It's hard being The Strokes. After setting the template for the next ten years of guitar-based rock with their 2001 debut, Is This It, it wasn't long before the NYC quintet was being outpaced by the bands they paved the way for. After some time apart, Julian Casablancas, Nikolai Fraiture, Nick Vale…
Tom Krell has always been a thinker. On 2010 debut Love Remains, Krell introduced us to his unique blend of slow jam R&B and heady philosophy (what he studied at school in Brooklyn and Cologne, Germany) with an unforgettable collection of heartbreaking magic. On 2012 breakthrough Total Loss, Kr…
It's almost summer 2014, and that means we get to see the indie pop scene evolve once again. Back at the beginning of 2012, Grimes dropped a bomb with Visions that didn't stop shaking up the synth pop scene for nearly an entire year. The post-modern (or post-Internet, if you prefer) aesthetic and m…
Where would we be without Wikipedia? And by we I mean both the human race and people who write blog posts as quickly as possible about esoteric subjects. If I were trying to write this series without Wikipedia, most of my information would come from the comments written by the DJs themselves, some …
The kids are coming up from behind - James Murphy called it 12 years ago and not much has changed since then. Seen nowhere stronger than in the realm of dance music, youthful vigor and forward thinking to an increasingly younger audience seems to dominate the scene as the spectrum of influences see…
There's not a ton to say about the last year of CHVRCHES' career that hasn't already been said. Anyone who's even occasionally read Stereogum or Pitchfork in the last six months probably knows the story by now: the Scottish trio of singer Lauren Mayberry and multi-instrumentalist Iain Cook, and Ma…
While he's been building steam for quite some time now, California rapper Vince Staples hit most people's radar hard with last year's excellent double LP studio debut, Summertime '06. Here, Vince showcased far more than bloodthirsty hooks and ravaging technique - he also displayed a keen awareness …
Since he broke his band up in the most grandiose way possible, James Murphy has stayed incredibly busy - maybe busier than he was when he was in LCD Soundsystem. It seems like every couple months, there's word of a new project from James, though not necessarily musical in nature. Sure, James has co…
The problem with cool stuff is there's always a process by which it becomes uncool. A handful of true artists perfect a craft and then an uncanny number of hackneyed copycats sample bits and pieces out of context and bastardize the whole thing to no end. This is maybe no better exemplified than wit…
