Beyoncé and JAY-Z’s Piracy Problem
The choice isn’t between Tidal and Spotify—it’s between streaming and stealing
View ArticleA Guide to the Chicago Acts Playing Pitchfork Music Festival 2018
With less than a month until our annual fest at Chicago’s Union Park, let’s shine a light on the locals.
View ArticleHow SOPHIE and Other Trans Musicians Are Using Vocal Modulation to Explore...
The voices of SOPHIE, Ms. Boogie, Macy Rodman, and more are both of the body and the cloud, living in Adam’s apples and circuit boards alike.
View Article‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Has Lost Its Free Queer Spirit in Its Lip Sync Songs
Suddenly you find yourself forced to entertain the idea that the new Meghan Trainor song is not only worth hearing, but worth inducting into a queer canon.
View Article5 Takeaways From Drake’s New Double Album, Scorpion
Two distinct sides, samples from MJ and iconic ladies, and countless Drake-isms ripe for IG captions
View ArticleHip-Hop Legend DJ Premier on Producing Drake’s Scorpion Track “Sandra’s Rose”
In the days after his father's death, the 52-year-old producer flipped a sample for Drake’s latest tribute to his mom.
View ArticleWhat It Means When Spotify Has Nothing to “Recommend” But Drake
Like Apple giving everyone a U2 album no one asked for, Spotify strongly suggesting its users engage with Drake undermines listeners’ sense of ownership.
View ArticleKanye West’s G.O.O.D. Music Rollout Was Anything But
The Wyoming experiment proved to be the cruelest summer
View ArticleWhy Richard Swift Was an Indie Rock Treasure
Ten songs that speak to the strengths of the recently passed singer-songwriter and producer, the embodiment of a musician’s musician
View ArticleThe Best Metal Albums of 2018 (So Far)
It’s been a banner year for all things slow and dismal.
View Article“Pose” Captures the Glamour and Struggle of 1980s Ball Culture, With a...
Music marks the disconnect between fantasy and reality, the ballroom versus the daily grind.
View ArticleWait, the New Whitney Houston Documentary Is Scored by a Guy from Stars of...
Drone great Adam Wiltzie was just as surprised when he was tapped for Whitney: "Has someone lost their mind over there in production?"
View ArticleThe Icarus Line Must Die Shows the Dark Purgatory of a Cult Rock Band That...
Too resilient to have flamed out in infamy but now too weary to keep going, L.A. punks the Icarus Line call it quits with a fictionalized film that’s just as strange as their actual career.
View ArticleThe 10 Best Garage Punk Songs of the Last Three Months
Your quarterly update from rock’s underground
View Article9 Weird and Excellent Iggy Pop Collaborations
With a new EP alongside Underworld on the way, let’s revisit Iggy’s best sonic cameos to date
View ArticleLast Night a Wax DJ Saved My Life
Looking for hope in a lifeless place: a silent disco at Madame Tussauds, hosted by “Calvin Harris”
View ArticleWhy I Fought the Sexist Gear Community (And Won)
Raphaelle Standell-Preston, singer and guitarist in Braids, explains why she controversially challenged TC Electronic and Steel Panther on their guitar effects preset “Pussy Melter.”
View ArticleTalking J Dilla, Kamasi, and the Hybrid Future of Jazz with Playing Changes...
The longtime jazz critic’s argument: we’re living through a deceptively rich era for the genre, it’s just more dispersed now
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