Jacobin magazine goes into a quest to find socialism in hip-hop, starting with the most famous examples - Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G. - and taking a left turn to find some new ones in underground hip-hop: "A handful of artists have been unequivocal in their willingness to operate under a red flag. Paris, Immortal Technique, and the Coup have been recording radical songs since the 1990s".
Miranda Reinert goes on to explain the punk subgenre orgcore, melodic punk, different from in due to the way music is discussed online, namely, it gets defined simply as “music enjoyed by users of punknews”. It is also defined by the type of person who enjoys it, which is why sometimes it is called FestCore and Beard Punk, because both bands and fans in the orgcore scene typically have beards. Typical bands from the scene include Dillinger Four, American Steel, None More Black, The Loved Ones, and The Falcon.
Medium writer Patsy Fergusson explaines why she liked Linda Lindas' 'Racist, Sexist Boy': "I’m not a fan of punk music. Screaming annoys me. But I loved the song... because it broke so many tired stereotypes.
The guitar industry has been struggling with scandals over illegal logging, resource scarcity and new environmental regulations related to trade in endangered species of trees. The Conversation went on a 6-year-long quest tracing guitar-making across five continents, looking at the timber used and the industry’s environmental dilemmas. A great piece of investigative (music) journalism.
The Punk Rock MBA YouTuber this week presents trap metal, a new genre combining trap-rap and metal, especially the industrial segment of it. The video-blogger goes from early pioneers like Suicideboys, Bones, Scarlxrd, Ghostemane, and XXXtentacion, and suggests newer trap metal artists like Mugxtsu, Mimi Barks, Sinizster, Gizmo and Sematary.
Beethoven's morning hygiene routine involved standing half-dressed before a mirror and pouring enormous pitchers of water over his hands while singing loudly to himself. After this, the German composer would count out exactly 60 beans and grind them, and make himself a coffee. Van Magazine's writer tried a week of this routine, as well as other somewhat strange daily routines of 4 other classical composers - Edvard Grieg, Erik Satie, Igor Stravinsky, and Antonin Dvořák.
A quintessential blog post at The Melt about "Spago Rock", defined by Mike Pace of Oxford Collapse: "A style of music that could be loosely defined as organic soul with synthetic instrumentation. If the yacht rock sound encompassed the mid-’70s to early ‘80s and centered around good times n' vibes, Spago Rock takes place from roughly 1986-1992, when many legacy artists matured and mellowed into their 40s, yet still wanted to be seen as contemporary and relevant. Artists who cut their teeth woodshedding in the analog days were now embracing the latest in digital studio technology, crafting immaculate electronic-based sophisti-pop while never truly abandoning their rock roots". Pace's new project Simmons & Matteo is the new phase of that genre.
Bands from all corners of metal are creating ferocious music that offers new perspectives on discrimination, race, gender and sexuality - Guardian reports on the changing face of the world's most controversial genre. The change is being fronted by podcasts On Wednesdays We Wear Black and Hell Bent for Metal, online communities like Alt Together, and fanzines such as Blkgrlswurld and Tear It Down, as well as by bands such as Nova Twins (dealing with misogyny and racial microaggressions), Life Of Agony (fronted by a transwoman), Tetrarch (fronted by African-American female metal guitarist), Pupil Slicer (discussing issues such as transgender healthcare) etc.
In the past year, pop-punk has made its comeback with the help of hip-hop crossovers by 4kGoldn and iann, Machine Gun Kelly and Travis Barker, MOD SUN, Trippie Red etc. Also, TikTok, good at nostalgia and promoting subcultures, also helped out bringing pop-punk back. Consequence gets a closer look.
The Atlantic follows the unusual life story of the song 'Take Me Home, Country Roads' by the American folk singer John Denver. The magazine calls it "an ode to an uncomplicated vision of the United States", which, however, found fertile ground in China and South Korea.
The entertainment industry appears to have massively capitalised on memes - Vice points out in an interesting article about how memes are new songs, and live streams. At first, memes were created using some other content intended for something completely different, but over the last year, there’s been a more formulaic approach where tunes are either made with the focused intention of being recreated as memes on Reels and TikTok, or beats are added to popular memes. What happened was that the audiences now expect memes from the producers now, not music, as few producers attest to. "The advantage is that you have better reach, but then people always expect you to incorporate humour into your music” - Anshuman Sharma said, while Sarthak Sardana added - “after I started making memes, my Instagram interactions went up by 3x, but the kind of following I got wasn’t into music”. Rosh Blazze got 7.2 million views for his remix - “now, my audience only wants to listen to my meme remixes, and sees me more as a video editor than a music producer”.
“I wouldn’t have a job right now if it wasn’t for Twitch” - DJ Ardalan says to Vice in a long-read about the transfer of DJs from clubs to Amazon's streaming service. For electronic dance music, Twitch has become a juggernaut. Paid partnerships with individual acts like Soul Clap, Seth Troxler, Justin Martin, and Ardalan show how Twitch is investing to attract more DJs to its platform.
"People just want to dance" - veteran producer and DJ Sarz says to DJ Mag about street-hop, ever-evolving sound of the 16-million people megacity of Lagos, Nigeria. It’s a mutating sound: even its most basic elements are in motion, influenced by hyperactive, ephemeral street trends. Dance music in Lagos is a percussion-heavy sound with a pitter-patter of percussive progression. DJ Mag speaks to some of street-hop’s key artists, like DJ Kaywise, Rexxie and Sarz, to find out how it’s evolved and where it’s going next.
"Lil Nas X used one of America’s most reliable engines for cultural outrage to his advantage: the conservative media ecosystem... With the 'Montero' video, Nas affirmed his personal identity as one of vanishingly few out gay rappers by expressing himself as flamboyantly and unabashedly as possible. He actively courted the controversy, measuring his success by the outrage and teeth-gnashing of his opponents - an approach straight out of the conservative culture-war playbook" - Politico analyses how the rapper turned the weapons against the shooter. He was prepared for this social-media battle - "for years as a teenager, Nas operated a popular Twitter account that reposted and repurposed viral content... He understands all too well that in 2021, there may be no quicker way to pump oxygen into a brand than to let partisan politics do it for you".
Independent touches the sensitive issue of doxxing, searching for and publishing private or identifying information about someone on the internet, typically with malicious intent. Pop critic Ann Powers endured a series of verbal attacks after an essay around Lana Del Rey's album 'Norman F***ing Rockwell!'. Pitchfork writer Jillian Mapes published a mostly positive review of Taylor Swift’s 'Folklore' only to be faced with threats, which included pictures of her home. Ariana Grande fans went after culture critic Roslyn Talusan in 2019 with the singer refusing to tell them to back off. So, journalism stays one of the few professions where the professional is too often expected to do their job not professionally.
"The premature loss of Earl 'DMX' Simmons labors as a frightening reminder that we, Black men, do not grow old, at least not nearly enough of us. Chadwick Boseman, Charlie Murphy, Bernie Mac, Nipsey Hussle, Prince, Heavy D, George Floyd, Gerald LeVert, Tupac Shakur, Notorious BIG, Prodigy (of Mobb Deep), J Dilla, Bernard Tyson, Fred the Godson. MF DOOM" - Consequence's Kahron Spearman writes on the sensitive issue, going into the wider societal and private contexts of the problem.
An encouraging story in BetterHumans about going from a “screeching cat” to "opera singer" in singing skills. What it took to step over that gap, was the transformation of the physical component of singing, perfecting sight-reading, and getting better at auditioning.
"We love antiheroes and complicated figures, and can acknowledge the ways in which the system preys on young Black men, but as long as we pretend that their upbringing completely stifles their agency, we allow them to avoid accountability for their actions [like Kodak Black and YoundBoy Never Broke Again]. To be 'complicated' is a patriarchal privilege. When Cardi B or Azealia Banks admit their past misdeeds or act out on social media, they aren’t contextualized; they’re policed" - Complex writes in an excellent essay.
"Is it ever a good idea to put on performances that depict police brutality, jail, and other facets of Black oppression, especially on the stages of white institutions? There’s the chance that these displays enlighten some viewers to the gravity of American oppression, but there is also the reality that they come off as pandering and upset people directly impacted by state violence" - Complex discusses the value, or harm, of these performances.
Guardian explores an interesting theory - that there aren't any new pop bands anymore in western music, rather a line of solo musicians. Ben Mortimer, co-president of Polydor Records, says that it's much cheaper and simpler to start a solo music career - "you could download Ableton [production software], shut your bedroom door and get creating straight away. Culture is shaped by technology”. Ben Mortimer, co-president of Polydor Records points out a socio-cultural change - “The majority of young people aren’t excited by band music in the traditional sense: groups of lads with guitars. And that’s reflected in the number of streams these bands receive. That then impacts on what talented young musicians go on to create". The G admits however that it's exactly bands at the forefront of pop music in Asia.
A very interesting theory in The Baffler about Hipgnosis and similar investment funds which buy rights to old hit songs, and make cash from those songs being played or remade. "This puts them in a curious position with regard to 'new music', which they must perforce view with a combination of avarice, suspicion, and fear. Every original song that gains cultural traction drains potential listeners—and therefore revenue—away from the Hipgnosis portfolio, diluting the value of their assets... In their ideal world, therefore, there are no original songs, no fresh styles or hybrid genres—nothing, in short, which might lure listeners away from the necrotic embrace of 'Can’t Touch This'”.
A great read in the Quietus about the legendary singer-songwriter Jake Thackray: "When an attempt is made by the artist to self-mythologise or distance themselves from biography, a la Tom Waits or Frida Kahlo, I see it as becoming part of the work. For someone who worked so hard to distance himself from attention, it seems fitting to give a summation of Jake Thackray’s music through his life. Indeed, his work often ended up echoing or anticipating what he later became".
A year ago Pop Smoke was shot and killed at age 20, as he was preparing to release his debut album. Although he died, his music reached high levels in the meantime, as Independent sums it up. Last summer, the rapper’s breakout 2019 single 'Dior' became fuel for the Black Lives Matter movement. His posthumous single 'What You Know Bout Love' reached the top spot on the US rhythmic radio chart last month. Song 'For The Night' is now a staple among the top five played songs on urban radio stations. His posthumous album 'Shoot for the Stars, Aim for the Moon' has topped the Billboard 200 twice...
"Cowpunk is a reaction against conventional country, yet embodies some of its distant and deepest traits; likewise, it is also a reaction against punk, yet manifests as one of its purest expressions" - PopMatters writes about the common ground the two seemingly distant genres have found some 40 years ago.
"Rollins' body, fortified with heavy weights and tattooed totems, became a vessel for the message of his music, which is that there is nothing glorious about being broken but there is dignity to be found in the bearing of it and consolation in the knowledge that it's not borne alone" - the Quietus writes in the lovely birthday card for the punk icon who turned 60 this weekend. The Q chooses 10 songs as points of entry to Henry Rollins' music.
"Western bands, largely blessed with unrivaled marketing and export power, won over ears and hearts worldwide. Had African bands had similar reach and clout, at worst they would have gone toe to toe with Europe and North America’s most revered. At best, you may have never heard of your favorites. I would argue without respite that what was happening in the buzzing cultural citadels of Africa—the railway station hotel of Bamako with Rail Band, Mogadishu’s Jazira Hotel with Iftiin Band, Dakar’s Le Miami nightclub with Star Band, the recording studios of Cotonou with Orchestre Poly-Rhythmo, the musseques of Luanda with Jovens do Prenda—was simply a notch above" - Africa is a Country argues quite confidently, asking for a return of physical recordings of African music from independence onwards, large catalogs of which are no longer on the continent.
Their predecessors once flaunted such signifiers as cars and diamond chains, while the new generation of hip-hop artists is flaunting ownership of their masters. High Snobiety names several artists who kept their music sovereignty, quite successfully so, like Russ, Young Dolph, JACKBOY, Rich the Kid, King Von, 21 Savage, J Cole, and expects the list to grow bigger in time.
"The common thread between those I spoke to about making music or writing in the midst of grief was that the art became a tool to make sense of the trauma. It was not made 'great' because of the pain but instead became a method to begin to understand what they had been through" - Welsh indie-rock multi-instrumentalist The Anchoress (real name Catherine Anne Davies), writes in the Quietus about the idea that it is great pain what is needed to make great idea. She has also started her career with that idea, but nos she believes there's a way out of it - "rather than chase down the 'chaos' of our adolescent 'dancing stars', under the illusion that it might make us burn brighter, write better, I’ve come to learn that we should instead acknowledge those deep scars that they leave upon the body of our lives so that we can in time turn our gaze once more towards the light".
Swizz Beats and Timbaland were the masters of the battle last year with their Verzuz shows, but it had all started in the Caribbean, half a century ago, NPR argues. The story goes back to Jamaica in the late 1950s, when the streets of Kingston hosted rabid competitions between DJ crews or "sound systems", blasting imported jazz and blues on colossal speakers stacked high. DJs staged lyrical battles onstage and in the studio, with some clashes so intense that the authorities have had to be called into suppressing them. Verzuz was born on that tradition, and last autumn a Caribbean battle show Showdown debuted with artists Alison Hinds from Barbados and Patrice Roberts from Trinidad. Showdown is born from Verzuz, which is in turn born from Jamaican dancehall, which is born from American jazz and blues, NPR concludes.
Producer Terrace Martin narrates a video about how jazz influenced New York graffiti artist Basquiat. Martin delves into how the genre, and especially artists like Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, played a role in his artistic vision.
