At The Novo in Downtown LA on Friday, February 21, indie rock band Cold War Kids performed their last show in a six-week tour with electronic duo Overcoats. From a cappella harmonies and classical string instruments to electric guitars...
When we last caught up with Philadelphia-based indie punk band Church Girls, they were just about to release their third EP Home; as the follow-up to their debut full-length Hidalgo, it showed a distinct evolution trending toward a rougher, more...
In 2018, singer-songwriter Niki Black released her first single, “Not Coming Up,” a harmony-driven track about refusing to apologize for her feelings for another woman. Since then, she’s also gained attention for “Hallelujah,” which explores her loss of religious...
On Sunday, January 26, 18-year-old singer-songwriter Billie Eilish took home an impressive five Grammy awards: best new artist, album of the year, record of the year, song of the year, and best pop vocal album. The week before, I...
Sex has long been a popular topic among musicians. But what’s unique about the past few years, 2019 included, is that artists are consciously using their platforms to promote sex positivity. Here are some moments in 2019 where musicians...
Over Thanksgiving break, I found myself with a friend in a San Francisco hotel room on a rainy day without any plans. I also found myself with a bag of cubensis mushrooms another friend of mine had just grown,...
Singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Lauren Rocket is the embodiment of the word “badass,” and that’s no clearer than in her latest single, “Rattlesnake.” In the video for the fierce, beat-driven rebel anthem, we see Rocket dancing around the house,...
On Saturday, October 26, I attended a San Pedro ceremony. With a group of fellow journeyers, I drank the extract of a psychedelic cactus sourced from Peru, danced around a circle to live music, shook rattles, played drums, lay...
Irish singer-songwriter Maija Sofia‘s debut album Bath Time (Nov 22) is a lesson in history — particularly in history’s forgotten women. Its first single, “The Glitter,” centers on Caribbean novelist Jean Rhys and the displacement and misrepresentation she faced after...
J and I met on Tinder and developed a relationship equal parts unconventional and beautiful. Our first date was vegan food and a late night beach walk, our second was mushrooms, and our third, perhaps the richest with meaning,...
Female sexual pleasure doesn’t get the attention it deserves, in the bedroom or in music. It’s traditionally been more common for male artists to sing about what turns them on, but that’s changing. With more and more female artists...
NYC-based alt-pop artist PETRA started playing piano before she could walk and got her first electric guitar when she was six, after she complained to her mother that she wanted to be her “own kind of musician.” Today, this...
Isabella Steinsdotter, known simply as Steinsdotter professionally, is best known as a visual artist. However, she recently debuted her first single, “Hidden Child,” a song about reclaiming your body in the aftermath of a sexual assault. The music and...
Ten years ago, I saw Incubus at Radio City Music Hall. It was also 10 years after my favorite album of theirs, Make Yourself, came out. Though I first fell in love with the band back in high school,...
MDMA has long been closely intertwined with music. It’s many festival and nightclub-goers’ drug of choice, and for good reason: it has a way of making every song sound infectious and every flashing light look vivid and brilliant. It’s...
They say getting there is half the fun, and that was definitely true for indie art-rock artist Chris Cohen’s latest show at Non Plus Ultra in LA. The underground venue’s address is ever-changing, as I discovered when I arrived...
Indie folk band The Mountain Goats has been around for nearly 30 years, but its members are still going strong. They released their 17th studio album In League With Dragons in April, and they’re currently touring around the country,...
Heroin is not a drug you fuck around with. It is not a drug you joke about. But it is a drug you can sing about — and one that many people have sung about, in fact. From 50...
I was a week away from getting LASIK to correct my near-sightedness when I caught wind of a recent study on the use of calming music before medical procedures. The University of Pennsylvania researchers found that soothing music was...
Having analyzed how LSD influenced The Beatles, my understanding of psychedelic rock music may appear sophisticated. But I have a confession to make: my favorite psychedelic rock band is actually Panic! At the Disco. Yes, you heard me right....
When you think of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, cocaine is probably at least one of the drugs you think of. Celebrities, musicians included, have a reputation for snorting coke at their Hollywood parties, as well as in...
Two weeks ago, I was checking out a yoga class in Ubud, Bali when the sole other student observed that I kept tripping on steps. “Not a good step day for you, huh?” he asked. We got to talking,...
“This life is just a dream. It’ll be over in the blink of an eye. Remember who you are. Remember what you are.” Omkara’s “Remember” filled the dimly lit, sand-colored living room of my Venice Beach apartment. I was...
The male gaze is practically part of our collective cultural definition of a music video. Even videos by seemingly progressive bands, like The 1975’s “Girls” and The Chainsmokers’ “Beach House,” present women as props, dancing scantily clad in the...
