That’s a cello.

The latest release from London collective Beauty & The Beat shines a spotlight on the music of Sao Luis, in Maranhao, Brazil, and the local trio, Loopcinico. Four tracks have been revived from the group’s 2013 album, and are now accompanied by 3 remixes. The originals are a melting pot of influences, reflecting the band members’ surroundings. Their rhythms inheriting, absorbing ingredients from Yoruba, Umbanda and Candomble. Both Kingston and Rio. The vibe is that of a real, proper, street…

The song, "Flex," by the music artist Cupid, is not a complex tune. It involves him telling an unnamed person to flex their body because they are sexy, whilst he also shouts out dance moves for listeners to do. That said, the beat, melody, and crooning combine to make a strangely addictive tune that admittedly goes a bit long for what it is (almost four minutes), but still makes you want to get up and move about. It's been out for some time, but it remains a big hit at parties. Have a listen…

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book. Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others. Jeff Miller’s novel Temporary Palaces is an enthralling debut with a punk heart. Publishers Weekly wrote of the book: “A memorable debut … Miller’s bittersweet novel burns with the warmth of lasting…

Like most of us the first music I listened to was my parents'. I'm the oldest so I didn't even have the influence of an elder sibling. I didn't really listen to anything that might be in the charts until I got to secondary school. The impact of Bob Dylan on my life deserves its own post. My dad was a big fan. And I mean Big Fan. My sister is named after the song Visions of Johanna. Guess who my brother is named after? Both my parents were into The Beatles. My mum saw them in concert in 1964…

In an age when we’re all amateur pundits now, I thought I’d do mini reviews of each song entered into this year’s Eurovision. There’s thirty-five of them altogether and I’d say the standard is a little down on the last couple of years yet also more varied. Trends I noted where the inclusion of operatic influences in several songs (though nobody is spinning on a disk like Nemo) and what has become a Eurovision trope- a song starting as a ballad then lurching into all out techno. There are a lot…

When I was in my early/mid-teens, my dream was to work on MTV. When I was in my late teens, my dream was to make album covers. I did neither, but now that I'm OLD and decided to cross-stitch my favorite album covers of my favorite bands, because why not? I decided to start with The Libertines, of course, 'cause I love the band and this album cover is perfect. The Libertines, 2004 They continue to make great music, by the way, and there's this video they released last year that always makes me…

gonna rank from worst to best song ranking system 😇- need to have a looong conversation with whoever made this song 🥹- teared up a little 🥰- i love love love 😊- very good 🙂- good with some issues 🤔- i would let it play in the background ig.. 😪- not feeling it 😠- no this is bad. 😡- this is really bad. 🤬- play this around me and im taking a gun out. for both of us. chilli 😡 the instrumental isn't even that bad it's just like put the autotune down and then they just play in my face with that…

So yes, I’ve been somewhat stuck on the topic of bands breaking up or apart in the last while, but I would be remiss to not point out that some are also coming back out of extended hibernations. 宇宙ネコ子, aka Uchu Nekoko, aka Universe Nekoko, aka Space Cat, aka the mysterious Kanagawa dreampop duo wholly […] The post 宇宙ネコ子 -『Flowing In The Wind』 appeared first on Space Echo.

Madrid, day 6.

Tigerella was another band I discovered through Shelflife CD-R series. Their self-titled EP was the fifth release on that very important series of releases our friend Ed released back in the early 2000s. The EP was released in 2003, in January I believe, it included just three tracks by the Los Angeles five-piece. These songs were “Existential War”, “Rid of You” and “E-Ticket Ride”. The songs were bright. The guitars chimed. Very nice! The band was formed by Bryan Yoshida and Gilber Chinn on…

P4LETTE (github) P4LETTE is a one-page color palette tool. Drag, click, lock, shuffle, name, and export. No accounts. No newsletters. No "premium tier." [ 📌stephanieleary ] Make Your Own Mixtape | Mixtape Create your own mixtape online. Add songs, design your tape, and share it with friends. A modern mixtape maker with a nostalgic twist. [ 📌cogdog ] 😎 Now. please enjoy the mixtape I made for ya!

This week’s theme: Jazz recordings of songs from the pop/rock, television and even maybe a little Yiddish. Artists include George Benson, Freddie Hubbard, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, Grady Tate, Ray Barretto, Richie Cole, Bobby Enriquez, Jimmy Rushing, Zoot Sims, Stephane Grappelli, Martin Taylor, Sonny Rollins, George Duke, Roland Kirk, Rosemary Clooney, John Oddo, Seve Lukather, Jackie McLean, Tony Williams, Hank Jones, Charles McPherson, Sonny Criss, Tal Farlow, Cedar Walton.The post…

Wow!? this Duo must have invented everything chill room infesting and bedroom festering one could care to imagine, it says 1985 to '96 here!? Not that it sounds like it was recorded on one of those cassette four track portastudios which I assume they must have used, with a noise reduction system that can only have been left behind by fleeing Aliens.Just listening to this stuff makes me smug enough to lie about how many O-Levels i got in 1983,or is that a Dostoevsky in your pocket or do you like…

"How You Remind Me" by Nickelback Listen on Apple Music Your browser does not support the audio element. Post a song by a band you think is overrated, but the song is almost enough to convince you otherwise. - How You Remind Me by Nickelback This Prompt is designed to let people share the Nickelback song they hate the least. View Lou Plummer's Crucial Tracks profile

I’m on the road this week and that means I’m loading up some music for long days in the airport and longer nights in the air. I have a long tradition of putting albums on my phone and when I decide to listen to some music finding nothing that I like. It’s annoying and predictable. I want to continue to my dive into the Miles Davis discography with two classic expressions of Miles electric period: Bitches Brew and Live-Evil. I’ve blogged about both recently and found the 1970 Cellar Door…

Trust me #115 What Difference Does It Make by The SmithsNick Grimshaw played What Difference Does It Make? by The Smiths on his 6Music show last month. Hearing the song blasting out of my car speakers while driving through the rain caused me to appreciate it even more. I often get that feeling whenever I hear something on the radio, especially in the car. I immediately made a mental note to write a blog on the song.The Smith had formed less than 2-years previously, when Marr showed up at…

A bit later than I would’ve liked (so it goes), the April 2026 playlist has landed! Featuring a bunch of good music from the past month or so as well as some miscellaneous older songs I’ve also been enjoying lately. Cape Crush, Prism Shores, Teen Suicide, and Sacred Heart Academy have two songs on this playlist. The Blackburns have three. Here is where you can listen to the playlist on various streaming services: Spotify (missing four songs), Tidal (missing three). Be sure to check out previous…

Here's In the Way on SoundCloud or YouTube, my latest one-take improved musical performance. I need a better name for these; "jam" feels reductive but maybe I am being too snooty in rejecting that term.

Bonus link: here is Cal Tjader’s Wikipedia page.

I often wake up with a random song as an earworm – and now I note them down for your enjoyment. This morning it was D:Ream with Things Can Only Get Better Reply by email

On Sundays I try to at least quickly note some of my favorite listening from the week prior — things I would later regret having not written about in more depth, so better to share here briefly than not at all. ▰ This track, “Steel Mill,” is a taste of the forthcoming Daniel Lanois album, Belladonna Nocturne, due out June 19. The core band is Lanois (piano, pedal steel, and “dub orchestration”), D’Angelo veteran Jermaine Holmes, and bassist Jim Wilson, of Rollins Band. In addition to drummer…

On Mixtape (2026) "We can dress it up however we like, but the truth is that Mixtape is a vibes-driven experience riding high on some kind of media nostalgia. It is an on-rails narrative experience where you do some light exploration of a sleepy little woodland town among a group of three friends who are sitting on three different versions of the razor’s edge of adulthood, and the thing that pulls you through that narrative is a series of songs arranged into a mixtape that sets the mood for…

Wonderfully carved metallic left-field techno three-tracker from London’s Leaches (real name Jack Reardon). This EP is an example of where a hardware rig can really take techno into more captivating territory. It’s a cliché to say that getting out-of-the-box makes music more “organic”–plenty of artists are capable of gorgeous, vibrant texture in a DAW–but there’s something to be said for the way machines (or instruments) invite both expression and experimentation. Maybe it’s the limitations…

All bangers, but my instinct is this question overlaps perfectly with “what’s the most iconic iPod commercial song” which is Are You Gonna Be My Girl bsky.app/profile/t…

Wonderful words by the ever erudite Adam Turner. The new 6-track Coyote album, The Higher The Sky, The Deeper The Ocean, landed recently, almost a year after its predecessor, Wailing To The Yellow Dawn. These two long-players follow a pair of similar releases from the Notts duo, Everything Moves, Nothing Rests from 2022 and Hurry Up And Live from 2024. All four sets share a similar space and feel, with aptly and expertly selected vocal samples, rich and deep Coyote dub basslines, Balearic…

Alliums ahoy! Some striking white ones in the Orchard in Grantchester on Friday afternoon. Quote of the Day “Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.” Picasso Musical alternative to the morning’s radio news Louis Armstrong | What A Wonderful World Link The BBC put on a wonderful — and moving — celebration of David Attenborough’s 100th birth in the Albert Hall on Friday night, which ended with a recording of him reading the lyrics of this song against a backdrop of clips from his…

I have been training in powerlifting for a year and just competed in a national federation meet, so OpenPowerlifting is a meaningful open source project to me. It is not just a website with rankings. It is also a public dataset that people use to analyze the sport, build tools, and even publish research. Seeing the list of papers, presentations, and projects built on top of the data made that very clear to me. That combination is hard to beat: a project connected to one of my interests, useful…

I can’t read this label without hearing Boycie’s voice in my head.

Hands Up anyone who thought Boards of Canada were from Canada?Ah......only me it seems!?Two smart-arsed Scottish brothers....no not Black Scottish, they were actually proper brothers,as in genetically brothers from the same mother.Well that's as Funky as it gets i'm afraid, as we are gently lulled to sleep by a myriad of rejected downtempo leftfield LP fillers recorded from 1991 to 1995. If you made it through this without going into a coma, then I shall hold back on the Bored of Canada…