Weekly Music Fix: SXSW, Laura Marling, Sparklehorse, Gaga and Nicki Minaj

After exhausting myself with the small task of churning out daily SXSW posts (it’s not that hard — I know), here’s this week’s Fix!

Laura Marling

Singer-songwriter Laura Marling discusses the title track from her upcoming album I Speak Because I Can and gives an intimate acoustic performance of the song at The Guardian UK. Now, after hearing two tracks from her sophomore release, I’m thinking one thing and one thing only: Will this be a sophomore slump? I hope not. I was a big fan of her debut release, Alas, I Cannot Swim. Revisit Laura Marling’s greatness with a live performance of “Ghosts” below — bonus points if you recognized Mumford & Sons as her backing band.

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Lady Gaga

New stills from Gaga’s “Telephone” video looking very Desperately Seeking Susan/Women Behind Bars. The video will debut Thursday.

Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse

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Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse took his own life this past Saturday, just days after the announcement that Dark Night of the Soul — a collaborative project with Danger Mouse, Sparklehorse, and David Lynch — would finally see physical release. Linkhous was a talented musician and multi-instrumentalist who struggled with personal demons throughout his life. He was 47. Remember Linkhous with his to “It’s A Wonderful Life” by Sparklehorse below.

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Nicki Minaj

Bisexual Nicki Minaj recently took part in a photoshoot for Right On! Mag. In it, she poses like a doll among dolls… or in her own words, “It’s Barbie, bittttch!” Check out a behind-the-scenes look here.

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Photo by Matias Corral

Ted Leo + Pharmacists

My former favorite band (they lost me with 2007’s Living With The Living) releases their new album The Brutalist Bricks today. You can listen to some of Ted Leo’s new tracks on MySpace and read a review at Chromewaves in which Frank Yang calls it “loud, punchy and pogo-friendly with a couple moments of acoustic thoughtfulness to punctuate proceedings.” Sounds right to me.

Remainders

A new video from She & Him, the cute band that Zooey Deschenel is in. It involves dancing in the library!

Johnny Weir talks abut his admiration for Lady Gaga, Adam Lambert and Christina Aguilera.

Hip-Hop Wired remembers the Notorious B.I.G, who was killed thirteen years ago today.

Kelis, who will be performing at Girlbar’s Dinah Shore Weekend for Lesbians Who Like Other Lesbians, debuts a “new look.”

SXSW

South by Southwest (SXSW), Austin’s annual music festival, kicks off this Friday, March 12th. Audiostraddle will be posting SXSW spotlights in the days leading up to the festival. We’ve already featured Baltimore rapper Rye Rye and singer-songwriter Jenny Owen Youngs, so be on the lookout for what comes next.

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Jess G.

Jess is a writer/producer with a knack for audio and online production. She grew up in California and now lives in Washington, DC, where she recently graduated from Georgetown University. Jess' jacket collection is obscenely large, and so is her music library. In her spare time, Jess enjoys riding her bike in the city, blogging, writing songs, and eating good food.

Jess has written 44 articles for us.

16 Comments

  1. -My sister says you have have to enjoy Nicki Minaj on mute. She will then be one of your favorite ppl
    – Kelis is a beautiful woman. Not feeling the mullet but the short hair works. I always liked that she was little off her rocker but I feel after her baby’s birth and simultaneous divorce she may be straight up loosing it.
    -Gaga with beer can rollers..got to love it!
    -Beyonce please put on some clothes. You have a nice body.. we get it, we got it, now cover it.

      • I like it too. I like her body, I have a similar body. I just want her to put on some damn pants. Every video/performance is the same thing with her

  2. I love Johnny Weir. Also loving the SXSW spotlights, I am adding all of the artists to my must see list for that week.

  3. Gosh I hate always having to be the Debbie Downer on here but sorry lesbians Nicki Minaj is NOT bi-sexual. In fact she doesn’t even know how the “whole signing ladies boobs, started.” She actually had the audacity to say she is “BI-POLAR” as her reason. So maybe that’s how you guys got confused. But yeah, I was really like bitch please when I heard that and have not liked her since.

    • Idk about that… There’s alot of stuff on the internet saying shes actually lesbian look on youtube there like a hundred people who say they have proof but she says “I’ll never come out”

  4. I absolutely love the new She & Him video, the dancing put a huge smile on my face this morning. It’s a little HSM, I half expected Zac Efron to jump out of one of the lockers.

  5. I’m not feeling Laura Marling’s new stuff either but will reserve judgment until I hear the entire album.

  6. my friend loves laura marling! she’s also really cute (laura marling) (also my friend too in case she’s reading this).

Comments are closed.