• Earlier this week, Sean Combs aka P. Diddy (or didn't he?) took time off from making $250,000 bets with Mark Wahlberg to release a fragrance called 3AM. And as we're all well aware, the best way to launch a new perfume is with what amounts to soft-core porn starring your own girlfriend. Cassie appears in a promotional campaign that prominently features her nipples and suggests that the couple's sex life is nothing if not art directed. I mean, who wouldn't want to smell like a combination of citrus, choking, and slight desperation? Sign me up. Let's all get laid! The only thing more ill-advised than this whole endeavor would be if Ben Carson decided to make a bid for the presidency by enlisting a gospel choir to sing Eminem's "Lose Youself" during his announcement. Wait.

• Next month, Morrissey is set to take the stage at Madison Square Garden (pending cancellation because who knows if he even has a contract, or whether he'll get sick, or, oh yes, the sum total of his onstage history since the cancer scare), and demanded the massive venue cease serving animal products for the evening, as is increasingly his custom. Madison Square Garden has not publicly confirmed it will meet this demand, though that didn't stop the incomparable New York Post from reporting that it would. The apparent source? Morrissey's open letter to former vice president Al Gore about the upcoming Live Earth concerts. With characteristic understatement, he claimed:

Serving meat and dairy products at an event to combat climate change is like selling pistols at a gun-control rally... if you choose to serve animal flesh at Live Earth, you'll be making a mockery of the very concept of the event, in which case it should be renamed 'Dead Earth: We Contributed!

To which Gore replied, "Pretty sure the gun will get you faster." (Just kidding, in a shocking turn of events, neither he nor any representative of Live Earth have responded.) In the same letter, Morrissey called it a "moral duty" to make Live Earth meat-free—"as is done now at every concert venue in which I perform, including Madison Square Garden." I guess we'll see (whether we want to or not).

• It looks like Mark Kozelek and El-P have struck up an unlikely friendship. Although Run the Jewels previously taunted Sun Kil Moon when their sets overlapped at last year's Fun Fun Fun Fest, El-P maintained his fandom and it appears he wasn't being facetious. Sun Kil Moon announced their new album Universal Themes will stream for one week starting June 1, and that they'll also be including an interview El-P conducted with Kozelek. I imagined this could very well be a joke, but El-P retweeted the announcement himself.
(Now, if he could slot it in there that Kozelek should "run naked backward through a field of dicks," I would just be so happy.) Don't forget that Run the Jewels will also be gracing us with their presence here in Washington soon enough.

• Might I make a few suggestions? Because an entire list of tracks have been catching my attention and I'm about to drop some knowledge on you. The June 12 release date of Giorgio Moroder's 74 Is the New 24 is just around the corner . His tracks with Charli XCX leaked Monday, and its imminent "Lindsay's Album of the Summer" chart position skyrocketed. Unfortunately, they were quickly pulled down, so we'll have to make due with the video for his collaboration with Sia – "Déjà Vu." While it might feel tiresome to watch an attractive man deal with his collective blonde loves, you'll want to stick around for the disco grooves and multiple Moroder cameos. Fetty Wap's "Trap Queen" currently occupies the #3 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 and he's definitely snagging the interest of indie critics, well on his way to becoming a media darling. He also performed on The Tonight Show yesterday evening. I'm going to weigh in and say the hype's deserved, as I have been listening to this remix with Azealia Banks, Gucci Mane, and Quavo pretty much nonstop since it dropped. If you're not familiar with the artist, allow him to say, "Hey, what's up. Hello." (I guess you could peruse this remix of "My Way" with a little-known artist named Drake while you're at it.) Meredith Graves also released her first solo song, "Took the Ghost to the Movies." Don't let the first notes fool you. Graves manages to combine her surprisingly soft vocals with enough distortion and snare to keep fans of Perfect Pussy intrigued. Then there is Shamir's new ballad, "Darker" and the Chemical Brothers' Michel Gondry-directed video for "Go" featuring Q-Tip. Honestly, there's too much good stuff to mention in this post. I didn't even get to discuss The Weather Station's new album Loyalty and they're going to be playing Chop Suey in a month. Or the new Joanna Gruesome album Peanut Butter! We've all got a lot of listening to do.

Before I leave you, can we take a moment to meditate on the crowning glory of Rihanna's Met Gala Dress. (Don't you dare mention that pizza meme.) Until next time!