Photo Credit: Jacob Webster Amala “Doja Cat” Dlamini has had the sort of career that could have only unfolded in our current “Very Online” era. Her big breakthrough arrived via the self-published “Mooo!” – a rap number, which was accompanied by a music video of Doja in cow pajamas, and which includes the line, “B*tch,… Read more
Photo Credit: Bryan Bedder (All Photos) You would be forgiven for forgetting that the VMAs are actually about music – discussions around this year’s ceremony focused on Yung Gravy’s surprising choice of date and a controversial, somewhat anticlimactic comeback by Johnny Depp as Moonman. But this year’s award show saw nominations and live performances by… Read more
The Top Ten Best Music Videos of 2022 (So Far) The last few years have given us some fantastic music videos, with Tyler, the Creator’s CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST-sequences, and FKA twigs’ “cellophane” in fresh memory. 2022 has been less fruitful, but I’ve been digging deep down in YouTube’s algorithms in search of… Read more
Photo Credit: Adam DeGross Austin Richard Post has a pretty serious self-destructive streak. If his recent admission to smoking up to 80 cigarettes a day wasn’t sufficient proof of this, his fourth album as Post Malone is. Indeed, if there’s one throughline across Twelve Carat Toothache, it’s one man’s ability to sabotage himself even as he reaches… Read more
Photo Credit: Getty Images for The Recording Academy (All Photos) Award show attendance has been reliably falling year-on-year and this year, the Recording Academy seemed less concerned than ever about doing anything to revert that trend, with an overlong, self-indulgent ceremony that ran for a seemingly never-ending 2 hours and 33 minutes. Beyond making a… Read more
Photo Credit: David LaChapelle Even in the age of virality – where the most unsuspecting of characters can be turned into worldwide celebrities overnight – Doja Cat still feels like an especially unlikely candidate for 2021’s biggest rapper. Yet, with nearly 60 million monthly Spotify listeners to her name, that’s exactly what she is. Having… Read more
Photo Credit: Charlotte Rutherford (Content Warning: this review – through exploration of the song “Sun Goes Down” – and briefly discusses themes of suicide.) After the record-breaking success of “Old Town Road”, Lil Nas X seemed destined to be a one-hit-wonder; the hip hop-country crossover felt unmistakably like a fluke; a gimmick. With each follow-up… Read more
Photo Credit: Collages via Billboard Most people will tell you that the only success that translates financially is “success.” In music, certainly, it’s thought to be almost entirely mathematical: the more records an artist has sold, the more “successful” they are (of course, in recent decades the number of downloads and streams would also have… Read more
The Top Ten Best Music Videos of 2021 (So Far) #10. “Montero (Call Me By My Name)” – Lil Nas X Lil Nas X catapulted himself into the public eye yet again with his controversial music video for “Montero (Call Me By Your Name).” The video depicts Lil Nas X discovering his sexuality in ‘Montero,’… Read more
Photo Credit: Getty Images for The Recording Academy (All Photos) The 2021 Grammy’s were one to remember. During the COVID-19 pandemic, award shows like the Oscars, Emmys, and Golden Globes were struggling to adapt to a blend of in-person and virtual acceptances, and pulled off their respective shows with varying degrees of success. The Grammys… Read more