The Week in Music: Lil Wayne on Life in Jail, Pearl Jam’s Anniversary Plans, ‘American Idol’ and More
It was a big week for Rolling Stone exclusives. First and foremost, cover star Lil Wayne opened up about his time in prison and feeling dissed by Lebron James and Dwyane Wade at a recent Miami Heat/New Orleans Hornets game. We talked to Pearl Jam‘s Jeff Ament about the band’s extensive plans to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their first album, uncovered the details of the Grateful Dead‘s upcoming box set and got the inside story on the making of the Strokes‘ hotly anticipated record Angles. We also reported from Kid Rock‘s birthday concert in Detroit, Bruce Springsteen‘s surprise gig in New Jersey and Diddy’s stand-up comedy experiment in Manhattan.
In addition to all that, we brought you live performances from Cage the Elephant and Justin Townes Earle in our RS Live series, spotlighted Smith Westerns as Band of the Week, remembered Janis Joplin on her birthday, reported on upcoming books by Bob Dylan and John Lennon, along with reviews of all the week’s most notable new releases.
On the pop culture front, Peter Travers slammed the new Natalie Portman/Ashton Kutcher romantic comedy No Strings Attached, Halle Kiefer recapped two episodes of Jersey Shore, and Rob Sheffield praised Community, the most hilariously ambitious sitcom on tv. Rob also described the season premiere of American Idol as “a lavish infomercial for the new judges,” while Mallika Rao wondered if the judges were already losing it in the second episode.
We’re most excited about the debut of Rolling Stone’s new video blog, where we’ll be sharing exclusive videos as well as interesting and amazing clips from around the web. We’ve also made it easier than ever to discuss our posts by letting you sign in with Facebook Connect. By all means, please join the conversation!
Last Week: Ice Cream Tattoos, a Grateful Dead Video Game and More