Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
June 25, 2010
Why We Wu 6
by Jacob Lambert
More than any other modern act—with the exceptions, perhaps, of Miles Davis and B.B. King—The Wu Tang Clan has laid claim to nearly every corner of its genre.
June 2, 2010
Headphone Elegies 5
by Sean Patrick Cooper
We’ve become not just curators of music but curators of connections, immersed in an aural landscape and a transporting, internal soundtrack.
May 11, 2010
The Weird Sisters: CocoRosie’s Grey Oceans 8
by Emily Colette Wilkinson
CocoRosie’s mythology is equal parts Victorian childhood and modern Gothic. The freak folk/trip hop duo are innocents who know about the dark side, but still believe in angels, fairies, God, St. Nicholas, rainbows, unicorns, Armageddon. The sisters’ haunting, perverse lullabies tend to make lovers or haters of their listeners pretty quickly.
January 22, 2010
The Music in My Head 12
by Emily St. John Mandel
A while ago I began wondering if I might use music to my advantage somehow. Because if music exerts the sway over us that I think it does, I might use it to help me ignore the distractions of the outside world.
December 15, 2009
All The Single Ladies: The Problem with Feminist Anthems 17
by Edan Lepucki
Perhaps “Single Ladies” can’t be a feminist anthem because, to reduce it to a rallying cry, a slogan, does not acknowledge it for the complex song that it is.
November 23, 2009
Phil Spector: Guilty of Creating the Greatest Christmas Album Ever 6
by Jeff Martin
Released on the day JFK was assassinated, Spector’s album ended up being a much-needed dose of joy in a dark and confusing time.