!!!

K-pop boy-band BTS is one of South Korea’s biggest exports - with ticket sales, music downloads and merchandise racking up a reported $4.65 billion last year, which amounts to 0,3% of South Korean GDP. They have sponsorship deals with companies from all over the spectrum - when BTS stepped out in a Hyundai Palisade last year, the SUV was on back-order for months. Sportswear manufacturer Puma had s deal with BTS for track suits and sneakers; global character brand LINE Friends had a deal for cellphone cases and plush dolls; South Korean beauty brands VT Cosmetics and Mediheal have a marketing deal with them for makeup, perfume and face masks; even toy maker Mattel is partners with BTS, for figurines and Uno card deck.

MIDI 1.0 was released 37 years ago, and it had a big influence on music as a tool for manipulating and transferring sound. Now, it has finally received a major update - MIDI 2.0 is expanded from 7-bit values to 32-bit values (like going from the resolution of a 1980s television to the high-def TVs of today). It means that instead of 128 steps for features like volume, there will now be billions. With more memory, this should mean music played on MIDI 2.0 instruments will feel more analog, and make it possible for non-keyboard instruments to work better with MIDI.

"If you want to know why everyone’s talking about New York right now, this should explain everything" - Fact magazine says representing a mix by New York DJ and producer MoMa Ready. His "FACT mix 744" is "a journey through New York City’s vibrant scene", with tracks by MoMa Ready, Gallery S., Kush Jones, P. Leone, AceMo, among others.

"I’ve been listening to jazz my whole adult life, or more. But I generally do not raise the subject with anyone unless I know they are also into it, as though it was a sexual kink or a fringe religion" - the Outline reporter writes in a great article about "the jazz guys". An interesting perspective of a "jazz guy" is the one on Damien Chazelle, director of the films 'Whiplash' (2014) and 'La La Land' (2016) - "'Whiplash' is a sports movie in which the athletes compete using musical instruments... 'La La Land' managed to be even worse - a story about black music that is overwhelmingly white, a movie musical that is inspidly heterosexual".

“I hate LA" - Kelis says in a Guardian interview, because - "There’s nowhere to go after 10 at night. So I thought, if I’m going to be in California, I should be where I can appreciate how beautiful it really is, not stuck in LA and pretending it’s a city that’s fun”. So, she moved with her two sons and husband to a 10-hectare farm deep in wine-country California, next to rocky hills. This spring she is going on a world tour to mark 'Kaleidoscope', her debut album she is very proud of - “the femaleness of the album, of the freaking outspokenness of it, the blackness of it, the alternativeness of it”.

Rolling Stone presents eight US cities where big things are going on, this time around it's Chicago. Makaya McCraven, Angel Bat Dawid, and Nicole Mitchell are leading a major jazz renaissance - they're connecting Chicago’s long history of avant-garde innovation with inspirations ranging from hip-hop beats to Nineties post-rock. On the other side, there are hip-hop up-and-comers like Calboy, Polo G, and Lil Zay Osama, who have softened some of drill’s hard edges, pairing deeply honest lyrics with delicate melodies over lilting beats.

There are: uplifting and smooth 'Show You' by CJ Fly; a powerful punk song 'Breeze' by The Men, written on a lunch break; The National collaborator Eve Owen presented her debut album with ‘So Still For You’; These New Puritans have reworked their song 'The Mirage' adding a children's chorus; Saudade - a collective including members of Deftones, Bad Brains and Cro-Mags - shared 'Lions', a synth-pop/screamo jewel; Berlin band Hope sing about anorexia on 'Shame'; Jah Wobble and Mark Stewart (of The Pop Group) teamed for 'A Very British Coup', an anti-Brexit song

“In the near future, It would be exciting to be able to rewrite ads as freely as is depicted in this music video while wearing such a device and wandering around the city” - director Daito Manabe explains the new video he made for 'Terminal Slam', the latest track from Squarepusher's new album 'Be Up a Hello'. In the video, the advertisements that inundate Tokyo’s Shibuya Crossing are visually disrupted by a pair of augmented reality goggles. A good song, also.

Normally, this would have been some satire, but in this case it's just - self-censorship. Indie-rockers from the not-so-unliberal Canada, the New Pornographers have released a new kids’ shirt with the censored name “The News Photographers”, as they announced on their Instagram. The shirt also features the artwork and title of their most recent album 'In the Morse Code of Brake Lights'. Well, maybe it's just a joke. Or, it's - a joke.

Music, like pretty much everything else, is caught up in petro-capitalism. Vinyl records, as well as cassettes and CDs, are oil products that have been made and destroyed by the billion since the mid-20th century. Is rejecting physical media and embracing streaming the answer? No, because digital media is physical media, too. Digital audio files rely on infrastructures of data storage, processing and transmission that have potentially higher greenhouse gas emissions than the petrochemical plastics – to stream music is to burn coal, uranium and gas.

"More clearly sketches out his development from displaced African boy to imprisoned British man, and it is by far the best J Hus has been on record as a performer and storyteller" - Pitchfork says about the new album by the London rapper. Alexis Petridis heard it sooner and chose it as his Album of the week, describing it as "an expression of growing up in London surrounded by an array of different cultural influences". The NME appreciates how J Hus artfully melded together various genres – Afrobeat, grime, dancehall, hip-hop, R&B, bashment – into a whole new genre "afroswing", adding the album is a "rounded project with polished edges that sparkle in parts".

Jim Marshall made the photo of Hendrix burning his guitar at Woodstock, Johnny Cash playing Folsom Prison, The Beatles at their last concert, now - he is being watched. A new film, 'Show Me the Picture: The Story of Jim Marshall', captures the stories behind the images and the man himself, a complex character who fully immersed himself into the culture of the time. The documentary is coming to cinemas.

British pop singer-songwriter Tom Rosenthal, and certainly a very proud father, shared a new tune he made with his toddler daughter named Fenn, "nearly 4 year old". Her hit single, 'Dinosaurs in Love', tells the heartbreaking tale of romance coming to a tragic end: "Dinosaurs eating people/ Dinosaurs in love/ Dinosaurs having a party/ They eat fruit and cucumber", and then comes the climax - "A big bang came/ And they died/ Dinosaurs, dinosaurs fell in love/ But they didn't say goodbye".

Ozzy Osbourne is urging people not to declaw their cats in a new ad for PETA, with the explanation the procedure is actually a partial amputation. The PETA ad depicts Ozzy with his fingers amputated and bloody, and the tagline reads - “Never Declaw a Cat. It’s an Amputation, Not a Manicure”. PETA explained that when cats are declawed, their claws and part of their toes are amputated.

The new album by the American indie synth-pop band Poliça’s "is the sound of an individual and a band finding a new purpose, a new way to live and create", as The Life of Best Fit says in a review. Clash Music says the album fuses "indietronica with downtempo and bass-heavy techno". For NME, it's simply "a stunning tale of redemption and rehabilitation" (the singer Channy Leaneagh badly hurt her back before they started making this record, "using music as a crutch")

A great interview by the UK grime rapper Stormzy for Tidal, where he talks about his sense of responsibility of being the representative of UK black culture, saying he feels pressure, but - "I have purpose and the purpose makes the pressure way lighter". Also, he talks about how proud he is of his Banksy Glastonbury vest and being relaxed about his Wiley beef because, as a grime MC, he feels "most comfortable in conflict".

Every winter, three thousand metalheads cruise the Caribbean at the largest Heavy Metal cruise in the world - 70,000 Tons of Metal. The cruise takes place upon The Independence of The Seas, the theatre stages on it are converted into onboard metal venues, becoming home to more than 60 metal bands over the course of four days at sea from Florida to Mexico and back. Paper Magazine writes, lovingly, how every year, almost all Royal Caribbean staff members allegedly ask to work the cruise, saying that people they meet are considerably nicer and cause way less drama than other cruise experiences.

London-born, launched in 2011 with a £5,000 budget and a pair of CDJs from a Littlewoods catalog, NTS radio now attracts over 1.5 million monthly unique listeners, and is currently growing between 3-10% a month. Artists that play live on NTS include Blood Orange, Erykah Badu, Flying Lotus, Aphex Twin, Brian Eno, Bjork, Slowthai, Skepta, The XX, Andrew Weatherall, Kamasi Washington, The Black Madonna, Sampha, Kelela, Floating Points, Mac Demarco and many others.

Jazz is more serious than other genres - jazz requires exactly as much or as little expertise to listen to and appreciate as anything else

Jazz was born in New Orleans - it emerged almost simultaneously in a number of different communities

Jazz must swing - jazz artists are prone to experimenting with unusual time signatures

Jazz musicians were (or are) on drugs - early propaganda designed to paint black communities as dens of iniquity, and create reasons to arrest them

Jazz is dead - it’s integral to hip-hop and vibrant jazz scenes in Los Angeles, Chicago, London, Canada

Turkish authorities in Istanbul have detained Amir Tataloo, real name Amirhossein Maghsoudloo after he was flagged as a wanted person by Interpol. A popular but controversial figure in Iran, the rapper is known for his outspoken criticism of the country's government. Police said Iran's judicial authorities had made the request for Tataloo's arrest "for encouraging citizens, especially young people, to use drugs, especially psychotropic drugs, and for spreading corruption."