Nina Simone, born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in Tryon, North Carolina, in 1933, was a classically trained pianist whose music moved freely through jazz, blues, gospel, folk, soul, and pop. Her first album, Little Girl Blue, was recorded in 1957 and released in 1959, beginning a career that would make her one of the most distinctive singers, pianists, interpreters, and political voices of the twentieth century. These ten songs show both sides of Simone’s work: the original material tied closely to her life and activism, and the remarkable covers she could transform into something unmistakably her own. # 10 – To
Bryan Adams has announced details of his 17th album. How’s It Goin’ is the follow-up to last year’s Roll with the Punches, and will be released via Adams’ own BAD Records on November 6.
According to Adams’ representatives, How’s It Goin’ is “a deeply personal musical love letter to Canada” which is “rooted in the people, places, landscapes and stories that have shaped his home country.”
“The idea was simply to make a record about Canada,” says Adams. “It started with writing the song for the documentary Canada’s Wild Eastern Edge, and after doing so much research, I was inspired to start writing more songs about Canada. Musically, it took me somewhere a little different too, which made the whole thing exciting.”
Adams has already released two singles from the album. 51st State arrived in July as a tongue-in-cheek response to the suggestion that Canada might be better off as part of the US, and The Ballad Of Terry Fox – released last month –is a celebration of Fox, the amputee who famously ran 5000 miles across Canada from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador to Victoria, British Columbia, to raise money for cancer research.
“I remember Terry’s run back in 1980 when I was on tour in Canada playing 200-capacity clubs,” says Adams. “I was 20 years old, and I think Terry was a year older than me.
“When he stopped near Thunder Bay on September 1, I had just played in Ottawa, and his run was all over the news. Without knowing it, Terry gave our country a ‘something’ and ‘someone’ that everyone could agree on and unite behind.”
How’s It Goin’ will be released in the usual formats, as well as a hardback book edition containing the album on CD and images connected to the songs. It’s available to order now. Full tracklist below.
Bryan Adams: How’s It Goin’ tracklist
How’s It Goin’ Highway 16 Diesel & Dirt The Battle Of Lundy’s Lane The Ballad Of Terry Fox 51st State When Canada Joined Newfoundland A Handful Of Gold Iron Ribbon The Bridge Canada’s Wild Eastern Edge Heave Away Lake Ontario *
Slipknot have produced their first musical surprise of the year, dropping their new single Arsenal. Arsenal is the bands first taste of what Slipknot sounds like moving forward after the departure of turntablist Sid Wilson and sampler/keyboardist Craig Jones. It is also the first track with new drummer Eloy Casagrande behind the kit and hints […]
Slide guitar wizard Sonny Landreth has released a new single, “Lady On The Rise,” the first preview of his forthcoming studio album, due in 2027 via Provogue / Artone.
Written by Landreth, “Lady On The Rise” features the Louisiana guitarist on vocals and guitar, with Brian Brignac on drums and percussion and Tony Daigle on keyboards. Landreth and Daigle produced the track, which was recorded, mixed and mastered by Daigle at Electric Comoland in Lafayette, Louisiana.
Landreth says the song was inspired by hope and felt like the right choice to introduce his next chapter.
”Oh man, after all this time, it feels great to have a new single coming out. That always gives me a boost and breathes new life into a project, so I’m excited to get it out there. I chose ‘Lady On The Rise’ because of the vibe I felt recording it in the studio this summer and because it’s a song inspired by hope.”
The as-yet-untitled 2027 release will mark Landreth’s 15th album and follows a career that has established him as one of the most distinctive slide guitarists of his generation. His approach combines blues, roots music and the sounds of his native South Louisiana with an adventurous playing style that has earned him two Grammy nominations and appearances at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival.
Landreth began his career playing with zydeco legend Clifton Chenier’s Red Hot Louisiana Band and has since appeared on hundreds of recordings. His collaborations and session work have included artists such as John Mayall and John Hiatt.
Along with the new single, Landreth has several live appearances scheduled. On September 16, he will make his first appearance at Americanafest in more than 20 years, performing on the day stage at Eastside Bowl alongside Grace Potter, Eli Paperboy Reed and others. The performances will be broadcast live on WMOT Roots Radio in partnership with NPR Music, World Café and Nashville PBS.
Landreth will also perform an official Americanafest showcase at the Station Inn on September 17. Later in the month, he heads to Austin for two appearances at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival.
UPCOMING TOUR DATES:
09/17 Nashville, TN – AMERICANAFEST 09/26 Austin, TX – Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival 09/27 Austin, TX – Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival 10/09 New Orleans, LA – FOC Concert Series – New Orleans Jazz Museum 10/11 Lafayette, LA – Festivals Acadiens et Créoles 10/17 Homer, LA – Louisiana Legends Festival
2027:
06/06 Frankford, NJ – Michael Arnone’s 34th Crawfish Fest
By the second half of September, Blone Noble and Hot Hail! will be moving through the Pacific Northwest and Western Canada on the DOMINATOR 2026 tour, carrying enough synthesizers, theatrical posture, political irritation, and suspiciously good tailoring to make a normal Thursday night feel like somebody accidentally booked a cabaret inside a government bunker. For anyone wishing they could have stumbled into a club 45 years ago to catch Fad Gadget and Soft Cell on the same bill, this unholy pairing may be about as close as the 21st century is going to get.
Seattle’s Hot Hail! will support the September run, with NITE SCHOOL co-founder DJ Candy Whiplash curating each night from behind the decks. Her adventurous selections and assured dance-floor instincts will connect the live sets, sustain the audience’s energy, and give every stop the immersive character of a NITE SCHOOL night. More dates in the U.S. South will be announced soon.
Blone Noble belongs to the grand tradition of performers who understand that walking onstage in ordinary clothes and looking pleased to be there is an unforgivable waste of electricity. There is Bowie’s appetite for reinvention, Bryan Ferry’s immaculate poise, Frank Tovey’s art-school mischief, and some of the elegant strangeness associated with Japan and Dalí’s Car. Noble treats clothing, lighting, posture, movement, and staging as part of the music, creating performances that can resemble a nightclub, a fashion shoot, an art installation, or an occult ceremony. Beneath the polish sits a colder electronic foundation built for physical movement. Synthesizers stretch outward, rhythms tighten, and pop hooks creep into spaces where less sociable musicians might have installed a folding chair and lectured you about theory.
DOMINATOR carries a sexually charged absurdity and mechanical tension—certainly the flip side of Fad Gadget’s Coitus Interruptus—while the eerie Subterranean World turns toward a more enclosed and psychological direction. Blone Noble shapeshifts with admirable disregard for anyone attempting to file the project under one convenient heading.
Then there is Hot Hail!, the Seattle duo of songwriter Billy Sigil and DJ Emilio Cerrillo, who bring classic synthpop instincts, darkwave excess, post-punk politics, horror, humanity, and jokes good enough to survive proximity to the apocalypse. Hot Hail! describe themselves as the perfect music for starting, then quickly ruining, any party. This is their first multi-city tour, giving several towns the opportunity to learn exactly how efficiently that process works.
Hot Hail! Photo by Victoria Renaurd
Their newest album, HOPE IN HELL, wrestles with the question of how anyone preserves sanity while fascism crawls back into public life wearing a fresh tie and insisting everybody calm down. The songs pair enormous hooks with political anger, proving that despair can at least have decent bass.
Drawing from the synth traditions of early Depeche Mode and Soft Cell, Hot Hail!’s WYRD takes the form of an address to an absent companion: the feminine self pushed down early, disciplined into silence, but never erased. The lyrics speak directly to this buried part of the self, allowing affection, recognition, and regret to occupy the same space. The arrangement leaves enough space for each admission to register, giving WYRD the feeling of a conversation postponed for years.
Candy Whiplash brings the full history and curatorial authority of NITE SCHOOL to the September bill. As the acclaimed series’ co-founder, curator, resident DJ, and creative director, she has spent nearly sixteen years helping shape one of Austin’s most respected underground music institutions. Candy and her late partner, Seattle-born DJ Scorpio RX, launched NITE SCHOOL at Beauty Bar before establishing its longtime home at Cheer Up Charlie’s, one of the city’s most influential queer live-music and DJ venues. Through acclaimed performances by artists from around the world, adventurous DJ programming, and a fiercely loyal community, the night became a cornerstone of Austin’s underground electronic music scene.
Candy’s work has always reached far beyond the DJ booth. She developed NITE SCHOOL’s distinctive minimalist visual identity and has overseen its branding, marketing, photography, graphic design, artist relations, and promotion. That combination of creative direction, musical judgment, and sustained care gave NITE SCHOOL a complete identity of its own while providing a platform for darkwave, post-punk, EBM, industrial, techno, noise, synthpop, and genre-defying electronic artists from around the world.
Behind the decks, Candy is known for emotionally charged, dance-floor-driven sets spanning French electronic music, goth, coldwave, darkwave, EBM, industrial, post-punk, no wave, mutant disco, Italo disco, synthpop, techno, and Spanish-language darkwave. Her selections connect foundational records with contemporary underground sounds, turning every changeover into an essential part of the evening and carrying the audience’s momentum from one live performance to the next.
Candy Whiplash. Photo by Victora-Renard
Following Scorpio RX’s passing in January 2024, Candy revived NITE SCHOOL by popular demand, honoring the vision they established together while leading it into a new chapter. DOMINATOR 2026 marks NITE SCHOOL’s Seattle debut and carries its legacy of immersive programming, adventurous booking, visual imagination, and community-building into the Pacific Northwest and Western Canada.
For several nights in September, restraint is officially somebody else’s problem. Have a blast!
Slipknot have produced their first musical surprise of the year, dropping their new single Arsenal. Arsenal is the bands first taste of what Slipknot sounds like moving forward after the departure of turntablist Sid Wilson and sampler/keyboardist Craig Jones. It is also the first track with new drummer Eloy Casagrande behind the kit and hints […]
