And the Most-Viewed Musical Artist on YouTube Is...NOT Justin Bieber

Nope.  His #1 spot has been taken by Rihanna.  Her 77 videos on her VEVO channel have been seen more than 3,784,000,000 times, which is roughy two million more than what Bieber has for his 79 videos on VEVO.

Billboard also reports these stats:

1.  Rihanna has 8.73 million subscribers to her video channel, a whopping 3.7 million more than Bieber. That tells you something about Rihanna fan engagement, doesn't it?

2.  Bieber has 54,300,000-ish "likes" on Facebook. Rihanna has 72,300,000.

3.  Other big YouTube stars include Psy (#3, 3.1 billion views), Eminem (#4, 2.4 billion), Lady Gaga (#5, 2.2 billion) and Shakira (#6, 2 billion).

Scratch These Vinyl Posters. Go On. You're Supposed To

I've never heard of an interactive fingernail-power gig poster before, but there's a first time for everything, huh?.

Read mroe at Creative Review.

The 20 Worst Bands of All Time

This originally came out from LA Weekly more a year ago, but just like strain of HxNx flu, it's back again, this time on a wave of social media postings.  Enjoy.  I think.

20 Worst Bands of All Time  (Rush?  The Raconteurs?  Really?)

20 Worst Hipster Bands (Yes, Arcade Fire made the list)

Interview with Kylesa

Contributor Andrew Epstein was at it again, getting an audience with Georgia sludge metallers Kylesa.

Savannah, Georgia’s Kylesa are a down-tuned psychedelic sludgy metal band who, like their friends in Mastodon, have managed to attract an audience outside of the usual heavy sphere. The band evokes the sensibilities of The Melvins and Sonic Youth, processing their eclectic rock tendencies through the needle-head of extreme metal. Describing their show as loud would be an understatement (they have two drummers by the way).

They’ve just released their sixth album Ultraviolet, and I had a chance to sit down with guitarists / vocalists Philip Cope and Laura Pleasants to talk about the progression of their sound, possible divisions in their audience, and their faithfulness to the heavy music scene.

Buy a Ticket to the Show, Get Five New Tracks

Everyone is looking for new distribution models for music.  In the case of Blondie--yes, them--they're going to try something different.

If you buy a ticket to their No Principals tour this fall, you will get five free tracks from their upcoming album. 

Interesting gambit. Let's see how this works.  More details here.