Cellist Kirin McElwain's exploratory album 'Youth' turns toward crystalline feedback, chaotic oscillators, and intentionally harsh tones to express the feelings of desire and shame occupying the same cognitive space.

On 'System', Izzy Hagerup aka Prewn builds maximalist songs alone in her home studio, using 'self-indulgent' cello and multitracked vocals to process the gravity of being trapped inside something much bigger than herself.

The Constant Smiles frontman discusses how 'Moonflowers' represents his return to fingerpicked folk after years of pushing against the Martha's Vineyard sounds that shaped him, and why he finally has the patience and skill to honor influences like Nick Drake.

From the Fairlight CMI to the 1940s Ondioline, Erika Dohi built her sophomore album using rare instruments with distinct personalities, astrology as a compositional framework, and meditation practices that confronted loneliness.

As a child of Nigerian immigrants, a queer Black person, and a proud advocate for social change, Joy Oladokun has been combating her “constant Little Sister Syndrome” to become a musical force in her adopted home of Nashville, Tennessee. With five studio albums to her name, including 2021’s in defense of my own happiness and 2023’s Proof of Life, she has risen to acclaim by weaving together folk instrumentation and avant-garde elements. Additionally, her albums have featured many guests, including Maren Morris, Chris Stapleton, and Noah Kahan. Oladokun self-produced her latest project, 2024’s Observations From a Crowded Room, highlighting her wide range of skills.

The experimental cellist discusses her ambient album 'Just Like Any Other Day (어느날): Background Music For Your Mundane Activities', a four-year project born from isolation that turned memories of Korean cinema and cheap-sounding synthesizers into companionship for daily living.

The visual designer and composer behind 'Monologue' explains why they're moving toward greater compositional control, how cassette decks remind them that sound is physical, and what's missing in ambient music right now.

Thea Gustafsson currently records emotive alt-pop as Becky and the Birds, a project which released its debut album Only Music Makes Me Cry Now on November 8th, 2024. As recent as this seems, she has a rich background in audio, from her days at Stockholm’s famed Musikmakarna Songwriters Academy to a later internship with Aviici. In 2025, Gustafsson was awarded Producer of the Year at the Swedish Grammis and in April, she released the single “Should’ve known better (choices),” on which her accordionist father contributes some accompaniment.

Sure, it’s fine when a character gets their teeth knocked out on the school playground in a YA book, but when a young couple has to contend with premature ejaculation in their story, some people get all mad. At least that’s what Judy Blume came to realize when her 1975 teen romance novel Forever… stoked controversy upon its release and spent years on banned-books lists.

Though British singer-songwriter Rosie Lowe has sustained a career as an artist for over a decade and has been recording her own music since her college days, it is with her August 2024 release Lover, Other that she took the lead on production, songwriting, and tracking. The result is a musical tapestry that crosses genres, spanning influences from R&B and electronic music to choral compositions. Her collaborators have included Little Simz, Jay Electronica, and Duval Timothy, with whom she released an album called Son in 2021.

Some people think of Ted Lasso as kicking off an era of television where kindness is king, the sort in which a Kansan with a folksy drawl can hand out some books, tape up a “Believe” sign, and bring a rag-tag team together. But as a showrunner, Michael Schur has been at this game from the jump, concocting series after series that sweetly investigates the human condition.

There seems to be something downright mystical about everything Anaïs Mitchell does. With Bonny Light Horseman's Keep Me On Your Mind/See You Free, a double album and their third release to date, blends conversational songwriting and a cast of characters culled from our collective mythology to expand upon their already rich brand of storytelling and music-making. Anaïs joined us via Zoom from her family farm in Vermont . . .

Now based in New Orleans but raised in the Bronx, Alynda Segarra of Hurray for the Riff Raff has crisscrossed the continental United States countless times since the age of 17 – they even spent two years in a hobo band, Dead Man Street Orchestra, touring by freight train. And they're no stranger to the various ways in which artists have to navigate the independent music world: self-releasing records, inhabiting the production space, even founding their own label, Born to Win Records, in 2012.

About ten years ago, New Jersey-born producer and songwriter Jennifer Decilveo pivoted from a degree and career in finance to begin a life in the Los Angeles music scene. Since then, she has collaborated with a multitude of artists, including: Amos Lee, Anne-Marie, Beth Ditto, Bat for Lashes, Ben Platt, Christina Perri, Cold War Kids, Demi Lovato, Fletcher, Hozier, Lucius, Miley Cyrus, Melanie Martinez, and Marina among them. This work has racked up sales, nominations, and award wins.

Sure, this lanky redhead has spent the bulk of his career talking to people from behind a desk, beginning with Late Night With Conan O’Brien in 1993 and continuing now with his podcast Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend, but his remotes have remained some of the most lasting bits from his run (thanks in part to the popularity of his YouTube channel).

Since its debut in 2021, Abbott Elementary has managed to tackle issues related to class, race, and even the complexity of charter schools’ influence on education—and all without sacrificing its commitment to character development and ability to find humor in the public-school system.

Those of us who felt compelled to rewatch beloved shows during the more locked-down days of the pandemic may have noticed a certain “ruckus” was missing from the earlier seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm. 

Kim Deal is the founder and frontwoman of The Breeders, whose landmark album Last Splash turned 30 in 2023. She also spent quite some time playing bass and lending vocals to The Pixies, but she's a massive creative talent in her own right, self-taught and scrappy (before she could even hit the record button, she had to learn to solder cables). With her own inimitable aesthetic as a songwriter, instrumentalist, and producer, Deal continues to make her mark on modern music.

The groundbreaking Marvel Spotlight miniseries Echo, which debuted earlier this month on Disney+ and Hulu, centers around Maya Lopez, a Deaf Choctaw superhero. However, as many fans know, this series isn’t the first time Marvel has introduced a Deaf or disabled character.

Thanksgiving gets totally bulldozed by Christmas, doesn’t it? There are certainly far fewer shows and movies to watch to get in the spirit of the thing. Sure, we’ve got some Thanksgiving episodes and a handful of films explicitly or tangentially about the holiday, including the beloved-but-dated classic Planes, Trains And Automobiles, as well as a new slasher.