Watch Stone Temple Pilots Render “Christmas Time Is Here” On David Letterman

In a week before Christmas Eve in 1994, Stone Temple Pilots stopped by the Late Show Show with David Letterman to performed a song from their new sophomore album Purple. The band scheduled to play non single track “Unglued” on the musical slot of the show. Before they begin to plug in “Unglued,” frontman Scott Weiland delivered an intro of “Christmas Time Is Here,” a song originally written by Lee Mendelson and Vince Guaraldi for the 1965 TV special A Charlie Brown Christmas. Watch the performance below.

Watch Scott Weiland Sing “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” On Jay Leno

Scott Weiland appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno to performed a “jazzy” version of the holiday standard “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.” Weiland sings alongside band consisting of Douglas Grean on guitar, Frank Reina on drums and musicians on grand piano, stand-up bass, horn, cello and violins. The song later released on Weiland 2011’s Christmas album The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year. Watch the performance below.

Watch Public Enemy Pay Tribute To Miles Davis On SNL

By the time the booker at Saturday Night Live got around to securing one of the best hip-hop outfits to call New York City home, Public Enemy had released their opus and one of the most critically lauded albums in rap, It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back. On the show 17th season premiere, Chuck D, Flavor Flav, and the crew made short work of the small stage with “Can’t Truss It” and “Bring The Noise,” passing lyrical volleys between each other and getting all up in the lens of the camera guys at every opportunity. It wasn’t all fun and rhymes, though: Miles Davis passed away the same day that Public Enemy played SNL, and they took a breath in between their intro (from Spike Lee and host-Michael Jordan) and their final song for a brief moment of silence for the jazz icon. Watch below.

The Jesus And Mary Chain Psychocandy Turns 30

By The Audio Mug | November 18, 2015

Arguably Psychocandy is an album with one trick and one trick alone — The Beach Boys melodies meet Velvet Underground feedback and beats, all cranked up to ten and beyond, along with plenty of echo. However, what a trick it is. Following up on the promise of the earliest singles, The Jesus And Mary Chain with Psychocandy arguably created a movement without meaning to, one that itself caused echoes in everything from bliss-out shoegaze to snotty Britpop and back again. The best tracks were without question those singles, anti-pop yet pure pop at the same time: “Just Like Honey,” starting off like the Ronettes heard in a canyon and weirdly beautiful with its bells, “You Trip Me Up” and its slinking sense of cool, and most especially “Never Understand.” Storming down like a rumble of bricks wrapped in cotton candy and getting more and more frenetic at the end, when there’s nothing but howls and screaming noise, it’s one hell of a track. However, at least in terms of sheer sonic violence and mayhem, most of the other cuts were pretty hard to beat, as sprawling, amped-up messes like “The Living End” (which later inspired both a band and a movie title) and “In A Hole.” “My Little Underground” is actually the secret gem on the album, with a great snarling guitar start, an almost easygoing melody and a great stuttering chorus — not quite the Who but not quite anything else. What the Reids sing about — entirely interchangeable combinations regarding girls, sex, drugs, speed, and boredom in more or less equal measure — is nothing compared to the perfectly disaffected way those sentiments are delivered. Bobby Gillespie’s “hit the drums and then hit them again” style makes Moe Tucker seem like Neil Peart, but arguably in terms of sheer economy he doesn’t need to do any more.

Alice In Chains Alice In Chains Turns 20

By The Audio Mug | November 7, 2015

Dispelling rumors of their demise due to Layne Staley’s heroin addiction, Alice In Chains is a sonically detailed effort that ranks as their best-produced record, and its best moments are easily some of their most mature music. Alice In Chains relies less on metallic riffs and more on melody and texturally varied arrangements than the group’s previous full-length albums, finally integrating some of the more delicate acoustic moods of their EPs. The lyrics deal with familiar AIC subject matter — despair, misery, loneliness, and disappointment — but in a more understated fashion, and the lyrics take on more uplifting qualities of toughness and endurance, which were missing from much of their previous work. The consistent visceral impact Alice In Chains lacks in comparison to that previous work is partially made up for by the skilled production and songs like “Grind," “Brush Away,” “Over Now,” and the hit ballad “Heaven Beside You,” which are among the band’s best work. Still, in spite of its many virtues, it’s hard not to feel a little frustrated with the record, as though, given those qualities, it should have turned out better than it did — there are some slow spots where the songs are undercrafted and not especially memorable, and those moments can make the band sound uncommitted and distracted. That, in turn, can make the defiance of songs like “Grind” (“you’d be well advised/not to plan my funeral 'fore the body dies”) sound more like denial; just when Alice In Chains’ music was finally beginning to emerge from the dark side, the intra-band problems became too much to bear and made Alice In Chains the last collection of new material the Staley-fronted AIC would release.

Nirvana MTV Unplugged Released 21 Years Ago After Kurt Cobain’ Death

By The Audio Mug | November 1, 2015

The final months of Kurt Cobain’s life were chaotic to say the least, but in the midst of it all, the singer and his band Nirvana delivered a poignant and beloved live performance that proved to be one of their most popular releases. That would be the band’s MTV Unplugged performance, recorded in Nov. 1993, that would eventually be released on Nov. 1, 1994, in the aftermath of Cobain’s death.
At the time, Nirvana had seen their popularity reach new heights and the band had become one of the most familiar faces on the music video network thanks to videos like “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” “Come As You Are,” “In Bloom” and “Heart-Shaped Box.” At the same time, MTV had spawned one of the most popular music showcases of the day with their MTV Unplugged series, showcasing some of the biggest acts performing their songs in an acoustic setting. Nirvana, who had released their In Utero album just two months prior to the taping, had been pursued by the network for what would definitely be considered a coup for the show. But the band wasn’t exactly keen on replicating what had been done by others before. As Dave Grohl stated, “We’d seen the other Unpluggeds and didn’t like many of them, because most bands would treat them like rock shows — play their hits like it was Madison Square Garden, except with acoustic guitars.” Instead the band looked at Mark Lanegan’s 1990 album The Winding Sheet as a source of inspiration. The disc featured a more stripped back sound and it should be noted that both Kurt Cobain and Krist Novoselic made guest appearances on the Lanegan disc. Unlike a lot of their peers, Nirvana didn’t view this as a “greatest hits” show, instead opting to go deeper in choosing cuts and including a number of cover songs, something that didn’t exactly sit well with the network. Among the set list, only “Come As You Are” could be considered a major hit for the band.
Speaking of covers, three of those belonged to the Meat Puppets, whom Nirvana had been touring with just prior to the taping. Cris and Curt Kirwook joined the band for performances of “Plateau,” “Oh, Me,” and “Lake of Fire,” the latter of which would receive plenty of play in the aftermath of the airing. Producer Alex Coletti told Guitar World, “[The network] wanted to hear the ‘right’ names — Eddie Vedder or Tori Amos or God knows who.”
In an interview with Rolling Stone, Curt Kirkwood was asked about the band’s influence on Nirvana. He stated, “We’ll never know how much influence we had on Kurt because we can’t ask him that. We can ask Krist Novoselic, I guess. Musically — by the time we heard them — we were too far gone into our own thing. I think they immediately warmed my heart because I immediately felt some sort of spiritual kinship. They were one of the only bands I’d seen since the Butthole Surfers that I really felt was in the same ballpark as us nihilistically and aesthetically and spiritually.”
Other covers included David Bowie‘s “The Man Who Sold The World,” which would serve as a single from the album release, Lead Belly’s “Where Did You Sleep Last Night,” which closed out the set, and a re-titled “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me for a Sunbeam,” which was initially done by The Vaselines. As for the Lead Belly cover, the song dated back for Cobain to the aforementioned Mark Lanegan disc The Winding Sheet. According to the New York Times, the two musicians bonded over the original song that Lead Belly recorded in 1944 and Cobain played guitar on Lanegan’s version. When it came time to do the MTV Unplugged special and feeling the spirit of the moment, the band closed out their show with their memorable rendition of the song.
The road to the taping did prove to provide many challenges. The band dedicated two days to rehearsing for the show and reportedly were not happy with Dave Grohl’s drum sound. “What I didn’t know was up until the day [of the Unplugged performance], there was talk of Dave [Grohl] not playing at all in the show,” Coletti remembered. “Kurt wasn’t happy with the way rehearsals were going; he didn’t like the way Dave sounded playing drums with sticks … He’s a heavy hitter, and the thing about Unplugged, especially with rock bands, is if the drummer doesn’t really, really get it under control and tries to play a rock show on a smaller kit, then it brings the show to a bad-sounding electric show instead of a good-sounding acoustic show.” Eventually, Coletti sent a production assistant to a local Sam Ash to get Grohl some wire brushes and sizzle sticks, which proved to do the trick.
Cobain was also nervous about the performance, fretting over everything from the sound to the look. Coletti recalls, “The set was a conversation with Kurt. He asked for stargazer lilies and when I went up to see Kurt and showed him the drawings, he said, ‘I need more flowers and candles.’ I said, ‘Like a funeral?’ He said, ‘Exactly, like a funeral.'” In Charles Cross’ bio about Cobain, one observer stated about the show that at one point the singer was refusing to play. He added, “There was no joking, no smiles, no fun coming from him … Therefore, everyone was more than a little worried about his performance.”
But the worry was for naught as Nirvana pulled together one of the more memorable live performances in music history with the show. The lineup featured the familiar Cobain, Novoselic and Grohl, bolstered with touring guitarist Pat Smear and cellist Lori Goldston. The show opened with a beautifully reserved version of “About a Girl” from the band’s Bleach album. The song was a key turning point in defining Nirvana’s sound early in their career and it’s pop-leaning influence set the tone for what was to come. When the Nirvana: MTV Unplugged in New York was released a year after the performance, “About a Girl” got the first nod as a single.
“All Apologies,” which was recorded for the In Utero album and was initially released as a double-A side with “Rape Me,” is probably better known for the MTV Unplugged version, which dominated the MTV airwaves in the aftermath of Cobain’s death. The song was nominated for Best Rock Performance By a Duo or Group and Best Rock Song Grammy Awards in 1995. “The Man Who Sold The World,” “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” and “Lake of Fire” also generated plenty of attention off the disc.
Cobain would die on April 8, 1994, just five months after the recording of the MTV Unplugged special. Initially, DGC asked for something they could release to combat bootlegs flooding the market. The band intended to release a double album featuring live performances from throughout their career with the addition of the MTV Unplugged special. But after having trouble emotionally investing themselves in the project, the surviving members opted instead to just release the Unplugged performance, turning it over to producer Scott Litt to oversee the record.
On Nov. 1, 1994, the album was released, immediately debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. The disc would go on to be certified 5 times platinum and has universally been considered one of the greatest live albums of all-time. Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged in New York would also win the Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album in 1996 and the DVD would be released in 2007.
“I think it’s a really important performance for Nirvana fans because I think it showed another side to them that unfortunately we never got to see again,” concluded MTV Unplugged director Beth McCarthy-Miller.




Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged in New York is released 21 years ago today. Kurt Cobain’s first solo album Montage Of Heck: The Home Recordings is out 11/13/15 via Universal.

Watch Adele Made An Infamous SNL Debut

Before she was famous with the chart topping album 21 and Grammy winning awards, there was Adele who made a Saturday Night Live debut as a musical guest back in 2008, in celebrating the released her debut album 19. In the episode hosted by Josh Brolin, Adele performed “Chasing Pavements” and “Cold Shoulder,” songs off the album. Watch the performance below.

Alanis Morissette Jagged Little Pill Turns 20

It’s remarkable that Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill struck a sympathetic chord with millions of listeners, because it’s so doggedly, determinedly insular. This, after all, plays like an emotional purging, prompted by a bitter relationship — and, according to all the lyrical hints, that’s likely a record executive who took advantage of a young Alanis. She never disguises her outright rage and disgust, whether it’s the vengeful wrath of “You Oughta Know” or asking him “you scan the credits for your name and wonder why it's not there.” This is such insider information that it’s hard to believe that millions of listeners not just bought it, but embraced it, turning Alanis Morisette into a mid-'90s phenomenon. Perhaps it was the individuality that made it appealing, since its specificity lent it genuineness — and, even if this is clearly an attempt to embrace the "women in rock" movement in alterna-rock, Morissette’s intentions are genuine. Often, it seems like Glen Ballard’s pop inclinations fight against Alanis’ exorcisms, as her bitter diary entries are given a pop gloss that gives them entry to the pop charts. What’s all the more remarkable is that Alanis isn’t a particularly good singer, stretching the limits of pitch and credibility with her octave-skipping caterwauling. At its core, this is the work of an ambitious but sophomoric 19-year-old, once burned by love, but still willing to open her heart a second time. All of this adds up to a record that’s surprisingly effective, an utterly fascinating exploration of a young woman’s psyche. As slick as the music is, the lyrics are unvarnished and Morissette unflinchingly explores emotions so common, most people would be ashamed to articulate them. This doesn’t make Jagged Little Pill great, but it does make it a fascinating record, a phenomenon that’s intensely personal.

Nirvana MTV Unplugged In New York Turns 20

If In Utero is a suicide note, Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged in New York is a message from beyond the grave, a summation of Kurt Cobain’s talents and pain so fascinating, it’s hard to listen to repeatedly. Is it the choice of material or the spare surroundings that make it so effective? Well, it’s certainly a combination of both, how the version of The Vaselines’ “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me For A Sunbeam” or the three covers of Meat Puppets II songs mean as much as “All Apologies” or “Something In The Way.” This, in many senses, isn’t just an abnormal Nirvana record, capturing them in their sincerest desire to be R.E.M. circa Automatic For The People, it’s the Nirvana record that nobody, especially Kurt, wanted revealed. It’s a nakedly emotional record, unintentionally so, as the subtext means more than the main themes of how Nirvana wanted to prove its worth and diversity, showcasing the depth of their songwriting. As it turns out, it accomplishes its goals rather too well; this is a band, and songwriter, on the verge of discovering a new sound and style. Then, there’s the subtexts, as Kurt’s hurt and suicidal impulses bubble to the surface even as he’s trying to suppress them. Few records are as unblinkingly bare and naked as this, especially albums recorded by their peers. No other band could have offered covers of David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold The World” and the folk standard “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” on the same record, turning in chilling performances of both — performances that reveal as much as their original songs.

Watch David Bowie Bring Joey Arias & Klaus Nomi To SNL

David Bowie had cleaned up and moved to Berlin but returned to New York to perform on Saturday Night Live. Always alert to stirrings in pop culture’s avant garde, he brought with him Joey Arias and Klaus Nomi, both leading lights of downtown New York’s performance art scene. Nomi was so impressed with the costuming that he adopted the huge plastic tuxedo Bowie wears during “The Man Who Sold The World” performance. Bowie launches next into Station To Station’s “TVC-15” in a skirt and heels, while Nomi and Arias drag around a pink plastic poodle. Bowie’s performance of “Boys Keep Swinging” was particularly remarkable as it featured Nomi and Arias on vocals. Bowie also performed in a green screen suit with a body puppet superimposed over top of him, cutting edge technology for that the time. He infamously ended the performance by flashing the puppet’s penis. The episode hosted by actor, Martin Sheen. Watch the performances below.

Watch Stone Temple Pilots Goes Unplugged On SNL

A year after releasing their debut studio album, San Diego alternative rock band Stone Temple Pilots traveled to the city of New York to attended two live performances invitation. First was MTV Unplugged gig and the next three day they’re scheduled to play as a musical guest on NBC’s Saturday Night Live for the first time. On the Nicole Kidman-hosted episode, the band performed two songs off the debut album Core, the unplugged’s “Creep” and wild vibe’s “Naked Sunday.” Watch both performance of the songs below.