First Floor takes a closer look at the current hype around Latin sounds and rhythms within the wider electronic music world. It examines how these flare-ups of interest have historically been not only fleeting, but shallow, playing into stereotypes and misinformed notions of what constitutes “authentic” Latin culture while also doing little to concretely benefit artists and scenes located in Latin America.

Pitchfork tells the story of "slack key—a distinctly Hawaiian sound with complex patterns of rhythm, bass, and a leading melody all handled by one player on an acoustic guitar. It would become synonymous with the identity of the islands". The P also chooses nine releases through which "a story emerges of how a little-known indigenous folk music transformed into an empowering voice for the revitalization of an endangered culture".

"First, many artists could not tour this year due to a variety of factors, including inflation, high gas costs, supply-chain shortages, overbooked music venues, and poor mental health... Second, a much smaller number of artists this year... found that touring for the industry’s top one-percent is almost too viable, in that the shadowy corporations who run the live-music business... were able to gouge consumers for hundreds (if not thousands) of extra dollars above the original face value of tickets" - Uproxx looks back to "a weird and often bad year".

New Tedium writer Chris Dalla Riva looked at what has caused the disappearance of key change in pop music: "As hip-hop grew in popularity, the use of computers in recording also exploded too. Whereas the guitar and piano lend themselves to certain keys, the computer is key-agnostic. If I record a song in the key of C major into digital recording software, like Logic or ProTools, and then decide I don’t like that key, I don’t have to play it again in that new key. I can just use my software to shift it into that different key. I’m no longer constrained by my instrument".

Music writer Harmony Holiday was a part of Madlib's camp, and thought about what it was: "The entourage is its own worst enemy. It’s an endless funeral procession for the personalities that existed before of it, and the retribution that pursues it and evades it. It makes those men almost untraceable, intractable, easy to distract and extract from and run. I wanted to save this man from becoming the entourage’s pawn or mime, with the kind of feminine power that is mine, that makes men men. It turned me, for a time, into his pawn or mime, a thankless, timeless easy-to-abuse muse position. The entourage is a ruins".

In his latest post, music writer Ted Gioia presents a scientific basis for his alternative musicology—a holistic way of thinking about songs and their impact on individuals and societies. He makes the argument that too much of our world today is controlled by left-hemisphere-of-the-brain worldview — analytic and detail-oriented - and calls for the right hemisphere - controls creativity, intuition, and imagination - to take over. "The simplest way to tap into the right hemisphere is music… The connection between songs and the right hemisphere of our brains is so strong that stroke victims who have lost the language-making capacity of their left brain are sometimes still able to sing words they can no longer speak". A great intro to the theory.

A very interesting Complex essay: "The exploitation of Black rappers’ deaths is part of a larger societal truth as it pertains to modern day media and social media consumption. When digital natives are committed to documenting each and every moment, death simply falls in line with that as one of the more grander, more scandalous forms of activity. In a toxic environment prioritizing clicks, engagement, and reach, blogs and individuals fall in line, scrambling to be first—however disastrous that quest is. In the content economy, rap is discarded, as a lack of due diligence echoes on and a lack of care toward Black rappers—and presumption that these rappers are destined for death—lingers. (Artist relations specialist Karlie) Hustle concludes, 'Death as ‘online content’ is a cultural failure in an attention economy'”.

In 2018, hip-hop became the U.S. most popular genre of music. In 2022, hip-hop is still on top, and its revenues
are still growing, but after nearly a decade of market share growth, hip-hop’s share of total revenue has declined. Trapital’s first-ever culture report found three key drivers behind the trend:

1. Streaming’s continued growth

2. Early-mover advantages don’t last

3. The end of bundles and the limited vinyl supply

"Critiquing masculinity while maintaining his position within the enduring hierarchies that put those bad boys on top, he's the one you love to roll your eyes at. He's a dirtbag, baby, in a long line of antiheroes who interrogate the shapes of male privilege from the inside, even as they benefit from its persistence" - NPR's Ann Powers writes in a great text about Matt Healy, and his latest album with The 1975, 'Being Funny in a Foreign Language'. She questions the "dirtbag": "When it comes to creating alternatives to the patriarchal status quo, men actually have to surrender some privilege, not merely question the effect an elevated status has on their own souls. This can be a painful realization, a disappointment. But it also opens up new possibilities, pointing toward a life that might be less damaging to others, and less lonely".

WRTI shares a lovely text about "viral jazz" describing it as "aesthetic rather than a set of quantifiable viewer metrics". DOMi & JD Beck, and Louis Cole are two of the acts from the new movement, which The New York Times Magazine has described as "both radically sophisticated and full of jokes, a combination of qualities you find in both the 20th century's jazz greats and the 21st century's extremely online teenagers".