Music

Vaughan Mason, the musician and producer whose influential disco-funk singles — most notably his 1980 roller skating anthem “Bounce, Rock, Skate, Roll” — have been sampled by dozens of artists ranging from Daft Punk to a Tribe Called Quest, died Thursday of natural causes at the age of 69. Mason’s …

Bill Withers got a late start. He was nearing 30 when he began writing songs on a cheap guitar between shifts at an aircraft-parts factory. “I figured out that you didn’t need to be a virtuoso to accompany yourself,” he told Rolling Stone in 2015. A demo he made caught …

Marcus Mumford virtually stopped by The Tonight Show to perform two songs, “Lay Your Head on Me” and “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” a Rodgers & Hammerstein cover the musician released as a charity single in March. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sdqoufY9CQ In footage shot by his wife, actress Carey Mulligan, Mumford explained why he …

The Bootleg Theater in Los Angeles — where Phoebe Bridgers met Conor Oberst — has launched a GoFundMe campaign amid the coronavirus pandemic. Bridgers posted a link to the theater’s campaign, accompanied by a clip of her covering Oberst’s solo track “Mamah Borthwick (a Sketch)” from 2016’s Ruminations. “If you …

Bon Jovi has released a new single in collaboration with the Duke of Sussex and the the Invictus Games Choir. The track, “Unbroken,” was recorded last month at London’s Abbey Road Studios and produced by John Shanks alongside the band. All proceeds from the single will go to the Invictus …

Dan Rather was born 10 years before America entered World War II, is more familiar with long-ago singing cowboy Tex Ritter than his actor son John, and took a stab at playing bassoon as a child growing up in Texas. In other words, he’s admittedly the last person anyone would …

5 Seconds of Summer have released the dreamy new song “Wildflower,” off their fourth album, Calm, which drops Friday. They co-wrote the track with Rami Yacoub (Britney Spears, Ariana Grande). “Wildflower” is the brightest-sounding song yet off the upcoming record — and gives a clear nod to Eighties synth-pop. It’s …

Keith Urban hosted a livestream concert from his basement studio this week, the second in his Urban Underground series. Performing a six-song set, the singer-guitarist mixed in a classic cover as a tribute to a recently departed icon: Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler.” “I wanted to do a song for the …

Lil Uzi Vert cruised to his second straight week at the top of the Rolling Stone Artists 500 chart, racking up a staggering 322.8 million song streams for the week of March 13th through March 19th. The rapper’s latest record, Eternal Atake, currently tops the Top 200 Albums chart, and …

M.I.A. released a new song titled “OHMNI20209” on her Patreonon the 15th anniversary of her debut album Arular. “Free music to get you the fuck up outta bed! Here’s the beginning,” M.I.A. tweeted Sunday, announcing the song’s arrival. Earlier this year, M.I.A. launched a two-tiered Patreon account — for $5 …