Shakira Goes 'She-Wolf' in Funky New Video

Will 'Pitchfork' keep Adele from taking the crown?

(NEWSER) - It’s the end of the year, which means a glut of music sites releasing “Best Of” lists. Indie-loving Pitchfork picks the top 100 tracks of the year; here are the top 10, which include some mainstream surprises:

1. M83, “Midnight City”
2. Bon Iver, “Holocene”
3. EMA, “California”
4. Nicki Minaj, “Super Bass”
5. Real Estate, “It’s Real”
6. Destroyer, “Kaputt”
7. Beyoncé, “Countdown"
8. Cass McCombs, “County Line”
9. Azealia Banks, “212”
10. DJ Khaled, “I’m On One” (Feat. Drake, Rick Ross, and Lil Wayne)

Band takes classic album on 40th anniversary 15-city tour

(NEWSER) - Jethro Tull’s 1971 album Aqualung may be a certified classic, but the band’s frontman calls it flawed. “It wasn’t a great sounding album,” Ian Anderson tells Bloomberg . The church-turned-studio where it was recorded was “big, echoey, daunting and rather dark,” he notes. “It had all the ghosts of its past, and plenty of technical problems. At the end of the sessions, I wasn’t sure what we’d got.” More»

Meghan Daum: To be really popular, you have to be really unpopular

(NEWSER) - With Friday, 13-year-old Rebecca Black has a top 20 song on iTunes and a video that’s reached 35 million views—but what she’s most noted for is widespread derision. “We don't hate you because you're famous. You're famous because we hate you,” reads one of the printable tweets. But that’s what fame is in the age of the Internet, writes Meghan Daum in the Los Angeles Times : "To do anything in a public arena is to invite an insta-response that will echo just as loudly with harsh critics as with fans." More»

Gold prices push the cost of 5 rings to $650

(NEWSER) - If your true love gives you everything from 12 drummers drumming to a partridge in a pear tree this year, he or she will have shelled out $96,824. That’s up 10.8% from last year, the AP reports. High gold prices pushed the cost of five gold rings up 30% to $649.95; nine ladies dancing now costs $6,294.03, up 15%; the price of feed and availability led to a 78.6% jump in the price of two turtle doves, to $100. More»

Even 'I Kissed a Girl' not as obvious as it sounds

(NEWSER) - In honor of Jay-Z’s Decoded, which breaks down the meanings behind his songs, the Independent offers up the true stories behind 10 hits:

• Katy Perry, “I Kissed a Girl”: The message behind this one seems fairly obvious, but Perry has insisted it’s actually about heterosexual friendships and was only sexed up to sell more records.
• Van Morrison, “Brown Eyed Girl”: Though many think it’s about heroin use, Van Morrison has said it is about an interracial relationship and was originally titled “Brown Skinned Girl.”