Tag: Music

Columns

Mariah Carey Has a Cold

Niela Orr

January 02, 2018

Year after year, and perhaps forever, Mariah Carey is the national symbol for our New Year's resolutions.

Slim Returns

Stephen Kearse

January 02, 2018

Given its emphasis on revenge, any real differences between Eminem’s music and a CNN-bashing Trump tweet are razor-thin.

Maneka’s Punk Pulpit

G’Ra Asim

November 02, 2017

Devin McKnight's new project asks if a racial slur can ever be weaponized to redistributive ends.

The Conversion of Gucci Mane

Niela Orr

October 23, 2017

Gucci Mane's conversion has many asking if he's a government clone. But it may be RZA we should worry about.

In Defense of the Money Phone

Niela Orr

July 31, 2017

JAY-Z has come out against the ostentatious kitsch of rap’s nouveau riche. We prefer the money phone.

Preserve Yourself!

Niela Orr

June 19, 2017

“All Eyez on Me” is the world's first superhero hagiography hologram biopic of black musical mortality.

Daily Bafflements

The Baffler

April 28, 2017

• Ja Rule’s Fyre Festival—a.k.a. Coachella for even richer, and even stupider, people—has been canceled due to Lord of the Flies-like conditions. (Some have also compared it to The Hunger Games.) The “luxury” festival—which promised resort-style accommodations ...

Punk Rock and Protest

G’Ra Asim

July 07, 2016

Growing up, I learned the word solidarity from a vocabulary flash card. It was not something I had ever felt until my shoe became untied in the mosh pit at a NOFX concert in the early 2000s. When I knelt to re-tie it, four strangers formed a wall around my crouching body to ...

Viva El Jay

Niela Orr

April 03, 2015

In his 2003 song “Public Service Announcement,” Jay Z claimed he was “Che Guevara with bling on”—a reference to a Che T-shirt he’d worn on an episode of MTV’s Unplugged. In both the MTV stunt and the song lyric, the rapper-cum-entertainment mogul ...