Swift Bloat

So, where do I go to read or hear formerly devoted Taylor Swift fans who think she’s let them down by getting “too weird” or “too artsy” for them? Happened with Beatles, Motown, etc. — I’m sure they’re out there, but for some reason I never seem to come across them. So has social media…

150 Best Albums of 2023

As the hottest year on record so far wound down to a holiday season portending what’s sure to be an even hotter and otherwise frightening on many fronts 2024, an article began making the rounds on what little social media I tune into wondering whether rock music is dead, over, kaput. In 2023, no less!…

70 Best Singles of 2023

By now, my calling these things “singles” instead of “songs” like everybody else has for years probably just seems obstinate or, what was that word colleagues used to throw at me, oh yeah “contrarian.” (Just this month finally saw my only indexed mention in Steve Waksman’s 2009 book This Ain’t the Summer of Love: Conflict…

35 Best Singles of 2021

tend to live in my own bubble, if not on my own planet, when it comes to singles these days. Well, maybe I always did (you might be saying), but at least I used to not go through entire years without writing about any of them, or really talking to anybody about them at all.…