“First, you exclude black people from the festivals. Then write them out by not recording them. And pretty soon, ‘you have this manufactured image of country music being white and being poor.'”
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Stumbling Can Be Lovely
On the many ways we fall—and the beauty of getting back up.
On Watching Boys Play Music
“With a drink in my hand and earplugs responsibly in place, I’m very aware that I’ve spent more than half my life essentially standing in the same spot: off to one side of the stage (close but not too close), eyes forward, shifting weight from foot to foot.”
Shelved: Pink Floyd’s Household Objects
On Syd Barrett’s time with Pink Floyd and making an album with household objects and found sounds.
I Feel Most Southern in the Hip-Hop of My Adolescence
“Joy Priest creates a Southern rap soundtrack of the cars, songs, and forces that sculpted her sense of freedom and confinement coming of age in Louisville, Kentucky, in the early 2000s.”
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, we’re sharing stories from Maurice Chammah, Jeff Weiss, Rasha Elass, Danielle Tcholakian, and Lila Shapiro.
Bread and Honey
Sometimes, marriage is about learning how to braid the bitter with the sweet.
What Do We Do Without Live Music?
Those of us who live for musical performances must find other ways to temporarily live without them.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, we’re sharing stories from Greg Tate, Alicia Inez Guzmán, Christian Wallace, Laura Hoffman, and Connie Wang.
Paging Dr. House: A Medical Mysteries Reading List
Once upon a time, I wanted to be a doctor. Never mind my terrible grades in all things science. Never mind that I decided this in my second year of college, after deciding that the music school that I’d wanted for years wasn’t for me. It was 2006. It was the age of Dr. Gregory […]

