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Jill Andrews: Thirties
Raise your hand if you thought your life would look different at whatever age you happen to currently be? It\’s an endemic condition, that. Maybe it\’s from the movies that we watch as kids. Maybe it\’s from the myths that we portray on social media. Whatever the cause, dang near no one is who they…
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Dave Simonett: Red Tail
There\’s nothing quite like a global pandemic to highlight the bubbles that each of us exists within, unable or unwilling to see past its boundaries. We so easily forget or ignore the fact that not everyone shares our resources, privileges, interests, or values. That holds true for non-crisis moments and topics, as well, including music,…
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Brandy Clark: Your Life Is a Record
The artist\’s way is hardly ever a straight line or a single path. It often strolls to and fro, around and about, here and there. Sometimes the tangents are dead ends; sometimes they are new beginnings. But pretty much always, they are worthwhile wanderings and wonderings because the muse must be honored, no matter where…
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Aoife O’Donovan: Bull Frogs Croon (and Other Songs)
Songwriting and poetry, while sharing so many similarities, continue to be two very different art forms, each with their own freedoms and constraints. Some artists bridge the divide single-handedly, churning out lyrical lines that knock back the breath of the listener, demanding more attention than a single listen might afford. Other artists take on the…
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The Secret Sisters: Saturn Return
Everyone knows, and has likely lived, the old adage, “When it rains, it pours,” to describe those phases of life when everything seems to come crashing down at once. It\’s not always bad things, to be sure; but it\’s always a LOT. According to astrology, the event dubbed a “Saturn return,” which happens every 28…
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Robby Hecht: “Ferris Wheel”
At a certain point in life, you realize that having hard, honest conversations about painful personal secrets is the only way to lessen the shame attached to them. One of the most stigmatized of those topics is mental health, an incredibly prevalent issue within creative communities, including music. That\’s why seeing more and more artists…
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Katie Pruitt: Expectations
Back in the 1990s, substantive lyrics paired with catchy melodies were the norm for pop radio. Look no further than the commercial success of artists like Alanis Morissette, Sarah McLachlan, Tori Amos, and others for proof. But, then, for whatever reason, pop rose to the surface, leaving the depths to the be plumbed, and so…
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KaiL Baxley: “In Lieu Of”
With the climate collapsing at a record clip, a lot of people are reassessing their priorities in life. For some, it\’s stockpiling arms with which to protect themselves from dangerous marauders. For others, it\’s stockpiling arms in which to wrap themselves with eternal love. Rather like in the ship-sinking scene in Titanic, do you fight…
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Katie Pruitt Debuts with Great “Expectations”
On a recent episode of the On Being podcast, shame researcher Brené Brown shared her finding that true belonging demands us to be who we are, even if it jeopardizes our relationships. She suggests that we must belong fully to, and in, ourselves before we can belong anywhere else, and that kind of self-acceptance requires…
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Maya de Vitry: “Better and Better”
There\’s a wonderful “self-help” theory floating about which espouses the idea that grief is part of forgiveness, that we have to let something go and mourn its loss before we can begin to recover any amount of internal peace in regard to it. Some even go so far as to say that the parts of…
