Table of contents for 28-Jan-16 in Rolling Stone

1. Radiohead “Spectre” The band says this lush, spooky ballad was meant for the latest James Bond movie. It got beaten by a Sam Smith song – tough break! But it’s a real beaut, with echoes of 2001’s “Pyramid Song.” 2. Santigold “Who Be Lovin’ Me” A sweet, hazy summer jam featuring Atlanta’s ILoveMakonnen on bliss-zonked guest vocals. Lovin’ it! 3. David Bowie “Girl Loves Me” This tensely coiled groove is our favorite moment on Bowie’s wild new Blackstar album – it’s dark, trippy and sexy in ways only he can pull off. 4. Bono “Every Breaking Wave” (YouTube) “Every Breaking Wave” sounded great on U2’s tour this past year, but it’s even more powerful in this simple acoustic performance with Glen Hansard, Hozier and others at a Dublin busking…

JULY 1993 The Use Your llusion tour, which was marred by late starts and riots, wraps up with a show at Estadio River Plate in Buenos Aires. It’s the last time Slash and Matt Sorum play with AXL ROSE onstage. OCTOBER 1996 SLASH announces his departure, fi ve years after the band last released an album of original material. “It was all about Axl wanting control to the point where the rest of us felt strangled,” he later wrote. AUGUST 1997 DUFF MCKAGAN quits, leaving Rose as the only original member left in the group. “I told [Axl], ‘Enough is enough,’” McKagan said. “ ‘This band is a dictatorship, and I don’t see myself playing in those conditions. Find someone else.’” JANUARY 2001 Guns n’ Roses begin playing with a…

Late in 2014, Bryson Tiller got a call from Timbaland. The producer, who had heard Tiller’s SoundCloud hit “Don’t,” told him to quit his job at Papa John’s and fly to Miami to work on new songs. “That was when I knew this could be a career,” says the Kentucky singer, 23. Soon he was fielding competing offers to sign with Drake’s OVO label or RCA, which ended up releasing Tiller’s syrupy, sexy debut, Trapsoul, in October. “It was a hard decision, for real,” Tiller says. “For Drake to reach out early and say he liked my music was crazy.”…

ON A QUIET SIDE STREET IN Brooklyn’s Fort Greene neighborhood – a few short blocks from the Barclays Center, and right above a natural-hair salon – is the low-rise red-brick building where Erykah Badu has lived on and off since the mid-Nineties. Walk up to the second floor and follow the vintage funk beats down a narrow carpeted corridor, and you’ll find her place: a cozy two-bedroom artist’s pad that radiates warmth and soul. “You can sit over there,” says the singer, gesturing at a futon in one corner of her living room after her younger sister and assistant lets me in. “I don’t have a lot of chairs.” For nearly 20 years, Badu has been one of R&B’s boldest innovators – a hippie dreamer, Earth goddess, Afrofuturist seer, proud…

Paul Giamatti is a crusading U.S. attorney with a perfect record taking down whitecollar criminals on Wall Street: He has won 81 cases, and never lost. Until he takes on hedge-fund flim-flam man Bobby “Axe” Axelrod, played BILLIONS SUNDAYS, 10 P.M., SHOWTIME by Homeland’s Damian Lewis, who’s exactly the kind of blowhard asshole you’d expect from a guy who calls himself Axe. He’s happy to play cat-and-mouse with Giamatti, when he’s not flying his personal jet to go party with Metallica. The fun of Billions is the way Giamatti’s only slightly less sleazy than his prey, though a lot less rich. “A good matador doesn’t kill a fresh bull,” he rants. “You wait until he’s been stuck a few times.” Even better, there’s Maggie Siff, beloved by Mad Men and…

2016: Officially Truckin’ Bob Weir, Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann and John Mayer continued the Grateful Dead’s tradition of New Year’s Eve blowouts with an epic Dead & Co. show at Los Angeles’ Forum. One highlight: NBA legend Bill Walton (left, with Mayer) reprised a Bill Graham stunt from the Seventies by dressing up as Father Time. Dead & Co. have no 2016 dates officially booked, but Mayer dropped a hint: “At the risk of rocking any boats, we’ll see you next year!” Nothing Else Matters: Hetfi eld on Holiday What was one of James Hetfi eld’s 2015 highlights? “Justin Bieber wearing a Metallica shirt!” The Metallica frontman took a break from sessions for the follow-up to 2008’s Death Magnetic (the band has written close to 20 songs) to spend the…

December 25, 1954, or April 4, 1957 Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán is born (the official date is contested) in La Tuna, Sinaloa. His father was “officially” a cattle rancher, but according to Malcolm Beith’s biography, The Last Narco, locals say he was actually a gomero, or opium farmer. Late 1970s El Chapo begins running drugs from the Sierra to major Mexican cities and to the border. He develops a reputation for efficiency and ruthlessness. Early 1980s El Chapo is introduced to the Sinaloa cartel’s leader, Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo (a.k.a. El Padrino), the godfather of the modern Mexican drug trade. 1989 El Padrino’s cartel is divided among the capos, making it more self-sufficient and less visible to law enforcement. El Chapo and “El Mayo” Zambada take over the operations…

The Lady in the Van Maggie Smith MAGGIE SMITH CAN DO ANYthing – even save this rickety vehicle from a case of the terminal cutes. Now ending her memorable run on Downton Abbey, Smith has picked herself another acting plum. She’s playing Mary Shepherd, an unsanitary and unlovable vagrant who parked her junkheap van in a London driveway in 1973 and for 15 years refused to budge. It’s a “mostly true story,” according to playwright Alan Bennett, who owned the driveway and wrote a memoir and a play about Shepherd. Now Bennett has written the movie. Alex Jennings plays him as an eccentric who’s exasperated by Shepherd’s antics – she leaves her shit in plastic bags outside her van – but can’t really turn the old dearie out. That’s the…

Power of the Force AN ABSOLUTELY WONDERful story [“Wars Without End,” RS 1250/1251]. I’ve been a Star Wars fanatic since Return of the Jedi opened in theaters. Brian Hiatt’s piece brought back amazing memories, and it was very cool to get inside the minds of cast and crew, old and new. I love Mark Hamill, but I don’t think The Force Awakens will change people’s lives the way the first three did. Shane Holley, Lakeland, TX BRIAN HIATT IS THE PERfect combo of reporter and fan. As soon as I finished his cover story, I wanted to see The Force Awakens, then come home and geek out on the other six flicks. Thanks for destroying my weekend! Barbara Hamilton Via the Internet A GREAT READ. HAMILL’S words prove he’s a…

With Cheap Trick elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, we asked the band’s guitarist to talk songwriting. The Nazz “Open My Eyes” A great early power-pop song – not too syrupy, kind of noisy. It’s like a bugle waking you up. Later on, it inspired me to write “Hello There.” The Raspberries “Go All the Way” All the parts fi t: There’s not too much bridge, and the chorus doesn’t repeat too many times. It’s exciting. Dave Clark 5 “Glad All Over” Today the drum parts would be toned down – they’re too loud. But why? They’re a signature part of the song. Small Faces “Whatcha Gonna Do About It” So simple that it probably wouldn’t make sense if anyone else did it – but there’s Steve…

THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS, Lemmy Kilmister’s doctor visited the Motörhead frontman at his condo in West Hollywood to deliver some bad news. Kil mister, who had been slurring his words lately, learned he’d been diagnosed with terminal brain and neck cancer. At most, he had six months to live. Kilmister took the news well – soon, he was cracking jokes and playing video games. Then, on December 28th, he nodded off and never woke up. He was 70. “I don’t know how he was able to go so quick,” says Todd Singerman, his manager. “He must have willed himself and said, ‘Fuck this.’ He did it on his terms, once again.” From his loud, fast, uncompromising music to his mythic drug and alcohol use, Kilmister did everything his way. As…

EVEN WHEN ELECTRIC Light Orchestra were selling millions of albums in the 1970s, only devoted fans knew frontman Jeff Lynne’s name – which was just fine by him. “I didn’t push myself forward,” Lynne says. “It just wasn’t in my nature. All I wanted was studio time, more studio time and even more studio time.” After ELO split up in the mid-Eighties, Lynne produced comeback albums for George Harrison, Tom Petty and Roy Orbison – then pulled all three together, along with Bob Dylan, to form the Traveling Wilburys. “It was marvelous,” says Lynne. “I thought, ‘I should have been doing this years ago.’ ” In 2014, Lynne revived ELO for a show at London’s Hyde Park before 50,000 fans. The gig went so well he decided to cut a…

Audeze EL-8 Titanium $800 These high-tech cans pack ultra-realistic bass – and are the fi rst pair to bypass the iPhone’s headphone jack for a higher-fi Lightning cable connection. SubPac S2 $379 Want to really feel the music? Strap this device to the back of your chair and every bass note will literally move you. It’s a visceral new way to listen to tunes. BoomStick $99 This device noticeably improves the sound on any set of headphones – even those feeble buds that come with an iPhone. Just plug them into it (and then into your phone) and enjoy a better quality of music, especially when it comes to bass.…

WHEN TWENTY ONE PILOTS FRONTMAN TYLER Joseph scrolls through his phone, there are hundreds of names in the contacts he doesn’t quite recognize: kids from the band’s hometown of Columbus, Ohio, who were the earliest fans of his two-man group, from back in the days when Joseph used to drive door-to-door hand-delivering tickets for club shows. When that grew too time-consuming, he and drummer Josh Dun would have fans meet them at a table outside the Chick fil-A in the Polaris mall’s food court. On show days, Joseph’s mom would stand outside the club and try to hawk tickets to passing Ohio State students. “She’d be like, ‘Come see my son play music,’ ” recalls Joseph, who’s 27 but could pass for a teenager, with a puppyish, Joseph Gordon-Levitt vibe…

And I don’t care if I sing off-key, I fi nd myself in my melodies. I sing for love, I sing for me, I’ll shout it out like a bird set free.” —Sia, “Bird Set Free” Sia This Is Acting Monkey Puzzle/RCA The past decade-plus of pop music has been dominated by behind-the-scenes songwriting maestros like Max Martin and Ryan Tedder, but only one of them – 40-year-old Australian Sia Furler – has become a solo star in her own right. Sia had a career as an electronica-leaning artist in the early 2000s, before finding her voice as a Top 40 master blaster, writing smashes for Beyoncé, Rihanna and more. She saved her most intense fi re for her own breakout solo hit, 2014’s “Chandelier” – a diabolically catchy…

You live part-time on Eleuthera, an island in the Bahamas. What’s a day like there? Last night, my sax player caught a 15-pound snapper that we just threw on the grill. That’s the quality of living here: Pick vegetables out of the garden and fi sh out of the sea. My big decision is: Which beach are we going to hang out on? When we get to the water, am I going to paddleboard or swim? I don’t surf, and I’m not even the best swimmer, but that’s part of my New Year’s resolution. I made a plan a month ago: Surfing is going to change my music. It’s going to offer me something I don’t have that I need to move toward. Lately I’ve been listening to “God Only…

AN EXTR AORDINARILY concise history of how the jousting between Democrats and the GOP, and between moderate and radical-right Republicans, has played out in national politics since the 1960s. Wilentz has clarified the profound implications of the upcoming presidential election. Gwenn Levine Woodcliff Lake, NJ ENJOYED THE STORY, but I noted a couple of missing details. Ross Perot’s contribution to shaving off the Republican vote in 1992 was left out. Wilentz claims Gore might’ve won Florida if the court permitted a full recount, but Gore never asked for one. Henno Heitur Hailey, ID WILENTZ NEEDS TO DIAL it back a few clicks. He and Donald Trump are on opposite sides of the same apocalyptic coin. Jeff Christenson, Boise, ID WE’RE GOING TO NEED A huge turnout of women, minority and…

BEFORE SOME SCREENINGS OF “STAR WARS: THE Force Awakens” in December, a mysterious teasteaser popped onscreen, with a snatch of “Welcome to the Jungle” playing over footage of rock-concert crowds. It was the first solid hint that months of improbable-seeming rumors were true: Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan were about to reunite onstage as Guns n’ Roses for the first time in 23 years. Confirmation came in January, when GN’R – with Slash and McKagan – were announced as Saturday headliners for 2016’s Coachella in Indio, California. The band called it “the most significant and anxiously awaited musical event of this century.” A report in Billboard suggested that a 25-date stadium tour would follow, but Guns’ reps wouldn’t confirm that. With the rest of the line-up unannounced, the big…

AS THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND LEARNED, THERE WAS MORE to Natalie Cole than sweet ballads. At a benefi t in 2011, she joined the band for three songs – including, at her request, “Whipping Post.” “We were like, ‘That’s odd – but cool,’ ” recalls guitarist Warren Haynes. “She said, ‘I’m a rocker at heart’ – and she killed it.” Cole, who died of heart failure on December 31st at 65, was fi rst known as the daughter of Nat “King” Cole, who died when she was 15. In college, she worked toward a pre-med degree, but eventually followed in her father’s footsteps, earning a Grammy for Best New Artist with her fi rst single, 1975’s “This Will Be.” Her impressive, young-Aretha pipes led to more hits, including “Sophisticated Lady”…

LAST YEAR WAS A ROUGH one for Rick Ross, who spent most of the summer and fall of 2015 under house arrest at his Atlanta mansion due to a pending case involving the alleged assault and kidnapping of a former groundskeeper.“ I had a few stumbles, most definitely,” the rap superstartells Rolling Stone. “Fortunately, it wasn’t the worst home to be confined in, you dig? But it wasn’t a vacation.” To avoid going stircrazy, he spent much of that time writing songs for his eighth studio album, Black Market, which is full of rich production, multilayered boasts and, at times, a more reflective tone than usual. “I love the uptempo club music that’s going on right now, but I wanted to step away from that sound,” he says. “I made…

Twin Peaks Last Aired: 1991 Current Status: In production What We Know: Twenty-five years after it became the freshest, weirdest thing on TV, David Lynch’s noirish crime series is returning for a run on Showtime. Lynch is directing every episode, and several characters – including FBI agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) – are back. Sadly, the actress who played Log Lady died last year. Star Trek Last Aired: 2005 (Star Trek: Enterprise) Current Status: Set to air in early 2017 What We Know: In the tradition of nextgen Star Trek series like Deep Space Nine, this one will feature new characters exploring new worlds. Boldly airing where no series has aired before (it will be the first new show for CBS’s streaming network), it’s exec-produced by Alex Kurtzman, who co-wrote…

1 Elect a Climate-Smart President in 2016 If the Paris agreement proved anything, it was the importance of presidential leadership. The next president needs to keep up the momentum, continuing to push for tougher measures in international climate negotiations, as well as find a way to convince Congress of the urgency of the issue. 2 Continue Full-Court Press in UNFCCC Meetings “The Paris Agreement is just a broad outline,” says Elliot Diringer of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions in Arlington, Virginia. “Now they have to fill in the details.” Key issues like the mechanism for emission monitoring and verification are hugely important and still need to be worked out, lest the agreement be rendered toothless and ineffective. 3 Cut Side Deals With Other Nations It’s tough to cut…

“The laws of conscience, which we pretend to be derived from nature, proceed from custom.” —Montaigne IT’S SEPTEMBER 28TH, 2015. MY HEAD IS swimming, labeling TracPhones (burners), one per contact, one per day, destroy, burn, buy, balancing levels of encryption, mirroring through Blackphones, anonymous e-mail addresses, unsent messages accessed in draft form. It’s a clandestine horror show for the single most technologically illiterate man left standing. At 55 years old, I’ve never learned to use a laptop. Do they still make laptops? No fucking idea! It’s 4:00 in the afternoon. Another gorgeous fall day in New York City. The streets are abuzz with the lights and sirens of diplomatic movement, heads of state, U.N. officials, Secret Service details, the NYPD. It’s the week of the U.N. General Assembly. Pope Francis…

Prince HitnRun Phase Two NPG Prince put out two back-to-basics LPs in 2014, but ultimately he was outdone by Bruno Mars and Mark Ronson’s “Uptown Funk,” which rode his classic Minneapolis sound all the way to Number One. Late in 2015, he came back with another one-two punch – the second half of which is a well-timed reminder that nobody knows how to funk you up better. HitnRun Phase One seemed to focus on where Prince wanted to go – EDMinfl ected bangers, poppy dance cuts – but Phase Two, with its brassy arrangements and cheeky lyrics, embodies the artist in his natural state as a soul-funk master. It adds up to his most consistently engaging album in years. He seems like he’s having fun: On “Look at Me,…