Music UK

The 1975, Florence + The Machine, Jorja Smith and Dua Lipa each received multiple nominations for the 2019 Brit Awards, which honors music both released in the United Kingdom and worldwide.
Ariana Grande, Drake, Eminem, Cardi B and Travis Scott were among the North American acts to receive nods ahead of the February 20th awards show at London’s O2 Arena.



In the Mastercard British Album of the Year category, the 1975’s A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships and Florence + The Machine’s High As Hope will face off against emerging artist Jorja Smith’s Lost & Found, Anne-Marie’s Speak Your Mind and George Eza’s Staying at Tamara’s.

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Ella Mai won’t wait around long for her suitor to come around in her new video for “Shot Clock.” The song appears on her eponymous debut album, which was released last year. The Colin Tilley-directed visual emphasizes the pressing countdown with scenes shot on a basketball court.

In the clip, Mai strolls a neighborhood, hangs out on bleachers, lounges in a bathtub and takes center court to blithely issue an ultimatum that time is running out on the relationship and she has “about a hundred things I could be doing right now/Than wasting my time with you.”

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Blur reunited for the first time in nearly four years for a surprise gig in East London Friday during Damon Albarn’s annual Africa Express concert. Blur last performed together in November 2015 following the release of The Magic Whip.

For the performance, Albarn rejoined his band mates Dave Rowntree, Alex James and Graham Coxon to play “Song 2,” “Tender” and “Clover Over Dover”; the latter performance marked the live debut of the Parklife track. For “Tender,” the band was joined by London Community Gospel Choir and Rokia Traoré.

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Fifty years ago, the Beatles walked across a street in London for a photo shoot that would become the cover of their next album, Abbey Road — an anniversary that was commemorated on Thursday with crowds and news crews. But for John Kosh, the Apple Records art director who had to turn those shots into an album cover, that was only step one in creating one of rock’s most recognizable covers.

In 1969, Kosh was what he calls the “creative art director” for Apple Records, the Beatles’ label, and had an office on the first floor of the building. He’d already designed album and single covers for John Lennon (including his and Yoko Ono’s Unfinished Music No. 2: Life with the Lions) and other Apple artists. He’d witnessed Lennon and Paul McCartney record “The Ballad of John and Yoko,” watching as the two supposed nemesis had fun playing all the instruments themselves. “Paul was on drums, John was doing the lead vocal, Paul came down and played bass,” he recalls. “It was two guys having as much fun as you can imagine — but they’re not supposed to be talking to each other! It’s almost as if they were back in Hamburg.”

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When Ozzy Osbourne launched his solo career with his 1980 debut album Blizzard of Ozz, he didn’t have the same support he had as a member of Black Sabbath. “That was in a warehouse in London,” Osbourne says of the album sleeve featuring him in a cape holding a cross with skull on the ground and a black cat behind him. “Because of funds, we had to do it ourselves. I think the cat was just there.” Then, with a laugh, he references one of the record’s more gothic songs, “Maybe the cat was a message from Aleister Crowley.”

With the release of a new vinyl box set, See You on the Other Side, the singer, who is recovering from a nasty fall earlier this year, has been reflecting on each chapter of his career lately. The collection, named after a psychedelic single off his Ozzmosis album, contains each of his studio albums on multi-color splattered, 180-gram vinyl, as well as otherwise out-of-print rarities like his Mr. Crowley and Just Say Ozzy EPs. It also features a collection of rarities, Flippin’ the B Side, a seven-inch flexi disc containing the previously unreleased “See You on the Other Side” demo, 10 posters, 12 augmented-reality experiences that allow fans to interact with the singer, and an autographed certificate. The collection is due out November 29th and is available for pre-order now.

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Ringo Starr joined the Roots and Jimmy Fallon for a new version of the Beatles’ hit “Yellow Submarine,” this time performed with toy instruments. In a set decorated like the animated submarine from the Beatles’ film (and with animation added to the video), the group offered up a quirky rendition of the tune using instruments like kazoos, xylophones and shakers.

In the clip, Starr takes on the main vocals while he plays a small toy drum set and Fallon plays a Casio keyboard, a wood block and honks on a kazoo. The segment includes new animation of Fallon and Starr riding off together on a pair of colorful fish and the group being overtaken with sea life inside their submarine.

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Steve Winwood remembered his former Blind Faith band mate Ginger Baker Sunday, hours after the Cream drummer’s death at the age of 80.

“A very sad loss, and my condolences to his family and friends,” Winwood wrote in a statement. “A loss also for his contribution to music. He was well-grounded in jazz from very early on, and later managed to combine this with African and rock music to create his own inimitable style of playing.”

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The latest TikTok craze is a series of goofy homemade Beatles videos all created by one person in their Brooklyn apartment.
Maris Jones — a Beatles diehard since the age of four — specializes in the evolution of each member of the group. She’ll depict a suited John Lennon in black and white singing “Twist and Shout” from the band’s performance on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, followed by a clip of “A Hard Day’s Night” with “SORRY GIRLS, HE’S MARRIED!” across the screen. “A lot of kids on TikTok kids are like, ‘That’s from That Thing You Do!'” she says. “And I’m like, ‘That’s actually from the Beatles.'”

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Sir Elton John won his first Golden Globe Sunday (Jan. 5) evening at the 2020 Golden Globes, taking home the trophy alongside longtime collaborator Bernie Taupin for “(I’m Gonna) Love Me Again,” the new song they contributed to Rocketman, the kaleidoscopic musical biopic about his life.

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London singer, writer, rapper and model J Hus scores his first U.K. No. 1 album with his sophomore release, Big Conspiracy (Black Butter). Lewis Capaldi has his second chart-topping single in the territory as “Before You Go” (EMI/Universal) climbs 2-1.

J Hus reached No. 6 with his first album, Common Sense, in 2017 and now logs combined units of 24,000 to lead the way with the follow-up. The Official Charts Company reports that 96% of the total for Big Conspiracy came from streaming. Last week's new entry at the top, Eminem's Music To Be Murdered By (Interscope/Universal), falls to No. 2.

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