The Witzard

"We are excited to announce that a new Joanna Newsom song was released this morning! Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson ," read an uncharacteristically serious Tweet from GRAMMY -winning Comedy-Rap triumvirate @thelonelyisland , which just so happens to showcase the rhymin' talents of Newsom's husband, Andy Samburg . While I'm vaguely familiar with Joanna Newsom 's beautifully fragile harp-assisted melodies, I'm gonna be completely honest here: the only time I've ever actually "heard" her music was on Asher Roth & Nottz Raw 's reflective "Sprout & The Bean" -sampling RAWTH EP cut, "Break Bread." Newsom's first album in nearly five years, Divers , features lush string arrangement composed by "a total murders' row: Newsom [herself], Nico Muhly , Dirty Projectors frontman Dave Longstreth , and Ryan Francesconi ," as Stereogum reports. Divers' string arrangements were additionally record...

While it's unclear to exactly what capacity at this point, but it seems as though Dirty Projectors frontman and guitarist Dave Longstreth was somehow involved in the writing/recording of Rihanna, Kanye & Paul McCartney 's new single, "FourFiveSeconds;" according to a currently unsubstantiated report from Kanye 's friend and long-time barber, Ibn Jasper , " Kanye 's whole new album is co-produced with Paul McCartney ... He decided to put Rihanna on ["FourFiveSeconds"] and put it on BOTH of their albums because they are both Roc-Nation " (reports which Rolling Stone have since shot down). In addition to Longstreth, "FourFiveSeconds" additionally features as-yet-unknown contributions from Mike Dean , Dalllas Austin, Elon Rutburg , and Noah Goldstein, as well as Ty Dolla $ign and Kirby Lauryen , both of whom previously worked with West-McCartney on "Only One." It's without a doubt the track Ty Dolla $ign ...

Following a largely un-fullfilled search for a copy of Modern Vampires of The City that aimlessly led me across Cumberland County , I realized that aside from 2-3 well-executed lyric videos, Vampire Weekend have yet to release a proper music video in support of their new album; Whilst still grabbing headlines by torching a couple Saab 900's and hanging out with "distant second cousin" Steve Buscemi , the New York -based band finally unleashed a "Diane Young" video Monday morning. Continuing a long-standing trend that started with "Giving Up The Gun" (2010), director Primo Kahn somehow managed to recruit a very interesting cast of characters: Chromeo , Dave Longstreth (Dirty Projectors), Sky Ferreira , Despot , Santigold, Hamilton Leithauser (The Walkmen), and a ski-masked man that just might be cameraman Kahn himself. What starts out looking mysteriously like a modern-day Last Supper slowly morphs into a righteous "dinner party where g...