This, but if we're sticking strictly to "online" - listserv groups.

One more time in case you haven't been Cured yet.

Catnip for VU completists within.

Iran +2, New Zealand +2, Trump -300,000,000,000

Maybe the best game I've watched in the tournament so far!

HOW GOTH IS IT? My guide to the Olivia Rodrigo album for puzzled Cure fans, also known as the battle for her soul from R. Smith v. T. Swift, or BATWINGS VERSUS CARDIGANS. slate.com/culture/2026...

HOW GOTH IS IT? My guide to the Olivia Rodrigo album for puzzled Cure fans, also known as the battle for her soul from R. Smith v. T. Swift, or BATWINGS VERSUS CARDIGANS. slate.com/culture/2026...

I've reported on Musk for around 8 years. I've co-authored a book on him. I don't think folks understand the rate of his wealth accumulation. Shortly after he helped elect Donald Trump in Nov 2024, his net worth was around $350 billion. That net worth has nearly tripled in less than two years.

Two red cards seems really harsh, without any actual damage being done. I know, by strict rules, they're justified, but still.

Today in "Crritic!" I talk TONE Toronto - who bring Dutch out-punk greats The Ex & a general World Cup of Weird to town this month - with curators Karen Ng and Tad Michalak. carlwilson.substack.com/p/take-that-...

This afternoon!

Tomorrow!

Oh, also briefly about the Carney govt's fucked up tech-culture policies!

Today in "Crritic!": On @joepernice.bsky.social's latest music, craftsmanship, songwriting, & generational anxiety. Sorry about the pic. (Plus the Times songwriting list debate, Phoebe Bridgers, Tony Head, and James Blood Ulmer.) carlwilson.substack.com/p/joe-pernic...

Wed Jun 10, 5:30pm ET, UK historian Will Kaufman and his fellow Woody head, our own Gus Stadler, talk Will's forthcoming book, AMERICAN SONG & STRUGGLE FROM WORLD WAR II TO MAGA. Join us for a replenishing end to the Popular Music Books series' season: iaspm-us.wildapricot.org/Popular-Musi...

James Blood Ulmer, rest in power, glad I got to see you a few times at your peak. "Are You Glad to be in America?" was always one of my favourite tracks, and it's still a good question. youtu.be/uJNNX5xmgH4?...

Ottawa is abandoning all efforts to make streamers work with the culture sector here (as they do in Europe), and ditto for AI companies. Carney honestly believes that to resist the U.S. government we have to outperform them at being captured by and subservient to U.S. corporations.

Bruce and Rosanne sing one of the most powerful protest songs in American history, Woody Guthrie's "Deportees," on Thursday. Suitable for a week in which the gains made by the great people of Minneapolis were betrayed by Congress. www.youtube.com/watch?v=timl...

We only need 235 more to reach 20,000! Please sign & share.

Becca Rothfeld deploys the P-word at Leslie Fiedler in the NYer. To quote Diego Montoya: "You keep using that word ...." slate.com/culture/2025...

NO NO NO NOT GILES

Michael Jackson: Verdict on Netflix: clunky but vital counterprogramming to the rep-polishing biopic. Strangely it never refers to the key revelations of the Leaving Neverland doc, now legally unavailable. Here's the essay I wrote on that, as part of Slate's MJ Reckoning series: tinyurl.com/58v23eah

Raise a glass. This was, as far as I know, the first culture-discussion podcast—eighteen years!—and the template on which all the others were based. When I was a junior staffer at Slate, so many moons ago, having one's work discussed on the Gabfest was the greatest thrill. Probably still.

Ontario is So. Freakin'. Embarrassing. These "don't get all excited about legal weed" posters aimed at FIFA visitors are plastered all over Bathurst Station and I assume everywhere else en route to the stadium.

Top nerd joke.

Very sadly, it's been announced today that the @slate.com Culture Gabfest, which set the standard for arts podcasts, will end after this month. I had the honour of being one of the first regular guests to come say goodbye, with a final great conversation. carlwilson.substack.com/p/au-revoir-...

Inspired by Mumbai’s street-drumming ensembles and underground dance music, Sunken Cages creates cinematically charged tracks. Ahead of his Toronto stop at Wavelength’s Block Party @ St. Anne’s on June 21, he has put together this banger mix! 🎧 bit.ly/SunkenCagesWL

After yesterday's preview, here's the actual full-to-bursting TO show listings for June, including one of the world's greatest live bands, The Ex! (More on that to come.) carlwilson.substack.com/p/lust-for-l...

I'm trying something different & putting out the digest of my Toronto June show calendar before the long version, which comes tomorrow. So! Many! Festivals! That's UK ECM jazz legend Norma Winstone in the pic, here June 26-27. carlwilson.substack.com/p/live-is-sh...

That "homework due" line in the caption below is the most true thing ever.

icymi: How Carole Pope's glam-cabaret Rough Trade shook and shaped the Great Off-White North in the '80s, and then fell into neglect. And a few more bracingly Canadian ideas. carlwilson.substack.com/p/sex-death-...

Ira and Georgia dj’ing at Don Pyle’s book launch in Toronto right now ….

In "Crritic!", some Torontonian ideas: Carole Pope & Rough Trade shaping a Canadian boho generation (via the recent documentary), the 2010s artist suicide epidemic (via Alan Zweig's Love, Harold), and a show by Charles Spearin & Karen Ng. & RIP Sonny Rollins. carlwilson.substack.com/p/sex-death-...

One tool to avoid this: udm14.com

Bad enough that Rob Base is gone a few days past his 59th birthday - it becomes especially upsetting when you recall that DJ E-Z Rock, born the same damn day, already passed twelve years ago: premature Black mortality takes 2.

Suck it, dorks!

I mean, good riddance to any of this pack of vampire clowns, but they continue to purge just the women.

Today in "Crritic!": Reflections on Colbert from my experiences both behind the scenes and in front of the screen. And love to all those who loved and lost indigenous Canadian composer Cris Derksen. carlwilson.substack.com/p/two-sad-fa...

Always appreciated Obama's musicality, but to say that after the more personal introduction this is nothing but an avalanche of clichés is way understating it.

alternative history novel where things are mostly the same except we’re living in a world where townes van zandt was the bassist for the 13th floor elevators

A great run as an editor in general, also maybe the best Popcast guest ever, keep an eye out for what Caryn Ganz does next.

I'd like to thank Drake publicly for releasing three albums, because if he'd only released one I might have been tempted to listen to it.

THIS is the attitude I want to see in today's youth. Stop enjoying your parents' music! Revel in your delusion of originality! It will be crushed soon enough, but it's your only chance of actually doing something original in the meanwhile.

RIP Claudine Longet, the sweetest of murderers. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nxrn...

Listen again: This Is For You, My 7 Listeners / 04th May 2026 Playing tracks by Dogs Vs Shadows & Nicholas Langley, Merival, Pat Keen, M.B.T's, Oby Onyioha and more. @mitchberghini.bsky.social | www.mixcloud.com/camp_fr/this...

"They made us make posters for their vape shops.... We had trouble with fingers for awhile." youtu.be/uzwu7g909KU?...

Stevie Wonder is 76 today - in his words, happy birthday to ya! - but what stuns me each year is how *young he is. Eight years younger than Paul Simon or Carole King, 10 than Smokey Robinson. "Little" Stevie was 13 when he had his first hit. "Superstition"? He was feelin' 22.

Superduperchunk.