Column
The Most Important Room in Music Right Now Has No Press Pass
Try to find a music journalism piece that traces an artist's career from a Discord server to a label deal. A real one, with dates and server names and a…
By Cole Briggs
Column
Rest in Peace, the Guilty Pleasure: What We Lost When Liking Pop Stopped Requiring an Explanation
I have a very specific memory of being seventeen and making a CD-R for a boy I liked. I spent forty-five minutes constructing a tracklist that would communicate that I…
By Maya E. Lin
Column
The Major Labels Sold Your Songs to the Algorithm
Here is what happened, stripped of the press releases. Suno built an AI that can generate a full song (vocals, instruments, production) from a text prompt in under thirty seconds.…
By Cole Briggs
Column
Origami Angel Should Be Everywhere By Now and the Reason They're Not Is the Most Interesting Thing About Them
Origami Angel have been releasing records for six years, built a catalog that holds up across every listen, and earned the kind of devotion most bands spend entire careers chasing.…
By Jesse Harlow
Column
The Opening Slot Is Not a Gift, It's a Loan With Terrible Terms
I have a habit of arriving early to concerts specifically for the opener. I know this is unusual. I have accepted it about myself. The opener is almost always the…
By Maya E. Lin
Column
The Industry Builds Girl Groups to Peak, Nobody Told MUNA
The industry builds girl groups to peak and then quietly waits for the solo careers to begin. MUNA is on their fourth album, still trojan horsing sad lesbian music into…
By Maya E. Lin
Column
The Labels Saw What Made K-Pop Work and Decided to Remove It
The labels saw what made K-pop undeniable and spent five years trying to remove it. The music got safer. The numbers got smaller. Nobody wants to say it out loud.
By Maya E. Lin
Column
I Read 200 Olivia Rodrigo TikTok Comments and Music Critics Have No Idea What's Happening
The press spent two days asking if Olivia Rodrigo had grown. Her fans spent two days doing psychology dissertations in the comments. Only one of those groups was actually listening.
By Cole Briggs
Column
Everyone Called Home from The Hotelier a Trauma Record and Missed the Whole Point
Everyone called it the album that got them through something. That's accurate. It's also the least interesting thing about it.
By Jesse Harlow
Column
The Girls Who Were Almost Famous Are Running the World Now
There's a specific kind of pop artist who spends a decade being described as underrated, and then one day the word stops applying. This is about what it costs to…
By Maya E. Lin
Column
I Got Played by a 2016 Zara Larsson Song and Honestly I Respect the Con
Nobody is nostalgic for these songs. They're nostalgic for the last time music felt like it was happening to them instead of at them.
By Cole Briggs
Column
Weezer Put Karly Hartzman on a Song and Accidentally Proved the Whole Thing Was Always Connected
Weezer put Karly Hartzman on a song and it works — not because someone had a good idea in a meeting, but because the line between Pinkerton and Rat Saw…
By Jesse Harlow