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In the last episode of our feral pop miniseries, we take a look at the 22 year old rapper primed to take over the world: 2hollis. Splitting the difference between hardstyle and hip-hop while emanating an aura best described as “vampiric,” he’s been one of the most hyped musicians coming out of the underground. His music is distorted, chaotic, and over the top – literally – but he reflects a larger sentiment from younger audiences: the more sonic chaos the better.
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
Songs discussed:
Ninajirachi – Fuck My Computer
underscores – Music
2hollis – poster boy
SUICIDAL-IDOL – ecstacy
2hollis – flash
2hollis – beginning
2hollis – sidekick
underscores, 8485 – your favorite sidekick
2hollis – crush
2hollis – 3
Skrillex – Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites
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This week on Switched On Pop, we’re looking at all things feral pop, the microgenre that takes pop music to its most wild extremes. And no feral pop artist is more tapped into that ethos than underscores. Her music synthesizes dubstep, trance, and Timbaland with ease, and her latest album ‘U’ is filled with boundless energy. She’s already opened up for 100 gecs, PinkPantheress, and Porter Robinson; this fall, she’ll open up for Charli XCX on her upcoming Music, Fashion, Film tour. She said it best on her debut album, Fishmonger: “it’s the new wave of the future!”
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
Songs discussed:
underscores – Music
SOPHIE – Ponyboy
underscores, 8485 – your favorite sidekick
Nelly – Country Grammar (Hot Shit)
Madonna – Music
Madonna – American Life
underscores – Do It
Britney Spears – Piece of Me
PinkPantheress, Zara Larsson – Stateside
Justin Timberlake – SexyBack
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What would it sound like if pop music was reverted to its most wild state of being? It would sound hyper-digital, influenced by the electronic vanguard of the 2010s, and speak to a post-genre audience. And while the charts have been stagnant, Gen-Z has been crafting this exact sound: one that is exciting, unpredictable, and above all else, feral.
After bubbling underground for the past few years, the subgenre we’ve coined “feral pop” is finally poised to have a breakout, best exemplified by the popularity of the computer-loving Ninajirachi, pop star underscores, and rave-rapper 2hollis. This week on Switched On Pop, Reanna, Charlie, and Nate are going to tap into all that this dubstep-influenced sound has to offer, starting with the Australian DJ Ninajirachi, and explore why everyone in pop music is finally getting feral.
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
Songs discussed:
Ninajirachi – CSIRAC
underscores – Music
2hollis – girl
Skrillex – Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites
Imogen Heap – Headlock
SOPHIE – BIPP
Ninajirachi – iPod touch
Ninajirachi, Izzy Camina – Ninacamina
Skrillex – Rock ’n’ Roll (Will Take You to the Mountain)
Skrillex, Sirah – Bangarang
Ninajirachi – Fuck My Computer
Ninajirachi – London Song
LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver
Justice – Genesis
Justice – Civilization
Justice – Stress
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Olivia Rodrigo is back with her third studio album, you seem pretty sad for a girl in love. As the title might suggest, it’s a deeply personal affair, with moody soundscapes supporting hyper-detailed lyrics of soul-wrenching depth. This album is a meditation on desire, and intriguingly, the letdown that can occur when desire is fulfilled. Each track is haunted by a band that basically invented the idea of unfulfilled longing, The Cure, who receive multiple direct shout-outs and numerous subtle references. But the album isn’t a tribute, or a rip-off. It’s a continuation of the voice Rodrigo has been developing ever since she debuted “drivers license” in 2021. It’s a sound distinctly her own, with signature techniques to match. The “re-verse” in “Drop Dead,” which we discussed in a prior episode, and a spiraling structure that keeps listeners waiting and waiting for the final word. Tune in to hear how Olivia channels her gothic predilections and fastidious lyrical craft into a powerful emotional payoff.
Songs discussed:
Olivia Rodrigo - drop dead, stupid song, u + me = <3, purple, the cure, begged, what’s wrong with me, less, expectations, cigarette smoke, drivers license, vampire
The Cure - Just Like Heaven, Friday I’m in Love
David Byrne - drivers license
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Boys of Dungeon Lane, McCartney's collaboration with producer Andrew Watt, arrived when McCartney was 83 and and he came out swinging: the opening track greets listeners with a dissonant, unresolved guitar chord that sets the album's tone. Harmonic instability runs through the entire record: chromatic mediants, deceptive cadences, and persistent pedal tones prevent even the most nostalgic songs from settling into comfort.
The album's lyrics focus on McCartney's pre-Beatles Liverpool youth, territory unfamiliar even to long-time fans. The songs pay deliberate sonic tribute to specific Beatles recordings: Mellotron strings echoing "Strawberry Fields Forever," a backwards laugh tape loop answering "Tomorrow Never Knows," a first-ever McCartney/Starr vocal duet so close in timbre the two voices are nearly indistinguishable.
Songs discussed:Paul McCartney – "Mull of Kintyre"Paul McCartney – "As You Lie There"The Beatles – "Blackbird"The Beatles – "Helter Skelter"The Beatles – "You Never Give Me Your Money"Paul McCartney – "Uncle Albert / Admiral Halsey"Paul McCartney – "Band on the Run"Paul McCartney – "Live and Let Die"Paul McCartney – "Mountaintop"The Beatles – "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!"The Beatles – "For No One"The Beatles – "Because"The Beatles – "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds"The Beatles – "Octopus's Garden"Paul McCartney – "Down South"The Beatles – "Two of Us"Paul McCartney – "We Two"The Beatles – "Strawberry Fields Forever"Paul McCartney – "Never Know Those"The Beatles – "Tomorrow Never Knows"Paul McCartney – "Salesman Saint"John Lennon – "Working Class Hero"John Cougar Mellencamp – "Small Town"Paul McCartney – “Home to Us” (with Ringo Starr)Paul McCartney – "The Days We Left Behind"The Beatles – "When I'm Sixty Four"
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A sci-fi ballet imagined a 2080 where AI strips people of purpose, and the day before its New York premiere, an actual dystopia arrived.
Arc Iris, the trio of Jocie Adams, Zach Tenorio and Ray Belli, built iTMRW as a concept record set in a future ruled by a mega-corporation that shares its name. In its world, AI has taken most jobs and even the thinking left inside them, so the corporation offers pods where anyone can live any dream in virtual reality. The piece premiered in Cambridge in January 2020, then its New York show collapsed the day before the lockdown.
What follows is the story of a project that outlasted its own premise. When venues closed, they left Providence for Los Angeles, rebuilt a dilapidated house, spent eight months in a 120-square-foot shed, and constructed their own studio and stage. The dystopia they wrote became, in their telling, a personal utopia.
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A culture that rewards easily consumable individual identities produces plenty of pop stars and almost no bands. A significant exception: MUNA, the trio of Katie Gavin, Josette Maskin, and Naomi McPherson. MUNA treats the band as a structure that grounds identity beyond the ego and makes any success feel shared among the three. Their new album, Dancing on the Wall, wraps that conviction in blaring, unapologetic '80s production: slap bass, brightness pushed to the front, and everything connected in one time and place.Links: Newsletter, YouTube
MUNA, "It Gets So Hot"
MUNA, "Dancing on the Wall"
Lionel Richie, "Dancing on the Ceiling"
MUNA, "Eastside Girls"
Yello, "Oh Yeah"
Dead or Alive, "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)"
Pet Shop Boys, "West End Girls"
Billy Joel, "We Didn't Start the Fire"
Charli XCX, "365"
MUNA, "Wannabeher"
Bikini Kill, "Rebel Girl"
Peaches, "Boys Wanna Be Her"
Le Tigre, "Deceptacon"
MUNA, "Big Stick"
MUNA, "Anything But Me"
Flobots, "Handlebars"
MUNA, "I Know a Place"
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Canada’s favorite export Drake is back! This month, the Toronto singer-rapper extraordinaire released three albums simultaneously: the long-anticipated return to form Iceman, the sultry, R&B Habibti and the pop-focused, clubby Maid of Honour. All three albums have much different vibes, and are Drake’s first official solo efforts since his seismic beef with Kendrick Lamar back in 2024.
There’s a lot of music to talk about. As a result, Reanna argues that we are living in an era of “Drake Slop” – low-effort, mass-produced dumps of music, often with confused intentions. On this episode of Switched on Pop, Reanna, Charlie, and Nate explore all that these three albums have to offer, and try to figure out exactly what is going on in the twisted mind of Aubrey Graham.
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
Songs discussed:
Drake – Shabang
Kendrick Lamar – Not Like Us
Drake – Circadian Rhythm
Drake, Central Cee – Which One
Drake – NOKIA
Drake – Make Them Cry
Drake – Janice STFU
Drake – Make Them Pay
Drake, Future, Molly Santana – Ran To Atlanta
Future, Metro Boomin, Kendrick Lamar – Like That
Drake – 2 Hard 4 The Radio
YG, Slim 400 – Word Is Bond
Mac Dre – 2 Hard 4 the Fuckin' Radio
Drake – Rusty Intro
Rihanna, Kanye West, Paul McCartney – FourFiveSeconds
Drake – High Fives
Drake – Tuscan Leather
Drake – Classic
Drake – Teenage Fever
Drake, Sexyy Red – Cheetah Print
Drake, Sexyy Red, SZA – Rich Baby Daddy
Afrika Bambaataa, The Soulsonic Force – Planet Rock
Drake – BBW
Queen – Fat Bottomed Girls
Drake – Princess
A$AP Rocky – PUNK ROCKY
Drake – Find Your Love
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Kacey Musgraves' album Middle of Nowhere finds the country outlaw taking a break from exploring her inner life to look outward, back to her roots: the regional stylings of Texas. She says the album was inspired by a sign in her hometown that read “Golden, TX: Somewhere in the middle of nowhere.” The album’s sounds probe this same borderland mentality, encapsulating desert noir, Norteño, tejano, and soft rock. Plus, Willie Nelson.
The result is a collection of songs that are funny, moving, and reaching back to the sound Musgraves established in her debut record 13 years ago. But the world of country has changed since then – artists like Ella Langley have taken over the charts, cribbing Musgraves' sound while courting a more conservative audience. Can the genre encompass all these multitudes? Nate and Charlie explore this debate through Middle of Nowhere.
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
Songs discussed:
Kacey Musgraves – I Miss You
Kacey Musgraves – Merry Go 'Round
Kacey Musgraves – High Horse
Kacey Musgraves – justified
Kacey Musgraves – Deeper Well
Kacey Musgraves – Dry Spell
Kacey Musgraves, Billy Strings – Everybody Wants To Be A Cowboy
Kacey Musgraves, Willie Nelson – Uncertain, TX
Kacey Musgraves – Middle of Nowhere
Kacey Musgraves, Miranda Lambert – Horses and Divorces
Miranda Lambert – Mama's Broken Heart
Ella Langley – Choosin' Texas
Dolly Parton, David Hidalgo – Before The Next Teardrop Falls
Ella Langley – Be Her
Kacey Musgraves – Rhinestoned
Neil Young – Harvest Moon
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The pedal steel and the saz both live in the spaces between equal-tempered notes, and that gap is where Rostam built American Stories.
Rostam joined Vampire Weekend at Columbia in 2006, produced the band's first three albums, and after leaving in 2016 made records with Clairo and Haim you can identify as his within a few bars.
His solo album, American Stories, reflects his experience as an American whose family is from Iran. He came into the studio this past March, just after the United States launched military operations there. It's a record that asks us to listen between two cultures.
SONGS DISCUSSED
Rostam "Like a Spark"
Wilco "What Light"
HAIM "Summer Girl"
Rostam "Back of a Truck"
Bob Dylan "Like a Rolling Stone"
Bob Dylan "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right"
The Supremes "You Keep Me Hangin' On"
Lou Reed "Perfect Day"
Rostam "Forgive Is to Know"
Rostam "Hardy" (ft. Clairo)
Clairo “Sophia”
Hamilton Leithauser + Rostam “A 1000 Times”
David Bowie "I Can't Give Everything Away"
Rostam "The Road to Death"
Rostam "Come Apart"
Rostam "Campus (Original Version)"
Rostam "The Weight"
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The flowers are blooming and the calendar says May. That can only mean one thing: the Eurovision Song Contest is upon us once again. This year, thirty-five countries face off to determine the best song that Europe and adjacent continents have to offer. However, the competition comes with a big asterisk: while Eurovision prides themselves on being “apolitical,” the inclusion of Israel in the competition has led to a massive boycott, and the nations of Ireland, Spain, Iceland, Slovenia, and the Netherlands all withdrawing their participation.
These are very real concerns impacting the general tenor of the competition this year, and are worth deeply considering. Since Eurovision is music news, and proves fundamental in discovering new sounds in global pop, as reporters, Nate, Charlie, and Reanna run down the top contenders according to bookmakers as of this recording. If you’re not watching this year, you’ll still know what’s going on.
But if Eurovision isn’t of interest, it’s all good. At the end of the episode, Nate, Charlie, and Reanna also take some time to run down the current state of Switched On Pop bingo.
Get your own bingo card here.
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
Songs discussed:
Céline Dion – Ne partez pas sans moi
ABBA – Waterloo
Joost – Europapa
JJ – Wasted Love
Delta Goodrem – Eclipse
Søren Torpegaard Lund – Før Vi Går Hjem
Ariana Grande – One Last Time
Lady Gaga, Bradley Cooper – Shallow
Akylas – Ferto
Käärijä – Cha Cha Cha
Linda Lampenius, Pete Parkkonen – Liekinheitin
Windows95man – No Rules
Erika Vikman – ICH KOMME
DARA – Bangaranga
Alexandra Cǎpitǎnescu – Choke Me
Satoshi – Viva, Moldova!
PinkPantheress, Zara Larsson – Stateside
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How do you write a rap verse that's clever without saying so? Samara Cyn, one of the sharpest young writers in hip-hop, joins us to talk about Detour, her new EP about going analog. We get into wordplay versus narrative, the Missy Elliott blueprint behind "oooshxt!", and why she takes a knee in the vocal booth when a line won't come out.
Songs Discussed
Samara Cyn — "Sinner"
Samara Cyn "BUSHWICK"
Samara Cyn — "FREE"
Samara Cyn — "Highest"
Samara Cyn — "oooshxt!"
Samara Cyn — "summer's turning"
Samara Cyn — "over influence"
Samara Cyn — "Nomad"
Samara Cyn — "Bad Brain"
Newsletter: https://switchedonpop.substack.com/
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Olivia Rodrigo's chart-topping new single "drop dead," the lead single from her forthcoming third album you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love, breaks one of pop's oldest rules by abandoning the traditional second verse and replacing it with something entirely new. From Mariah Carey's "Fantasy" to Sabrina Carpenter's "Manchild" and Chappell Roan's "Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl," a growing wave of today's biggest pop stars are ditching the verse-chorus formula listeners have been trained to expect for decades. Rodrigo didn't invent the second-verse switch-up, but on "drop dead" she may have just killed off the predictable second verse for good.
Songs Discussed
Frank Zappa "Charlene"
Olivia Rodrigo "drop dead"
The Cure "Just Like Heaven"
Jean-Baptiste Lully "The Tragey of Armide" Ryan Brown conducting Opera Lafayette
Olivia Rodrigo "drivers license"
Olivia Rodrigo "good 4 u"
Olivia Rodrigo "vampire"
Olivia Rodrigo "ballad of a homeschooled girl"
Arnold Schoenberg Pierrot Lunaire — Patricia Kopatchinskaja
Mariah Carey "Fantasy" (ft. Ol' Dirty Bastard)
Blackstreet "No Diggity" (ft. Dr. Dre, Queen Pen)
Peter Gabriel "Don't Give Up" (ft. Kate Bush)
Kendrick Lamar, SZA "luther"
Lady Gaga, Bruno Mars "Die With a Smile"
Post Malone, Swae Lee "Sunflower"
HUNTR/X "Golden"
Joshua Bassett, Olivia Rodrigo "Start of Something New"
Matt Cornett, Olivia Rodrigo "What I've Been Looking For"
Olivia Rodrigo "All I Want"
The Avett Brothers "I and Love and You"
Sheryl Crow "Strong Enough"
Sabrina Carpenter "Please Please Please"
Sabrina Carpenter "Manchild"
Chappell Roan "Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl"
Chappell Roan "HOT TO GO!"
Chappell Roan "Red Wine Supernova"
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Hrishikesh Hirway, host of Song Exploder, returns with his first album in fifteen years, In the Last Hour of Light, made under a premise that's almost contradictory for a podcaster built around isolated stems: session players who had never heard the songs, vocals tracked live in the room, no click track, and no overdubs.
The layered style that defines current pop production is itself a relatively recent development. Hirway's record reaches back to the older live-tracking tradition that shaped the 1950s and 60s Bollywood recordings he grew up listening to in his parents' house. The album is about memory and so it’s appropriate that the music is recorded whole in all its beautiful imperfections.
Songs Discussed
Hrishikesh Hirway "Things Change Even Now"
Hrishikesh Hirway "Stray Dogs"
Hrishikesh Hirway "The Ocean"
Hrishikesh Hirway "Home Movies"
Adrienne Lenker “Anything”
Chuck Berry "Maybellene"
The Beatles "Twist and Shout"
James Brown "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag"
Sidney Bechet "The Sheik of Araby"
Les Paul & Mary Ford "How High the Moon"
The Beach Boys "Good Vibrations"
The Beatles “A Day In The Life”
Queen "Bohemian Rhapsody"
Jacob Collier "With the Love in My Heart"
Brandi Carlile "You and Me on the Rock"
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BTS is back. The best selling K Pop group of all time has been on hiatus for four years. They haven’t released an album in six. They were once the biggest band in the world. Can they regain their throne? Or has the world moved on. Leaning on traditional Korean sounds and a bevy of international producers, from Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker to JPEGMafia, is their album Arirang the future or the past of K Pop? Hye Jin Lee, communications professor at USC and K Pop scholar, joins to break down the album's references and ponder how longtime fans will respond.
Songs Discussed
BTS - Body to Body
Koreana - Hand In Hand
Lee Chun-Hee - Arirang
BTS - Hooligan
Michel Magne - Yang Tse Kiang - Bande originale du film "Un singe en hiver"
ROSALÍA - MALAMENTE - Cap.1: Augurio
Prefuse 73 - The End of Biters - International
BTS - Aliens
Kim Young-gil and Yoon Ho-Se - Ajaeng sanjo - Jungmori
BTS - FYA
Junior Sanchez - Lookin 4 Love - Extended Mix
BTS - No. 29
BTS - SWIM
BTS - Merry Go Round
Tame Impala - New Person, Same Old Mistakes
BTS - NORMAL
BTS - they don’t know ’bout us
The Four Freshmen It's A Blue World
BTS - Paldogangsan
BTS - No More Dream
BTS and Zara Larsson - A Brand New Day
Agust D - Haegeum
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Ten years ago, Maggie Rogers was a senior at NYU, scrambling to finish a song for a music production class she was close to failing. The guest critic that week happened to be Pharrell Williams. She played him "Alaska," a track she'd written in about fifteen minutes. It is a bit of folk songwriting crossed with the electronic music she'd fallen for studying abroad. Pharrell told her he'd never heard anything that sounded like it. Someone was filming. The clip went viral, and it launched Maggie into pop stardom.
Ten years later, she's released three studio albums, earned a Grammy nomination for Best New Artist, and gone back to school to pick up a master's from Harvard Divinity School, where she studied the spirituality of public gatherings. And in the last few months she's been as visible offstage as on — advocating for free speech in DC, performing for 200,000 people at a protest in Minneapolis alongside Joan Baez, and delivering a haunting performance during the final run of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, which CBS is ending in May.
This week host Charlie Harding got to sit down with Maggie live at Chelsea Studios, in front of a room of current NYU students. It’s the same school, ten years later, now with Charlie in the professor's chair and Maggie as the visiting artist.
SONGS DISCUSSED
Maggie Rogers "Alaska"
Maggie Rogers "Better"
Maggie Rogers "One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)"
Maggie Rogers "Different Kind of World"
Marvin Gaye "What's Going On"
Bob Dylan "The Times They Are a-Changin'"
USA for Africa "We Are the World"
More
Newsletter
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Train is the kind of band that some people love to hate. Songs like "Meet Virginia" and "Hey Soul Sister" gave the band huge hits, and no small amount of snark. And then there's "Drops of Jupiter." Released in 2001, the song is almost impossible not to love, no matter how many lyrics about soy lattes and Tae Bo it includes.
"Drops of Jupiter" was released 25 years ago, so there's no more perfect time to plumb the secrets of this celestial smash, and there's no more perfect guest than Train's lead singer and songwriter, Pat Monahan. Pat breaks down the origin of the song, why he thought it would flop, how Train is like a rom com, and why he'd rather his songs be more famous than him. By the end of our conversation, you might find yourself learning to love Train.
Songs Discussed
Train - Drops of Jupiter, Meet Virginia, Hey Soul Sister
Taylor Swift - Drops of Jupiter
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Going for broke turned out to be the most honest thing Slayyyter ever made. After financial losses and a depressive episode that left her ready to quit music entirely, Slayyyter entered the studio planning to make one final album. In this conversation, she traces how that desperation shaped every decision on Worst Girl in America. This conversation will leave you feeling Daddy AF.
SONGS DISCUSSED
Slayyyter – "Daddy AF"
Slayyyter – "Brittany Murphy"
Slayyyter – "Dance"
Slayyyter – "Crank"
Slayyyter – "Gas Station"
Slayyyter – "Beat Up Chanels"
Slayyyter – "Old Technology"
Slayyyter – "Yes God"
Slayyyter – "Unknown Lovers"
Slayyyter – "Cannibalism"
Slayyyter – "Actually Kind of Famous"
Slayyyter – "What It's Like to Be Liked"
Slayyyter – "Mine"
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Charlie Puth joins Switched On Pop in Studio A at Power Station at Berklee NYC, live before a room of current students, ten days after performing the national anthem at Super Bowl 60 and weeks before releasing his fourth album, Whatever's Clever. The conversation is grounded in one question: how do you absorb the music you love and turn it into something that actually sounds like you?
Puth traces his national anthem arrangement through a lineage running from Jose Feliciano's 1968 World Series performance to Marvin Gaye's 808-driven 1983 All-Star Game version to Whitney Houston's 1991 Super Bowl rendition. The through-line: citation is letting your influences dissolve into your hands until they become unrecognizable. That principle runs throughout the new record, from the Quincy Jones guitar tone on "Cry" to the Chick Corea quotation buried in "Boy" that Puth didn't realize was there until after writing it.
Songs Discussed
Bruce Springsteen – "Born in the USA"
Madonna – "Like a Virgin"
David Bowie – "Let's Dance"
Charlie Puth ft. Wiz Khalifa – "See You Again"
Charlie Puth – "We Don't Talk Anymore"
Charlie Puth – "Attention"
Charlie Puth – "Light Switch"
Whitney Houston – "The Star-Spangled Banner"
Babyface – "Whip Appeal"
Jose Feliciano – "The Star-Spangled Banner"
Jimi Hendrix – "The Star-Spangled Banner"
Marvin Gaye – "The Star-Spangled Banner"
Marvin Gaye – "Sexual Healing"
Soulja Boy – "Crank That (Soulja Boy)"
DeBarge – "Who's Holding Donna Now"
Charlie Puth ft. Jeff Goldblum – "Until It Happens to You"
Charlie Puth – "Changes"
Charlie Puth – "Cry"
Kenny G – "Lullaby"
SOPHIE – "It's Okay to Cry"
Michael Jackson – "Human Nature"
Johnny Hates Jazz – "Shattered Dreams"
Madonna – "Into the Groove"
Joshua Redman – "St. Thomas"
Charlie Puth – "Boy"
Chick Corea – "Spain"
Charlie Puth – "How Long (Has This Been Going On)"
Bell Biv DeVoe – "Poison"
Elton John – "Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me"
Prince – "When Doves Cry"
Schoolly D – "PSK What Does It Mean"
Rick Astley – "Never Gonna Give You Up"
Charlie Puth – "Beat Yourself Up"
Britney Spears – "Lucky"
George Benson – "Give Me the Night"
No Doubt – "Hella Good"
Michael Jackson – "Beat It"
Michael Jackson – "Billie Jean"
Charlie Puth – "Washed Up"
Charlie Puth – "I Used to Be Cringe"
Richard Smallwood – "Center of My Joy"
Richard Smallwood – "Total Praise"
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RAYE names Amy Winehouse and Edith Piaf as her artistic predecessors on the opening tracks of new album This Music May Contain Hope. Both died young, undone by the same darkness they sang about, and placing them there reads as a dare to herself. The album that follows is her attempt to find a different ending: a 17-track, 75-minute work featuring Al Green, Hans Zimmer, the London Symphony Orchestra, and over 80 collaborators, structured around the four seasons as a journey from autumn despair toward summer light.
Every genre shift on the record, from Vivaldi's Winter to post-bop jazz combo to gospel choir, serves that arc: small emotional truths get cinematic treatment, most strikingly when the click of heels on pavement becomes the central rhythm of an anthem about getting dressed to go out with friends. The episode serves as a field guide to the album's vast musical language, and to the argument that hope is something you have to build, genre by genre, track by track.
Links: Newsletter, YouTube
RAYE – "WHERE IS MY HUSBAND!"
Nat King Cole – "Let There Be Love"
Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong – "Summertime"
RAYE (ft. 070 Shake ) – "Escapism."
RAYE – "Intro: Girl Under the Grey Cloud."
RAYE – "I Will Overcome."
Edith Piaf – "La Vie en Rose"
RAYE – "Nightingale Lane."
RAYE – "Fin."
RAYE – "The WhatsApp Shakespeare."
Mark Ronson & RAYE – "Suzanne"
RAYE – "I Hate The Way I Look Today."
RAYE – "Winter Woman."
Vivaldi – "The Four Seasons: Winter"
RAYE (ft. Hans Zimmer) – "Click Clack Symphony."
RAYE (ft. Al Green) – "Goodbye Henry."
Al Green – "Love and Happiness"
Aretha Franklin – "Rock Steady"
RAYE – "Skin & Bones."
Fred Wesley and The J.B.'s (ft. James Brown) – "Damn Right I Am Somebody"
RAYE – "Beware.. The South London Lover Boy."
The Supremes – "You Can't Hurry Love"
Iggy Pop – "Lust for Life" Jet – "Are You Gonna Be My Girl?"
Mark Ronson (ft. Amy Winehouse) – "Valerie"
Charles Albert Tindley – "I'll Overcome Someday"
Prince - “Purple Rain"
Beyoncé – "Love on Top"
RAYE (ft. Amma & Absolutely) – "Joy."
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