What a busy President’s Day weekend this is shaping up to be! We already have the return of three cultural phenomenons - Valentine’s Day, the mid-season return of The Walking Dead season 6 and the 58th annual Grammy Awards - but now we welcome a new contender to the stage: HBO’s Vinyl. The new series has some blockbuster names associated with it, meaning you’ll probably want to tune in. There is way you can watch Vinyl online without using a television, which we’ll get to in just a second, but first - a preview.
The new music drama is produced by a pair of legends in their respective mediums - Martin Scorsese and Mick Jagger, with the pilot and creation of the overall series being handled by Boardwalk Empire’s Terence Winter. Set in 1970s New York, Vinyl will examine the expanding music industry transitioning into a new era of genres. The official description from HBO states: "A ride through the sex-and drug-addled music business at the dawn of punk, disco, and hip-hop, the show is seen through the eyes of a record label president, Richie Finestra, played by Bobby Cannavale, who is trying to save his company and his soul without destroying everyone in his path."
The setting of Vinyl will prove to be as important to the new series as well as its plot. As Jagger told the New York Times, "New York was broke ... You've got a lot of poverty, a lot of rich people and a lot of disparity — all these scenes going on against a background of quite tough and grimy cityscapes."
Scorsese has directed the pilot and the series will also star Olivia Wilde, Ray Romano and Juno Temple, along with appearances from Andrew Dice Clay, Max Casella, Birgitte Hjort Sørensen and Mick Jagger’s son, James.
The trailer showcases everything that one would expect from a rock-and-roll show including raucous crowd-surfing concerts, record label execs popping champagne bottles and lots and lots of drugs. The project has been in the works since 2011, so it should be quite interesting to see how Scorsese, Jagger and Winter will execute the original series after so much preparation.
Vinyl premieres at 9 p.m. ET Sunday, Feb. 14 on HBO. To watch Vinyl online, simply log into a HBO Go account with your cable subscription info, or sign into HBO Now and watch immediately. Take a look at the trailers for Vinyl and be sure to check back in for a recap after the series premiere concludes.
