KINGDM recently dropped the straightforward up-tempo track  Dust featuring Reo Cragun. The upcoming producer has been praised by tastemakers and his tracks have landed on KCRW, Beats 1, BBC1 and BBC2. Splitting his time between Los Angeles and Europe, Italy born KINGDM has worked his way up to 10 million combined streams. The debut track ‘Can’t Get Over You’ reached No. 1 on HypeMachine while the follow up track “Baby” featuring Kevin Garrett landed n the Top 10 Spotify’s global and U.S. Viral 50 charts. I believe KINGDM is lightyears ahead with his songwriting. In an interview with ATWOOD Mag he notes, “Most of my songs start in my head. Sometimes I hear melodies or ideas, and the first step is usually to capture them on the Voice Memo of my iPhone. When I move to production, I generally have a clear picture of how I want the track to sound, but it’s rarely related to a style. The first flow of ideas is usually very quick. 90% of the song is usually done within a couple of hours. But then I spend a LOT of time editing and tweaking sounds, and I think that’s when the blend of styles often happens”.  Give the track a stream.

Velvet Starlings is picking up steam with its brand of retro  rock. Behind Velvet Starling is Christian Gisborne a 15 year-old indie rock singer/songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist. I think we are seeing more of these type of 70’s influenced type of acts pop up, while Greta Van Fleet, the most popular of the pack right now, just received a Gold certification for their debut album. The latest track Sold Down the River opens up with a moody organ swell and takes you on musical journey. Think Black Keys meets The Yard Birds. The band started making waves after receiving heavy spins on Sirius XM. Additionally, they are tapped to play festival “Summerfest” in Milwaukee and will tour Europe in 2019. Give it a stream.

Today, the Music Modernization Act has been officially signed into law by President Trump.  Kanye West among others witnessed the historic moment. Artists have been treated very unfairly for a long time. The Music Modernization Act will modernize copyright protection for recording artists and songwriters in the digital and streaming age. Simply, artists will get paid fair market value.

The bill revamps Section 115 of the U.S. Copyright Act. Their are the act’s three main pieces of legislation:The Music Modernization Act, which streamlines the music-licensing process to make it easier for rights holders to get paid when their music is streamed online. The Compensating Legacy Artists for their Songs, Service, & Important Contributions to Society (CLASSICS) Act for pre-1972 recordings. The Allocation for Music Producers (AMP) Act, which improves royalty payouts for producers and engineers from SoundExchange when their recordings are used on satellite and online radio.

Matthew Rapp started making noise with duets and mashups often with female singers. The videos racked up thousands of views while “We Don’t Talk Anymore” mashup/duet with Denisse Borquez clocked over 340,000 views on Facebook.  Not surprisingly, the video was taken down due to copyright issues, but was uploaded on YouTube. Moreover, the Las Vegas indie artist dropped a new original track Place which was just added to Spotify’s Friday Cratediggers playlist. Musically, think Charlie Puth meets electro pop. Give it a stream.

You’ll never get a second chance to make a first impression. Before you hit the share button on Instagram, make sure you’re visually literate. In fact, social critic Camille Paglia takes on the current state of Instagram in her latest article “The Rise of “Strangely Unsexy” Instagram Exhibitionism — And Why It Hurts Women”. Consequently, whether you’re are a boy or girl, artist or model, actor or actress, unflattering photos will kill your opportunities in seconds. Camille Paglia targets women more than men since Instagram is used by more than twice as many women as men.

Camille, a staunch feminist says this, “I have to say that an overwhelming number of today’s female-authored Instagrams seem stilted, forced and strangely unsexy. Visual illiteracy is spreading: It is sadly obvious that few young people have seen classic romantic films or studied the spectacular corpus of Hollywood publicity stills, with their gorgeous sensual allure.

Ironically, she praises Rihanna for her visual aesthetic. “The leading artist of Instagram eroticism remains Rihanna, who for several years uploaded one brilliant image after another, often via the intuitive camera of her best friend, Melissa Forde. Rihanna understands magic, mood and mystique — sex as a shimmering state of mind. But the bright and shiny surface of too many of today’s female-generated Instagrams conceals a bleak and regressive reality, with men in the driver’s seat for careless, hit-and-run hookups”. She even rips Ariana Grande for performing at Aretha Franklin’s funeral while wearing a sleeveless minidress. CONTINUE READING