November 2009 Archives

On the Record is a video series where rock stars gush about their favorite records -- in exactly 45 seconds.

ARTIST: Silversun Pickups RECORD: In Rainbows

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Lemmy on the Beatles and more in the rest of our On the Record series.

Wavves

La Roux

Jay-Z

Animal Collective

Given the roller coaster of his career so far, it's hard to believe that Chris Brown has been in the pop spotlight for just four years. But it was only late November 2005 when "Run It!" began its five-week streak atop the pop chart -- a peak that, among male solo artists, only Montell Jordan a decade before had managed with a debut single. Three albums, numerous solo R&B and pop Top 10s, several equally popular collaborations and guest spots, a few TV and film roles, countless mind-boggling dance moves, and one potentially career-destroying guilty felony assault plea later, Chris Brown is now at a major juncture.

So to mark the release of Graffiti, we've put together a few playlists taking stock of where Brown's career now stands and putting it inside a larger picture -- which is to say, not just Chris Brown's own hits and those of his peers and influences, but in the context of the assault against Rihanna that will inevitably define him in many minds for the forseeable future. (To listen to, collect and share the awesome tracks we've compiled, all you need to do is sign up today for a free trial Rhapsody membership.)

Country music went on a wild ride the past decade, a ride that took us to the honky-tonk, the Appalachian Mountains, where the blacktop ends, and to Small Town, U.S.A. The watered-down flavor of contemporary country music has been an issue for some time now, and for better or worse, a handful of young country artists have taken the genre more into the mainstream than ever.

In retrospect, it was a good 10 years for country music, where if nothing else, the viability of the format and the star power of its singers have never been stronger. We've tried our best to assemble the highlights, whether artistic or commercial. If we've overlooked your favorite, let us know in the comments box.

Wu's Iron Chef returned in 2009 with a sequal to his classic 1995 album, Only Built for Cuban Linx. Despite the naysayers and haters, the Chef did not dissapoint, giving us a slew of gritty tales of the crack game told over dusty soul loops. Rhapsody recently caught up with Rae and spoke with him about his new album as well as his upcoming collaboration with Method Man and Ghostface.

Dr. Lonnie Smith

Palmetto Records has been carrying the torch for forward-thinking modern jazz since 1990. With an indie spirit and a refusal to be pigeonholed, founder and producer Matt Balitsaris is serving to extend the vernacular of post-bop, avant garde and other jazz-inspired sounds. Artists/composers such as bassist Ben Allison, organist Dr. Lonnie Smith, pianist Fred Hersch, saxophonist Ted Nash and drummer Bobby Previte round out a roster that is as varied as it is virtuosic and important to the continued growth of independent jazz.

Download eight free tracks from some of Palmetto's all-star players -- with no strings attached -- including Will Bernard, Javon Jackson, Frank Kimbrough, Kate McGarry and more.

Clink link below to download a zipped file of MP3s.

Hawk Nelson
It wouldn't be the holidays without eating, gift-giving and more eating. We put the word out to some of our favorite artists -- A Fine Frenzy, 30h!3, Zac Brown, and many more -- and they got back to us with their favorite holiday recipes, including photos. So preheat your ovens, throw on one of our holiday playlists and enjoy the culinary stylings of Rhapsody's own Top Chefs.

Let R&B singer Angie Stone warm up your winter with this special holiday edition of Rock Star Guide to the Galaxy. Angie gives us details on her new record Unexpected, shows us her favorite places in Atlanta to spend time with family, and gives us her very own recipe for pineapple upside down cake. Yum.

Forget six degrees of Kevin Bacon, try three degrees of Them Crooked Vultures -- the new rock supergroup featuring John Paul Jones, Josh Homme and Dave Grohl -- and you'll get to just about anyone who's ever picked up an instrument. Because that would be a never-ending project, we decided to plant the seed of a Kevin Bacon-esque flowchart -- sans Jones (not because we don't love him or Led Zeppelin, but because that would be a whole other never-ending project) -- and see how far we could let it grow. So with the two ringleaders of rock's current fraternity, desert-rock pioneer Homme and drummer/frontman extraordinaire Grohl, we've charted out their numerous bands, projects and collaborations and realized these guys are not just ridiculously prolific, they have so many connections to each other and rock's elite that we couldn't even plot them all. We stopped at around 69, and that number was mere coincidence.

Our challenge to you: click on the image to view our complete, interactive flowchart, listen to all the artists represented -- just click on their name and press Play -- and start configuring more degrees of separation. Not too difficult, right?

Over the past decade, the definitions of "alternative" and "indie" have become increasingly subjective. An independent artist can quickly attract a mainstream following thanks to instant blog/social-networking stardom, and a major-label luminary can venture into decidedly "indie" sounds (which in itself really has no concrete meaning). Alternative and indie can refer to artists who delve into rock, pop, electronic, world, jazz, classical -- sometimes all at once. It's a genre that refuses to be a genre. Its essence is to reject classification and celebrate eccentricity, abstractness and autonomy.

So this is by no means a definitive list; it's simply an acknowledgment of artists that have managed to continually stand out, whether they're Brits, Canadians, Brooklynites or a solo dude holed up in a Midwestern cabin. Though many of the artists represented here belong to some sort of revival -- post-punk, synth-pop, classic rock, garage-rock, shoegazer, folk -- each has imprinted their genre with a distinctly modern touch that will forever be recognized as quintessential '00s, a decade when innovation was steered not by looking to the future but by honoring the past.

Be sure to listen to all the artists mentioned here, anywhere and anytime in high-def audio, with your Rhapsody subscription. Not a member? Click here for a free trial and get on board with the ultimate music experience.

The Swell Season

ANTI- Records was founded in 1999 as a sister label to Epitaph Records. It's the byproduct of  its founder, Bad Religion guitarist Brett Gurewitz, growing up a bit and realizing that he has broadened his musical horizons beyond just punk rock. Sure, the Distillers and one of ANTI-'s earliest signings, Tom Waits, are both punks at heart, but they hardly make good labelmates.

The latest crop of releases from the Swell Season, Neko Case, Os Mutantes, Islands and Booker T. are kind of all over the place stylistically; they almost make you think there oughtta be yet another sublabel under the Epitaph roof. Irish-Czech emo-pop (the Swell Season), cheeky alt-country (Case), Brazilian psychedelia (Os Mutantes), Hammond organ-infused blues-rock (Booker) and preciously baroque indie rock (Islands) hardly share a common note, but maybe that's the point.

Here's a taste of free tracks from the label's latest.

On the Record is a video series where rock stars gush about their favorite records -- in exactly 45 seconds.

ARTIST: Raekwon RECORD: Paid In Full

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Lemmy on the Beatles and more in the rest of our On the Record series.

Strangely enough, one of the most influential songs of the '00s may have come out in 1981. Hank Williams, Jr.'s "A Country Boy Can Survive" is basically a doomsday sermon about how the big city is going to hell in a handbasket, but it doesn't really matter, because out in the sticks, where folks are still taught to run trout lines and say "ma'am," life will go on no matter what. "The preacher man says it's the end of time/ And the Mississippi River she's a goin' dry," Bocephus ominously warns. "The interest is up and the stock market's down/ And you only get mugged/ If you go downtown." Not an entirely new stance for country music, obviously -- it's called "country" for a reason, after all -- but somehow more paranoid and mean-spirited than, say, "Okie from Muskogee" ever was. And even if Hank hadn't recorded an updated version called "America Will Survive" in 2002, in the wake of September 11th, his early '80s anthem would be a foreshadowing of the anti-urban resentment and stubborn local-barricade libertarianism that, a quarter-century down the line, would fuel Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann and countless tea parties and right-wing talk-show hosts. Throughout the '00s, similar fightin' words -- often from Nashville's best artists -- came close to defining country music, even as the genre's sound put up its dukes, appropriately turning tougher, louder, more rock. Here, a brief backlash primer.

Sex! Fame! Fashion!  It’s been a great year for Lady Gaga, who's become the world's most controversial pop star with her sexually charged, dance-inspired electro-rock that's as confrontational as it is catchy. Now she tops it all off with The Fame Monster, which you can hear a week early on Rhapsody with your free trial membership. A-list premieres, however, are just one of many reasons you should give Rhapsody a spin. We've compiled a few others below, from customized  radio stations to professionally built playlists in high-def audio, plus views, news and more tunes than you could play in a lifetime -- whether on your PC, your stereo, or our brand new iPhone app. Not a Rhapsody subscriber? Sign up for a free 14-day trial, then crank the latest and greatest from Lady Gaga, including The Fame Monster.

	Gay Pop: See which of your favorite songs are queer anthems		Discover Lady Gaga's full catalog on Rhapsody
	American Synth-Pop, from Lady Gaga on Back		Listen to continious mixes of Lady Gaga and other artists like her
	Glam Goddess, Drag Queen or Hipster Tease: What is Lady Gaga?		Review: Our critics discuss Gaga's The Fame Monster

After a decade spent floundering in a sea of flannel-shirted grunge rockers and precocious alt-poppers, Pop regained its footing -- and reclaimed its proper reign over the charts -- in the 2000s. The decade began where the '90s left off: boy bands, girl groups, and especially, the solo efforts of those post-bubblegum divas, who shook off their kiddie club pasts to regale us with sexy, sleek beats and more hooks than you could shake a fishing pole at. On one hand, then, Pop was back to its roots: dance music that nearly everyone could jam to on their car radio. If you know what we mean. In other ways, however, the genre branched out like never before: country artists infiltrated the charts, the dance grooves got eclectic and worldly, everyone got a hankering for a little choice retro-soul in their sound, and hip-hop was absolutely everywhere (thanks in large part to one Mr. Tim Mosley sowing his hop-scotching beats throughout the charts like a musical Johnny Appleseed). As the decade moved on, Pop even let the rockers back in, although they've fortunately been mostly the glammy, guylinered, mall-pop varieties. Relive the glory days of the new millennium with our fabulous countdown of the top of the decade's pop!

(In addition to great premieres from your favorite artists, cool radio stations and exciting exclusives, Rhapsody also offers in-depth album reviews written by our team of nationally renowned music critics. Be sure to drop us a note in the comment field to let us know if you agree or disagree with our album assessments, and sign up today for your free Rhapsody trial. Also! This just in: our friends at VH1 are having a smashing contest to win a trip to NYC to see Gaga in concert! Won't you click on by.)

It's a deluxe album as only Gaga could do it: larger than life, over the top and, yes, even monstrous. The Fame Monster is stuffed to the gills with eight -- count 'em, eight -- new tracks. Most don't radically depart from her debut's uber-hipster dance-pop vibe, but they do reinforce Gaga's particular talents -- namely, making somewhat familiar musical ideas a wee bit edgy and a whole lot addictive. The vaguely tropical pop of "Alejandro," with its borderline-telenovela drama, for instance, is positively coated in "La Isla Bonita" and "Fernando" (down to the similar sound of its love object's name). It's so close, it's almost a cover -- and yet, something is slightly off. This is where Gaga lives, right smack in the midst of our comfort zone, where she sets up camp with the goal of screwing it up, just a little bit, just enough so that we feel not quite as certain of where we are. Then there's the Beyonce-featuring "Telephone." Now undoubtedly, this is a calculated collaboration from which both of these artists will benefit. And frankly, nothing about it is shockingly novel. But that's what's kind of interesting. Beyonce's cameo sounds every inch like a Beyonce track -- that's immersed in a track that's every inch Lady Gaga. Despite her relative youth as an artist, Gaga at once manages to pay tribute to those who have gone before her and yet make those influences her own.

The most relevant fact about music in the '00s was the sheer volume of it that came out, as digital technology democratized recording and distribution down toward individual-artist level. Most conservative estimates cite a figure somewhere in the 30,000-albums-per-year range in the U.S. alone, which computes to 300,000 over the entire decade. Add in countless bands who never graduated past five songs on MySpace, and the quantity turns astronomical. Given that only a tiny fraction of this music has inspired lasting adulation outside performers' immediate families, that means the overwhelming majority has long since slipped through the cracks of history. That said, here's a representative, genre-spanning sample of 10 great albums unlikely to make many other best-of-decade lists: if you knew about any of them in the first place, chances are you forgot them already. Until now.

10. The Exploding Hearts
Guitar Romantic, 2003
The decade's most tragic rock story: on July 20, 2003, a bus carrying Oregon powerpop-punk foursome the Exploding Hearts overturned on the Interstate while returning home to Portland from San Francisco. Three members -- vocalist and guitarist Adam Cox, bassist Matt Fitzgerald, drummer Jeremy Gage -- died. Only four months earlier, the band had put out its only album: 10 songs -- seven of them less than three minutes long -- about modern kicks and modern chicks and sleeping aides and razorblades. No other album in recent memory has come so close to matching the sweet-and-sour relentlessness of the Buzzcocks' Singles Going Steady; most likely, no album ever will.

9. Skye Sweetnam
Noise From The Basement, 2004
Where pop-punk -- or at least cool old Pat Benatar chords -- lived on was Radio Disney. But where Avril reached a mass American audience, her fellow Ontario native Skye Sweetnam only crossed over to Canadians, and maybe some Cheap Trick fans in Japan. Underground tween-pop from its title on down, Noise From The Basement -- released when she was just 16 -- peaked at a humble #124 in the U.S. But that didn't make its impudence any less precocious or self-aware, from the single about skipping school to avoid Shakespeare to the subterranean homesick "Hypocrite": "Bubblegum braniac! Baby girl ultra brat! Angst schmangst! No thanks! Hope my record doesn't tank!" Sigh...

8. Wolf
Evil Star, 2004
In a decade wherein heavy metal never stopped mutating, but did so within a tighter and tighter perimeter, in increments indiscernible to most humans unschooled in the art of experimental composition, this Swedish trio stubbornly stuck to the pre-thrash leather-jacket-full-of-zippers basics: Power anthems distinguishable as actual songs, with ice-blue riffs as hooks, and words about ominous objects in the sky and werewolves going bump in the night -- all howled in a high register melodic enough for a layman to actually decipher them. And the Blue Oyster Cult and Ramones covers sure didn't hurt.

7. Collin Raye
Never Going Back, 2009
As metal and rock radio abandoned old-school blues-based hard rock, country picked up the ball -- so much that, by decades end, Bad Company riffs were even sounding stale in Nashville. So nobody much noticed when this longtime journeyman, who hadn't taken a single into the country Top 40 since early 2000, kicked off his last-year-of-the-decade album with some Grand Funk Railroad cowbell, then loaded the thing with butt-rocking couples smuggling contraband across the border and heading west for Vegas dancing jobs only to wind up on a riverboat outside Cincinnati. Plus remakes of Nilsson and Stealers Wheel classics, and Eagles-worthy ballads that frequently mention Jesus.

6. ZZ Top
Mescalero, 2003
Talk about your blues-rock journeymen making runs for the border: These ancient Texas beardos had been stuck in the boogie mud ever since their hightly lucrative mid '80s sellout-to-MTV era, then they suddenly took a sharp left turn on this largely unheard platter full of Spanish words, warped funk, screwy electronic effects, and flatulent jokes about alley-gators and intelligent quotients and punk-ass boyfriends. If a more entertaining hard rock album emerged this decade, it surely wasn't by guys in their 50s (all three born 1949!) who'd been grumbling like old men since they were in their 20s (excellent long-range business plan!) Their weirdest since El Loco in 1981, if you're keeping score.

5. Field Mob
From Tha Roota to Tha Toota, 2002
Not hard to imagine ZZ Top and Field Mob enjoying the same barbecue: This album's title refers to feasting on the entire hog, from snout to tail. And give or take Bubba Sparxxx, it's doubtful that the decade produced more countryfied rappers than these hick-town Georgians, who lyrically trace their Southernness back to the plantation their ancestors were sold and hung on. So while they revel in a comedic trickster spirit their genre mostly abandoned, it's run through with sadness -- soul, in other words, the red-clay variety, yet spiked with melodic beauty from classical Europe and the Far East.

4. Koffee Brown
Mars/Venus, 2001
And here's a path that r&b in the '00s sadly managed not to follow: From a man and woman named Fonz and Vernall, a grown-folks gender battle, in the time-tested tradition of Womack & Womack or Ashford & Simpson, "retro" only in the sense that it's not emotionally stunted by ice-queen restraint or melismatic bombast or strip-club crotch-grab. The fugue-like "Weekend Thing," setting its anticipatory upscale summer scene in beauty parlors and barbershops, gave up as warm a groove as any soul track this decade. But that single only charted #71 r&b; the duo never made another album.

3. Oneida
Steel Rod EP, 2000
Checking it at 31 minutes, this record is misnamed -- while admittedly containing only six songs including an untitled four-second closer, it's more a short album than an EP. And a half-hour is just about perfect for this dirty-twanged, keyboard-tempered breed of Brooklyn science-lab sludge, tossing Link Wray, MX-80 Sound, Pere Ubu, and Devo into the choogle-metal blender while obsessing on loaded weapons and hellbound trains. You'd have a hard time finding any other '00s guitar rock so convoluted and repetitious that also kicks so hard. In 2000, Oneida could've almost passed as Queens of the Stone Age's nuttier cousins; later on, QOTSA got more commercial as Oneida got artier. And they both kicked less.

2. Fannypack
See You Next Tuesday, 2005
"Do it now, turn around, get off like a wedding gown, people on the pitcher's mound, turn it up and lock it down, fast ball, curve ball, workin' on your nerves ya'll " -- Three impossibly sassy and accented Brooklyn girls, two hipster NYC club producers life-affirming enough to opt for freestyle jump-rope chants over electroclash bondage gear, a skit revolving around one svengali's hatred of reggae leading into a dancehall guest-spot by Mr. Vegas, what else do you need? From M.I.A. to "Chicken Noodle Soup" to Kid Sister, the '00s weren't a bad decade when it came to channelling the spirit of "Iko Iko." But nobody gave it more bounce than this oddball outfit from the 718, who seemed like a novelty but were more.

1.Various Artists
Bring It On: Music From The Motion Picture, 2000
If you need documented evidence that the decade kicked off with a great girl-group wave, look no further. Irish fiddle-gum flirts B*Witched revive Toni Basil; Left Eye discoveries Blaque get sarcastic then collaborate with an unknown named 50 Cent; fellow post-TLCs 3LW keep things light; bizarre Jersey expats Daphne And Celeste -- whose own album never even came out in the States -- inform you that you ain't got no alibi for being U-G-L-Y. Mere males like the Jungle Brothers and 95 South stay on the sidelines, leading cheers. R&B in the '00s never got giddier, teen-pop never got funkier, and where such good-natured energy disappeared to is a history that has yet to be written. If you don't miss it, you missed the boat. Or, as Liverpool's Atomic Kitten put it, "See ya. I wouldn't wanna be ya."

(In addition to great premieres from your favorite artists, cool radio stations and exciting exclusives, Rhapsody also offers in-depth reviews, analysis and fun features written by our team of nationally renowned music writers. Be sure to drop us a note in the comment field to let us know if you agree or disagree, and sign up today for your free Rhapsody trial.)

She hit the charts running with brain-numbing dance track after brain-numbing dance track about getting messed up and dancing that are layered with (not-so) hidden messages about bisexuality and S&M. She makes weird, confusing, campily glam/glammily dark videos that live in that who-knew-it-existed land between telenovela and dirty hipster nightclub. She not only doesn't deny rumors that she may be intersexual (old-school translation: a hermaphrodite), she encourages them. And come on, people, she wears outfits made entirely out of stuffed Kermit the Frogs. More than a year after she released her wildly successful debut and as she drops a deluxe version of The Fame that's jam-packed with new tracks, we're left wondering just who -- or perhaps more accurately, what -- Lady Gaga is. In honor of Rhapsody's exclusive early premiere of The Fame Monster, we set out to try to address that question, to dissect the Lady Gaga phenomenon. What we discovered, however, is that -- and this should come as no surprise -- there is not one answer but many.

Oh, Lady Gaga. We love everything about you, from your weird, childlike name to your endless costume changes. You define pop stardom even as you mock it. And you trusted so fiercely in “the Fame” that you made yourself famous by the sheer power of self-belief (and maybe a little hard work). Bravo. Tony Robbins couldn’t have done it better.

But people. Don’t forget that Lady Gags is not just a fashion icon, not just a purveyor of top-class video events, not just a provocative performer. It’s about the music, dears. The music. And so we survey the pop scene Gaga has entered -- and reinvented -- with a bunch of playlists to get you going.

And, of course, you can listen, collect and share all these great tracks with your free Rhapsody trial membership. Sign up today.

Lest there be any doubt about it, Lady Gaga wants us to know that her song "Poker Face" is about fantasizing about women when she's hooking up with men. (It's a double entendre, capiche?) Sure, you could write that off as merely an attempt to stir up a little controversy -- although, if it's a ploy, it pales in comparison with her teasing suggestion that she may or may not have hermaphroditic features. But Gaga has backed up her sexuality in interviews, insisting that "people are born the way they are," and she's vocal in her support for gay and lesbian communities. Whatever you may think of her music, it's a refreshingly different approach from Katy Perry, who flirts with Sapphos on "I Kissed a Girl" -- mostly for the benefit of her ego and her boyfriend -- and then gets regressive on "Ur So Gay," her ode to an insufficiently butch boyfriend. ("I hope you hang yourself with your H&M scarf" -- classy!)

But pop music has always been a proving ground for the public's evolving attitudes toward sexuality, from Little Richard to Liberace, Prince to Peaches, out-and-proud disco to rap's confused "No homo." Check these key moments in gay-themed pop from the past few decades, and add your own favorite picks in the comments below.

Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe.

One thing about Frank Sinatra: he was not shy about letting people know what musicians and singers he admired (read a past post on Sinatra and Lester Young here). Probably the artist he complimented most, including Lady Day, was Ella Fitzgerald.

Ella Fitzgerald and Sinatra came up together during the big band era. They were both popular with the public during this time and were admired by other singers and musicians for having perfect pitch. They grew up in tough yet somewhat isolated neighborhoods outside New York City and were misfits in different ways, which ended up carrying through in their music.

Ever since the early days of MTV, Flock of Seagulls haircuts, and Spandau Ballet new romanticism, it's been widely accepted that synthesizer pop is a mostly British (or at its weirdest, continental European) phenomenon: "Glitter-disco-synthesizer night school, all that noble savage drum drum drum," the band X ranted in their 1983 anti-Anglo tirade "I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts." Americans were just too gritty and guitar-loving for all that silliness, right? Well, not all of them. Lady Gaga is only the latest -- and potentially the biggest -- artist from U.S. shores to re-imagine Anglo/Euro technopop, fashion sense and all. Here's a rundown of electronically inclined Americans who preceded her.

Probably the most important thing that happened to electronic music in the '00s was its acceptance as a more or less everyday part of popular music, period. Sure, subgenres like house and techno persevered, and onetime blips blossomed into full-blown global subcultures -- witness U.K. garage's resurrection as dubstep, a transformer of a genre currently plowing a juggernaut across just about everything in its path. But electronic music's once-marginal techniques found themselves diffused into every capillary of the pop bloodstream, from Kanye's Auto-Tune conceptualism to Lady Gaga's trance makeover. The point is no longer what is or isn't "electronic," but what musicians do with the tools at hand -- and how they interpret the legacy of all the disco auteurs and avant-garde freaks that made our contemporary soundscape possible. So this list isn't necessarily a definitive list of the "best" electronic albums of the '00s. Consider it, instead, a sampling of some of the decade's more provocative (or at least prescient) statements, from the underground to the charts.

Be sure to listen to all the artist mentioned here, anywhere and anytime in high def audio, with your Rhapsody subscription. Not a member? Click here for free trial Rhapsody membership and get on board with the ultimate music experience.

John Mayer is one of the most celebrated and popular singer-songwriters of his generation. His earnest and earthy take on pop music is assured, mature and sultry. Battle Studies is the latest chapter and is premiering here on Rhapsody, one week early, which we think is pretty cool. A-list premieres, however, are just one of many reasons you should give Rhapsody a spin. We've compiled a few others below, from customized  radio stations to professionally built playlists in high-def audio, plus views, news and more tunes than you could play in a lifetime -- whether on your PC, your stereo, or our brand new iPhone app. Not a Rhapsody subscriber? Sign up for a free 14-day trial, then crank the latest and greatest from John Mayer, including Battle Studies.

	Review: Our critics discuss Mayer's Battle Studies		Discover Mayer's full catalog on Rhapsody
	Explore Mayer's greatest hits, best collaborations and much more		Listen to our wide range of John Mayer Radio Stations
	Is John Mayer this generation's Bob Dylan?		Discover the many babes of John Mayer.

Happy days are here again -- it's time for another Twitter Contest to help get the word out on our one-week-early premiere of John Mayer's Battle Studies. You can stream the album via Rhapsody -- so like, on Rhapsody.com, the Rhapsody desktop client on your PC, through the Rhapsody TiVo app, and of course on your iPhone via our sweet app, along with a dozen or so other places -- starting on Nov.10, so that's when our Twitter contest kicks off. Tune into Twitter.com/rhapsody from today until Nov. 17th. There, we'll drop a trivia question at three random times during the next seven days. Anyone who responds with the correct answer will be entered into that day's contest. Be sure to send in your answer by the deadline or it won't count. Also -- and this is IMPORTANT -- be sure to include the hash-tag #rhapsodymayer in your answer.

Winners be selected at random to receive either a Rhapsody $50 gift card or a Rhapsody-enabled Philips Streamium NP2900. Of course, you'll need your Rhapsody membership to enjoy the full benifits of these devices, so sign up right here for your free Rhapsody subscription, where you can rock out with John Mayer to your heart's content and share your favorite songs and artists on Facebook and Twitter.

There are three really cool things about my job. One of them is getting to turn people on to the music I'm most jazzed about: it's a license to pontificate, really -- a pulpit for strictly musical evangelism. But, recognizing that my own tastes can be, shall we say, peculiar, I also try to listen with open ears and the humble reminder that what doesn't float my boat (a rather cramped dinghy, it sometimes appears) may carry another listener's craft all the way to shore. They talk about the critic's role as a "filter," but I'm really more like a theater usher, lighting your way to the appropriate aisle.

(In addition to great premieres from your favorite artists, cool radio stations and exciting exclusives, Rhapsody also offers in-depth reviews of all major albums written by our team of nationally renowned music critics. Be sure to drop us a note in the comment field to let us know if you agree or disagree, and sign up today for your free Rhapsody trial.)

As Pat Benatar once said, love is a battlefield. That’s the main point John Mayer wants to convey on his fourth studio album. It’s called Battle Studies, and militaristic song titles expand on the theme: “Heartbreak Warfare,” “War of My Life,” “Assassin.” That last one is the set’s most ambitious track -- an obsessive groove building louder toward clatter and buzz for five minutes, insulated by Middle Eastern background wails as Mayer likens both parties in an apparent one-night stand to killers performing a night’s mission. But the album’s tone is already set in the first two numbers, both prominently featuring broken hearts; by the third -- a duet with Taylor Swift, who enters only briefly, toward the song’s end -- his heart has been split in half.

We'd be remiss in our blitz of John Mayer coverage if we didn't make some mention of the dude's well-documented but truly astonishing list of ex- and current girlfriends. A quick Goog'  of "john mayer girlfriend" yields a veritable trinity of major league "J" babes: Jennifer Aniston, Jessica Simpson and Jennifer Love Hewitt right off the bat. Those are some high-level exes, both looks- and celebrity-wise, and even folks who are not fans of his music have to marvel at Mayer's exploits. You have to figure he's got something to offer in addition to his prodigious songwriting and subtly excellent guitarwork.

As the story goes, Mayer's first hit single, "Your Body Is a Wonderland" was written for then-girlfriend Hewitt. What we want to know is, what songs did he write for Cameron Diaz, Minka Kelly, Hank Williams, Jr.'s daughter Holly, etc.? Well, months of diligent research have paid off, and here we present Mayer's most memorable mates and his songs that we think sum up those relationships.

Often with Rhapsody, people want to listen to their favorite songs (or discover new ones) but don’t want to hear to the same old albums they have lined up or shuffle the same old songs around.

That's where Rhapsody's staff comes in. We do all the heavy lifting and work countless hours testing and listening so you can just lean back, hit Play and enjoy the music.

We have many solutions to your particular listening dilemmas, and one of them involves bringing in or crack Rhapsody Radio Team.

Even before we went live with our premiere of John Mayer’s Battle Studies, we had tunes from it (like “Heartbreak Warfare” and “Edge of Desire”) playing on Rhapsody radio stations such as Pop Hits, Soft Sounds and Acoustic Dawn. Speaking of acoustic, when I heard Mayer's sublime solo concert reading of Tom Petty's "Free Fallin'," I knew that it had to go on Crazy for Covers radio.

Of course, we don't stop there -- every single artist on Rhapsody, no matter how well-known or obscure), has a radio station that includes music from them and similar artists. Click here to sign up for a free Rhapsody trial.

We've buffed out John Mayer's very own artist-based radio station, where you get dozens of his best songs mixed in with great material by like-minded big names (Coldplay, David Gray and Train, for instance). We even include fantastic material by artists who we feel are about to break big (Rhapsody has faith in Brett Dennen, Donavon Frankenreiter and Landon Pigg). And we also include Mayer's funky guest appearances on albums by artists he respects (he has impeccable taste: B.B. King, Herbie Hancock and John Scofield). 

If you hear anything you especially like, you simply click on the artist or album, jump off the radio station and start digging new tunes. Also, If you liked something you heard an hour ago, you can just go down the saved radio song list and replay it or save it for later. It's music discovery made easy.

We even have a feature where you can create your own unique, personally named radio station by entering up to 10 artists, and Rhapsody will play a mix of their tunes. There are no limits: you can combine John Mayer with Radiohead, Jay-Z and Barbra Streisand if that's what floats your boat.

In his eight years recording, John Mayer has walked a stylistic tightrope, splitting his time between presenting himself as a sensitive heartthrob (mainly on his solo studio albums) and a serious bluesman (on the live 2005 John Mayer Trio album Try!, for instance). By now, he seems to have found a comfortable middle ground between sex appeal and chops. But he's hardly the first musicianly beefcake to balance such seemingly competing sides. Here, some hunky virtuosos who've come before.

John Mayer is 32. In just eight short years he has positioned himself as this generation's James Taylor, Cat Stevens and Eric Clapton combined. Think about it: he's loved for both his sensitive confessionals and virtuoso, pop-blues guitar skills. To soak up the full scope of Mayer's artistry, explore the bundle of playlists Rhapsody has prepared in anticipation of his new album, Battle Studies. Not only do we feature his music, but we also shine a light on the adult-alternative genre that Mayer has helped innovate.

(Pictured: Deerhunter)

Chicago-based Kranky records has been tearing both electronic and rock music a new one since 1993. From the droning post-rock of the label's first signing Labradford, to the crackling landscapes of Tim Hecker, and the rumored-to-be-defunct, lo-fi pop act Deerhunter, the label has chucked the envelope clear out the window into a nebulous cloud of beautifully musical goo.

For neophytes and fans alike, here's a free Kranky sampler of recent releases to get your get your feet--and ears--wet, including tracks from Atlas Sound, Pan American, Windy and Carl and more. Soon you too, ladies and gentlemen, will be floating in space.

The groovy Rhapsody iPhone App now comes with improved sound and graphics!
When I first downloaded the Rhapsody iPhone App, I was actually pretty impressed with the sound quality. I played Andrew Bird's "Plasticities" (this song rules) on both the Rhap App & on the iPhone's iPod App, and and I couldn't really tell any difference between the two.

Now, I just upgraded to the new Rhapsody App release and was blown away with the increase in sound quality.

Trying to be an audio nerd instead of a music geek, I brought up Steely Dan's "Black Cow" on the Rhap App and appreciated its richer, deeper and fuller sound and noticed more dimension to the music than I did before. You can feel the space that the music was recorded in now.

I also noticed that Aja's CD cover art comes off as much more defined. Another bonus was that the playback on my awesome Rhapsody radio stations like '80s Alternative and Frank's World keeps on truckin' now.

There are some more big upgrades just around the corner, and I'd tell you about them but I just discovered a mess of long out-of-print Bill Withers reissues on Rhapsody that I want to check out.

  

Any star is an unknowable quantity, one from whom we expect distance but crave intimacy -- it’s the paradox that drives the star-making industry. With our pop stars, we literally can’t get enough: we flock to flawed films, hungry for a glimpse of the “true” person behind the persona. We’ve watched Bette Midler channel Janis Joplin (sort of) in “The Rose,” Elvis remain himself even when he should be acting (just about any film), U2’s self-aggrandizing at the dawn of its career in “Rattle and Hum,” Madonna playing herself in both fiction (“Desperately Seeking Susan”) and documentary (“Truth or Dare”). The latest in line? Michael Jackson, who’s drawn a flood of viewers to the posthumously released rehearsal doc “This Is It,” which topped the box office last weekend.

Blister Pop is the name of an album from the Embarrassment, this wonderful little band that has become something of a cult legend over the last two decades. The Kansas-based group crafted a shambolic -- and really quite nervy -- brand of underground awesomeness that fell in the cracks between post-punk, hardcore, power pop and Attractions-style pub rock. Nowadays, the Embarrassment would be considered indie rock or quite possibly pop-punk, but back in the 1980s there wasn't a quality name for what they were doing.

Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley

On Wednesday ABC Television will air the 43rd annual CMA Awards. The event, once again hosted by Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood, features live performances from, literally, the Who's Who of country music.

There are a dozen award categories that range from Artist of the Year to Musician of the Year, so needless to say, the CMAs have all the bases covered. Let's just jump right in and talk about the most popular of the categories for a minute, and who we think should win, shall we?

May 21, 2008 forever changed the life of award-winning singer-songwriter Steven Curtis Chapman. His five-year-old daughter Maria Sue was struck and killed in the driveway of the family home outside Nashville, Tennessee. One of Chapman’s teenage sons was behind the wheel when the little girl stepped out where she shouldn’t have been. Just hours earlier, Chapman and his wife had been celebrating the engagement of their oldest daughter and the impending high school graduation of one of their two sons. Playing nearby were their three younger daughters, all adopted from China. These fresh-faced additions to the family had turned their world upside down and made the whole family ferocious adoption advocates. Now, this awful tragedy would change the course of this family once more.

As you scan our 25 best rock albums of the '00s, you'll quickly notice that a lot of these artists could be claimed by other genres: Susan Tedeschi by blues, Drive-By Truckers by alt-country, Wilco by indie. And that's the thing about rock in this young century: it's less a definable genre and more of a fractured aesthetic scattered across numerous genres. But make no mistake -- had Back to the River or Yankee Hotel Foxtrot or Southern Rock Opera come out in the 1970s, they would've been considered nothing but rock.

Because of rock's current state of affairs, readers are going to stumble across new flavors. Fans of Jack Johnson are going to read about High on Fire's Matt Pike, while followers of Nickelback will get to learn about something called Creepjoint. So yeah, keep an open mind and instead of bemoaning what rock has become in the 21st century, embrace it. There are a lot of killer jams to be found here. Be sure to listen to high quality audio of all the artist mentioned here anytime and anywhere you want with your free trial Rhapsody membership. Click here to join!