Paramore: This Is Why review – deft songs of millennial malaise | Music

Paramore squash their faces against glass, on the album cover of This Is Why

In 2007, Paramore released their breakthrough hit, Misery Business. It’s a song the band have a complicated relationship with. A few years ago, singer Hayley Williams began offering caveats about it – “I haven’t related […]

Polobi & the Gwo Ka Masters: Abri Cyclonique review – a fresh take on Guadeloupean music | Music

The artwork for Abri Cyclonique

The voice of 69-year-old Guadeloupean singer Moïse Polobi is a uniquely powerful presence. Deep, laden with heavy vibrato and rasping through yearning melody, his delivery has been honed through a lifetime spent with groups singing […]

‘It speaks straight from the heart’: Bryan Ferry, Adele and Engelbert Humperdinck on Bob Dylan’s Make You Feel My Love | Bob Dylan

Adele performing at the Griffith Observatory, Los Angeles, 24 October 2021.

When Adele covered Bob Dylan’s Make You Feel My Love on her debut album 19, her interpretation was a sparse piano ballad that exuded tortured romantic longing. “The lyrics are just amazing and summed up […]

Jessica Chastain urged extras to ignore Tammy Wynette lyrics during concert scene – Music News

Jessica Chastain urged extras to ignore Tammy Wynette lyrics during concert scene - Music News

Jessica Chastain urged extras in one of her George & Tammy concert scenes to ignore Tammy Wynette’s Run, Woman, Run lyrics. The Oscar-winning actress plays the country singer alongside Michael Shannon as her famous musician […]

David Crosby: a mercurial musical genius who thrived through the chaos | David Crosby

Stephen Stills, David Crosby and Graham Nash AKA Crosby Stills & Nash.

By all accounts, including his own, David Crosby could be a tricky and difficult character. His career was regularly punctuated by angry arguments, bitter fallings-out, sackings, general discord. Joni Mitchell once waspishly suggested he was […]

‘A fundamental blow’: anger over threat to BBC Introducing music discovery platform | Music

Little Simz at the Music Industry Trust awards in London last year.

It is the nationwide network of weekly regional radio programmes and festival stages that has helped launch the careers of British superstars such as Ed Sheeran, Florence + the Machine, Celeste and Little Simz. But […]

25 iconic outfits in Grammys history

25 iconic outfits in Grammys history

From Aretha Franklin to Lenny Kravitz, Stacker takes a tour through 25 of the most celebrated outfits worn over 50 years of the Grammys. – David Crotty/Patrick McMullan // Getty Images Sofia Voss While the […]

‘I want an indescribable feeling’: composer Kali Malone on her search for the sublime | Experimental music

Kali Malone with a chamber pipe organ.

Listening to composer Kali Malone’s Does Spring Hide Its Joy is like watching weather move across a landscape. Sinewaves and strings swell gently, like a calm dawn; electric guitar overwhelms like clouds blocking the sun. […]

Pharrell Williams: ‘Life without music would be like a human being without sense’ | Pharrell Williams

Parrell Williams with his collaborator Chad Hugo

A common feature of the early Neptunes sound was the clavichord. Did you or Chad Hugo introduce this, and can you recall the first song you made using it? Rochase Man, you’ve put me on […]

From Abba to enka: how my 10-year-old fell in love with 1940s Japanese music | Music

Enka’s undisputed queen, the late Hibari Misora, performing at Tokyo Dome in 1988.

Since her father is a longtime music journalist and her mother is a musician, it was inevitable that my 10-year-old daughter would fall in love with music. But I never imagined that the music she […]

Rian Treanor and Ocen James: Saccades review – Rotherham producer meets Ugandan folk fiddler | Music

The cover of Rian Treanor and Ocen James: Saccades.

Within the grid-based continuum of contemporary electronic music, Rotherham producer Rian Treanor is an experimental outlier. Shunning four-to-the-floor kick drums and repetitive synth melodies, Treanor trades in squeals, shrieks and scattergun bass, stretching formulaic structures […]

The 1975 review – a tale of two halves packed with raw meat and talent | The 1975

Matty Healy does push-ups while watching Rishi Sunak on TV.

Matty Healy is chewing on slab of raw steak. Minutes later, after doing push-ups while images of Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak and Margaret Thatcher flash on screens, he crawls into an old rear-projection television and […]

Crossing the line: Louis Tomlinson queue controversy sparks debate around camping out for gigs | Music

Louis Tomlinson performing in New York, September 2022.

In Kingston upon Thames last week, a group of teenage girls lay on the floor in sleeping bags and swathed in blankets in sub-zero temperatures. To the average passer-by, they might have appeared homeless. But […]

Thom Bell: the musical maverick who shaped Philly soul | Music

Bell with Gamble and Huff.

Thom Bell, along with Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, was part of the holy trinity of Philly soul – the lustrous, aspirational sound that bossed the US R&B charts between the peaks of Motown in […]

‘I will outshine them all’: the enduring genius of Bloc Party | Bloc Party

Kele Okereke performing live in 2022.

When emo legends Paramore made their comeback with new single This Is Why in October, something about its blend of danceable guitar work and lyrical anxiety felt more than a little familiar. Speaking on her […]