Music
-
Song of the Day: “Good Day Bad”
Meshell Ndegeocello probably knows the difficulty her audience has pronouncing her name. Maybe that’s why, on her latest album, Comet, Come To Me, she urges us: “if you love me, forget my name.” You don’t need to know that her surname means…
-
Song of the Day: “Smokestack Lightning”
Howlin’ Wolf is the moniker of Chester Arthur Burnett, the legendary blues artist whose voice gave him his name. But the 6 foot 3, 270 lb. Burnett may have just as easily earned his reputation from the feral spirit animating…
-
Swinging Modern Sounds #55: Meredith Monk, Composer
Rick Moody talks with composer Meredith Monk about her new album Monk: Piano Songs, the physical movement integral to music-making, and what the future holds after 50 years of performing.
-
Song of the Day: “Unfuck the World”
The most prominent feature of Burn Your Fire For No Witness is the haunting voice of Angel Olsen. The St. Louis-bred singer’s husky tone sounds a bit like Cat Power with an exposed nerve. Though Olsen is only 27 (or…
-
Swinging Modern Sounds #54: Jam Band Apotheosis
Back in the seventies, in circles I travelled in, you could not escape the Grateful Dead, even if you wanted to—and I was someone who wanted to.
-
The Sunday Rumpus Interview: Sean Madigan Hoen
“I wanted to convey the ecstatic experience of performing really destructive music, and to articulate the kind of raw need that drives young people to do so.”
-
Sound & Vision: Melissa Cross
Melissa Cross, a vocal coach who’s worked with everyone from the lead singer of Slayer to non-metalists like Sarah Bareilles, talks about her road to teaching, how to scream without compromising your voice, and the importance of performance.
-
Song of the Day: “Don’t Let It Go”
Beck’s skillfully-produced new album, Morning Phase, is loaded with beautiful, atmospheric melodies like “Heart Is A Drum” and “Wave.” So the decisive guitar hook of “Don’t Let It Go” provides a pleasant lift without sacrificing the moody pacing of surrounding…
-
The Rumpus Interview with Julian Tepper
Writer and musician Julian Tepper talks about his first novel Balls, the social stigmas surrounding illness, the appeal of lounge jazz pianists, and the imaginary boredom of Philip Roth.
-
Song of the Day: “Airwaves”
These days it seems there’s never enough time to get everything done. Or time to think about how there isn’t time to get it done. “Airwaves,” off Ray LaMontagne’s new record Supernova, is just the thing to help us tune into…
-
Swinging Modern Sounds #53: The Distribution Problem, Part Three
I thought, in my ongoing attempt to describe how digital music is changing the way we consume music, that it would be good to speak to a representative young person about her music listening habits.
