Daily Newsletter, May 5, 2025

Here are the albums and songs from the last month that we think you should hear, as selected by tQ's staffers

KXT's Jackson Wisdorf joins Stephen Thompson to discuss their favorite records out this week — and shed a few tears in the process.

Welcome to “Essentials,” a sporadic column for new music recommendations from one lifelong chucklehead with questionable taste. It’s similar to “Fuzzy Meadows” except the title makes more sense and we’ve removed the words “best” and “weekly”.

Essentially, we get a meticulously crafted modern avant-pop album that works at every level. Harry seems to be quite a glittering nightgown.

There are people who make a fine living by closely monitoring this nation’s youth sports leagues in hopes of finding players to replenish America’s college and professional teams. I wonder if Matador Records has a similar program, but for potential next-generation indie rock stars? The tastemaking institution established its rep by plucking Pavement, Guided by Voices, and Liz Phair from the tape-trading micro-release deep underground, and in the past decade or so it’s shown a keen interest in what the young people are getting up to, ushering young acts like Snail Mail, Car Seat Headrest, Julien Baker, and Lucy Dacus into the big leagues after they built up varying degrees of buzz. More recently, the “cool parents and after-school music programs to Matador Records” pipeline remained remarkably strong with the young Chicago trio Horsegirl, and now it’s given us the young Chicago trio Lifeguard, an outstanding coup by Matador’s perhaps apocryphal youth development division. Raises all around.

Instrumental mood music by artists like Khruangbin has surged in popularity. The reasons reflect our changing lives, Spotify playlists, and more.

AOR might have come truly blossoming into platinum-tinged life in the 1980s, but the genre had been holding lighters aloft and weeping in its beer in the 1970s. These are the best albums

Exploring the weird and wonderful world of Genoa-based duo Gotho, whose 2024 album 'Gothron Versus Fartark' tells the tale of two warring robot overlords.

They may have been a manufactured band, but the Monkees nonetheless created some of the greatest pop-rock music of the 1960s.

Today I am going to do something a little different.  I am recommending music that is off the beaten path, experimental, a little – or a lot – away from the mainstream.  Some of it may be an acquir…

From Brubeck to Basie, our jazz expert Geoffrey Smith digs deep and selects the 15 greatest jazz pianists of all time

There's a lot to explore in YouTube Music, from smart downloads to autoplay playlists. Here's what you can do.

Our columnist on the twisty, suspense-laden books that will keep you on the edge of your seat.

Playlist · Numero Group · 31 items · 2.8K saves