Music

Dear listeners,Earlier this week, I was listening to “Pictures of You,” one of the many great singles by the British band the Cure, on the subway. It’s a song I’ve heard approximately...

Sheldon Harnick, the lyricist who teamed up with the composer Jerry Bock to write some of Broadway’s most memorable musicals, including the Tony Award winners “Fiddler on the Roof” and “Fiorello!,” died...

Double bill challenge: write a song with the act sharing the tour to prove compatibility. Beck and the French electro-pop band Phoenix, who will hit the road together this summer, have done...

The lights inside the cavernous McCourt space at the Shed had been dimmed, and a mystical soundtrack was playing. “Your journey begins in five minutes,” a recorded voice announced to the roughly...

Claudio Abbado lit a cigar and looked uneasy, as he often did.The Italian conductor, who died in 2014 but would have turned 90 on June 26, was at a meal with the...

The pop super-producer and songwriter known as Dr. Luke has dropped a defamation lawsuit against the singer Kesha, a former protégée who had accused him of rape in a 2014 lawsuit, the...

In the late 20th century another variant emerged: the modernized bandit songs called narcocorridos, which tell stories of the drug trade. Some were commissioned by drug lords as praise songs. “Just as...

Teresa Taylor, a drummer for the Texas acid-punk band Butthole Surfers who became an emblem of Generation X aimlessness and anomie with a memorable appearance in Richard Linklater’s 1990 film “Slacker,” died...

Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Amazon MusicThis week’s episode of Popcast (Deluxe), the weekly culture roundup show on YouTube hosted by Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli, includes segments...

On a nighttime street in 1970s Belfast, Northern Ireland, a D.J. named Terri Hooley runs into a pair of local toughs — young men who’ve found their purpose in the gunfire and...