The spread of the Coronavirus has forced us all to self-quarantine in our homes. As numbers continue to increase, festivals, venues, and artists have been forced to cancel or postpone their events within the next couple of months, crushing the hearts of music lovers everywhere.
Luckily for us, now that all our favorite artists, musicians, and DJs are all stuck at home just like us, they have a lot more time to be creative and make new music for us all to enjoy. Since we’ve gone into quarantine we’ve gotten new albums and singles from several different artists. Some have even gotten creative and started sharing performances through different streaming platforms like Instagram live, Twitch or Youtube for fans to enjoy in the comfort of their own homes.
Artists across all genres such as Miley Cyrus, Kali Uchis, Steve Lacy, 4B, and Diplo have all been actively live-streaming for fans to help them during this difficult time. However, it’s the EDM community that has mainly used this as a way to keep their community close while in quarantine. Several DJs have begun live-streaming weekly hour long sets for their fans to enjoy. DJs like 4B, Wuki, Party Favor, Skrillex, Subtronics, GG Magree, Valentino Kahn,Wax Motif, and Sullivan King to name a few have all been actively live streaming sets for their fan to enjoy.
On April 9 Kayzo went live for two hours for his Unleashed Online, and Alison Wonderland will be going live every Monday for “Alison Wonderland Mondays.” Boombox Cartel just announced he will be streaming a set this Sunday April 19 at 8 pm PST. During this time, Diplo and Dillon Francis who have teamed up with DoorDash, will also be live-streaming bringing back their “Coronight Fever.” For every viewer who tunes in, DoorDash will donate one meal to a family in need. This whole weekend (April 17, 18, & 19) Lost Lands Festival is presenting “Couch Lands,” where they will be streaming their full sets from 2019.
Insomniac CEO and Founder Pasquale Rotella, hosted Beyond Wonderland’s Virtual Rave-A-Thon on March 20 and 21 in place of the actual festival that was forced to be postponed until June 19 and 20. The livestream brought in over 3 million viewers, prompting Rotella to host weekly virtual Rave-A-Thons to keep headliners entertained at home. This weekend April 17 and 18 Insomniac will be hosting Escape Halloween’s Virtual Rave-A-Thon, featuring performances from artists like AC Slater, Bonnie X Clyde, Cut Snake, Dillon Nathaniel, Duke Dumont, GRAVEDGR, Kendoll, Mikey Lion, Morten, No Mana, Sian, Slushii, TSURUDA, Two Friends, and Yulton.
Virtual Rave-A-Thons and livestreams will never compare to the feeling that comes with being at a live show and dancing with your best friends. But for now they offer us a brief moment of escape, as well as new music during this crazy time. For many of us music is our lifeline, and artists are trying to give us what we need in order to make staying home more bearable. It’s also a way for us all as a community to stay connected, and has reminded me why I love this community so much.
A reported 3.5 million viewers tuned into the Insomniac’s first livestream. Artists such as Joyride, Party Favor, 4B, Drezo, SayMyName, Kill The Noise, SVDDEN DEATH, and Wax Motif all gave sets spanning from 25 minutes to an hour. All the artists and host Rotella continued to encourage people to stay safe and to stay home. He even asked artists questions about how they’re spending their quarantine, asking Party Favor how many pairs of sweats he had been rotating at home. Here are some of my favorite sets below.
Insomniac presents Countdown Virtual Rave-A-Thon
Viewers tuned in to Insomniac Events Youtube channel from 8pm to midnight on March 27 and 28 for the Countdown Virtual Rave-A-Thon. Rotella was decked out from head to toe in an alien mind control deflection unit, and was accompanied by his alien friend “Trillion Toth.” Artists such as DJ Soda, Ekali, Flosstradamus, Peekaboo, Dombresky, i_o, JVNA, K?D, Los Kings, Mat Zo, Medasin, Ookay, Phantoms, Sacha Robotti, Sage Armstrong, SNBRN, and Tisoki. Not only did Rotella remind viewers to stay home and stay safe, but he also asked the artists Coutdown themed questions. We learned that Dombresky believes in aliens, and the Ookay would his laptop, Nintendo Switch, and his dog if he could travel to space with only three things. Here are some of my favorite sets below.
REZZ
Rezz gave her fans a live 45 minute set on April 1, finally joining artists in accepting livestreams as the new temporary normal. The audio and visuals weren’t the best, but her intent was clear: she wanted to give her fans live music and a moment of escape from all the madness going on in the world right now.
Insomniac presents Hard Summer Staycation Virtual Rave-A-Thon
On April 3 and 4 Devault, Ducky, Franklin Watts, Habstrakt, J Worra, Jauz, Kaivon, Mr. Carmack, Noizu, Omnom, Party Pupils, SVDDEN DEATH, Valentino Kahn, Walker & Royce, Wolfgang Gartner, and Wuki, all came to the Insomniac headquarters for Hard Summer Staycation. The lobby was covered in sand and palm trees, and Rotella was in his beachwear. Here are some of my favorite sets.
Brownies and Lemonade presents Digital Mirage Online Music Festival
Over 4 million people tuned in on April 3, 4, and 5 for Proximity and Brownies & Lemonade’s Digital Mirage, where 51 artists streamed sets from their homes. They originally set out to raise $100,000 for charity, but ended up raising over $300,000. Artists like Kaskade, Alison Wonderland, Kill the Noise, A-Track, Seven Lions, Ghastly, Nitti Gritti, 4B, and 12th Planet were all trending on twitter. Unfortunately the sets did not stay up after they were streamed, but I was able to find some below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wha_yS_sOXk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmPNG5WC0fM
Insomniac presents Nocturnal Wonderland
For the fourth weekend in a row, artists came to the Insomniac headquarters to perform live sets for audiences at home. Nocturnal Wonderland included performances from 12th Planet, ARMNHMR, Arty, Bijou, Borgore, Born Dirty, Champagne Drip, Demigod, Jason Ross, Ship Wrek, Spencer Brown, TJR, VNSSA, Z-Trip, and an hour and a half long set from Zeds Dead.
The Weeknd has been keeping his fans very happy during quarantine. After releasing a deluxe edition of his new album After Hours on March 23, the singer has surprised fans by expanding the track listing with three new bonus tracks, “Nothing Compares,” “Missed you,” and “Final Lullaby.”
Abel had recently deepened the LP, by adding on five tracks to the album. The album’s new additions included The Weeknd’s live Saturday Night Live performance of “Scared To Live,” as well as four remixes from Chromatics, Oneohtrix Point Never, Vapor Wave, and The Blaze. The deluxe album version also includes a new slasher-styled music video for “In Your Eyes.”
“Nothing Compares” which is produced by Abel, Ricky Reed and DaHeela, gives fans a taste of a roaring electric guitar line paired with 80s styled electro synths and percussion. The track finds Abel coming to terms with feelings that he has for his lover. We’re presented with classic The Weeknd vibes on “Missed You,” where he reflects on feelings he still has for a past lover over a trap-clad R&B beat. It all comes full circle on the soothing “Full Lullaby” where Abel sings to his past lover in an attempt to put both of them to sleep.
Listen to the bonus tracks and the deluxe version down below:
During his “183rd day of quarantine” Bad Bunny made the announcement on Instagram that he would be dropping the visual for his song “Yo Perro Sola” on Friday (March 27). The Puerto Rican artist dressed in complete drag in an effort to defend women’s rights.
The song which translates to “I twerk alone” is about a women who likes to dance reggaeton alone and doesn’t need anyone’s company at the club. The song features vocals from up-and-coming singer Nesi. “I wrote this from the perspective of a woman,” Bad Bunny explained in an interview with Rolling Stone. “I wanted a woman’s voice to sing it–‘Yo Perreo Sola’– because it doesn’t mean the same thing when a man sings it. But I do feel like that woman sometimes.
Directed by Stillz and Bad Bunny himself, the colorful music video starts off with him dressed in a red latex skirt and knee-high boots, as he brushes off a group of men trying to dance with him. Other women dance freely on their own as he sports a kilt and chains, “Te llama si te necista/Pero por ahora está solita/ Ella Perreo Sola (She’ll call you if she needs you/ But for now she is alone/ She twerks alone).”
The final frame reads a necessary public service announcement on sexual harassment: “If she doesn’t want to dance with you, respect her, she twerks alone.”
Harry Styles and his touring band stopped by NPR for an intimate Tiny Desk Concert featuring songs from his album Fine Line. The former One Direction member stripped things down in his peaceful and melodious four-song-set, that highlights his intimate songwriting abilities.
Styles, who is wearing a powder blue sweater with a chicken on it, and his band kicked the set off with an acoustic version of his song “Cherry.” Before jumping into his song “Watermelon Sugar,” he gives us some background and explains that the song was written during the tour for his debut album in 2017, during his day off in Nashville.
“It’s probably the longest it’s ever taken me to finish a song,” he went on to explain. “We kind of liked it when we first had it and then I really hated it for a long time and it kind of came back and it seemed to kind of kept coming back into the mix.” The songs title came from the Richard Brautigan book of the same title.
Styles goes on to describe the song as describing the “initial euphoria” that comes along with new love. The feeling and excitement can be felt from the unplugged version’s funky arrangement of a triple-acoustic guitar and angelic backing vocals coming from the band’s drummer, keyboard player, and rhythm guitarist.
Before playing “To Be So Lonely,” Styles introduced his guitarist and collaborator Mitchell Rowland whiling describing how the song was made, including the sad bit about everyone singing along the loudest during the line about him being an “arrogant b—–d.” The song has become a hit on the TikTok app.
The set ends with the song “Adore you,” which Styles says is about a fish. The song is actually similar to his previous songs about those first initial feelings that come with a new relationship.
Styles will begun his tour for “Fine Line” on June 26 at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia. Styles is scheduled to perform three back-to-back shows at Madison Square Garden in New York, from July 6th through the 8th.
On Monday (March 9) Eminem shared the new music video for “Godzilla,” the latest visual from his new album Music to Be Murdered By. The video is directed by Lyrical Lemonade’s Cole Bennett, and is dedicated to the late rapper Juice WRLD, who is featured on the song’s hook.
The video begins with Eminem in a Costco-like warehouse store, where he begins rapping, “I can swallow a bottle of alcohol and I’ll feel like Godzilla.” We then see the rapper beginning to chug a bottle of Godzilla, with his face on the bottle. The drunk rapper then begins to wander around the store clearly hallucinating, and runs into an array of characters some of which are played by himself, before he vomits up a pile of lego chunks.
The rapper then lands on top of a mountain of his entire discography, and raps to the shoppers in the store. He later runs through a parking lot where he is accidentally punched in the face and knocked out by Mike Tyson.
At the hospital, we see his longtime collaborator Dr.Dre playing up to his title in a white lab coat and blue scrubs alongside Eminem who is also playing a doctor. Eminem then spits his last verse before Bennett signs us off with a special tribute to the 21-year-old rapper Juice WRLD.
A black and white video of Juice laughing plays, accompanied by a voiceover from the rapper. “I hope everybody havin’ a good day. I hope everybody accomplished something significant. Even if you didn’t accomplish anything significant, don’t be discouraged. Just aim to accomplish something significant tomorrow and the next day and so on. If anybody is going through anything, I hope and pray you get through it. And just know you do have the strength to get through whatever the f— you going through, no matter what it is.”
Music to be Murder by was released in January, with “Godzilla” being its standout track. Both from Chicago, Bennett and Juice WRLD were close friends. Bennett is best known for his work directing videos for not only Juice WRLD, but Vic Mensa, Chance the Rapper, Famous Dex, Lil Pump, Smokepurpp, Lil Xan, Blueface, Ski Mask the Slump God, Jack Harlow, and more. His most notable video on his Youtube channel is Juice WRLD’s “Lucid Dreams,” which has surpassed 400 million views.
In January Dua Lipa released a technicolor music video for her single “Physical” off her upcoming album Future Nostalgia. Today, the British singer has released an 80s inspired workout video for the single.
While the single’s original music video is more focused on the “future” aspect of her upcoming album, the new workout has a much more 80s nostalgia look and feel to it. Dua is dressed in a yellow body suit that reads “Physical” and matching socks to go along with it, both of which can be purchased online.
The 24-year-old singer channels her inner Olivia Newton John in the new workout video. “Hey, I’m Dua and I’ll be your instructor today,” she says. She is the epitome of fitness as she walks us through her routine. She starts us off with a warm up filled with slow movements and stretches to get our limbs ready for some serious grooving. Things then begin to pick up as she brings out the mats and everyone begins to do moves like “The Crybaby,” and “The Fonda.”
Dua’s sophomore album Future Nostalgia is set to release on April 3. She has also released the album’s title track and “Don’t Stop Now” as singles. Check out the original “Physical” music video below.
