Haim Page 4

Update: Taylor Swift and Calvin Harris are indeed a thing. Besides hanging out A LOT recently and adopting matching outfits (see here), the pair have now stepped out holding hands. So that means it’s on... right?

While not too obvious in this photo, that leather-clad arm is indeed attached to Calvin Harris.

According to People’s timely report, The 25-year-old singer was spotted holding hands with DJ Calvin Harris as the pair left a concert at the Troubadour in West Hollywood on Thursday. What makes this even more awesome is that said show was by Haim, aka the awesome all-female indie trio, who vacationed with Swift last month.

Continue reading: Taylor Swift And Calvin Harris Seal Relationship Status With Hand-Holding Photos

So um, the Grammys are about to get really interesting this year – mostly because there are so many fresh faces on the nominees list. From Bastille to Sam Smith, you could call this the year of the young and angsty up-and-comers.

The lads of Bastille are staying humble and supporting their fellow artists tonight.

Debutants Bastille, who are nominated in the Best New Artist category, are planning to spend the night ““awkwardly tripping down the red carpet and pulling our shirt collars,” per their interview with MTV. They certainly have a reason to be nervous, as the category also includes some of the biggest successes of 2014 - Iggy Azalea, Sam Smith, Brandy Clark and Haim.

Continue reading: Grammy Newcommers Bastille Preparing For A Surreal Night

Possibly the only major festival where you can enjoy fine gourmet cuisine while rocking out to an eclectic variety of international artists, Outside Lands has now unveiled the 2014 line-up as it prepares to return to San Francisco this August.

We just can't express our excitement enough at the newly revealed line-up for Outside Lands this year. Topping the bill are the likes of Kanye West, The Killers and Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers; three very different artists which see the latter become the first act ever to headline twice following their incredible set in 2013. Now in its seventh year, Outside Lands are showing signs of development every single summer, and at much benefit for the city with a percentage of every ticket sale going to San Francisco's Recreation and Park Department.

Continue reading: Outside Lands Brings You The 2014 Line-Up! Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers, Duck Sauce, Jagwar Ma And More

The vinyl list has been released for this year's Record Store Day, which will be celebrated by 240 independent music shops throughout the UK with over 600 exclusive releases available. More big-name acts than ever before have lent their music to the unique event, which is designed to save the nation's record shops from the threat of online shopping and big corporations.

Californian Sister Trio Haim Are Contributing Vinyl-Based Music To Record Store Day 2014.

Placebo, Green Day, Outkast, Bombay Bicycle Club, Chvrches, Disclosure, Dinosaur Jr, Bruce Springsteen, David Bowie, Jake Bugg, The Flaming Lips, Elbow, Fleetwood Mac, Haim, Richard Hawley, and Johnny Cash represent just a handful of the most high profile LP or EP releases this year with an eclectic range of genres for music fans to flick through.

Continue reading: Placebo, Outkast, Bombay Bicycle Club Lead Record Store Day 2014: Race You There!

All set for the BRIT Awards this evening? Indeed, Britain's biggest night of music awards will take place today and we're feeling pretty excited for the ceremony, which is set to be as spectacular as ever. Of course, if it was purely based on sales, most of the awards would go to One Direction, who have sold 3.19 million albums in the past year. Luckily that's not the case and the awards look set to be handed out to a diverse range of acts who've made their mark on music this year.

Nominated 'International Female Solo Artist' Will Be Bringing Her Pop Hits To Tonight's Ceremony.

This year's musical entertainment will be provided by Katy Perry, Pharrell Williams, Ellie Goulding Arctic Monkeys, Rudimental, Bruno Mars, Bastille, and Lorde but a rumour has arisen that Prince may make a surprise performance with his band, 3rdEyeGirl. The funk singer has been delighting Londoners with surprise gigs over the past week so it's highly plausible that he'll make the BRIT Awards his final London date.

Continue reading: Tonight's BRIT Awards Preview: Who's Performing, Who's Up For A Prize?

Coachella 2014 will be returning to Indio, California, this spring for a two-weekend spectacular that will see some of the world's biggest performers gather in one polo field in the middle of the desert. This week the full line-up for the latest incarnation of the ever-popular festival was announced, with the bill yet another feast for the eyes (and eventually the ears too).

Big Boi and Andre 3000 will reunited for the headline performance

Eight years since their last album and eventual hiatus, Outkast will reform to headline the first day of the festival, which will kick start on the weekend of 11-13 April. The Grammy-winning hip-hop duo will be joined on the first day by fellow returnees The Knife, who released their first album in seven years - the acclaimed Shaking the Habitual - in 2013 and The Replacements, who reformed in 2012. Ellie Goulding, Chromeo, Haim, A$AP Ferg, Bryan Ferry, DJ Falcon and many others will also appear on the first day.

Continue reading: OutKast, Muse And Arcade Fire To Headline Coachella 2014

Treasure Island Music Festival returns to San Francisco, California this October for two days with an impressive selection of live music and other entertainment at a stunning location on this popular man-made island.

Headlining Saturday, October 19th is Radiohead singer Thom Yorke's supergroup Atoms For Peace - a band with a dream team line-up in itself who released their debut album earlier this year - who will be joined by the likes of dancehall DJ Major Lazer and British duo Disclosure. Sunday 20th sees yet more great sets from exclusive headliner Beck, as well as Animal Collective, hyped band of the moment Haim, London indie group Palma Violets and pop duo Sleigh Bells. What's more, you don't have to miss out on any of this incredible music as bands will be spread out on two stages, with no-one playing at the same time and, more importantly, no interruptions.

Continue reading: Treasure Island Music Festival 2013 To Arrive With Another Weekend Of Uninterrupted Musical Fun

We're almost halfway through an incredible 30-day iTunes Festival with some legendary shows still to come from the likes of Elton John, Justin Timberlake and Katy Perry.

One of London's most fabulous concert venues, The Roundhouse, is holding the biggest artists of the year between September 1st - 30th and it's only going to get better from here.

The festivities kicked off with Lady GaGa, who certainly garnered much 'Applause' with her electric set which saw her don little more than seashells in strategic places as she bellowed out a taster of her upcoming album 'Artpop'.

Continue reading: Get Ready For The Second Half Of London's 2013 Star-Filled ITunes Festival

The Budweiser Made in America Festival 2013 was jampacked with highlights from some of the most iconic artists of the age, as well as some of the best up-and-coming stars and the hidden talent you'd be a fool to have missed.

Taking place over August 31st and September 1st in Philadelphia, the Saturday kicked things off with some impressive acts. Feisty California sisters Haim performed early on in the afternoon with a thoroughly entertaining set, in terms of both music and audience interaction, on the Liberty Stage where other must-see artists such as Deadmau5, 2 Chainz and triple BRIT winning Emeli Sande also thrilled the crowd. The Freedom Stage saw the likes of Rudimental further establish their place in the hearts of a large proportion of festival goers, while the Skate Park Stage saw much smaller bands such as Ohio group Cloud Nothings and New Jersey D&B duo Brick & Mortar get the ultimate chance to showcase their talents. The main Rocky Stage was, of course, the real crowd bringer, with Beyonce headlining and Phoenix and Imagine Dragons delivering the uttermost electrifying rock shows of the night.

Continue reading: Made In America Festival 2013: One Of The Happier Memories Of The Festival Season

Talking to the artists... Small festivals don't necessarily mean an inferior line-up as was more than proved at the quaint Beacons Festival 2013 in the Yorkshire Dales town of Skipton. We caught up with Ghostpoet before his Friday set (which was definitely a weekend highlight!) where he confessed that he'd 'changed in many ways and some of it may have been for the better and some of it not' over the last year but still doesn't think of himself as 'being successful'. He also talked about working with Melo-X and his fondness for documenting interesting cars on Instagram. Read the full interview here.

NYPC have abandoned their former moniker of New York Pony Club as they have gone through quite a rebirth since the departure of former band member Lou Hayter. 'We've taken what we've perceived as being the strongest elements of the previous two albums and tried to make them into something which is mature and progressive', Tahita Bulmer told us in an interview when we caught up with them to talk about their new self-titled album. She also didn't hesititate to tell all about NYPC's touring adventures - including their trip to the 'amazing' and 'unspoilt' Kazakhstan. Read the full interview here.

Continue reading: A Week In Music, Ghostpoet Opens Up At Beacons, Cloud's 'Comfort Songs' Is A Classic And Gaga Goes Bowie-esque On 'Applause'

One of the three Haim sisters fell ill whilst on the Pyramid Stage today at Glastonbury Festival (28th June) - Este Haim began falling ill in the middle of the first of the band's two performances this weekend, blaming diabetes. Despite feeling a little off, the bassist began to play the rest of the songs on a stool and explained after their set: "Sometimes diabetes gets the better of you." According to DIY, Este declared to the crowd mid-set: "I'm not going to let this get the better of me, especially when there are so many beautiful people here. If I pass out, will someone give me mouth to mouth?" After she recovered, she declared it to be "the best day of [her] life."

Bassist Este Haim In Action.

Este is the eldest of the three sisters in the band from California's San Fernando valley- with Alana and Danielle Haim, and also including drummer Dash Hutton. She has become famous to her extreme facial expressions she pulls whilst playing bass guitar, with her "bassface" even having a Twitter account dedicated to it. She holds a degree in Ethnomusicology, revealing to the London Evening Standard that she finished the five year degree in just two, and plays guitar as well as bass.

Continue reading: Haim Bassist Gets Ill During Glastonbury Festival Set

Liam Gallagher was given the enviable job of opening the 2013 Glastonbury Festival with a surprise set on The Other Stage on Friday morning (June 28, 2013). The singer, who aired his dismay for the festival following his former band Oasis' set in 2004, arrived on-stage and immediately launched into Flick of the Finger, a recent single for Beady Eye.

Liam Gallagher Performing With Beady Eye At Brixton Academy

The cloudy weather and early start did nothing to deter the famous Mancunian, who was on typically brash form. "It's never too early for a bit of Rock'n'Roll aggro, is it?" asked Gallagher as his new band launched into Morning Glory, an Oasis hit written by his brother Noel Gallagher.

Continue reading: Liam Gallagher's Beady Eye Open Glastonbury Festival With Morning Set

With such a ginormous festival site at 900 acres, and plenty of drunken hoardes and muddy puddles to fight through, the simple act of walking from one stage to another can be a difficult task. Throw in a lost mud-sucked welly and inebriated disorientation and you haven't a hope in hell of deftly navigating your way in between acts - even with that overpriced festival lanyard you spent half your first day's budget on.

Glastonbury returns in 2013 after having taking a well needed break in 2012 - the Eavis family, the cows and the grass all had a rest whilst the portaloos and crowd barriers were in London for the Olympics. The festival this year marks it's revival with an exciting line-up, including The Rolling Stones, Mumford & Sons, Arctic Monkeys, Chic feat. Nile Rodgers, Chase and Status, and Public Enemy.

However, with all star-packed line-ups comes inevitable clashes: fan of both Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds AND Smashing Pumpkins? Too bad - they're both on around 20:30 on the Sunday with a good half mile hike between stages, meaning you'll have to forego one sullen frontman for another.

Continue reading: Glastonbury Festival 2013: Your Guide To The Biggest Clashes!

John Legend is excited to team up with Beyonce for a London concert, endorsing Chime for Change – a charity, aimed at helping girls and women around the world. The singers will perform at London’s Twickenham stadium on June 1st alongside a host of other international acts, including Florence + the Machine, Haim, Ellie Goulding, Iggy Azalea, Laura Pausini, Rita Ora and Timbaland. Chime for Change was founded by Gucci and profits from the initiative go to various NGOs around the world, which aim to affect change in the lives of underprivileged women.

John Legend himself has been working with various organisations, focusing on women’s rights, for a long time. For The Huffington Post, the singer said he was “inspired” to act after traveling to Ghana with Millenium Promise co-founder Professor Jeffrey Sachs, who wrote The End of Poverty.

The Grammy Award winner is excited to perform alongside Beyonce.

Continue reading: John Legend Would Love To Duet With Beyonce In Aid Of Women's Rights

As the annual South by Southwest festival heats up over there in Austin, Texas, we’ve cast a jealous eye over the line-up and picked out five of some of the bigger names that you really should start queuing nice and early for and thrown in five hype bands for you, too, so you can get all hip with your friends, upon your return and start laying down all those “saw them first lines,” when they blow up next year.

First up, the acts that have already broken, that you really need to check out, or at least pretend that you did, if you were stuck in that queue for BBQ wings…

1. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis – their ‘Thrift Shop’ song really blew up, especially online, where they challenged Carly Rae Jepsen’s chart record for ‘Call Me Maybe.’ No one can predict whether or not Macklemore’s going to be a one hit wonder or whether he’s got more up his sleeve, he’s known for putting on a good show, and all six of their shows are likely to be rammed.

Continue reading: SXSW Movers And Shakers: The Biggest Names And Best New Acts At South By Southwest 2013

Albums of Note... Heaped with praise and riding high in the UK charts, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ 15th studio album, Push the Sky Away is not only an artistic triumph but a commercial one, too. Cave’s songwriting style has mutated significantly since his early days as frontman and resident wildcard of The Birthday Party; he now resembles a particularly well-dressed bar fly and his songs are peppered with his quintessentially erudite turn of phrase.

For our reviewer, Push the Sky Away demonstrates Cave and his cohorts at their finest:“Knowing when to stop and what to leave out, when adding more will lessen the quality and having the strength of character to just cut away the surplus is most definitely driven by the ever uncompromising Cave and here it has clearly paid dividends… Push The Sky Away' has a delicacy and tenderness woven through it like a fine silken tapestry of beguiling beauty but it can still be unflinching and brutal.”

Continue reading: A Week In Music - Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds' 'Push The Sky Away' Riding High, Foal Break New Ground With 'Holy Fire' And Haim Get Close To Nature With 'Falling'

Until relatively recently you wouldn’t have reckoned that The Rolling Stones would be up for four nominations at the 2013 NME Awards (the N stands for ‘new’, lest we forget), but it appears that a handful of extortionately priced gigs have got the old rockers back on the map, as the long running publication revealed its contenders for this year’s bash.

The Rolling Stones are in with a chance in Best Live Band, Best Book, Music Moment Of The Year and Best Music Film. Giving the event even more of a time warp feel, they’ll be doing battle with David Bowie in the Music Moment Of The Year, after the Thin White Duke announced his comeback on his 66^th birthday recently. Bowie is also up for Best Music Video and Hero Of The Year. Commenting on the nominations, Mick Jagger said "It's very nice to be nominated. When I first heard it was four things, I thought, 'Ooh, blimey! That's very nice!' And it’s not a journalists-only thing, it's not a coterie of closely-knit people choosing. It’s funny, because when we were rehearsing at Wembley Arena last year, it was where we used to do the NME Pollwinners. We remembered, it was the first time we ever played 'Jumping Jack Flash', at one of those Pollwinners concerts!"

More contemporary acts who are in with a chance of glory include Haim; the BBC Sound of 2013 winners are up for Best New Band, Best Track, Best Music Video and Best Twitter. Australians Tame Impala are also up for four nods: Best International Band, Best Album, Best Track and Best Music Video, whilst M.I.A is mysteriously in with a chance at four wins, despite just releasing one single since the 2012 awards. The full list can be found here.

Continue reading: The Rolling Stones NME Awards Nominations The Surprise Of A Retro Looking Shortlist

"The NME Awards is the highlight of the music calendar and the most Rock'n'roll party of the year," says NME editor Mike Williams. He's not wrong, and this year's nominations, which have just been released, prove to make this year's party even better.

The bands to be most proud of their nominations this year are new-comers Haim and Tame Impala, both of which have never been nominated in the awards before. Haim's nominations are for 'Best New Band', 'Best Track', 'Best Music Video' and 'Best Twitter' for Alana Haim (@babyhaim). We're not entirely sure what makes a good Twitter, but we're sure she deserves it, mostly because she posted a photo of her kissing a trout. Tame Impala's nominations are for 'Best International Band', 'Best Album', 'Best Track' and 'Best Music Video'. Also with four nominations each are veterans The Rolling Stones, and controversial act, M.I.A. 

This year's heroes and villains are an interesting bunch with Harry Styles and David Cameron undoubtedly leading the troupe for the villains, while Frank Ocean, Barack Obama and Pussy Riot are all up for the Hero award. 

Continue reading: NME Award Nominations Announced: HAIM And Tame Impala Four Nominations Each

Albums of Note... Deftly side-stepping the pitfalls of ‘second album syndrome,’ Everything Everything have stepped things up a notch with second album Arc, which looks set to raise their profile even further. They’ve retained their quirky dance geek sound, but this time around, the songs have a darker, more emotional sound. Where their debut was playful, a newfound intensity can be found on this follow-up. “Arc offers more drama and intensity than the playful-ness we heard on Man Alive, Everything Everything's 2010-released debut… each track stands in its own right; nothing is filler and Arc maintains interest throughout; it's a much more mature offering than Everything Everything's previous, particularly with the likes of the gentle, piano-backed 'The Peaks, which sensitively showcases their trademark falsetto vocals in an atmospheric setting.”

Paul Weller’s latest release, the ‘Dragonfly EP’ is described by our reviewer as a “victory lap.” The EP contains a number of unreleased tracks from the Modfather’s trilogy of experimental albums released in 2012. Described as “by no means essential for the casual fan,” the tracks contained herein are a step away from the sonic experimentation of the albums and are closer to his early solo days.“The Dragonfly EP is therefore well worth your time if you have any interest in Weller's more recent output. However, for the more casual listener, it may seem like it's business as usual for the Modfather. The 5 additional songs certainly deserve to be heard, and it's a welcome move that they haven't just ended up on the cutting room floor.”

Continue reading: A Week In Music – Everything Everything Avoid Second Album Syndrome With 'Arc,' Paul Weller's 'Dragonfly' Is A "Victory Lap," Jools Holland Teams Up With The Stars

The BBC’s Sound of 2013 winners have finally been announced. The US band Haim say that they have “found our second home in the UK!” and after extensive press coverage on these shores, since they started making waves at 2012’s SXSW festival in Austin Texas, they have become a hotly-tipped band. It’s no surprise then, that their accessible, ‘80s influenced guitar sound has earned them a place at the top of this year’s poll, beating AlunaGeorge and Angel Haze, who sit behind them in the race.

So who exactly are Haim, then? 21 year old Alana, 23 year old Danielle and 26 year-old Este are three sisters, making music that sounds as though it’s inspired as much by Fleetwood Mac as it is by their own self-confessed influences of TLC and Destiny’s Child. These are a girl group in a more traditional sense though; a guitar band with pop sensibilities; credibility lends weight to their songwriting and their extrovert personalities have certainly made recent interviews in the UK press an entertaining read.

One of the first magazines to champion Haim were NME. The publication’s new music editor Matt Wilkinson said “After years of boring indie bands who seem to almost be embarrassed to be featured on mainstream radio or in magazines like NME, Haim are a shining light. Not only do they write brilliant songs, but they also want to be a really big deal… the fact they are now getting wider recognition is no real surprise - they have a knack for writing amazingly catchy singles, they're a killer live band and they talk-the-talk miles better than most other new bands. It's a rare and exciting combination.”