In 2020, Choctaw singer-songwriter Samantha Crain released A Small Death, a lush, indie folk album about surviving trauma and chronic pain. That album found both critical acclaim and a huge base of fans who fell in love with Crain’s...
Asked to summarize the themes on her debut LP Cool Dry Place (out February 19 via Keeled Scales), singer-songwriter Katy Kirby says, “Failed attempts at connection, unspoken rules, care or preservation, learning how to take care of oneself and...
In 2014, after Lia Ices released her third album Ices—her first time adorning her ethereal piano with electronic loops—she realized she needed to recommit to her intuition’s call. She took a break from recording and touring, but she hardly...
On her latest single “Trad,” Nadine Shah sings “Shave my legs/Freeze my eggs/Will you want me when I am old?” and it’s clear that Shah’s latest project tackles expectations put upon women and how women internalize that pressure. While...
“I loved digging into memory. It wasn’t intentional; memory just happened,” says Nashville-based singer-songwriter Lauryn Peacock of her time in quarantine. Memory just happened. Many of us are finding that truer than ever in this stressful time that leaves...
“I hated Bob Dylan growing up! I detested his voice and thought his music was whiny. I would scream at my dad to turn his music off,” Juanita Stein recalls. Stein, who formerly fronted Howling Bells, came of age...
When musician Terra Lopez was 11 years old, she told her father she wanted to reinvent herself every day. Having lost her father as well as her best friend in 2015 and 2016, respectively, Lopez has been healing through...
It’s hard to imagine the unstructured, genre-spanning ecstasy of the Grateful Dead translating well to solo piano. But if anyone was going to do it, it’s San Francisco-based Holly Bowling. Bowling, who started playing piano at age five, remembers...
In the 1966 Czech film Daisies, one character says, “You’re so earthly and yet so heavenly! You don’t belong in this century.” This movie, jam-packed with playful decadence, is a favorite of Charlottesville, VA singer-songwriter Kate Bollinger; having recently...
ONLY NOISE explores music fandom with poignant personal essays that examine the ways we’re shaped by our chosen soundtrack. This week, Erin Lyndal Martin takes comfort in unexpected covers. “Hallelujah” is pretty much a perfect song. Appearing on his...
It was the spring 2009, and I had a leisurely day off, getting ice cream and going to see a tribute event to the Brothers Quay. I rode the subway back to Davis Square, checked my voicemail, and panicked....
ONLY NOISE explores music fandom with poignant personal essays that examine the ways we’re shaped by our chosen soundtrack. This week, Erin Lyndal Martin shares a selection of songs that bring back the rush of a schoolgirl crush. No matter...
ONLY NOISE explores music fandom with poignant personal essays that examine the ways we’re shaped by our chosen soundtrack. This week, Erin Lyndal Martin shares a selection of songs that jar her out of a sardonic mindset when...