Remember that minor blogospheric meltdown when it was revealed that MGMT were to appear on Jay-Z’s Blueprint 3? Yeah… what a summer. Well, as we all know by now, the MGMT bros were left off Hova’s final tracklist (I figured they were bumped off by Alicia Keyes or Mr. Hudson or something) and here’s why: “MGMT turned me down,” Jay-z told Gotham (via Digital Spy). Perhaps it was that “Brian Eno” track and they wanted to keep it for their next LP.
R.E.M. are apparently back in the studio, as a recent photo of Michael Stipe with Accelerate producer Jacknife Lee was sent to fansite Murmurs by R.E.M.’s tour manager, Bob Whittaker. Murmurs says the photo depicts Stipe and company starting “work on the new R.E.M. record.” Watch ‘em twiddle them knobs here.
After over a decade of collaborating with Gillian Welch and a slew of solo shows as the Dave Rawlings Machine, Dave Rawlings is putting out his debut album, A Friend of a Friend. The album features seven originals and a few covers, including versions of Ryan Adams’ “To Be Young (Is To Be Sad, Is To Be High)” and Bright Eyes’ “Method Acting.” Can’t find any samples online just yet, but you can pre-order the record here and listen to Rawling’s play “To Be Young” on Adams’ original recording (via one of those new Google pop-up thingies) here.