Maria Aragon was 11 when she was discovered by Lady Gaga in 2011. Five years later, Maria is rocking Canada and preparing her soon to explode career. With Gaga on the charts today, it seemed like a good time to see what was happening with Maria. Check out these videos. Maria was signed by Steven Nowack in Toronto, and is featured on his website. Big things are coming. I am assured. Just check out this performance from last December–how long before she conquers America?

how it all started:

Madonna and Jay Z have been nominated for induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. And you thought Trump signaled the end of the world.

Madonna’s hits were all written by other people. Two of those people, Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly– who wrote “Like a Virgin”–were inducted a few years ago. Madonna wouldn’t come to the ceremony even to sing the song, and the guys made jokes about it.

Most of Madonna’s early hits were written by Stephen Bray and or Patrick Leonard. William Orbit took over after that. Maybe you could say Madonna “inspired” some of her hits. But this isn’t the Inspiration Hall of Fame. Every songwriter already inducted should sign a petition against this.

This is the 2nd time SHOF has tried to get Madonna in there. If it works, it’s sad.

As for Jay Z, his inspiration for “songwriting” is taking existing pieces of music– a like a song from “Annie”– and using it to support his rap lyrics. Jay Z doesn’t know how to write music and hasn’t written music. His raps are great, they belong in the Rap Hall of Fame. They could even be considered a form of poetry. But they are not songs.

The other nominees actually wrote songs: Cat Stevens, Gloria Estefan, the late PJ Sloan, Bryan Adams, George Michael, the amazing Sylvester “Sly Stone” Stewart, as well Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds and Swedish hitmaker Max Martin. All of them deserve to be inducted.

Hal David must be spinning in his grave today. Really. The music publishers are really leaning on the SHOF now like never before. All things must pass away.

Either Amazon or Interscope or both of them have dealt a blow to Lady Gaga‘s “Joanne.” They’ve deep discounted MP3 downloads of the album for $3.99, just about the lowest you’re allowed to price an album for and still make the charts.

The album was released last night and went right to number 1 on both iTunes and amazon. But the deep discount is going to cause a furor since most MP3 albums are priced between $8.99 and $11.99. Deep discounting in the past led to an industry wide decision that albums had to be priced at a minimum of $3.49 to be eligible for the charts.

But pricing “Joanne” so low is a signal that neither Amazon nor Interscope has much confidence in the record. And that basically sucks. “Joanne” turns out to a terrific collection, Gaga’s best yet, most mature offering. And by mature I don’t mean boring. Far from it. It’s really a rich group of songs and one that has to be heard in its context. For some reason, Interscope has already thrown three singles into release, none of which has caught on. They came with no context and no marketing as far as I can tell. Is this because Gaga is leaving the label? Is Interscope going to kill a great album? I think that’s a valid question.

Well, at least I’ve helped. Last night I downloaded the iTunes version for $11.99, thinking there was no Amazon download. Now I’ve added the $3.99 version. You know what? It was worth it. “Joanne” is just great. Lady Gaga’s fans had better buy tons of these albums. And I hope radio gets on some of these songs. They’re hits. (I really love “Just Another Day.”) This could be Gaga’s “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.” It’s that good.

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Prince’s estate is releasing their first two albums since the tragic death of the pop star last April. One will be a new greatest hits collection, and other is an expanded “Purple Rain.”

Circle November 22 for “Prince4Ever” which includes a 1982 recording called “Moonbeam Levels” – a previously unreleased song later considered for but not used for the Rave Unto The Joy Fantastic album.

The expanded, remastered “Purple Rain” will come in the spring with a second CD of outtakes and so on. No date yet. But I imagine they’ll shoot for April 21, the 1st anniversary of Prince’s death.

The albums are on NPG through Warner Bros.

The track-listing for Prince 4Ever is as follows:

1. 1999
2. Little Red Corvette
3. When Doves Cry
4. Let’s Go Crazy
5. Raspberry Beret
6. I Wanna Be Your Lover
7. Soft and Wet
8. Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad
9. Uptown
10. When You Were Mine
11. Head
12. Gotta Stop (Messin’ About)
13. Controversy
14. Let’s Work
15. Delirious
16. I Would Die 4 U
17. Take Me With U
18. Paisley Park
19. Pop Life
20. Purple Rain
21. Kiss
22. Sign ‘O’ The Times
23. Alphabet Street
24. Batdance
25. Thieves In The Temple
26. Cream
27. Mountains
28. Girls & Boys
29. If I Was Your Girlfriend
30. U Got The Look
31. I Could Never Take The Place of Your Man
32. Glam Slam
33. Moonbeam Levels
34. Diamonds and Pearls
35. Gett Off
36. Sexy MF
37. My Name Is Prince
38. 7
39. Peach
40. Nothing Compares 2 U

On what seems like a very, very strong new album called “Joanne,” Lady Gaga is getting serious about a lot of stuff. Serious stuff. She’s got a song called “Angel Down” about Trayvon Martin in which she embraces Black Lives Matter and makes a stunning statement– very much like Bruce Springsteen did years ago with “American Skin (41 Shots)” about Amadou Diallo. There’s a weird clip that will give you an idea, and here are the lyrics:

I confess I am lost
In the age of the social
On our knees
Take a test
To be lovin’ and grateful

Shots were fired on the street
By the church where we used to meet
Angel down, angel down
But the people just stood around

I’m a believer
It’s a trial
Foolish and weaker
Oh-oh-oh
I’d rather save an angel down

I’m a believer
It’s chaos
Where are our leaders?
Oh-oh-oh
I’d rather save an angel down

Doesn’t everyone belong
In the arms of the sacred
Why do we pretend we’re wrong?
Has our young courage faded?

Shots were fired on the street
By the church where we used to meet
Angel down, angel down
Why do people just stood around?

I’m a believer
It’s a trial
Foolish and weaker
Oh-oh-oh
I’d rather save an angel down

I’m a believer
It’s chaos
Where are our leaders?
Oh-oh-oh
I’d rather save an angel down

Hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo
Hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo
Hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo

I’m a believer
It’s a trial
Foolish and weaker
Oh-oh-oh
I’d rather save an angel down
Ohhh
I’m a believer
It’s chaos
Where are our leaders?
Oh-oh-oh
I’d rather save an angel down

Save that angel
Catch that angel
Catch that angel
Catch that angel

Otherwise, “Joanne” the album has a lot of depth. It’s also a hit for the moment, entering iTunes at number 2 and amazon at number 1. “Hey Girl” with Florence Welch is a tribute to Elton John and “Bennie and the Jets.” More traditional Lady Gaga fans will go for “Dancin’ in Circles.” “Come to Mama” is also very strong. More on the album later on Friday. But I wish Gaga had made the Grammy deadline on September 30th. She woulda been a contender.

Edie Brickell, Paul Simon and their whole family are probably in love with Alicia Keys right now. The reason? Alicia’s latest single, “Blended Family,” is based entirely on Edie’s early 90s hit “What I Am.”

I hadn’t heard “Blended Family” until this morning. But now I realize that like most of Alicia’s recordings, it should be called “Blended Song.”

The whole song is supported by the guitar lick from “What I Am.” It sounds like Alicia just sampled it and stuck it on her record. Why bother playing it yourself?

All of Edie’s New Bohemians are listed in the songwriting credits, too. Imagine this– last night I went to a party for Carole Bayer Sager. She wrote all of her songs herself, maybe with one or at most two collaborators. No sampling! All those hits and they were original!

Alicia has great, catchy hits. But nearly all of them are based on other, older and often obscure songs. “Empire State of Mind” comes from “Love on a Two Way Street.” “You Don’t Know My Name” came from a Main Ingredient song. And so on.

I do like the Rocky A$AP rap in “Blended Family.” But musically, the record is just about the guitar lick. And the Brickell-Simons raking in some $, I hope!

Seriously, when Alicia Keys first started out in 2000 I thought she was amazing. I was so excited that she played the piano, she knew composition, she could write her own songs. I thought she was a throwback to writers like Carole Bayer Sager and Carole King. But she’s not. She’s a Mixed Media artist or something. If you turned work in like this in sixth grade you’d get an F and told you were guilty of plagiarism. Now, it’s rewarded!

Edie and the New Bohemians
 

Alicia Keys