American Songwriter : Patti Smith Joins Greta Thunberg for Climate Change Protest (by Alex Hopper) →

Thunberg has given speeches, petitioned the Swedish Parliament, protested and more all to raise awareness toward what she believes will be the hazardous effects of climate change on the next generation. Her final strike at the school happened last week, given that Thunberg is graduating. She wasn’t alone on her final day though, legendary artist Patti Smith decided to join her ranks. Smith has long extended her support to climate change activists. “I think the climate movement is the most important thing on the planet right now,” Smith previously told The Guardian.

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The Africa Report : Angélique Kidjo, an encounter beyond space and time (by Patrick Smith) →

Fresh from winning the prestigious Polar Music Prize, the Benin-born singer tells The Africa Report what motivates her to cross cultural divides in her art and advocacy. Angélique’s life, music and art are about as heterodox as it gets. More than three decades as a star song­writer, musician and singer has garnered her the honorific ‘Mama Africa’ across the continent, as well as an attic full of prizes, five Grammys, the Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France, and top musical awards in more than 20 countries.

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The New Yorker Interview : Joan Baez Is Still Doing Beautiful, Cool Stuff (by Amanda Petrusich) →

Since 1959, Joan Baez has been electrifying eager crowds with her elegance and ferocity. Baez was central to both the folk revival and the civil-rights movement of the nineteen-sixties; her protest songs, delivered in a vivid, warbly soprano, felt both defiant and gently maternal. Now eighty-two, and with twenty-five studio albums behind her, Baez has mostly retired from music, though she is still making poignant and unpredictable art.

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Pop matters : CARLY SIMON BECAME A POP ROM-COM QUEEN WITH ‘COMING AROUND AGAIN’ (by ​Peter Piatkowski) →

Like Ephron, Simon looked to her fame-laced life when composing her tales of domestic ennui. When Ephron’s roman à clef, Heartburn, was adapted into a film by Mike Nichols, Simon was tapped to write the film’s theme song, “Coming Around Again”. Both projects – the film and the music – are artifacts of the 1980s. Heartburn and “Coming Around Again” are products of a decade that wrestled with rapidly changing gender roles as well as a generation of Baby Boomers who came of age during the counterculture of the 1960s only to become more conservative and embrace the capitalist, consumerist culture of the ‘Me Decade’ of the 1980s. Simon’s song and album is the standard-bearer of 1980s mainstream, upper-class liberal pop.

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Chronogram : Album Review: Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams | Live at Levon's! (by Seth Rogovoy) →

The Hudson Valley's first couple of roots music offer an eclectic celebration of Americana on this collection of a dozen tunes recorded before a live audience at Levon Helm Studios in Woodstock, where multi-instrumentalist Larry Campbell led the Midnight Ramble Band for a decade or so in support of the venue's namesake.

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BBC : Harry Belafonte: Singer and civil rights activist dies aged 96 (by Mark Savage) →

One of the most successful African-American pop stars in history, he scored hits with Island In The Sun, Mary's Boy Child and the UK number one Day-O (The Banana Boat Song). A close friend of Martin Luther King, the artist was a notable and visible supporter of the civil rights movement, who bankrolled several anti-segregation organisations and was known to have bailed Dr King and other activists out of jail. He was one of the organisers of the 1963 March on Washington, and also took part in the Selma to Montgomery marches in 1965. "Belafonte's global popularity and his commitment to our cause is a key ingredient to the global struggle for freedom and a powerful tactical weapon in the Civil Rights movement," Dr King once observed. "We are blessed by his courage and moral integrity." The star also campaigned against poverty, apartheid and Aids in Africa; and became an ambassador for Unicef, the United Nations children's fund.

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Best Classic Bands : The Barnestormers, All-Star Combo, Announce Debut Album →

A new all-star combo, the Barnestormers, have recorded a self-titled debut album. The group is led by Australian rock ‘n’ roll and soul singer Jimmy Barnes, former Squeeze member and popular TV host, Jools Holland, and Slim Jim Phantom, the drummer and founding member of the Stray Cats. Those three are joined by Chris Cheney, the frontman and guitarist for Australian punk-rock outfit, The Living End, as well as studio whiz Kevin Cheney. Together, they’re releasing The Barnestormers, coming May 26, 2023, via Rhino.

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Irish Examiner : TV review: Bono & the Edge get to Dublin's heart with Dave Letterman (by Pat Fitzpatrick) →

I was coming around to Bono after reading his recent autobiography, but this show makes it clear why people outside of Ireland are inclined to listen to him. He’s an optimist. While the rest of us were wallowing in cynicism and chunky jumpers in the 1980s, he put on a cowboy hat and pissed off to America. The pinnacle of this, as he explained to Letterman in a well-appointed mahogany Georgian library in Dublin, was the U2 song, 'Where The Streets Have No Name'.

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