On the surface, Anderson .Paak’s Oxnard is a little obnoxious. There’s the obvious aping of Kendrick Lamar’s voice (and sound) and the the jazz/R&B instrumentals that almost…
In the uncommonly crowded year of the female MC — with two projects by Cupcakke and other high-profile ones from Rico Nasty, Cardi B, Tierra…
Skipping elliptically across 15 or so years in an economical 84 minutes, Pawel Pawlikowski’s Cold War tells of the tumultuous, postwar love affair between…
Norma, the fifth album from Chilean pop artist Mon Laferte, opens with a chance encounter in a dancehall between two soon-to-be-sweethearts, and concludes with their eventual separation. While 2018 has…
There’s a moment at the end of the first part of Dead Souls (roughly three hours into the film’s eight-hour runtime) when its director,…
Maison Book Girl don’t craft full-fledged songs so much as attempt to make sense out of cacophonous noise. Toy flutes, jagged guitars, and pensive pianos sound-off at once, but don’t fully communicate…
Red Velvet rose to prominence just as girl groups like Miss A, Sistar, and 2NE1 were disbanding, with a string of projects that showcased K-pop at…
With the reissue of Park Jiha’s 2016 debut, Communion, the South Korean composer and multi-instrumentalist has gained considerable notice for her positioning of traditional…
Kayoko Yoshizawa has approached songwriting as a process somewhat akin to writing a storybook since her 2013 mini-album, Majo Zukan, building her elaborate pop songs around…
Vox Lux, the second film from actor-turned-director Brady Corbet (after 2016’s The Childhood of a Leader), scans as a fruitless and embittered attack on…
Bridey Elliott casts her comedian-actress sister (Abby Elliott), her character-actor father (Chris Elliott), and herself as three members of a preening showbiz family. But the…
A relatively unknown Chicago rapper, Jean Deaux (pronounced “John Doe”) hasn’t released a project in four years. Despite this, or maybe more accurately because of…
Over the past decade, Brandon McCartney AKA Lil B’s notoriety as an internet personality/troll with oddball rap aspirations has found a way to eclipse the actual music…
Future tends not to work well with others. The Atlanta rap workhorse has proven he can produce a well structured posse cut, at least with…
In the rap game, it’s hard to differentiate bluster from authenticity — or as ZillaKami puts it on “GraveHop187”: “Y’all ni**as bluffin’ / Not…
Keith Ape, a hyped rap prospect from the genre-eclectic 88rising house, delivers a consistent sound on his debut EP, Born Again. The technical aspect…
Matt Ox is a bit of a conundrum in the game. A 13-year-old white rapper… ok seriously, I can’t give you much more than…
While it won the prestigious Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, there’s nothing especially radical about Shoplifters that sets it apart from the other…