Commander-In-Drake:

Mixtaper-that-could, Drake is making headlines with a quip about returning to acting, where he got his start via Degrassi: The Next Generation, to play President Obama. Speaking to VH1 News at the Sundance Film Festival, Drake said, “I really want to do something, a movie specifically for my culture, the younger people that are still in tune with everything going on.” If you’re not too old to read on, the artist elaborated, “I hope somebody makes a movie about Obama’s life soon because I could play him. That’s the goal. I watch all the addresses. Anytime I see him on TV, I don’t change the channel. I definitely pay attention and listen to the inflections in his voice. If you ask anyone who knows me, I”m pretty good at impressions.” In case you’ve forgotten, Obama has also considered a cross-over career recently channeling Al Green.

The Artist Formally Known as Lizzy Grant:

In the wake of her major-label debut, Born to Die, leaking, and the encyclopedia of internet philosophy and hype the artist formerly known as Lizzy Grant has spawned as the music business’ latest square peg in a round hole, the LDR camp has decided to re-issue her first LP from 2008 later this summer, Lizzy Grant aka Lana Del Rey via Interscope. Her statement to the BBC; “People act like [the record] is shrouded in mystery, the ‘forgotten terrible album’. But if you look on YouTube, all 13 tracks are available with millions of views, so it’s not like no-one’s heard them.” Objective query: if Lizzy Grant… is her “forgotten terrible album,” what does that make Born to Die?

 

 

Beyonce 101:

One of the lasting values of the declining values of a college education is to consistently remind and engage new generations in the ongoing digestion of world media and culture. Or rather to quote the viral perceptions of Paul “Double Rainbow” Vasquez: “What does this mean?” So goes the framework of Rutgers‘ class, “Politicizing Beyonce,” in which PH.D. Kevin Alfred isolates the pop star’s lyrics and videos “in comparison to the writings of Alice Walker and Sojourner Truth,” reports the Huffington Post. Part of the university’s Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, the course will tackle the “extent of Beyonce’s control over her own aesthetic, whether her often half-naked body is empowered or stereotypical, and her more racy performances as her alter ego, “Sasha Fierce.” To bootylicious or not to bootylicious, that is the question.

 

Too Legit To Quit:

Since ending its free honeymoon phase, in which the breakout Swedish music-streaming service Spotify entered the world market with, allowing users unlimited, all-you-can-listen-to access to its 15 million and rising song library, initiated January 14th, three million of its 10+ million users have decided to subscribe to the pay format of the future, roughly 20%, the service made public to FT Tech Hub. Important numbers in the business of legal music consumption. Meanwhile, a Europe edition of a legit Napster by its new owners Rhapsody is currently live, promising a similar multi-million song library.

Lyricapsule:

“Instant Karma!” the name of the tune John Lennon famously packaged in a day, telling press, “I wrote it for breakfast, recorded it for lunch and we’re putting it out for dinner,” was cut on this day in 1970, not long before the Beatles broke up. For as much as we love Lennon and this song, it’s kind of a threatening  – “Instant Karma’s gonna get you” – a la the Christian idea of sin they he so ironically attempted to diffuse in “Imagine.” Nevertheless, the chorus is sing-song pop geniusry for something written during a single breakfast: “Well we all shine on/Like the moon and the stars and the sun/Well we all shine on/Every one, come on.” Plus the video has Yoko Ono crocheting blindfolded.