Salon.com > Adele

Little Disappointments: Adele to Raphael

Sat, 16 Feb 2013 15:00:00 +0000

We spend most of the week at Salon exploring the day’s big events and outrages, the fiery, boiling cauldron that rests on the front burner of the news.

But life’s incidental urgencies, the bummers in a minor key, often play as meaningful, if momentary, role in our days. So we’re giving our little disappointments their own Saturday column. And we hope you’ll send us your own, as well.

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Little Disappointments: Adele to Raphael

Sat, 16 Feb 2013 14:58:00 +0000

The Grammys’ most surprising moments

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 04:50:00 +0000

Most Staggering Display of Self-Regard: Host LL Cool J hectored the audience at length after the show began, delivering a rambling monologue that he seemed annoyed had been postponed last year due to the death of Whitney Houston. It was mainly about his own career, and how his two Grammys inspire him to pursue excellence. And he kept talking about Twitter, though it seemed he had just found out what it was. "You're gonna see hashtag Carrie Underwood, hashtag Jack White, hashtag Kelly Clarkson," he announced before a show-closing performance. It was alternately narcissistic, and so 2009.

Most Improved Live Singer: Rihanna gave a surprisingly compelling take on her ballad "Stay" and was creditable in the Bob Marley tribute. That said, her disaffected pre-show red carpet interview -- and her walking off-camera after losing an award to mentor Jay-Z -- indicated that 2013 may be the year she opts out of releasing her annual album.

The Grammy Awards: Who won?

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 00:30:00 +0000

RECORD OF THE YEAR

Lonely Boy - The Black Keys

Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - Kelly Clarkson

We Are Young - Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe

WINNER: Somebody That I Used to Know - Gotye Featuring Kimbra

Thinkin Bout You - Frank Ocean

We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together - Taylor Swift

ALBUM OF THE YEAR

El Camino - The Black Keys

Some Nights - Fun.

WINNER: Babel - Mumford & Sons

Channel Orange - Frank Ocean

Blunderbuss - Jack White

SONG OF THE YEAR

The A Team - Ed Sheeran, songwriter (Ed Sheeran)

Adorn - Miguel Pimentel, songwriter (Miguel)

Call Me Maybe - Tavish Crowe, Carly Rae Jepsen & Josh Ramsay, songwriters (Carly Rae Jepsen)

Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - Jörgen Elofsson, David Gamson, Greg Kurstin & Ali Tamposi, songwriters (Kelly Clarkson)

WINNER: We Are Young - Jack Antonoff, Jeff Bhasker, Andrew Dost & Nate Ruess, songwriters (Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe)

BEST NEW ARTIST

Alabama Shakes

WINNER: Fun.

Hunter Hayes

The Lumineers

Frank Ocean

BEST POP SOLO PERFORMANCE

WINNER: Set Fire To The Rain [live] - Adele

Megan Fox, commodified

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 14:30:00 +0000

Megan Fox is an actress who, after getting her start in silly action films like "Transformers" and "Jonah Hex," has tried to branch out. In 2012, she was a supporting player in two serious-minded comedies with a melancholy edge, "Friends With Kids" and "This is 40." She told the New York Times Magazine's Lynn Hirschberg in 2009, “I do live in a glass box. And I am on display for men to pay to look at me. And that bothers me. I don’t want to live that character.” She claimed that her body parts were the only thing that were hers, and thus she'd never do a nude scene on film.

That article hinged on Fox's rather unsuccessful attempts to define herself as something other than a sex-bomb starlet, an attempt that, for whatever reason but not for lack of trying, has evidently been unsuccessful. Fox is profiled in the new issue of Esquire. She strips down for the camera as the author waxes rhapsodic: The actress is "a screen saver on a teenage boy's laptop, a middle-aged lawyer's shower fantasy, a sexual prop used to sell movies and jeans."

2012′s best-selling album is so two years ago

Fri, 04 Jan 2013 15:19:00 +0000

Despite the album having gone on sale in February 2011, Adele's "21" was the best-selling LP of 2012 according to the year-end Nielsen SoundScan figures. This gives Adele the crown two years in a row, and caps off a year in which Adele won the Album of the Year Grammy, recorded the theme to the Bond film "Skyfall," and began a break from recording occasioned by the birth of her son.

It's that last part that may have the record industry a bit concerned. Adele's success (her album sold over 1 million more than Taylor Swift's "Red" in 2012, though it had several more months on shelves) is among the only inspiring stories that music labels can tell themselves about the album, a form that may have outlived its usefulness in a post-CD world. After an uptick in 2011, album sales were down in 2012 as they had been for years before; CD sales continue to flat-line, though they make up the majority of album purchases.

Adele named AP Entertainer of the Year

Wed, 19 Dec 2012 15:45:00 +0000

NEW YORK (AP) — Though Adele didn't have a new album or a worldwide tour in 2012, she's still rolling. After a year of Grammy glory and James Bond soundtracking, Adele has been voted The Associated Press Entertainer of the Year.

In 132 ballots submitted by members and subscribers of the AP, Adele easily outpaced other vote-getters like Taylor Swift, "Fifty Shades of Grey" author E.L. James, the South Korean viral video star PSY and the cast of "Twilight." Editors and broadcasters were asked to cast their ballot for the person who had the most influence on entertainment and culture in 2012.

Adele's year began in triumph at the Grammys, took a turn through recording the theme to the 007 film "Skyfall," and ended with the birth of her son in October. The ubiquitous Adele was that rare thing in pop culture: an unqualified sensation, a megastar in a universe of niche hits.

By the end of the year, her sophomore album, "21," had passed 10 million copies sold in the U.S., only the 21st album in the Nielsen SoundScan era (begun in 1991) to achieve diamond status. Buoyed by hits like "Someone Like You" and "Rolling in the Deep" long after its release in early 2011, "21" was also the top-selling album on iTunes for the second year running.

Lou Reed’s been terrible for years!

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 18:44:00 +0000

Dylan Jones has strong opinions, even when they're a little dodgy. For my money, he gives Spandau Ballet and Travis too much credit, and R.E.M. and Lloyd Cole nowhere near enough. His favorites hew a little close to the artists he's interviewed over his long career as an editor and writer at British magazines. (He's now the editor of British GQ.)

But that's the thing about critics: Sometimes you love the ones who are so smug and sure and confident that they're perfectly fine defending something unfashionable, or going on for pages about someone you'd never otherwise have taken seriously. Often, that's the best way to break past your own biases and prejudices.

Adele confirms James Bond rumors

Mon, 01 Oct 2012 16:46:00 +0000

After months of speculation, Grammy-winning singer Adele has confirmed rumors that she has recorded the next James Bond theme. Earlier today, she tweeted the cover page of "Skyfall," which featured her name (A. Adkins), along with P. Epworth, the producer and co-writer of her 2010 hit "Rolling in the Deep."
[embedtweet id="252762323884847104"]

"Skyfall," 007's latest romp, will be released in the U.S. on Nov. 9.

The obscene power of the middle finger

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 17:15:00 +0000

The middle finger is making a comeback. I know what you're thinking. Who knew it ever went away?

But the bird -- specifically the flipping of it -- has managed to make worldwide headlines twice now in the past month. First, there was M.I.A.'s apparently unscheduled additional choreography during her appearance at the Super Bowl halftime show, a move that occasional finger-giver Madonna "wasn't happy about." M.I.A.'s off-book version of double dream hands swiftly proved the power of a gesture to shock, as NBC – the same network that features "penis cleavage" gags on "Are You There, Chelsea?" -- hastily issued an apology and lamented that "Our system was late to obscure the inappropriate gesture." The NFL similarly decreed that "The obscene gesture in the performance was completely inappropriate, very disappointing and we apologize to our fans."

Adele: The new Kurt Cobain

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 16:40:00 +0000

With her armload of Grammys, three nominations for tonight's Brit Awards and a stack of platinum albums, England’s Adele reigns over pop music at home and abroad. “Someone Like You,” the closing track of her 17-million-selling album "21," is arguably the past year’s signature song, widely hailed – as is all her music – for its “authenticity.” But beyond its piano-and-voice starkness, it sounds like, well … 1992.

The song’s quiet/loud structure, its nakedly personal lyrics, and Adele’s aggressive, cathartic yawp in the chorus are all hallmarks of grunge-era rock. And authenticity, that elusive concept, is what Kurt Cobain was said to embody 20 years ago. As a resolutely working-class singer who penned songs about psychological pain and refused to conform to a stereotypical pop-star image, he was seen as a beacon of “realness” in an era of manufactured pop. The same could be said of Adele. If her success is any gauge, we’re entering a new era where displays of “authenticity” will be de rigueur. Let’s just hope it doesn’t do away with fun.

The Grammys’ most memorable moments

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:30:00 +0000

The Grammys have always trod the line between dull veneration of industry success and outrageous celebration of rock 'n' roll excess. But this year, with the losses of Etta James, Clarence Clemons, Gil Scott-Heron and Amy Winehouse, the show had an even tougher time finding the right pitch than Coldplay's Chris Martin did.

The specter of death would have hung heavily over the proceedings even if Whitney Houston hadn't died suddenly the day before. But the singer's untimely demise Saturday gave an unavoidable air of sorrow to the proceedings, a grim dose of reality that couldn't help crashing into the fantasy realm of Lady Gaga scepters and Nicki Minaj eyelashes. That's why the most memorable aspects of the broadcast weren't just the loudest or the tackiest. They were sad, they were weird, they were sometimes awful; sometimes, they were even fantastic. And they were dominated by two big-throated ladies – the troubled diva from Newark and Adele, the whiskey-voiced British blonde. And though we loved The Civil Wars' one minute of perfection and were baffled by Rihanna's "When Harry Met Sally" hair and got weepy over Paul McCartney and company's poignant and timely "Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight," these are Salon's top-10 biggest moments of the night.

Adele: Too fat for fashion designer

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 18:10:00 +0000

Is it possible to be both "too fat" and "beautiful"? Ask Karl Lagerfeld – the man who this week found himself about as popular as last year's jeggings when, in his capacity as Metro's guest editor, he sounded off about Adele.

The 78-year-old Lagerfeld, a man who co-authored a best-selling diet book featuring "protein sachets," "homeopathic granules" and "quail flambé" -- and who has very publicly struggled with his own weight issues over the years -- has never been one to hold his tongue on the subject of women's bodies. In 2009, he was quoted in the German magazine Focus saying, "No one wants to see curvy women. You've got fat mothers with their bags of chips sitting in front of the television and saying that thin models are ugly." But this time, the Chanel designer seems to have believed he was paying a compliment. While declaring the British chanteuse "a little too fat," he helpfully acknowledged that "she has a beautiful face and a divine voice" and called her "the thing at the moment."