Table of contents for June 16, 2016 in Rolling Stone

it was a pleasure to read Joe Levy’s honest obituary [RS 1261]. Prince was a musical chef, mixing funk, rock and R&B. His songs transcended boundaries, genres and generations. Thank you for a funky time, your Purpleness. Your music will live forever in my heart. Ron Morrison, Bourbonnais, IL thanks to joe levy for producing something meaningful, reverential, informative . . . and also, somehow, healing. Karina Fox Landward, Salt Lake City the photograph that led Joe Levy’s wonderful Prince retrospective was breathtaking, but as a hawk-eyed Prince fan, I couldn’t help but notice that, judging by his hair, outfit and guitar, this is Prince on the 1988-89 Lovesexy tour and not Purple Rain. Considering this legendary dresser’s meticulous attention to detail, I say we owe it to him to…

One night last fall, Dead and Company were closing a show with “Brokedown Palace,” from 1970’s American Beauty, when singer-guitarist John Mayer spotted “the real thing,” as he puts it: a veteran Deadhead with long white hair, matching beard and a tie-dye shirt. “He was in tears,” Mayer recalls. “You could tell he was there on behalf of his youth, the friends he’d lost and what these songs meant to him. I thought, ‘This is what I get to do – have this artistic freedom and give some freedom in return. And I get to do itwith the guys who were there.’ ” On June 10th, Dead and Company – formed last year by Dead guitarist Bob Weir and drummers Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart with Mayer, former Allman Brothers…

It’s a monday morning, and rising 26-year-old country star Maren Morris is driving through Nashville on her way to rehearsal. In a week, she’ll kick off some opening dates for Keith Urban that coincide with the June 3rd release of her major-label debut, Hero. Given that Morris’ breakthrough, “My Church,” is a booming praise song about the redemptive power of the radio (as presided over by Hank Williams and Johnny Cash), you might expect her to be cruising to some classic country. But she’s a woman who doesn’t draw boundaries in the music she makes, or listens to, so right now she’s blasting Ginuwine’s 1996 bump-’n’-grind classic, “Pony.” “I’m doing this Nineties night on Tuesday here in Nashville with a bunch of friends, and I’m singing on that song,” she…

Drake’s “hotline bling” video, Taylor Swift’s tour movie and the Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face” have something in common: They’ve all been funded by Apple. The world’s most valuable company has thrown its immense resources into making music videos, concert documentaries and, above all, scoring album exclusives. The tech behemoth’s top execs are involved in pop-star projects: Apple CEO Tim Cook had a hand in the production of M.I.A.’s “Borders” video. “Tim weighed in on that one in particular,” says Larry Jackson, Apple Music’s head of content. The most recent major exclusive was Chance the Rapper’s Coloring Book, which customers could hear only on Apple Music because Chance has no label and was not selling a download version. “We’d like to be a home where artists can do their thing,”…

British singer michael Kiwanuka’s 2012 debut, Home Again, took a folky approach to soul music, inspired by Richie Havens and the Band. For his second LP, Love & Hate (out July 15th), he shook up his sound with producer Danger Mouse, crafting songs the producer compares to “Pink Floyd and Isaac Hayes, the kind of stuff I love so much.” Case in point: “Cold Little Heart,” a psych opus with Kiwanuka shredding like Funkadelic’s Eddie Hazel. “It’s the first song, so people will know [the LP is] going to be different,” says Kiwanuka. “It’s better to go whole-hog and not be so polite.”…

CONNER4REAL, THE BAD-BOY singer played by Andy Samberg in Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, isn’t real at all. But with his fawning entourage, featherweight R&B-meets-EDM hits and feats of public idiocy (at one point, he passes out on a hoverboard), you might mistake him for a genuine Top 40 star – in particular, a certain Canadian chart-topper. “Oh, we love Bieber!” Samberg says, as his partners, Popstar directors Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone, nod in agreement. “But Conner isn’t based solely on him, or anybody specifically.” The “popumentary,” as the trio call it, was inspired by high-gloss, fan-friendly tour documentaries like Katy Perry: Part of Me and One Direction: This Is Us. “We watched a lot of those,” Samberg says. “We grabbed different elements from everywhere, and then amped them…

Last year, blake shelton’s four-year marriage to Miranda Lambert fell apart, and the saga turned the country star into a tabloid fixture. “I had to piece my life back together,” he says. But happiness turned out to be just two chairs over on the set of The Voice. Shelton bonded with fellow coach Gwen Stefani, who was going through a divorce of her own, and the two started dating. “If you had told me that that’s who I’m gonna end up with, I would have thought you were crazy,” he says. “But she became my closest ally.” Shelton chronicles his road back from heartache on his new album, If I’m Honest, which features a duet with Stefani, “Go Ahead and Break My Heart.” “We realized that we were both having…

Ariana Grande Dangerous Woman HHH <div class="thin-border"></div> Meghan Trainor Thank You HHH <div class="thin-border"></div> Fifth Harmony 7/27 HHH <div class="thin-border"></div> there are many route to power, or self-empowerment, for pop queens right now. “A little less conversation, and a little more ‘touch my body,’ ” commands ‘Ariana Grande’ on “Into You.” Grande’s Dangerous Woman is practically a concept album about the liberation of losing self-control. The title track and “Touch It” may be the best Weeknd songs not actually made by the Weeknd, full of slow-burning guitar drama and bad-girl sex, an throwback Seventies groov “I Don’t Care” gives Grande’ vocals the room to run free that they rarely had on 2014’s My Everything. But while this album is more personal, there’s nothing as insistent or universal as her monster EDM…

What do you wish someone had told you about show business before you entered it? I’m not sure anything anyone said would’ve made life easier. It’s like asking, “Do you wish somebody had told you about that scene in Poltergeist before you watched it?” [Laughs] There are a lot of moments in show business – and I’m sure in everyone else’s life – where you’re skipping along with a huge confidence, and then you step into a manhole and crack all your teeth on the pavement on the way down into the sewer. The idea of somebody telling me where all those holes were makes me sad. If I had avoided them, I don’t think I’d be as good at what I do. What were the manholes in your career?…

1. Chance the Rapper “Blessings” The Chicago MC’s new gospel-steeped album, Coloring Book, is the year’s richest hip-hop LP so far, and “Blessings” gorgeously sums up its message: “I don’t make songs for free/I make ’em for freedom.” 2. The Strokes “Oblivius” The Strokes are back – and not the goofy synthpop Strokes, either. “Oblivius,” from their new three-song EP, has darting, skeletal guitars, desperate over-thephone vocals, and a chorus that shoots you from the gutter to the stars in seconds. 3. Mudcrutch “Trailer” A fine, forlorn rocker – off the second LP from Tom Petty’s re-formed pre-Heartbreakers band – about love and loss and dancing to Skynyrd in a sad mobile home. 4. Car Seat Headrest “Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales” Will Toledo battles his angst and bearhugs the world. The…

Paul McCartney was talking recently to a woman who works at his New York office when he got an idea. She was about to embark on a road trip and wanted an extensive playlist of his music. He made one – it will be released as Pure McCartney, out June 10th, a 67-track collection that covers every corner of his post-Beatles catalog, from “Big Barn Bed,” a 1973 country rocker, to “Sing the Changes,” from his 2008 album with the Fireman. For McCartney, hearing the old songs was a time trip. “Maybe I’m Amazed” reminded him of the satisfaction he felt recording it after the Beatles’ breakup, and “Live and Let Die” evoked his children’s youthful days. “My kids said, ‘My dad wrote that,’ and nobody at school would believe…

  Vice Principals HBO, July 17th For most people, high school is a four-year sentence. For Neal Gamby, it’s the hellhole he’s dug himself into for life – and the only thing that keeps him going is the dream that someday he’ll run the place. He’s the most pitiful high school teacher you’ve ever seen – especially since he’s Danny McBride, who makes Gamby a comic creation worthy of Kenny Powers, the slob he played to mulleted perfection on Eastbound & Down. McBride makes Vice Principals the summer’s best new comedy – he’s a bundle of sweaty midlife despair, a petty tyrant seething in his sad blue school-spirit sweater vest. As Vice Principals begins, the retiring principal of a South Carolina high school leads his two deputies in one final…

Paul Simon Stranger to Stranger Concord HHHH Some recurring images on Paul Simon’s new LP: hospitals; insomnia; heaven and the afterlife; riots and looting; a character called the Street Angel; wolves; love; God. Just some stuff in the head of a 74-yearold New Yorker, spun casually into art in that sagely, choirboycum-everymensch voice. Even Simon’s discourse on the word “motherfucker” – on the irresistible “Cool Papa Bell” – feels nearly Talmudic. “I think, yeah/The word is ugly, all the same/Ugly got a case to make,” he sings, prettyasamotherfucker. That’s not even the funniest bit on Stranger to Stranger, a record that draws together nearly all of the man’s accrued vernacular with seeming effortlessness: the gentle folk of Simon and Garfunkel; the gospel flavor ofThere Goes Rhymin’ Simon; thepercolatingAfropop of…

The former Ramones drummer will spend this summer playing the group’s classic tunes with his band Marky Ramone’s Blitzkrieg. The Kinks “All Day and All of the Night” The raunchiness of the production and Dave Davies’ guitar sound were the beginnings of punk. When I first heard it I was like, “Holy shit!” The Trashmen “Surfin’ Bird” This is an off-the-wall song that’s crazy and insane beyond description. It was different than anything on the radio. Love “7 and 7 Is” This came out 10 years before the genre was really consolidated at CBGB, but it’s still punk. It should have gone Number One. Richard Hell and the Voidoids “Blank Generation” I was in this band. This song spoke for the populace at the time CBGB was going. It reflects…

Last year, when samsung used “Queen’s Speech 4,” a freestyle by U.K. rapper-singer Lady Leshurr, in a TV ad, Americans were unknowingly introduced to an exciting new sound: a brash MC delivering a flurry of punchlines, chatty sound effects and pop-culture references in a thick British accent, over a thunderous beat. In fact, Lady Leshurr (Melesha O’Garro, 23) has been a fixture on the U.K. dancemusic scene for years, working with artists like Wiley and Tinie Tempah. In 2011, she had a viral hit with a video parody of a Chris Brown song. That almost led to a deal with Atlantic. But she didn’t like the label’s idea of marketing her as a kind of “next Nicki Minaj.” “They thought, ‘Let’s mold her and have her dress like this and…

Mophie powerstation 2X Nothing is more of a buzzkill than a Bluetooth speaker with a dead battery. This ultrathin external battery can slip into a pocket and rejuice your devices in a pinch. $60; mophie.com Karma Go Tired of sucking down expensive data on your phone while you stream music? This mobile hot spot gives you Wi-Fi anywhere, and best of all, you pay as you go without a contract. From $149; yourkarma.com Urban Armor composite cases What good is a rugged speaker if you bust the music’s source? Protect an iPhone from the elements with this military-grade case that won’t weigh you down. From $35; urbanarmorgear.com…

In 1967, ralph j. gleason was a 50-year-old jazzhead and columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle when he wrote an essay titled “Like a Rolling Stone.” It declared that to understand “the reality of what’s happening today in America, we must go to rock ‘n roll, to popular music.” Forking over $2,000 to a college dropout named Jann Wenner, he co-founded a magazine with a name inspired by that essay – the magazine you are reading right now. Always fiddling with his signature pipe and rocking a handlebar mustache, Gleason was a character: He would often be seen sipping from glasses of milk in nightclubs (he was diabetic and didn’t drink). As a writer, he used his platform for social critique, frequently on the persistence of American racism. Two new…

OH, MY GOD, THE SON OF A BITCH IS back,” announces Lisa Kristofferson as she stands in the kitchen of her Los Flores Canyon home in Malibu. The son of a bitch, who is next to her, is more commonly known as Kris Kristofferson. He has been her husband for the past 36 years. He also happens to be one of the greatest songwriters of all time (covered by Johnny Cash, Janis Joplin, ElvisPresley and some 500others),not tomention an iconic actor in his own right (from A Star Is Born to the Blade movies). Three decades ago, “the son of a bitch is back” may have been the rallying cry of Kristofferson’s girlfriends or wives after he went off on a drinking or cheating bender. But today, just weeks away…

Chance the Rapper Coloring Book HHHH Kanye West called The Life of Pablo a gospel album. But the new mixtapeLP from Chicago’s Chance the Rapper (who shined on TLOP’s “Ultralight Beam”) truly fits that billing. Gospel choirs are the backbone of this ecstatic album, but everything on Coloring Book seems to take a spiritual hue – “I don’t make songs for free, I make ’em for freedom,” he raps on the soulful rumination “Blessings.” The result is the richest hiphop record of 2016 so far. Chance can paint a vivid picture of growing up in his beleaguered Chicago: “None of my niggas ain’t had no dad/None of my niggas ain’t had no choice,” he observes on the bluesy “Summer Friends.” YetwhenNewYork altsoul songwriter Francis Farewell Starlite testifies through a…