folk pop

Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ Subverts Being Trapped in a Glass Castle

Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ Subverts Being Trapped in a Glass Castle

For her 1989 album, Taylor Swift wrote breakup songs that cleverly conveyed to fans she had personal freedom even from within her glass castle.

Kishi Bashi’s ‘Kantos’ Is a Sonic Exploration Into Philosophy

Kishi Bashi’s ‘Kantos’ Is a Sonic Exploration Into Philosophy

Kishi Bashi’s Kantos blends philosophy, identity, and the human condition with genre-defying music and introspective lyrics.

What If They Had a Folk Festival and Nobody Protested?

What If They Had a Folk Festival and Nobody Protested?

What if they had a folk festival and nobody protested? Evanston, Illinois hosted its first folk festival without politics from its stages.

Mark Ambor’s ‘Rockwood’ Looks at the Bright Side of Life

Mark Ambor’s ‘Rockwood’ Looks at the Bright Side of Life

Singer-songwriter Mark Ambor prefers the sunlight over the moon, literally and metaphorically. Living for today doesn’t have to mean forgetting the past.

Beabadoobee Is Timeless on ‘This Is How Tomorrow Moves’

Beabadoobee Is Timeless on ‘This Is How Tomorrow Moves’

On her third album, This Is How Tomorrow Moves, Beatrice Laus, also known as beabadoobee, blends folk and rock to create a timeless fantasy world.

Cassandra Jenkins Trips the Cosmos on ‘My Light, My Destroyer’

Cassandra Jenkins Trips the Cosmos on ‘My Light, My Destroyer’

Brimming with cosmic musings and darkened Americana, My Light, My Destroyer earns Cassandra Jenkins a place among the best contemporary singer-songwriters.

Gabriel Birnbaum’s New LP Is Filled with Deep Emotion

Gabriel Birnbaum’s New LP Is Filled with Deep Emotion

Gabriel Birnbaum takes many aspects of rock, folk, and indie music that everyone is familiar with and subtly rearranges them in ways we never thought possible.

Maya Hawke Gently Kicks Open Another Door With Her Foot

Maya Hawke Gently Kicks Open Another Door With Her Foot

Stranger Things‘ Maya Hawke admits on Chaos Angel she “was born with my foot in the door” and delivers one of the best LPs in the history of singing Hollywooders.

Taylor Swift: The Great American Poet?

Taylor Swift: The Great American Poet?

It’s not literary devices that make something poetry or the analysis we perform, but the emotion it elicits through them, which is why Taylor Swift is a poet.

Jessica Pratt Addresses the Mystery Found in the Pitch

Jessica Pratt Addresses the Mystery Found in the Pitch

On Here in the Pitch, indie folk’s Jessica Pratt offers an aural world where opposites are part of the whole. The best interpretation is to accept the mystery.

L’étrangleuse Find Artful Balance with ‘Ambiance Argile’

L’étrangleuse Find Artful Balance with ‘Ambiance Argile’

L’étrangleuse’s music draws from all sides of the Mediterranean and beyond, creating something new and categorically nebulous in a way that works well.

Thin Lear Reveals an Uncanny Ear for Melody

Thin Lear Reveals an Uncanny Ear for Melody

Thin Lear’s EP is a unique and instantly lovable combination of indie folk and chamber pop and a superb showcase for Matt Longo’s immense songwriting abilities.