Table of contents for September 7, 2017 in Rolling Stone

Pride of Canada I JUST FINISHED THE ARTICLE on Justin Trudeau [“The North Star,” RS 1293]. He’s doing in Canada what Trump needs to do in the United States: Unify citizens and politicians. Trudeau would make a great president of the United States. Brian Olson Norfolk, VA AS AN AMERICAN LIVING IN Canada, I don’t get all the love for this limousine liberal. While he isn’t actively trying to make the country worse for the average Canadian, he isn’t doing all that much to make things better, either. Don’t hold your breath waiting for him to cure what ails Western democracies – he’s too busy with his photo ops. Laura Messer Toronto YOUR ARTICLE ON TRUDEAU made me giggle a few times, ’cause, yes, as a rule, Canadians are like that. We…

In 2012, when Judd Apatow used the Avett Brothers’ buoyant, love-drunk ballad “Live and Die” in his coming-of-middle-age comedy This Is 40, it was a choice that reflected a passion for the band’s heartfelt folk pop. “Their music is about reaching out and trying to connect with other people, as well as the obstacles of love,” says Apatow. “And I try to express some of the same things in the realm of comedy.” So when he heard that his friend Rick Rubin was producing the Avetts’ ninth album, True Sadness, which came out last year, Apatow asked the band if he could document its creation. The resulting film, May It Last: A Portrait of the Avett Brothers – which Apatow made with co-director Michael Bonfiglio – will get a one-night-only…

Avicii spent most of his twenties as one of the biggest touring DJs in the world, blowing fans’ minds from Las Vegas to Ibiza with confetti cannons and colossal EDM hooks, not to mention a wedding-favorite pop smash (“Wake Me Up”). But, it turns out, it wasn’t much fun for him, as seen in an Avicii documentary due out later this year. It shows how the stress of life on the road led the Swedish superstar (real name Tim Bergling) to multiple hospitalizations – for inflammation of the pancreas linked to excessive drinking, for a burst appendix and for a gallbladder that needed to be removed – and, eventually, to retire from touring last year. “I needed to figure out my life,” says Avicii, 27, who also just released a…

WELL, IT’S OVER NOW – RIGHT? HE MAY HAVE three and a half years left in office, but Donald Trump is finished. The Charlottesville tragedy was the final stake through the Grinch-heart of his presidency. If he didn’t deserve it so enormously much, it would be sad. The presidency of Donald Trump has already seen mass dismissals, felony accusations, a key adviser raided by the FBI, a press chief accusing a fellow official of auto-fellatio, a preschool version of a nuclear stare-down with North Korea, and countless other fiascoes and indignities. But a rampage of misjudgment and anti-leadership starting on August 12th, 2017, was a clear nadir. It began that Saturday morning. After torch-bearing neo- Nazis stormed a postcard-perfect Virginia university town, and the life of a young woman was…

The War on DrugsA Deeper Understanding Atlantic Philadelphia has always been known for lush music – from the richly orchestrated proto-disco Philly Sound to the kaleidoscopic psych scene that spawned the War on Drugs. Steadily widening the canvas since co-founder Kurt Vile’s departure, leader Adam Granduciel achieves full-on sonic rapture with his band’s latest LP, an abstract-expressionist mural of synth-pop and heartland rock colored by bruised optimism and some of his most generous, incandescent guitar ever. Which is hardly to say the War on Drugs have become a boogie-till-you-puke jam band. Granduciel is still more about layered textures and tight-woven phrases than he is about noodling, and anxiety still lurks under heady aural comforts, laid out in his nasal, Dylanesque vocal tones. On “Up All Night,” literal or metaphoric…

1. Car Seat Headrest “War Is Coming (If You Want It)” Released days after the Charlottesville riots, with a title that twists a John Lennon slogan, garage-rock prodigy Will Toledo’s new anthem follows visions of violence and paranoia into a chorus that prays for peace amid chaos. Lennon would be proud. 2. Leon Russell “Love This Way” The soulful rock pioneer passed away last year, but not before leaving us his final LP, On a Distant Shore, due out in September. This high-stepping R&B tune is the sound of a legend who still had plenty left in the tank. 3. Alborosie “Living Dread” This Italian-born reggae singer offers a growling update on a classic by roots greats Black Uhuru – proving vintage music can be potent without pop sugarcoating. 4.…

DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT TELLING JOSHUA Homme that rock is dead. Seriously, don’t. Because he will contemplate punching you, and that would be bad. He is, at 44, still a very large, very intense dude, redheaded in a feral rather than Ed Sheeran-y manner, with more than a hint of curled-lip Presley-an swagger. And as it turns out, an unwise exec – “somebody way up” – once uttered those dangerous words. That was a few years back, before Homme’s ever-stellar, ever-mutating band Queens of the Stone Age left Interscope Records for indie Matador, which releases the groovacious, Mark Ronson-produced new LP Villains on August 25th. Just after 11 a.m. on a Monday in early July, Homme sips from a glass of high-end tequila in his management company’s L.A. headquarters and…

IN LATE 1967, MICK JAGGER STOPPED AT A NEWSSTAND and saw a new magazine whose name made him do a double take. “Quite surprised, really,” he joked in an interview about ROLLING STONE with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. “Didn’t know we had a magazine at that time, but you never know.” The name of the magazine was a nod not just to the Rolling Stones but also to Muddy Waters’ “Rollin’ Stone” and Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone,” as well as the aphorism “a rolling stone gathers no moss.” But one of the Stones’ lawyers, clearly not as amused as Jagger, sent a cease-and-desist letter to founder and editor Jann S. Wenner, accusing the magazine of copyright violation. Wenner never considered changing the name. “We said,…

IN THE LONG, TEDIOUS HOURS BETWEEN SOUNDCHECK and showtime, Brian Wilson likes to park himself at the side of the stage, hidden behind the curtains, in an oversize black chair. The chair has traveled with him from Tokyo to Tel Aviv and back home to the Pantages Theater in Hollywood tonight. Dressed in a lavender button-down, sweatpants and white Nikes, Wilson sits impassively atop his faux-leather throne, munching sushi rolls as the preshow noise and bustle swirl around him. ¶ When a concert promoter or VIP guest wanders over to say hi, Wilson often shuts his eyes and pretends he’s asleep. After 56 years as a Beach Boy, he admits the buildup to a concert can still be “a total mindfuck,” filled with worry and self-doubt. So he likes to…

The Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers keyboardist – who hosts his own Sirius XM show – is on the road for the group’s 40th-anniversary tour. Martha and the Vandellas “Dancing in the Street” A clarion call to the world – a beautiful notion, since at that time what was going on in the streets wasn’t always dancing. J.J. Light “Baby Let’s Go to Mexico” This is a great, mariachi-inflected song by the bassist in the Sir Douglas Quintet. It’s this glorious piece of freedom. Dwight Yoakam with Buck Owens “Streets of Bakersfield” Buck did this on his own, but his version with Dwight is better. It’s about the need to see each other without judgment. Lord Creator “Such Is Life” I came across this early reggae song in a compilation.…

“The old guys are frightened, And frightening to behold.The kids come out fighting, And still doing what they’re told.”—LCD Soundsystem, “Call the Police” LCD Soundsystem American Dream DFA/Columbia BY ROB SHEFFIELD The time has come, the time has come, the time has come today. LCD Soundsystem have finally returned from a mysterious five-year breakup they never quite explained, despite making a high-profile film documentary ostensibly designed for just that purpose. As rock & roll retirements go, it was about as believable as Cher’s sixth farewell tour. But wherever these guys have been, what matters is that they’ve returned at top strength. James Murphy and his wrecking crew of New York punk-disco marauders don’t waste a moment on the superb American Dream – it’s a relentless, expansive, maddeningly funny set…

What’s the best advice you ever got? It came from my father. He was a pilot officer in the Royal Air Force. When I started to be what could be construed as famous-ish, he said, “Never forget you get up and go to the toilet in the morning, Michael.” Which means, just keep it in perspective and have a good sense of humor and remember that you are a human being, and keep it in line. If he had added, “And don’t take too many drugs,” that might have been helpful too. What’s the most indulgent purchase you ever made? I bought a thousand-acre farm in Australia in the early 1980s. It was this whimsical decision to start a whole new life. The property had about eight houses on it…