Dustin Wong, Takako Minekawa, and Good Willsmith's New Album Is Pure Bliss
The beauty of making mostly improvised music is that you can always make the most of a moment. You fill in gaps, you push sounds in new directions, you cause chaos that the players around you have to...
View ArticleRap is Banned in Iran, But the Underground Scene is Flourishing
This article originally appeared on Noisey France.Omid, also known as Safir, pushes open the door of a café in Tehran, the capital city of Iran. On the window, a sign advises us to "be quiet between...
View ArticleKembe X's "Goofass" Is a Great Way To Let Off Steam
Chicago rapper Kembe X is a true chameleon. Over the past few years, he's built a strong base of listeners with an impressive range of bellowing harmonies and more conventional styles of flowing. It's...
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A Guide to the Right-Wing Losers Who Suddenly Love Kanye West
Kanye West has picked up some new fans recently. Since the rapper’s return to Twitter, he’s courted a fanbase comprised of notable MAGA trolls and right-wing bottomfeeders who’ve become sudden admirers...
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How Johannesburg's Young Black Artists Are Shaping The Future They Want
Mthembeni Ndevu clamped onto the wheel of his black Mercedes GLE truck and mashed on the gas with reckless abandon, periodically reaching toward the backseat to grab a double cup of codeine mixed with...
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How Death, Grief and Rage Transformed Parkway Drive
Peter Paul Rubens’ masterpiece “The Fall of The Damned” hangs on the walls of Munich’s Alte Pinakothek, one of the oldest art galleries in the world, in a heavy gilded frame. The 397-year-old painting...
View ArticleChildish Gambino Is Properly Back with the New "This Is America" Video
Well, Childish Gambino is back. Moments after hosting and performing as the musical guest on last night's SNL, Donald Glover officially released one of the two songs he debuted on the show. The studio...
View ArticleDeath Grips' "Streaky" Sounds Like a Song
Compared to the glitchy mania of their last single, the wonderfully titled and 22-minute-long "Steroids (Crouching Tiger Hidden Gabber Megamix)," Death Grips' latest song, "Streaky," makes for easy...
View ArticleWatch Meek Mill's First Interview After His Release From Prison
Meek Mill has been a free man for a couple weeks and since then he's rededicated himself to his fight for justice reform. Since his 2017 sentencing following a 2008 gun charge, he's been working to...
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Petite Noir Is Creating a Borderless Utopia With His Music
“It’s all about people doing something else other than what they have done, because what they have done is the possible,” said musician, philosopher, and pioneer of Afrofuturist ideologies Sun Ra in a...
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How eMTee Rose to the Top of Johannesburg's Trap Movement
When trap music was being established in early 2000s Atlanta, the purpose was to give an intimate soundtrack to the life young people were living in the city’s streets but the form has since become the...
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The World Moonchild Sanelly Is Creating Includes Sexual Liberation for Women
Moonchild Sanelly has a gift for inserting the intricacies of life into songs that’d otherwise make you want to do nothing more than dance unconsciously. And it’s likely due to her maturation as an...
View ArticleHey Uh... a Small Child Gets an Arm Ripped Off in This Morbid Angel Video
Believe it or not, in a bygone era before the advent of the lyric video, there was a time when it was actually fun to watch a music video. For metal musicians in the late 80s and into the 90s, the gold...
View ArticleJessie Reyez Is Using R&B to Deal With Old Demons
There’s a wave of women in R&B who carry as much bravado as your favorite rapper, while still managing to sing past their most vulnerable moments. That quality is present in the gravelly tone that...
View ArticleFuture and Chance the Rapper Finally Release "My Peak"
A little over a year ago, Chance the Rapper posted some studio footage to Instagram. The two clips, uploaded with the caption "#mypeak," previewed a new collaboration with Future and DJ Esco that...
View ArticleThis Year’s Met Gala Looks Were Fucking Satanic
The first Monday in May is my favourite day of the year. Some people like the Grand Final, some people like Christmas, I like the Met Gala. You’re probably thinking “It’s just fashion! Fashion doesn’t...
View ArticleSkepta's New Track "Pure Water" is a Welcome Refreshment
If you were a betting person, you might say that the odds for Skepta making an album-length comeback in 2018 were pretty good. He's announced a large-font slot at London's Lovebox festival, covered GQ...
View ArticleThe Archbishop of Canterbury is Listening to Stormzy to Prep for the Royal...
The Most Rev Justin Welby, also known as the Archbishop of Canterbury, isn't like other Archbishops: he's a cool Archbishop! He made this abundantly clear in a new radio interview with, ahem, BBC...
View ArticleRemembering Fall Out Boy’s 'Take This To Your Grave'
When Fall Out Boy released their debut album Take This to Your Grave in 2003, pop punk was alternative while also gaining mainstream popularity. Some of the most widely-loved albums of the genre were...
View ArticleMadonna Performed "Like a Prayer" at the Catholicism-Themed Met Gala
As a (very lapsed) Catholic, I was excited to see what the great and the good of the Met Gala made of last night's 'Fashion and the Catholic Imagination' theme. Of course, most of the celebrities...
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