“The Congolese rumba pioneer Docteur Nico helped define the sound of African decolonization—and became one of the great visionaries of the electric guitar.”
Search results
Posted inReading List
Bad Blood (Longreads’ Version): A Musical Feuds Reading List
Whether competition between artists or strife within a band, popular music features some of pop culture’s messiest rivalries.
Posted inFeature
An Internet of Checkpoints
A mysterious YouTube video gave thousands of people a place to breathe. Then it vanished.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Jazz Off the Record
“In the late 1960s, the recording industry lost interest in America’s greatest art form. But in a small, dark club on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, jazz legends were playing the best music you’ve never heard.”
Posted inEssays & Criticism
Finding Worth Among the Echoes
Faded music dreams, a fledgling family farm, and a search for new definitions of work and success.
Posted inCuration
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Recommending stories from Yasmin Tayag, Elliott Woods, David Ramsey, Larissa Diakiw, and A.S. Hamrah.
Posted inEditor's Pick
A Notorious Pitchfork Reviewer Was My Biggest Musical Influence
“Pitchfork reviews have always been just as much about where and how music fits in the culture as they have been about the music itself.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
Eurovision Reminds Me of a Country That No Longer Exists
“Europe’s pop music Olympics makes me nostalgic for my motherland before war splintered it.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
Stevie Nicks: ‘I Believe in the Church of Stevie’
“In a nearly four-hour interview, the legendary singer goes deep on longevity, Kamala Harris, why Fleetwood Mac are finished, and much more.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Elusive Erykah Badu
“Twenty years ago, she dropped Baduizm, the album that created a genre. I wanted to know how she did it and found something I hadn’t bargained for.”
