My review of Mutiny After Midnight, the redneck disco excursion Sturgill Simpson has released under the name Johnny Blue Skies (this time backed by the Dark Clouds).

My review of Mutiny After Midnight, the redneck disco excursion Sturgill Simpson has released under the name Johnny Blue Skies (this time backed by the Dark Clouds).

Catching my breath after a hectic March with a newsletter filled with quick takes on SXSW 26, Morrissey, Black Crowes, Harry Styles, Squeeze, Elvis EPiC soundtrack, Kim Gordon, Aubrey Sellers

Catching my breath after a hectic March with a newsletter filled with quick takes on SXSW 26, Morrissey, Black Crowes, Harry Styles, Squeeze, Elvis EPiC soundtrack, Kim Gordon, Aubrey Sellers

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review It's The Long Goodbye, the cathartic new album from The Twilight Sad.

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review It's The Long Goodbye, the cathartic new album from The Twilight Sad.

"But then Abraham Lincoln, a white man, set them free." youtu.be/cFy6j9r7uvo?...

A good thread about something i've thought about for a long while: the potential for so much of the early 21st Century to be simply lost

Also, it's fairly standard to have tracks from these cross-licensed Rhino comps be unavailable on streaming services. For instance, at least "Moulty" and "A Public Execution" are missing from Nuggets. The story and sometimes the essence of a scene/era/etc were in these little details.

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review The Way I Am, the satisfying new album by Luke Combs.

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review The Way I Am, the satisfying new album by Luke Combs.

I wrote about some of the SXSW 2026 highlights—Noah Kahan, Charley Crockett, Los Lobos, Geordie Greep, Don Toliver, Lainey Wilson—as part of Rolling Stone's 20 Best Things We Saw in Austin roundup.

the news about Frame's passing is apparently false. but it's been a joy to celebrate his work this morning, and glad he's still here.

Clearing up some confusion I've accidentally added to! Per posts from David Quantick and others, the mighty Pete Frame of rock family trees fame was said to have left us. However! Kris Needs, a longtime friend of Frame's, has confirmed he's very much still with us via this genius FB post.

'Mr. Deighton liked to tell interviewers that he “grew up in a house with 15 servants,” before noting that his parents were two of them.'

My tribute to Augie Meyers, the Texas legend who co-founded Sir Douglas Quintet and Texas Tornados with Doug Sahm. Includes a recommended discography which happens to include some of my all-time favorite records.

I enjoyed talking to Billboard about our grand ambitions for Tapedeck.

My tribute to Augie Meyers, the Texas legend who co-founded Sir Douglas Quintet and Texas Tornados with Doug Sahm. Includes a recommended discography which happens to include some of my all-time favorite records.

The playful, prolific use of hyperlinks in online journalism (eg Slate, Pitchfork) didn’t anticipate link-rot. Now so many articles are pock-marked with cryptic allusions that some long-dead link once explained. Weird how quickly a new style comes to feel more archaic than the traditional format

On Saturday, March 7th Jello Biafra suffered a hemorrhagic stroke caused by high blood pressure. 

As per Jello:

Farewell to the great Augie Meyers, founding member and keyboardist for both the Sir Douglas Quintet and Texas Tornadoes and a genuine Lone Star legend.

way sharper, weirder, & more outwardly psychedelic (& original) than the debut LPs by the dead, airplane, quicksilver, etc. going by first albums only, country joe & the fish might've seemed like the bay area's freak champs in '67 (though, to be fair, "surrealistic pillow" came out just before).

Stop literally everything. Steve Albini's Fugazi sessions, widely bootlegged and full of lore, now available officially for the first time. fugazi.bandcamp.com/album/albini...

Catching up with new albums by Gorillaz, Bruno Mars, Megan Moroney, Bill Callahan, Crooked Fingers, and a new Clifton Chenier box in my latest newsletter.

Catching up with new albums by Gorillaz, Bruno Mars, Megan Moroney, Bill Callahan, Crooked Fingers, and a new Clifton Chenier box in my latest newsletter.

RIP Mike Vernon, producer of Bowie's first album, among many (& more successful) others: www.theguardian.com/music/2026/m...

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review Hen's Teeth, the warm, comforting new album from Iron & Wine.

!!

The new Johnny Blue Skies/Sturgill Simpson album Mutiny After Midnight is now up on YouTube, sounding like an LP rip from 78, right down to the runout groove at the end. (My take after one spin: it's a lot of fun.) www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKHG...

I'm gonna take my time with my Sturgill thoughts, as anyone should, but the amount of folks already missing how sex - in country music, in a world hell bent on controlling women's bodies and honestly what anyone is doing in the bedroom if it ain't for making babies - is a fuckin act of protest

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review Hen's Teeth, the warm, comforting new album from Iron & Wine.

I interviewed the great Neil Sedaka 10 yrs ago. He was fun. He said Barry Gibb encouraged him to smoke weed to 'open up my mind creatively and take away my inhibitions'. He gamely gave it go but a joint wasn't Neil's speed. 'I'm a boozer. Give me a vodka and a glass of wine at dinner and I'm fine.'

I selected 14 essential Neil Sedaka songs for the New York Times, balancing his effervescent early hits with his lush '70s comeback.

I try not to complain about the exclusion of favorite songs from lists like this, especially when they’re assembled by someone as thoughtful and knowledgeable as Tom. And this is a terrific list, but really: you need to hear “Little Brother” sometime, because that is some sublimely messed-up shit.

It’s an absolute classic.

I selected 14 essential Neil Sedaka songs for the New York Times, balancing his effervescent early hits with his lush '70s comeback.

Farewell to Neil Sedaka, the consummate pop songwriter and showman responsible for the enduring hits “Breaking Up is Hard to Do” and “Love Will Keep Us Together.” My obit for the LA Times: www.latimes.com/entertainmen...

My thoughts on the 17 nominees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026.

A new wrinkle this year: voters MUST vote for seven nominees. In previous years, it was fine to stop at, say, three.

My thoughts on the 17 nominees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026.

My latest newsletter: reviews of excellent new LPs from The Paranoid Style and Charli xcx, an admirable one from U2, live Eric Church, Ratboys and a salute to the late Billy Steinberg.

My latest newsletter: reviews of excellent new LPs from The Paranoid Style and Charli xcx, an admirable one from U2, live Eric Church, Ratboys and a salute to the late Billy Steinberg.

the techbro dream of sailing away/isolating from a world falling apart is a variation on an old hippie one; see Jackson Browne & Grace Slick's memories of David Crosby

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review Deface the Currency, the exhilarating new album by The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis.

Over at @pitchfork.com, I review Deface the Currency, the exhilarating new album by The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis.

There's a strong case to be made that this is the least essential nine minutes of Neil's entire discography.

Billy Steinberg began his career in Billy Thermal, a terrific Californian power pop band whose scrapped 1980 album featured the original version of “How Do I Make You” which Linda Ronstadt took into the Top Ten. Omnivore Records finally released the Billy Thermal album in 2014.

I still think about Gene Shalit’s praise for Roberts De Niro and Duvall in TRUE CONFESSIONS.

& always a team player, as seen in this Godfather outtake shot, where he's the cue card man for Marlon Brando