After nearly five years of radio silence, Grammy-award-winning artist Adele recently announced that she is releasing her fourth studio album, 30. On October 5th, Adele dropped the teaser for her latest single, “Easy On Me.” Before confirming, many fans were speculating her return after seeing billboards plastered with the number “30” all across the globe. Adele’s previous three albums are all named after her age; from 19 in 2008, 21 in 2011, and 25 in 2015, and many of us began connecting the dots with...

TKAY MAIDZA  Last Year Was Weird Vol. 3 (4AD/Dew Process)  Tkay Maidza exemplifies what happens when you pair creative ambition and raw talent with Last Year Was Weird Vol. 3, the final installment of her acclaimed trilogy (Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 came out in 2018 and 2020 respectively). With longtime collaborator/producer Dan Farber, the Zimbabwe-born, Australian-raised, genre-blending rapper and singer takes us on an eight-song trip as vivid and commanding as her visual presence, like in the psychedelic daydream video for single “Cashmere.” From easy summer singalong...

Like many people stuck at home during the pandemic, Neko Case had to find a new way to occupy herself. Unable to tour and still dealing with the aftermath of the 2017 fire that burned down her Vermont home, the singer/songwriter turned to a friend who’s never let her down: nature. “I write about it all the time in my journal,” she explains. “I think a lot about nature when I’m sitting around for hours outside a club and there are plants growing through the...

Directed and produced by Bobbi Jo Hart Fanny was one of the first all-women rock bands to release an LP on a major record label (Warner/Reprise, 1970). The nucleus of the band was Jean and June Millington, two sisters who moved from the Philippines with their family in 1961, landing in Sacramento, CA. They were influenced by the Beatles and 1960s youth culture at large, but they didn’t want to date the band, they wanted to be them. Self-taught on bass and guitar, the sisters formed their first band, the...

R. Kelly, multiplatnium R&B singer and producer, was found guilty on Monday of all counts of racketeering and sex trafficking. For decades, the “I Believe I Can Fly” singer has been accused of masterminding a scheme to recruit underage girls and boys for sex. He was charged with one count of racketeering - which includes charges of sexual exploitation of a child, bribery, and sex trafficking - as well as eight violations of the Mann Act, a federal sex trafficking law. The verdict was reached...

Lil Nas X has transcended to new levels of queer cowboy greatness with his latest performance, a soulful rendition of Dolly Parton’s 1973 classic song, “Jolene.” In celebration of his debut album, Montero, Lil Nas took over BBC Radio 1’s Live Lounge with a small band and a flower-adorned mic stand to work some country magic. His cover of “Jolene” invokes the same Western profundity of his first hit, “Old Town Road,” but with a newfound sense of depth and self-awareness. As he sings “Jolene”’s lyrical tale...

    Becoming a mother has been long identified as a woman’s main “role” amongst patriarchs, but motherhood is certainly not for everyone, nor does it come easy to many. In a video for Vogue, Musician Grimes, 33, challenged the expected role of the “mother” when she revealed that her 16-month-old son X Æ A-Xii, X for short, with Elon Musk, calls her by her first name.    Grimes, whose real name is Claire Boucher, told the camera: Being a mother feels weird to say. For some reason I don’t Identify...

After a year of cancelled music festivals and travel, musicians and attendees of the Bottlerock Napa Valley Music Festival were thrilled to drink wine together, dance together and enjoy a little bit of normalcy for three days from Sept 3-5.  This was the first music festival/live music event I personally attended since before the pandemic and I was not the only one.  I am one of those people who covers live music regularly. For the past couple of years I have had the privilege of covering...

Halsey mastered dreamy indie-pop on their 2015 debut album Badlands, delivered club-ready jams on 2017’s hopeless fountain kingdom, and demonstrated a voracious musical appetite with detours into baroque pop, mainstream rock, and country on 2020’s Manic. Now, bolstered by production from Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, Halsey has conquered the murky, haunting terrain of industrial rock in an album reflecting nothing less than the horrors and desperate joys of pregnancy and childbirth on her latest release,  If I Can’t Have Love, I...

With her latest release Lady Gaga has given us new reasons to dance.The artist, known for her techno-pop music released a remixed version of her 6th studio album Chromatica, released in 2020. With the help of many young artists, mainly from hyperpop and electro background, she has reinvented her own universe with this new album Dawn of Chromatica released on September 3rd. In April 2021, producer BloodPop, who had already worked on Chromatica, announced that a remixed version was on the way by asking what artists...