TERRA COTTA RELEASE DEBUT RECORD I FOUND A LIGHT
Press release made and distributed for Philadelphia folk quintet Terra Cotta
Selected Works
INTERVIEW: feeble little horse are wired in
A cultural backlash-induced luddite movement was bound to happen. On Instagram, the product I get advertised to me the most is a hunk of plastic that locks you out of whatever apps you tell it to. "Analog bags" stuffed with screen-free activities has become a rising trend among young adults. In a time where the pope writes an Encyclical rebuking the technocrats of Silicon Valley and their sweeping AI aspirations, it feels obvious young creative types are desperate to turn back the clock. Pittsb...
Inside Kilby Block Party 2026: our takeaways and highlights
The inaugural Kilby Block Party in 2019 was exactly what is said on the tin: a block party taking place outside of the storied music venue Kilby Court. The name has stuck for tradition’s sake, but the scope of the festival has grown exponentially. In just 7 years, 500 attendees has turned into a figure closer to the tune of 90,000. In the continued absence of Pitchfork festival in Chicago and All Things Go’s mainstream pivot, indie fans nationwide have found themselves flocking to Salt Lake City...
INTERVIEW: Broken Social Scene provide some conventional human wisdom
When I logged onto my Zoom call with Broken Social Scene songwriter Kevin Drew, I was met with an unexpected second face. At 10:30am on a Thursday morning, Drew was huddled up in multi-instrumentalist (and fellow Scenester) Charles Spearin's garage-turned-studio. The pair gave me a tour of the space before I got a chance to introduce myself, showing me individual pieces of gear that were near and dear to their hearts. They showed me the 8-track tape machine that recorded the group's 2001 debut F...
"I don't feel like it really benefited anybody": Snail Mail on rejecting the "sad girl" genre, vocal surgery, and the Goo
Snail Mail frontwoman Lindsey Jordan is no stranger to confession. She wrote all of the songs on her 2018 debut Lush before she could vote. Jordan's pointed yet complicated tales of queer heartbreak had critics designating her as a wunderkind wise beyond her years. Now eight years, two albums, and a vocal polyps surgery later, Jordan has new priorities. She moved from a small one bedroom apartment in New York City to a big house in North Carolina, got a dog, and is in a happy long-term relations...
Sleeper Hit Support Group: "Fame Is A Gun" by Addison Rae
Welcome to Sleeper Hit Support Group, a column diving into the song currently occupying the bottom spot of the Billboard Hot 100.In a pop landscape that asks more questions that it answers, I'm setting out to answer three questions about each of these songs: how it got here, if the song is good, and where it's going. In this 100th spot we'll find unlikely ascents, falls from grace, and resurgences of hits from bygone eras.Today, we're queening out and taking a look at "Fame Is A Gun" by Addison...
dodie: a career retrospective and notes on 'Not For Lack Of Trying'
30 year old singer-songwriter Dorothy Clark has been sharing pieces of herself online since she was a child. In a bit-crushed 144p video, a 14 year old dodie stands in an open field in her hometown of Epping, England. Next to her stands her childhood best friend Alice, and they sing a vague song of heartbreak – the exact kind you'd expect a 14 year old to come up with. They giggle in between verses, eventually devolving into the two taking turns riffing "yeah yeahs" and impersonating Michael Jac...
INTERVIEW: Wednesday's Karly Hartzman talks 'Bleeds', quitting social media, and 'Rap World'
The invigorating charm of a Wednesday song is not made in vain. Frontwoman Karly Hartzman is a curator of her surroundings. Even the corner of her room that framed her half of our Zoom call was filled to the brim with an eclectic collection of records, books, and posters. She dons Stewie Griffin pajama pants with a panache that feels unique to her alone. In the time that she used to spend on social media, Hartzman now chronicles and commemorates her life via her website prisondivorcebombshell.co...
INTERVIEW: Water From Your Eyes talk Zohran, the Pope, and their new record
Brooklyn's Water From Your Eyes have really made a name for themselves. The duo comprised of Nate Amos (who had a breakout 2024 with side project This Is Lorelei) and Rachel Brown (who also releases music under the moniker Thanks For Coming) present themselves in a humble and understated fashion despite how audacious and daring their music sounds. While 2023's Everyone's Crushed made them a bonafide act to watch, It's A Beautiful Place, out today via Matador records, will likely send them over t...
We Nibbled Our Butter Cookie Rings to the Knuckle: Cap’n Jazz’s Shmap’n Shmazz Turns 30
My hometown is always on the precipice of completion, and the people there hold their cards quite close to their chest. I went home for the holidays this past winter, and as I passed by the remnants of the now defunct Sam Ash I grew up across the street from—the one that Mike Kinsella recalls to have purchased his first guitar at—I thought of how many remarkable things come from being surrounded by what feels inherently unremarkable. The town in question—Buffalo Grove, Illinois—is a part of a ha...
The Needle Drop’s Recap of Governors Ball 2025
This past weekend, the annual Governors Ball returned to New York City’s Flushing Meadows Corona Park in Queens. Artists representing the best and brightest in pop, rock, and hip-hop came to perform across three days, bringing a flock of eager fans with them.The Needle Drop’s Jaeden Pinder, Leah Weinstein, and Victoria Borlando showed up all three days, teaming up to cover as much of the large music festival as possible (although, we unfortunately missed the promised Benson Boone backflip). In t...
She Tastes Like The Real Thing: Radiohead’s ‘The Bends’ at 30
Radiohead as it exists today is not simply the band composed of Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood and co., but instead the bands that have started and thrived from their influence. Yorke and Greenwood continue to make music together as The Smile, but the output of that band has proven that the two are a bit past their prime. Their music as The Smile still has that Radiohead je ne sais quoi, but they have certainly lost much of their edge with age. That being said, there is still a reason why Radiohead...
DIY Superbowl Underdogs and the Ethos of the Philly Scene - The Alternative
Posted: 3rd October, 2024 by The Alt Editing Staff
Photos by Alex Ramirez
It pays to be a good hang – that’s the mantra DIY Superbowl openers armbite live by. After placing second at a battle-of-the-bands style show for a slot playing at the festival’s fifth annual installment, the band was invited by the members of the 4333 booking collective to play anyways. I sat down with armbite immediately following their set at Ukie Club to discuss their story and their reverence of the Philly scene at...
Photos by Alex Ramirez
It pays to be a good hang – that’s the mantra DIY Superbowl openers armbite live by. After placing second at a battle-of-the-bands style show for a slot playing at the festival’s fifth annual installment, the band was invited by the members of the 4333 booking collective to play anyways. I sat down with armbite immediately following their set at Ukie Club to discuss their story and their reverence of the Philly scene at...
Rex Orange County, 'The Alexander Technique' Album Review
During the summer of 2022, Alexander O’Connor (professionally known as Rex Orange County) had to abruptly cancel his tour dates in Australia and New Zealand due to “unforeseen personal circumstances.” The public would later find out that the circumstances in question was just one: a legal battle pertaining to six charges of sexual assault, which were eventually dropped due to CCTV footage exonerating him. While it’s not particularly relevant to dwell on the minutiae of the substance of this case...
As Fall Approaches, Brat Summer Readies Its Exit
It takes a certain je ne sais quoi to be the driving force of a cultural moment and having your album cycle’s visuals co-opted by every brand, organization and Trader Joe’s chalk art in the West. The age of monoculture has become fleeting over the past 10 years, as state-of-the-art social media algorithms have turned the wet dreams of shareholders into reality. Not only does this reality incentivize artists to extract their niche from the context of elemental consumer culture they feel would bes...
Untangling the Unique, Private and Meteoric Rise of Mitski in the Age of TikTok
Mitski’s meteoric rise over the past year of her career has been nothing short of an anomaly. Last September, the former indie darling garnered her first Billboard-charting single with “My Love Mine All Mine,” peaking at #26. It doesn’t seem like Mitski (or her team) did anything in pursuit of this song becoming the hit that it is—it just sort of happened, which is even more confounding, considering that “My Love Mine All Mine” wasn’t even one of the album’s three pre-release singles (“Bug Like...
