Digest: Eminem to Release EP With Royce da 5'9"; Beastie Boys Stream New Album

Eminem to Release EP with Royce da 5'9"
Eminem is set to release a new collaborative EP with fellow Detroit rapper Royce da 5'9" on June 14th. The as-yet-untitled disc, which will be issued on Eminem's own Shady Records, reunites the pair, who once performed together under the name Bad Meets Evil. [Vulture]

Beastie Boys Stream New Album
The Beastie Boys are now streaming their new album, Hot Sauce Committee Pt. 2, on their website. A clean version of the record was leaked to the Internet this past weekend, but the version streaming on the band's site is uncensored. [Beastie Boys]

Against Me! Announce Summer Tour
Florida punk rockers Against Me! will embark on a 50-date North American tour on May 20th with a performance at the Krazy Fest in Louisville, Kentucky. The band's itinerary will include a number of headlining sets in early summer as well as 28 dates as part of the Vans Warped Tour. [CMJ]

The Knife Plan New Album
Swedish electronic duo the Knife have announced that they have begun work on the follow-up to their acclaimed 2006 album, Silent Shout. The group has not provided any details about the record other than it intends to put it out sometime in 2012. [Pitchfork]

Pet Shop Boys Release First Live Record in U.S.
The Pet Shop Boys will release Concrete, their first-ever live album, on May 17th. The set, which previously had been available in the States only as an import release, was recorded live in London with the BBC Concert Orchestra and includes guest performances by Robbie Williams and Rufus Wainwright. On the same day, the group will release its score for the 1926 silent film Battleship Potemkin. [Press release]

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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