Women ruled the night at the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards, with Beyoncé and Taylor Swift leading the pack at Los Angeles’ Staples Center last night amid a flurry of bizarre collaborations. This time, however, Kanye kept his fat mouth shut. Full Article »

Was Chinese Democracy worth the wait? When we got our hands on a bunch of damn-near finished songs in June, we said it was. And we had always suspected it was going to be, for years leading up to that moment, as rumors and rough demos trickled out of whatever mansion / studio / nudie bar Axl Rose was holed up in.

After all this time, all fans east of psychotic had the common sense to at least suspect that the big secret had been built up too much, that if and when the moment of truth finally came, it would likely be an anticlimax. Of course, the most amazing thing about this album is that it’s in our hands. Full Article »

It’s only been eight years since AC/DC put out an album? Jesus, it seems like twenty. Things have changed quite a bit since the glory days of Back In Black. Arena rock’s been homogenized, sounds and styles have been co-opted and xeroxed till the ink is barely legible and the substance is… well, there is no fucking substance.

But still, to this day, nobody does it quite like AC/DC. The snarly, sex-anthem party rock with swagger for miles that we grew up on is a stylistic entity all its own, a timeless symbol of nostalgic rock purity that’s stood the test of time. And while the modern relevance has diminished considerably, the legends’ return is anything but unwelcome. Full Article »