An amazing read in the CBS about Prince and his legacy, remembering him five years after his untimely death in an accidental overdose of painkillers. In July, 'Welcome 2 America', the first full previously-unreleased studio album of Prince material is to be released posthumously. It will be the tenth posthumous Prince album release overall (all the other albums were a mix of re-releases and newly mined gems). 'W2A' is an album about racial inequality and social injustice, recorded more than a decade ago just outside Minneapolis, crackling with relevance today. This album is just a small part of what Prince has recorded and stashed in his vault, which he couldn't come into since he has - forgotten the password. There's roughly 8,000 Prince's recording left unreleased, which means we could get a Prince album every year for the rest of the millennium.

An interesting interview in the Rolling Stone with Bob Dylan manager Jonathan Kaplan, who releases his new book ‘The Magic Years: Scenes from a Rock-and-Roll Life’ May 4. The part about drugs says plenty about his rock years: "Robbie called Eric [Clapton] a 'chicken junkie' because Eric snorted it. He didn’t shoot it in his veins. But he was definitely at loose ends in a way that I hadn’t seen". Kaplan refused to manage Rolling Stones because of drugs: "I had just dealt with Eric, and just the nervousness of trying to get somebody onstage who was wrestling with heroin didn’t seem like it was worth it. Life was too short. I reached that point where I thought, maybe there’s a way to make a living where you don’t have to worry about a call at 3 a.m. because Richard has driven his car into a tree. The only person they call is the tour manager, right?". Slightly better experience with the Band: "Everybody was pretty well behaved from, say, June of ‘69 until June of ’70. Richard [Manuel] wasn’t drinking that much. Levon [Helm] liked sleeping pills, but it didn’t get to the bad spot. Rick [Danko] would snort anything that was put in front of him, but quite frankly, cocaine was not an issue in the late Sixties, and neither was heroin". George Harrison, on the other hand, liked to speed-drive and - meditate!

Primary Wave Music has bought the catalog of songwriter and producer Patrick Leonard, in a “multi-million-dollar deal”, Music Business Worldwide reports. Included in that acquisition is Leonard’s share of a number of hits from Leonard Cohen such as 'You Want It Darker', 'It Seemed the Better Way', and 'If I Didn’t Have Your Love', as well as his share of songwriter royalties from his work with Madonna - 'La Isla Bonita', 'Frozen', and the classic 'Like A Prayer'. MBW also reports about the first acquisition by the Influence Media Partners - a portfolio of select copyrights from the catalog of multi-platinum songwriter Ali Tamposi: 'Havana' by Camila Cabello, 'It Ain’t Me' by Selena Gomez, Shawn Mendes' 'Señorita' with Camila Cabello, Justin Bieber' 'Let Me Love You', Beyoncé's 'Save The Hero' and others.

A great text in the Quietus about the movie 'Sound of Metal' about a metal drummer losing his hearing. "Yet this film asserts the beauty of silence. The sound design immerses us in the surf of Ruben’s [main character] ears, forcing the undeaf onto [director]Marder’s subtitles, or leaving hearing suspended, making us question how we use noise to avoid life" - Soma Ghosh writes, adding "our worship of the physicality of rock has silenced the deafness in our midst, though deaf artists have shaped Romantic music since Beethoven".

Jim Steinman, the composer, lyricist and record producer behind many rock and pop hits has died at the age of 73, Deadline reports. His roster of hit records began with Meat Loaf’s smash 1977 debut album 'Bat Out of Hell' (among the 35 best-selling albums in U.S. history, racking up 14 million units sold), only to be continued by Bonnie Tyler hits 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' and 'Holding Out For A Hero', Barry Manilow’s 'Read ‘Em and Weep', Celine Dion’s 'It’s All Coming Back to Me Now' and many more.

"I write sad music. It’s how I process and it makes me feel good" - Pom Pom Squad's frontwoman Mia Berrin says in a Stereogum interview about their debut album 'Death Of A Cheerleader', out June 25. It's not that sad-sounding at all, the album is "bigger and brighter than Pom Pom Squad ever has, spanning Misfits-style punk bursts, longer grunge ballads, and a lot of pop".

"Formed in 1980, Rudimentary Peni shuffled awkwardly at the edges of the anarcho-punk scene, their breathless pace and sheer oddity marking them as something else entirely" - the Guardian looks back at the history of the UK punk band. The Quietus also goes on to explore "the curious case of Rudimentary Peni, a transcendent punk band". Band's first new album in 26 years, 'Great War', is out this week.

Rolling Stone brings an overview of marijuana's legal status in the US. The minority of 13 states have not legalized THC for either medicinal or recreational purposes by now. 17 of the federal states have given their residents a green light to smoke up at their leisure. The rest of the 20 states have it legalized for medical use only.

"Such high-profile homages to a band long under-appreciated beyond these shores... cut far deeper than any barbs in the script. They don’t just lift The Smiths into the revered echelons of your Beatles, Rolling Stones, Whos and U2s; they remind us how special a band we’ve come to define by their differences really were as a unit" - NME's Mark Beaumont writes about a recent 'The Simpsons' episode (as well as the recent movie 'Shoplifters of The World'), and what it means for the band (Morrissey didn't like The Simpsons, said he would sue, if it weren't so costly). The columnist believes "here’s our chance to rescue The Smiths from the pyre, unshackle them from the conversation around them and let their music settle back into its rightful place, just below the heart of the human condition".

UK music stars young and old - including Paul McCartney, Kate Bush, Robert Plant, Stevie Nicks, Sting, Roger Daltrey, Chris Martin, Kano, Noel Gallagher, Mike Skinner, Damon Albarn, Wolf Alice, and around 150 others - have called on the UK government to reform the way musicians are paid when their songs are streamed online, NME reports. They point out that "songwriters earn 50% of radio revenues, but only 15% in streaming". On streaming services, labels retain the majority of the money - with the artist receiving about 13% on average, and session musicians receiving nothing.

Adam Met from the pop trio AJR wrote an outline for eco-friendly touring, including the ways in which everyone - artists, agents, promoters, venues, fans - can participate in technological, agricultural, and psychological solutions. For agents it would mean connecting flydates in ways that permit less travel, encouraging less private plane usage, and choosing the most direct bus routes. Venues could transition to electricity from renewable sources, standardize the requirements for food and drink vendors to use local farms and move away from single-use plastics...

Apple Music has published last week that their average per play rate is $0.01, which is roughly double what Spotify pays the artists. But it's not that simple - MBW and Trapital explain Apple Music's and Spotify's models, their reach, the number of users, and how much exactly they pay to the labels (not directly to the artists, actually). Variety also points out, with word of an unnamed executive, that the best option is "a lot of users streaming a lot of music”, which would in return mean a lower per-stream rate. For example, if one artist were racking up a high percentage of streams on a less-popular streaming service, their per-stream rate would be quite high — but they’d actually have fewer streams than they would on a site with more users. Spotify has an industry-leading 155 million paying subscribers and 345 million active users, according to its most recent report, while Apple last reported more than 60 million Music subscribers in June 2019.

“The hatred shown towards me from the creators of the Simpsons is obviously a taunting lawsuit, but one that requires more funding than I could possibly muster in order to make a challenge” - Morrissey writes on his website after a Simpsons episode which parodied the former Smiths frontman. "The worst thing you can do in 2021 is to lend a bit of strength to the lives of others. There is no place in modern music for anyone with strong emotions … In a world obsessed with Hate Laws, there are none that protect me” - the singer says. Morrissey satirised during the episode 'Panic on the Streets of Springfield', in which Lisa Simpson becomes obsessed with a fictional band called the Snuffs and befriends its frontman, Quilloughby.

As of October 2020, TikTok was reaching 732 million monthly active users around the world, which was more than double Spotify‘s global monthly active user base as of the end of 2020 (345 million), but less than half the 2 billion-plus logged-in monthly active users YouTube pulls in around the world, MBW reports on the popular app's statistics. TikTok’s average user opens the app 19 (nineteen!) times in an average day, in an average of 89 minutes per day. Nearly half (42%) of all active users on the platform were between the age of 18 and 24, a further 17% were aged between 13 and 17, and just 7% were over the age of 45.

Pakistan-born, New York-based artist Arooj Aftab is releasing her new album 'Vulture Prince' later this month, with South Asian, reggae, western indie music influences, which she explains in an NPR interview: "I sometimes feel that, even approaching my own music - what I mean is South Asian music - is like the quintessential imposter syndrome situation where it's like, you know, I haven't really studied this, and I never went back since 19. I might be appropriating it, too, you know? So I'm always kind of making sure that I'm actually inheriting the music with integrity and with some kind of depth and with some kind of respect for its history rather than using it".

The No. 1 YouTube musicologist delivers yet another fun music class, this time about "the most elegant key change in all of pop music", written by Eric Carmen and made famous by Celine Dion. Neely says it's "modal mixture, common tone, enharmonic, double chromatic, mediant modulation".

Apple Music told artists and labels it pays a penny per stream, according to the Wall Street Journal. Apple's penny-per-stream payment structure is roughly double what Spotify, the world's largest music-streaming service, pays music-rights holders per stream. Spotify pays an average of about one-third to one-half penny per stream. However, Spotify's larger user base generates many more streams.

Songwriter of, well, the most popular pop band in the history of pop music, has some ideas for underpaid songwriters, which he shared in an op/ed in the Guardian: "Record labels could encourage a 'songwriter in residence' model, where artists are paired with songwriters at the development stage, as a long-term partnership: the writers would effectively become part of the band, paid a regular salary... I suggest that streaming services allocate their royalty payments based on the behaviour of individual listeners. The subscription should be divided by the number of songs the individual listener has played during a month".

P-MRC, the owner of Rolling Stone, The Hollywood Reporter, Variety, Billboard and Deadline, has acquired a 50% stake in SXSW LLC, making it the biggest single shareholder in the music/film/tech conference and festival based out of Texas, the Wall Street Journal reports. The SXSW 2020 event was scrapped by Austin officials due to the coronavirus outbreak, and in 2021 an online event was organized, so, when “Jay Penske approached us with an interest in becoming a partner, it was a true lifeline for us", SXSW CEO and Co-Founder, Roland Swenson, has said.

The Face presents 'Deviation Classics', a compilation of music that best represents "a key part of a healthy musical ecosystem", the London club night Deviation. With Dorian Concept, Carl Craig, Flying Lotus and James Blake featured there, it "arguably represents certain values of club culture that are worth preserving for a post-pandemic world".

Plenty of records set by Taylor Swift on Billboard 200 chart this week, according to Billboard. Re-recorded version of her 2008 album 'Fearless', titled 'Fearless (Taylor’s Version)' scores the biggest week of 2021 for any album with 291,000 equivalent albums. She's the first woman with three new No. 1 albums in less than a year - in August 'Folklore' debuted at No. 1 with 846,000 units, while 'Evermore' arrived at No. 1 in December with 329,000 units. 'Fearless (Taylor’s Version)' is the only No. 1 album of its kind: a re-recording of an artist’s (own or another’s) previously released album. Album sales of 'Fearless (Taylor's Version)' comprise 179,000, making it the top-selling album of the week. The three largest weeks for an album in the last eight months all Belong to Swift. She is also the first woman with three new No. 1 albums in less than a year. Swift also becomes the first woman in the 65-year history of the chart with three new No. 1s in less than 12 months; Donna Summer held that record since 1979/1980.

"I no longer have any need for drugs, the Maharishi or the Beatles. I am myself and I know why" - John Lennon has said at the time when his 'John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band' coming out, which was also when he was going through then-fashionable but now-discredited “primal scream” psychotherapy technique. The new technique was the work of psychotherapist Arthur Janov who believed that unlocking repressed childhood pain required a physical release - maybe even screaming. GQ brings the story of the cult-like therapy and its connection to the album (deluxe edition came out last week).

Mike Mitchell, who recorded one of the most famous guitar solos of all time for Kingsmen’s 'Louie Louie' (a loose rendition of Richard Berry’s 1957 song), has died aged 77, Rolling Stone reports. With Mitchell’s rock’n’roll guitar solo adding a crazed energy to the three-chord recording, the song is a cornerstone of the garage rock sound. It also features a famous error by the band's vocalist Jack Ely as he comes back in too early after Mitchell’s solo. The band had a decades-long touring career with Mitchel as the permanent, and the only founding member left.

"Though female country stars didn’t compete for the night’s top prize – Luke Bryan was named entertainer of the year – they owned Sunday’s ACM Awards" - Denver Post argues about the nature of last night's ceremony. "Carrie Underwood brought the Academy of Country Music Awards to church. Maren Morris won two honors, including song of the year. Miranda Lambert performed three times and held onto her record as the most decorated winner in ACM history. And Mickey Guyton, the first Black woman to host the awards show, gave a powerful, top-notch vocal performance".

Russian electro group Love Object share a dance bomb 'Transparent Woman (Prozrachnaya Zhenschina)' with added cinematic video; psychedelic prog meets post-rock on Elder frontman Nick DiSalvo's 'The Reflecting Pool' which announces his solo debut; Andra Day shares a smooth banger 'Phone Dies' produced by Anderson .paak; Alfa Mist shares jazz-electronics-psych mix 'Teki'; Rodrigo Y Gabriela have covered Astor Piazzolla's flamenco instrumental 'Oblivion'.

"Cannabis is a very different social lubricant from alcohol. It heightens sensitivity to the emotional states of both yourself and those around you, rather than numbing everything into a blur. The intimacy and introspection that weed brings to a party is a different kind of energy that makes is well-suited to the need for post-pandemic healing in spaces of social reunification" - Rave New World newsletter writes ahead on 4/20 weed parties about to happen next week.

“I wouldn’t have a job right now if it wasn’t for Twitch” - DJ Ardalan says to Vice in a long-read about the transfer of DJs from clubs to Amazon's streaming service. For electronic dance music, Twitch has become a juggernaut. Paid partnerships with individual acts like Soul Clap, Seth Troxler, Justin Martin, and Ardalan show how Twitch is investing to attract more DJs to its platform.

A group of 277 attendees at the notorious Fyre festival are to receive settlement payouts of $7,220 each, according to the latest lawsuit ruling, at the US bankruptcy court in New York. The 2017 event drew global attention after the supposedly luxury music experience, promoted by supermodels and set to feature artists such as Major Lazer and Migos, turned out to resemble a disaster relief camp with windswept tents and decidedly non-gourmet food. Attendees had spent between $1,000 and $12,000 on tickets to the festival, which was cancelled on its opening day. Organiser Billy McFarland was sentenced to six years in prison for fraud in October 2018, The Verge reports.

"Their elaborate and very loud efforts to build tension, achieve overwhelming catharsis, and write their most memorable melodies yet feels more like a conversation with a medium they love. It doesn’t hurt that their newfound transparency makes the music feel refreshingly human and relatable" - Pitchfork reviews the new album by the elusive hipster-hardcore band The Armed (tagged it Best New Music, grade 8.2). 'Ultrapop' is also Stereogum's Album of the Week, described as "punishing, bombastic, catchy, genuinely surprising collection of songs... It sounds like everything hitting at once. It rules so hard". Treblezine appreciates the album's "juxtaposition of delicate dream pop and metal".

InsideHook offers a brief rundown of some of the best musician archives on the web, from indie superstars like Radiohead, Courtney Barnett, and Fugazi to icons like Neil Young, Johnny Cash, and the Dead, with some Def Leppard in between.