There & Then Jeff Lehman There & Then Jeff Lehman

The Waters of March

March is, generally speaking, when a lot of the year’s best music starts coming out of the woodwork. Think last year: Cindy Lee, Adrienne Lenker, Vampire Weekend, Challengers score (okay, technically April). Think Scaring the Hoes the year before that. The story of music in the 2020s is the story of March.

Read More
The Best Of Jeff Lehman The Best Of Jeff Lehman

The Best Songs of 2024

The best song of 2024 isn’t on Spotify. It’s called “24/7 Heaven,” Diamond Jubilee’s closer. It comes drenched in strings and draped in blue light, at the end of Cindy Lee’s two-hour album. It’s the epitome of sublime, if you ask me—a sweet and perfect fruit, an apple at first sight.

Read More
Fearwyrms Jeff Lehman Fearwyrms Jeff Lehman

Dungeon Synth II: Castle Crypts

Two years after our first maddening descent into dungeon synth—the haunted, medieval, dark ambient subgenre born from side projects of Nordic black metal stars—and we’ve already seen a swell of scholarly literature on the genre from dark-corner music nerds and fantasy-flecked weirdos (both me) alike.

Read More
The Annivyrsaries Jeff Lehman The Annivyrsaries Jeff Lehman

Hegemony Bites: Annivyrsary 1994

Kurt Cobain died on April 5, 1994. He killed himself—and he did kill himself. Crazy the acrobatics our minds will go through to rule out the reality of suicide. Impossible! That life could be too hard to live? We’re more likely to see misogynistic conspiracy lurk around every corner. 

Read More
Sleep Well Beast Jeff Lehman Sleep Well Beast Jeff Lehman

Environments

Irv Teibel, who released the influential Environments records over ten years from 1969–79, was a pioneer in putting field recordings (i.e., nature sounds) into the hands of stressed-out college students and, eventually, anyone who needed to drown out all the noise. Turns out that was a lot of people.

Read More
Artistography Jeff Lehman Artistography Jeff Lehman

Fireworks Fall

MJ Lenderman is one of the greatest guitarists. A supreme pleasure I get out of listening to his latest album is the sick guitar. He makes it talk, baby! I hear Dinosaur Jr. and Zappa’s best; I hear chapters in a book that switches narrators.

Read More
Artistography Jeff Lehman Artistography Jeff Lehman

Mitski Business

The opener to Mitski's latest album, “Bug Like an Angel,” starts as many songs do: with a single strum of an acoustic guitar. It’s not long before her voice becomes a choir, and the effect is that of intoxication, a blossom in the bloodstream, sinking at first and floating toward the end. Iggy Pop has described her as “probably the most advanced American songwriter that I know.”

Read More
Censory Overload Jeff Lehman Censory Overload Jeff Lehman

The Filthy Fifteen

I may have mentioned last week that 1984 did not turn out to be Orwell’s dystopia—but there was one consequential act of censorship that occurred. It was no panopticon, no ever-present Big Brother, no. Instead, it took the form of a tiny sticker—one that read “Parental Advisory: Explicit Lyrics,” and has adorned nearly every heavy metal, punk, and hip hop album since the mid-1980s.

Read More
Game Theory Jeff Lehman Game Theory Jeff Lehman

RGM: Rhythm Game Music

Yet these are often sophisticated and complex compositions. They’re designed at first provide stimulating play, but there’s artistic meat there nonetheless. It’s a hyper mix of classical, breakcore, bubblegum pop, and progressive rock.

Read More
The Annivyrsaries Jeff Lehman The Annivyrsaries Jeff Lehman

Discobahn: Annivyrsary 1974

When I started gathering my research for this Annivyrsary back in January, one thing became clear—1974 was not a good year for music. This was very much a puberty period, an awkward personality vacuum that comes between shedding the old and fully realizing the new. This was to be my Waterloo.

Read More
Peyote Rock Jeff Lehman Peyote Rock Jeff Lehman

Desert Days

It’s hot out there folks, so you know what that means—fight fire with fire, crank up the heat, love your blisters till they callous. Just grab onto whatever you can.

Read More
The Best Of Jeff Lehman The Best Of Jeff Lehman

The Best Songs of 2024 So Far

Technically, halfway through the year is next Monday, July 1st. This is a leap year, after all. They’re the only years where there’s an even split in days; the only times the divide falls at midnight, not noon.

Read More
Genre Fluid Jeff Lehman Genre Fluid Jeff Lehman

Kaleidosonics: Descents into Post-Nightcore

There are now roving bands of sonic scavengers in the fractured data gutters of the post–Web 2.0 internet, musicians often known by little more than alt-code symbols (♡u∫agi幻覚∀∁ⓛᙌ✬) or keyboard vomit (Sophiaaaahjkl;8901). These boundary pushers are chopping and screwing so hard it sounds like a chainsaw, their samples reduced to little more by the end than glitter and stardust.

Read More
Earwyrms City Soundtrack Jeff Lehman Earwyrms City Soundtrack Jeff Lehman

Danny Boyle’s 2012 London Olympics Opening Ceremony

I’ve been watching through the films of Danny Boyle. Some examples: Trainspotting, Sunshine, 28 Days Later, Slumdog Millionaire. From early on, Boyle was rightfully recognized for his edgy and sophisticated musical taste—the Trainspotting soundtrack alone, from Iggy’s “Lust for Life” through Underworld’s “Born Slippy (Nuxx)”, helped define the tastes of a whole generation.

Read More