Riffiter is officially launching. Rate and review every album and track you hear, keep a running log of what you've listened to, and dig up the next thing worth your time.
The iOS app is out today, and the website is open to everyone at https://t.co/M1zE2jJLpf
Madonna won 7 VMAs on Sunday, including Artist of the Year and Best Album. Taylor Swift won Video of the Year and passed Beyoncé for the all-time record, 33 to 30. LISA beat both Swift and Ariana for Best Pop with a song that never charted in the US.
MTV dropped its Best Rock category this year after 37 years. Same ceremony, it gave Nirvana the Video Vanguard, the first band to get it since Duran Duran in 2003. Novoselic spoke, Grohl stood silent, Pat Smear lit a cigarette.
Bono pitched Dolly Parton an Irish-folk idea. She said it was "a little too Irish" and gave him her own song, "Torn". She recorded it in June, already ill, and it closes the new U2 album, out November 13.
Massive Attack's Robert Del Naja was arrested outside Labour conference in Liverpool on Saturday, under the Terrorism Act, for a sign reading "I oppose genocide I support Palestine Action". In April the same sign got him arrested in Trafalgar Square, one of 523 that day.
Choosin' Texas is now the longest-running No. 1 in Hot 100 history: 23 weeks, one past Mariah. It lost the top spot five times on the way and has held it every week since July 4.
Todd Rundgren on Taylor Swift, to Vulture: "the apotheosis of mediocrity." Lady Gaga, same interview: "a real musician." One producer's grudge against one artist. He made Bat Out of Hell. Is he allowed?
Pitchfork had not given a 0 to anything since 2007. It ended the drought on Tyga. The company he joins: Kiss, the Flaming Lips, John Frusciante, Sonic Youth, Liz Phair, Jet.
Liz Phair's 0 did not survive. The critic apologised in 2019 and Pitchfork quietly rescored the album 6.0 in 2021. The Jet zero had no review under it at all, just a video of a chimpanzee urinating into its own mouth.
Blonde is ten today. The cover says blond. The credits say Blonde. Both shipped, neither was a mistake.
Half the record has no drums on it. Everyone who copied it since put the drums back.