This Sunday, February 11, Glen Campbell will have Blake Shelton and the Band Perry accompanying him as he performs at the Grammy Awards where he will be presented with the Recording Academy® Lifetime Achievement Award. This week saw the reissue of Glen Campbell’s critically acclaimed 2008 album, Meet Glen Campbell—expanded with exclusive bonus tracks for a special CD and digital edition—in advance of this great honor. Upon its original release in August 2008, Meet Glen Campbell was met with worldwide critical praise, and Campbell promoted the album with interviews and performances for a broad spectrum of media, including an “AOL Sessions” concert. Meet Glen Campbell’s expanded edition adds three performances from that concert (Campbell’s classic hits “Wichita Lineman” and “Rhinestone Cowboy”, and U2’s “All I Want Is You”), as well as 2008 remixes of “Gentle on My Mind” and “Galveston”. And we’ve got two copies of this album to give away to two of our lucky readers!

From the press release:
In a legendary music career that spans more than five decades, Glen Campbell has achieved chart-topping, platinum-selling pop and country success singing everyday tales of life, love, work, and heartache. Campbell has been honored with five GRAMMY Awards and trophies for Male Vocalist of the Year from both the Country Music Association (CMA) and the Academy Of Country Music (ACM). In addition to being inducted into the CMA’s Hall of Fame, he has been awarded its top Entertainer Of The Year honors, and the ACM has honored him with its prestigious Pioneer Award.

Tayisha Busay is an electro-dance band known for their energetic live performances and sparkle-heavy, bouncy, music videos. The band, comprised of Tessa G, Ariel Sims and Brandon LalaVek, is based in Brooklyn. Some of Tayisha Busay’s past popular tunes include such colorful titles as “WTF You Doin in My Mouth” and “Soul Power”. This highly unique band has their own sound and their own style, listing among their influences “Classy meets trashy, dancing like you mean it, glitter and sweat, heavy and hard, short and sweet”, just to name a few.

“Heartmeat, Lovemuscle” is Tayisha Busay’s newest single, and the video is all too appropriate for Valentine’s Day. The lyrics are clearly about love, past, present and future, and the overall vibe is quirky love story—we watch as different candy hearts and other holiday-themed sweets flash before us and shape shift into the lyrics of the track. Confection-like in its aesthetic, the video employs glitter in more diverse and inventive ways than a homemade valentine, and colorful graphics grab the eye while highlighting the pounding beat and echoing vocals. The overlapping close ups of the band members are playful and visually appealing, even, perhaps, evocative of the infamous morphing sequence in Michael Jackson’s iconic “Black or White” video.

“What was it like coming back to America after fighting in Vietnam?” asks an off-screen narrator. A 22-year-old black man nods and begins to talk, his weary expression suggesting this is a question he’s prepared to answer, but one he dreads. “It’s almost the same as when I left, ” he begins. “I say this because when a man goes to fight for his country and then comes back over here and almost have to fight for his life in certain parts of the country, get ridiculed and discriminated, you know, and be less than a man. I don’t think it’s right, you know.” It’s 1967. 

This early scene sets the stage for Göran Olsson’s terrific documentary, Black Power Mixtape 1967-195, which premieres on Independent Lens on 9 February. Specfically, it lays out the film’s premise, that the Black Power Movement, building and then suppressed from 1967 to 1975, emerged out of needs to resist injury and endure trauma, and also, to make visible what was going on in America, what remained unknown to people who didn’t have to know. The film features interviews with civil rights figures like SNCC’s Stokely Carmichael and Angela Davis, as well as today’s activists (Talib Kweli, ?uestlove), tracing how the Panthers resisted oppression (see especially, the FBI’s COINTELPRO) and also built a lasting sense community. Looking back, it looks forward, observing from the outside (the Swedish reporters’ footage that makes up the bulk of the film), it reveals what goes on inside.

See PopMatters’ review.

Watch Looking Back at the Black Power Movement on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.

Joachim Dyrdahl, known in the music scene as successful producer and DJ “diskJokke”, has debuted the latest video for his new single “Now Dance”. Initially reaching fame for his imaginative remixes of songs by the likes of David Lynch, Lindstrøm, Foals and Bloc Party, the Oslo-based artist is now coming into his own, creating original, funky sound mixes based in electronica and infused with hints of house, disco and pop.

Below is the most recent video, designed to accompany “Now Dance”, a single that has also been reworked by UK artist Bright Light Bright Light. The song is one of many singles featured in the limited edition 7” series, produced by Oslo-based label Splendour, a brand that has collaborated recently with high profile artists such as His Highness and Shimmering Stars.

Released on vinyl in early 2012 as the b-side to a DJ Hidden/Broken Note collaboration, “Obey” sees Ad Noiseam producers Niveau Zero and Balkansky come together for one brief, dirty moment. While the North American mainstream struggles with the cycle of dubstep hype and backlash, this track falls not into its spiral. Rather, “Obey” huffs and puffs and blows down the house with its uncompromising bass and meticulous production. This is not your basic club single. It doesn’t ask you to like it. It commands you to obey, and can smell your fear.