Music news. Beyond the headlines.
Writer
Mara Ellis has a weakness for R&B records that sound better after midnight. The kind with warm basslines, expressive vocals, and lyrics that reveal a little more than the singer probably intended. She's equally happy revisiting an old Motown favorite or getting lost in a contemporary soul album that hasn't found its audience yet.
Her listening habits are driven by curiosity more than nostalgia. She notices the background harmonies, the unusual phrasing, and those little moments when a singer's voice cracks in exactly the right place. A beautifully imperfect performance will usually win her over faster than a technically flawless one.
Mara has a particular affection for overlooked album tracks and artists who never received quite the recognition they deserved. She's also willing to admit that some classics haven't aged as gracefully as their reputations suggest. For her, the pleasure of discovering music never really wears off.
Hip hop changes quickly enough that even an ambitious documentary can become a period piece. The strongest films use that limitation to their advantage: they preserve a neighborhood, a creative partnership or a turning point while it is still unfolding. The ones that survive tend to do so because they…
Max has one of the strongest collections of established concert films and music documentaries, including several titles that helped define the form. Its catalog is smaller than some competitors’ but unusually deep in landmark work. For viewers interested in older concert films and widely recognized classics, it is a strong…
Rock has been documented longer than any other genre, which means the good ones and the embarrassing ones have had decades to sort themselves out. The result is a surprisingly deep shelf, from concert films shot in the sixties to band therapy sessions from the two thousands. Three useful starting…
Boys Noize will release 7LLVSION on November 6th, ending a five-year gap between solo albums with a record that brings Alexander Ridha back to his own catalog after an unusually collaborative stretch spanning Nine Inch Nails, film scores and a younger generation of electronic artists. The September 24th announcement arrives…
LANDR says artificial streams flagged by Spotify across music it distributes fell 95% between the first quarter of 2025 and the second quarter of 2026, as the company adds more fraud screening before releases reach streaming services. The Montreal-based music-creation and distribution platform disclosed the figure in a September 22nd…
Spotify is expanding Reserved beyond early concert-ticket access with setlist playlists that change after each show, personalized share cards and a dedicated in-app destination designed to keep ticket holders inside Spotify from the presale through the days after the concert. The features begin rolling out September 24th for Reserved, Spotify’s…
A song can feel completely secure in the practice room and surprisingly unfamiliar the moment another person sits down to listen. Hands tighten. A lyric that has survived dozens of rehearsals suddenly disappears. The difficult passage goes fine, then an easy entrance gets missed because attention is somewhere else entirely.…
Coachella will remain exclusively on YouTube through 2030, keeping the festival’s global livestream on the platform through the end of the decade. YouTube and Goldenvoice announced the renewal September 23rd, confirming that YouTube will remain the exclusive global livestream destination for both Coachella weekends. Financial terms were not disclosed. The…
Ha*Ash will return to the United States and Canada in 2027 with an 18-city tour that takes the Mexican-American duo from Toronto to Miami Beach over five weeks next spring. Hanna and Ashley Pérez will launch No Me Hablen de Amor – Gira 2027 on April 20th at Meridian Hall…
Winamp is preparing to launch its own premium music subscription service with Deezer providing the streaming technology and licensed catalog behind a new player expected in the first half of 2027. The partnership gives Winamp a route into subscription streaming without turning the product into a simple Deezer app with…