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https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/mil monthly 0.5 2024-06-10 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1625085862186-2XJH5E5PU5TQL5LJ10V3/AdobeStock_428958756.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1625085696522-QS8L7RJXQ88X30P2UX16/AdobeStock_336913632.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1625085600398-EO3WH2YHGE3TAYN4XG6T/AdobeStock_157870739.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1625086017804-UZX1VUF87QCANFFW0678/AdobeStock_336883591.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/341500ef-5ff3-4ddd-858f-4c728de113bd/Screen+Shot+2021-07-14+at+11.53.34+PM.png Guides - Media & Information Literacy https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/2ab9cdc2-cd9b-4d80-a9d2-9aaa23781a65/Screen+Shot+2021-07-14+at+11.53.56+PM.png Guides - Media & Information Literacy 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https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/c9005d34-e600-44d6-8fcb-bbd3373ff6e8/maxresdefault.jpg Guides - Identify Mis/Dis Information - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/ed72349a-f737-494f-815a-29bbaee9f0e1/dslr-gb4645fb38_1920.jpg Guides - Identify Mis/Dis Information - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/4195baf1-66ed-4abf-b713-00fa2785faab/71rdnKP2xkL._RI_.jpg Guides - Identify Mis/Dis Information - Teale’s documentary, Kill Chain: The Cyber War on America’s Elections, is an investigation into cyber security and US elections. Teale was concerned about protecting the identity of the hacker CyberZeist, a young man from India who hacked into the Alaskan election reporting system. Teale was worried that CyberZeist might inadvertently identify himself or incite violence. What Teale did not expect was for someone to use her film to promote something she disagreed with, expressing extreme frustration about Michael J. Lindell co-opting part of Kill Chain. https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/graffiti-media monthly 0.5 2021-06-30 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1633974781138-CNCRWDC2SG4EALW2MUAZ/Graffiti+1.jpeg Guides - Graffiti Media Photograph: Courtesy Elle Street Art https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1633974703645-DSDCYZQUMG8X3YEA16DO/Graffiti+2.jpeg Guides - Graffiti Media Photograph: Time Out/Ali Garber https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1633974719548-E1F9T2D43920PPPQDMDY/Graffiti+3.jpeg Guides - Graffiti Media Photograph: Courtesy Mike Fernandez/National Audubon Society https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/helpful-links monthly 0.5 2021-05-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/dc2dff4b-b419-4250-9aed-448cb113beaf/Edutopia Guides - Helpful Links - Make it stand out Edutopia: Started by the George Lucas Foundation, Edutopia houses a collection of recommended resources to help readers learn more about media literacy and its nuances. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/c832bec5-7b36-43cc-8b2a-9b552946129d/NAMLE Guides - Helpful Links - Make it stand out NAMLE: The National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) is an organization that MSC has worked with. Our Express Your Power project was selected for their 2021 conference promoting media literacy and social justice. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9a4c76f9-34bd-4306-8780-99837a235f84/unesco-mil-alliance-logo-2.jpg Guides - Helpful Links - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d10c8b11-e37c-4390-a746-73061fede414/CML Guides - Helpful Links - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1602c740-0f2a-49ca-8729-7897a72571ef/Common+Sense+Media Guides - Helpful Links - Make it stand out Common Sense Education: Common Sense Education has created a platform for educators and anyone who is interested in learning about Media and Information Literacy. Their resources include apps and resources to learn new skills as well as information about key points in the media field. https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/web3 monthly 0.5 2024-06-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/74aaf2ff-df43-476a-b013-7ded8fc70eb8/proof+of+work.png Guides - Blockchain, Bitcoin, and Web3 - Make it stand out Image from Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0d1f796c-291b-4ce6-a45b-48d8e1a57d66/pexels-tima-miroshnichenko-7567442.jpg Guides - Blockchain, Bitcoin, and Web3 Bitcoin is a particularly volatile investment. Just this year, it dropped about 70% in roughly six months. Aside from that, it’s also not currently regulated the same way the banking system is. If you lose your savings after investing them into crypto, the FDIC and SIPC won’t help you. Although bitcoin has the potential to become a universal world currency and improve the economy, MSC does not formally suggest investing in it. Nor is this article financial advice. For more information about bitcoin, check out Coindesk, Investopedia, or the original site Bitcoin.org. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/976aa0e7-3a78-4d55-98f2-ede19a224527/blockchain-gec362138f_1920.jpg Guides - Blockchain, Bitcoin, and Web3 - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/watch-guide monthly 0.5 2024-06-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/519f60f4-c5d1-4aa4-90dc-5f57c9bda92c/7F2640E2-DCE3-49E5-B07B-5E1F8D103369.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b11eeab4-80e0-45ed-b040-00b05caca6b0/8726AA31-FD03-433E-B07C-763D51DFC995.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/08b26fd4-5dc9-4bcf-a66f-e7110af376f5/5B110A7A-81C3-4E89-AD3C-F384F4FBCD33.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/779ffcb2-be28-4e5a-9d95-e5c3978892a2/tg.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e431a5c4-9118-46a1-a0c0-9d544e4dce84/everythingetc.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/2a938c16-cb92-4d4c-9e2a-0689898f72c4/8CB1CCEC-4945-4AD3-8FBD-2DE77F7D1FA8.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9591738c-498d-4c30-a1aa-428dee501b0e/243BD205-33DF-4B47-8743-EBDCB426F9F8.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Dog Day Afternoon is based on a Life article about an actual event. The film stars Al Pacino with direction from Sidney Lumet, who had also directed 12 Angry Men and Serpico and, more recently, Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. The film is about a bank robbery gone wrong, forcing protagonist Sonny and his accomplice to take the bank staff hostage. John Wojtowicz, represented by the character Sonny, said the film was only 30% accurate but later showed approval of the actors’ representations. Wojtowicz received $7,500 and 1% of the film’s net profits to have his story told on the silver screen. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/15140b6d-5e92-4647-a84a-ca992478198a/D4FC878E-1480-4EBF-BD54-EC0DAAE75B42.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/bce00948-be5c-42d9-81d0-6ec3a7679dd1/9F5A3578-1A43-4B91-A357-54DFE6881FA6.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Gus Van Sant is known for his films Milk, a biopic on gay activist Harvey Milk; Elephant, based on the Columbine Shootings; and Drugstore Cowboy. My Own Private Idaho is more of a cult classic. It focuses on the relationship between two young hustlers in Portland. Van Sant originally penned the script in the 70s, neglecting it after reading City of Night by John Rechy, deciding it was better. Eventually, Van Sant rewrote the script with two plotlines, one that relates to Rechy’s book and the other that serves as a loose adaptation of Shakespeare’s Henriad. Initially, Van Sant couldn’t fund the project and planned to use real street hustlers, but Keanu liked the script enough to show it to Phoenix. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/35326ab0-b4ee-447e-b1b3-a25233960304/E3687F77-FB8D-4560-905C-FC2307B26903.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Portrait of a Lady on Fire is a French historical fiction film directed by director Céline Sciamma. Sciamma became the first woman to win the Queer Palm Award at Cannes. She cast her former lover Adèle Haenel in a leading role as Héloïse, a French noblewoman betrothed to a man she doesn’t want to marry. The film is about Héloïse’s relationship with Marianne, a painter Héloïse’s family commissions to illustrate her. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/42047d5a-2817-4add-94d5-7f1383b079fe/F5C221D9-7CC0-467A-9015-1EBA94C71D4E.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Few reality shows have come close in quality and originality as RuPaul’s Drag Race. The show’s host is the titular RuPaul, who, if you didn’t know, is probably the world’s biggest drag queen. RuPaul got his start in the Atlanta creative scene, working as a musician and filmmaker, performing in clubs with a band or as a singer, and producing low-budget films. In the 90s, he started performing in New York, releasing his first dance album in 93. RuPaul started working for MAC cosmetics as a model, continuing to produce music until 2008 when he launched Drag Race. The show pits drag queens against each other. Contestants tailor outfits to perform judged lip-syncing battles like America’s Next Top Model. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/81e00848-05f2-44c7-b9b5-259a44d2c39f/7D8DDA13-8C27-4FBA-A070-2D384F08E3E9.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide A Single Man is fashion designer Tom Ford’s first of two films. It’s about an aging English professor contemplating taking his own life after the death of his partner of 16 years, who died in a car accident. Ford based the movie on a Christopher Isherwood novel of the same name. The film stars Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, and Nicholas Hoult, landing Firth an academy award nomination. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/dea03fe8-43f9-4e8c-a1e7-56a4c4ec63d4/32BE4EAC-7353-45D4-8A4F-BF1BA0941823.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Adventureland, like The Graduate, captures that post-graduation feeling of having spent thousands of dollars on an education and still not having a clear path to a stable life. Unlike in The Graduate, there’s no bizarre sexual tension. Adventureland is much more like a conventional contemporary rom-com. By way of it being more expressly relatable, it becomes less artistic. It almost feels marketed toward millennials. The film’s narrative drive comes from the main character’s inability to find work after graduating college. With no other choice, he takes a job at an amusement park called Adventureland over the summer to save up for Columbia’s Journalism school. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d11e6e0f-b220-4a6b-b374-0e5677b84bf2/BAD1D973-85AE-407B-8321-631197696C12.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “Dazed and Confused” is a song popularized by Led Zeppelin. The phrase also describes the state of the disaffected drug-addled youth of 1970s hippie culture. But it’s also somewhat representative of many people’s emotional state towards the end of their academic careers. Dazed and Confused is kind of like if That 70s Show was a movie. It’s centered around a town’s high school in the mid-70s kicking off with junior Randall “Pink” Floyd as he struggles with his football coach’s request to abstain from drug use over the summer. It gives you a good idea of how different life was in the 70s. None of the characters display any real drive to attend college because, at the time, it wasn’t a requirement to access middle-class life. It features breakthrough roles for several actors, including Ben Affleck and Matthew McConaughey. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/40c97d1b-e7ba-4381-af56-2d29905fc7af/98F2677E-3955-4929-8178-D19A492D740D.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/042bd78a-5487-49d0-8a35-5e4238450f48/CA327782-B671-4EC8-B5C3-818E5B8385A3.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide This movie is the embodiment of senioritis. The titular character, played by Matthew Broderick, who is all set to graduate, decides to feign illness and hang out with his best friend, who is legitimately sick. It’s a classic John Hughes flick, who is known for his comedic use of magical realism in late 80s and early 90s films. He’s probably most well-known for the Home Alone franchise. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/3d7a41dd-89df-44a0-8223-259cbd12160e/DA569BD2-0CB2-4A77-8F52-F5B6B6070AD5.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Reese Witherspoon stars in this comedy adaptation of a novel of the same name. Author Amanda Brown based the story on her experience at Stanford Law School, which she attended despite her interest in fashion. Brown never actually completed her law degree, but her character Elle Woods does. Elle’s boyfriend breaks up with her after confessing his aspirations of becoming president. Essentially, he doesn’t think she’s intelligent enough to be a respectable first lady. Devastated by this, Elle decides to apply to Harvard Law School to win him back. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/dfe6dd66-8244-448f-aab6-35571ac8db7a/97C88E4C-4DA0-4C4F-85B3-9D63C18284C4.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide I wouldn’t argue that Adam Sandler has made no mistakes in his career. Billy Madison is not one of those mistakes, though, and I would even say it was a character-defining role for him. Sandler co-wrote the film, but Tamra Davis, who you may know from her work on Half Baked, directed it. Billy Madison is about the spoiled son of the founder of a fictional Fortune 500 company, Madison Hotels. Billy behaves in an exceedingly juvenile manner. As a result, his father plans to leave the company to the Vice President instead of Billy. After revealing he bribed his grade school teachers to pass him, his father challenges Billy to graduate high school again to prove he’s smart enough to run a business. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/aaadb537-02e1-4265-b90d-7c57b1022219/SJ4mDLi-show-mezzanine16x9-ep0GS0f.jpg.crop.510x286.jpg Guides - Watch Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/930949ea-97bf-4d00-9e13-8f2949c0eba5/Chinatownposter1.jpg Guides - Watch Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/fcd726d4-0c8a-4dc9-a324-4b96e7b4383a/dontlook.jpg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5fec3534-ef61-4535-ae53-5eccdc7dbb04/d8ca4d_3b79ee36b47b4ccd89e7c826a721341c_mv2.jpg Guides - Watch Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/73c89582-e83d-48ed-90b8-2bff894d379e/BBC_PE_title.jpg Guides - Watch Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8a33407a-1830-4131-9d07-d0f76a695fe1/no-impact.jpg Guides - Watch Guide No Impact Man is a 2009 documentary about how Colin Beavan, a blogger and nonfiction writer, his wife Michelle, a journalist, and their toddler daughter decided to experiment with minimizing waste. Beavan’s family experiment started for a book he was writing but was recorded as a film when one of Michelle’s friends found out. For one year, the family committed to producing no trash, saving compost, only purchasing food grown within a 250-mile radius, using no carbon-based transportation, and eschewing paper products. They also did not buy any new products or clothes and lived as freegans. In a blog post about the experiment, Michelle admitted that she was the most affected and that it lowered their energy bill to zero. She lost weight and cured her insomnia and pre-diabetic condition. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/27ac5346-0e70-4245-9950-7971138046d5/The+Tinder+Swindler+2022.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide This woman-directed Netflix original does not intrinsically address women’s history or feminism, though it does address media literacy. The Tinder Swindler is a documentary which is, as you may have guessed from the title, about a serial con artist who defrauded several women around the world using the Tinder dating app. The doc tells the tale of Israeli scammer Simon Leviev through the perspective of a few of his victims. After serving time for theft and fraud in various countries, Leviev changed his legal name from Shimon Hayut and fled Israel to Europe. There he posed as the son of Lev Leviev, a successful Russian-Israeli businessman. Leviev reportedly finagled around $10 million from women in Ponzi scheme-like fashion, pretending to be targeted by his “enemies.” He then used the money his victims loaned to beguile and manipulate new women, pretending to repay previous marks by sending them forged bank transfers. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5ec84b05-da2b-4ada-ae42-c9ab2141b618/Alien+1979.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/723a0cdc-4f5b-46a0-98fe-b719b0b3c9ac/Charli+XCX+Alone+Together+2021.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide I was surprised to see the critical acclaim this documentary was getting. If you’re a Charli fan, you’ll definitely want to check this out. Alone Together follows Charli XCX’s lockdown narrative and the recording of her subsequent album, How I’m Feeling Now, which was a reflection of her experiences during that time. Over the course of the film, Charli attempts to tackle the emotional difficulties she faces as she realizes how reliant her self-esteem is on her fans and seeing crowds cheering her name on a regular basis. The film also documents her relationship with her on-and-off-again boyfriend. While not directed by Charli, she records much of the footage, thus offering a glimpse into her creative process. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/4c925bd3-5d4f-4428-9342-8eec93def5ac/Me+You+And+Everyone+We+Know+2005.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide I would be remiss to avoid mentioning any film directed by a woman for Women’s History Month because what is a more gender-challenging role than the director? Me and You and Everyone We Know has been somewhat of a hipster staple since it came out almost 20 years ago, though engagement with it has declined significantly since the 2010s. It’s directed by Miranda July, who just released her third feature film starring Evan Rachel Wood, Kajillionaire. July also stars in Me and You and Everyone We Know. Though Miranda states mostly being inspired by the riot grrrl movement and less so by other films, Me and You similarly captures a human intimacy seen in flicks like Bottle Rocket, Garden State, Napoleon Dynamite, Lost In Translation, and Little Miss Sunshine. Like many of these films, Me and You usually gets labeled as a comedy, but I think it’s far too sentimental to lump in with titles like Knocked Up or The 40-Year-Old Virgin. It’s really just a quirky drama. As much as I dislike the term “New Sincerity,” I feel like it applies to films like this, being that film critic Jim Collins coined the phrase to describe Wes Anderson’s style. I think Kmart realism, a term usually applied to Alt Lit which also peaked in the aughts, also works. The main love interest works in a department store at a mall. I wouldn’t be the first to apply Kmart realism to film; critics have also called Blue Valentine an example of Kmart realism. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5750565e-a2ba-476b-a645-26b6fe6c61a2/pers.jpg Guides - Watch Guide Persepolis is an adaptation of a graphic novel of the same name by Marjane Satrapi. Satrapi also directs the film. Persepolis is an autobiographical coming-of-age story about growing up during the Iranian Revolution. Stylistically the film plays out like a cross between Maus and Amélie. Persepolis follows Satrapi as a new fundamentalist regime takes over in Iran. Her story is unique because she was alive at a time when she was old enough to remember what it was like before and can thus compare it to the way it is now. Satrapi grows into a rebellious teen in an intolerant society. Her parents, worried she’ll get arrested, send her to Europe. Eventually, she comes back, only to leave yet again on her own, to where she currently resides, France. Persepolis was historically imperative to humanizing Islamic people in America after the 9/11 attacks and war in Iraq. Originally published a year before the attacks, Satrapi published an English translation in 2003, and the film itself came out in 2007. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/a91d6b1a-ed9e-476a-9cef-dc3deccb7003/Jackie+Brown+1997.png Guides - Watch Guide Several critics regard Jackie Brown as Quinton Tarantino’s best work. I actually had to watch it for a class in my undergrad program. Jackie Brown is a neo-noir crime thriller about an eponymous flight attendant who smuggles money across the border for an illegal arms dealer in LA. The LAPD gets involved, and Brown has to figure out how to escape the situation without landing in jail or dying. Like most noir films, Tarantino based Jackie Brown on a book, in this case, it’s Rum Punch by Elmore Leonard. Leonard also wrote Get Shorty, which inspired a film and television series by the same name. Jackie Brown features a star-studded cast with Pam Grier as the lead, Samuel L. Jackson, Robert De Niro, and Michael Keaton. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/581da3e7-6343-495e-88f3-df8e850a388c/The+Princess+Bride+%281987%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide There are a lot of films that work at challenging the classic tropes of a masculine hero who needs to save the helpless female damsel in distress. Princess Bride does not do that, nor will it come anywhere close to passing the Bechdel test. Released in ‘87, it gets more difficult to call it contemporary every year, but Princess Bride has no interest in being modern. You couldn’t even call it neo-romantic. It’s intentionally pulpy, jejune, and anachronistic in a dreamy reminiscent sort of way, pulling it off through its light-hearted wit. While often being categorized as a comedy, it’s a far cry from Robin Hood: Men in Tights, but it does tend to lean on puns rather than getting steeped in despondent drama. At its heart, Princess Bride is about love, but it’s also about chivalry, a Chaucerian fairy tale conscious of being in the wrong period. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/95a43c7f-2ec5-467d-906a-6526dadff1b6/Punch-Drunk+Love+%282002%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide This film is oddly similar to the previous one in that they both are romances starring comedians out of their element. In Punch Drunk Love, Adam Sandler plays Barry, an emotionally unstable business owner with seven overbearing sisters. One of his sister’s coworkers, Lena Leonard, sees him in a picture on her desk and decides to meet him in person. The film chronicles Barry and Lena’s courtship as Barry wrestles with his intense emotional problems. The film is driven by director Paul Thomas Anderson’s idiosyncratic writing and Sandler’s surprising performance. Punch Drunk won Anderson best director at Cannes, Sandler best actor at Gijón International Film Festival, and several other nominations. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/6c3561f1-9871-41cd-ab4c-b3b0e5f8e6fe/Wild+At+Heart+%281990%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide David Lynch is known for outlandish films and his show Twin Peaks, oddly enough, after his first surrealist film, Lynch forays into more traditional storytelling with his subsequent four films, where viewers can detect a distinct plot with a rising action, climax, and ending. Wild at Heart is where Lynch begins to break down again and embrace his surrealist style. Though, more along the lines of hysterical realism, viewers can sense Lynch getting bored of conventional narratives. The over-the-top performances from Nicolas Cage and Willem Dafoe foreshadow the dreamy delivery seen in later works. Though somewhat controversial among critics, it won the Cannes Award and several nominations for Academy Awards. The plot follows an impulsive young man and his lover whose mother tries to separate them. Based on a novel by the same name, the writer liked the adaptation enough to collaborate with Lynch on his following work, Lost Highway, in which Lynch dives fully back into the abstract. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/fe7c9dea-04cf-4bee-8407-dc3ff47b65fe/Eternal+Sunshine+of+the+Spotless+Mind+%282004%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Starring Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet, Eternal Sunshine is the story of two lovers who seem to need each other on a chemical or molecular level when they decide to erase the other from their memories after becoming estranged. Believe it or not, this process has been somewhat successfully practiced on mice. Michael Gondry’s imaginative vision and Charlie Kaufman’s absurdist writing blend faultlessly to tell this story taking place primarily in a dream. Carrey’s previous experience producing visual comedy with his body allows him to effortlessly adapt to a more surreal role. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/feb69294-eeff-4973-8e1b-9747afd4d9cd/Man+Seeking+Woman+%282015-2017%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide If you’re looking for something a bit more long-form, check out Man Seeking Woman. Man Seeking Woman is a romantic comedy series created by Simon Rich and based on his book, The Last Girlfriend on Earth. The show stars Jay Baruchel and Eric André. Jay is torn between advice given to him by his best friend Mike, played by André, and his older sister. Critics adore the three-season-long show. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/972ede35-3932-4c85-8c07-ec86598fa8a3/Casablanca+%281942%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/dce3ba25-eae2-4c4c-874b-15329948a78c/Red+Rocket+%282021%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Simon Rex is really given a chance to shine with Red Rocket. A former MTV VJ, Scary Movie actor, and rapper who collaborated with Riff Raff, Rex seems perfectly cast as a former adult film actor. It’s not blatantly optimistic as the other films on this list, leaving the audience with an unresolved ending. Instead, it’s more of a critique of the male gaze and thus elicits more change in the viewer than the character. Rex’s character lands himself in a situation where he must experience some fundamental change, but we’re only with him for half the journey. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/6939c0b8-63b1-4912-8251-e2a7ec548240/Good+Will+Hunting+%281997%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Is it about hunting for goodwill, or is the title simply saying the main character Will Hunting is good? It could have been about thrifting, but it’s not. Good Will Hunting is about an apparent genius struggling with his rough upbringing. Written by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, directed by Gus Van Sant, and featuring Robin Williams, this movie is a high point for all four. On top of that talent, the soundtrack prominently features Elliott Smith, even winning him an Academy Award. At times, the plot feels a little unbelievable that someone so failed by the public schooling system could turn their life around so dramatically, but the team pulls it off in a very engaging way. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/2bb16b9c-5ef3-4d86-80f8-fc4bdf9ff59d/The+Secret+Life+of+Walter+Mitty+%281947%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide This is the second iteration of Walter Mitty. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty was originally a short story by James Thurber, who wrote for The New Yorker, publishing books and plays as well. You can still read it on The New Yorker's website. This 1947 adaptation strays from the original, which is little more than a character study. The 2013 version strays even further. Regardless, Mitty is a character who needs some kind of change in his life and escapes reality regularly through elaborate daydreams. In the 1947 film, Mitty eventually finds himself on a real adventure which gives him a new lease on life and the courage to stand up to the manipulative people around him. Maybe 2022 is the year you finally cut off those gaslighters. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9407e4a5-892e-4263-b6b2-f19f37b7ef97/Silver+Linings+Playbook+%282012%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8c406d79-bd50-4d8d-8fb0-f0c069692bc3/Groundhog+Day+%281993%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Groundhog Day is a quintessential Billy Murray film whose influence spans Nintendo’s Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask to Andy Samberg’s Palm Springs. Murry’s reputation of being difficult to work with helps construct the Scrooge-like character that carries the film. Phil Connors is inexplicably doomed to repeat the same day. At first, it makes him even more cynical, but eventually learns to make the most of it, changing his ways. The reason for the time loop is never explained, but an early draft of the script credits it to a curse put on him by his ex. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/cc3a48e1-f03c-4498-b56f-050413cfa22d/The+Tragedy+Of+Macbeth+%282021%29.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Macbeth is more of a cautionary tale than one of new beginnings. But this latest presentation of the Shakespeare play being released around new year’s reminds us not to get too carried away with our resolutions. The Tragedy of Macbeth is the most critically acclaimed adaptation. If you didn’t read it in grade school, the title undoubtedly gives away that things don’t turn out so well for the titular character when he tries to defy the prophecy of three witches in a quixotic pursuit of power. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/bc125aaf-f42b-4d32-87d5-deac10e53592/Jingle+Jangle.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Academy Award winner Forest Whitaker and comedian Keegan-Michael Key star in this completely new Christmas musical. Whitaker plays a toymaker who is down on his luck. His daughter sends his estranged granddaughter, who happens to share the same spark he has for inventing, to visit him for the holiday. Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey really is as classic as Christmas movies come and perfect for all ages. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9a8a42ef-2ba0-4488-95c6-2c8f961e00b5/Tokyo+Godfathers.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Christmas vacation wouldn’t be complete without a holiday themed cartoon. This one was created by Satoshi Kon, director of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Perfect Blue, and Paprika. Tokyo Godfathers is the story of three homeless people who stumble upon an abandoned newborn in the garbage and their journey to find the child’s parents. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/06fac9f0-c14e-43ca-91b5-f1537f6dbbf4/thesnowmn.jpg Guides - Watch Guide The Snowman is based on Raymond Briggs' picture book of the same name. The film is a symphonic poem with no dialogue that follows the unspoken bond between a young boy and a mystical flying snowman. Make sure you find the one with an introduction by David Bowie. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/132a0737-5367-4955-9839-2fc30ad0f56f/Bridget+Jones%27s+Diary.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/919c943d-ffa4-49b5-8f96-70f61628fc2a/Eight+Crazy+Nights.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Adam Sandler may not have been the first person to notice the lack of mainstream representation of Jewish lore during the holiday season, but he appears to be the person responsible for creating the first Hanukkah Movie. Eight Crazy Nights, in classic Sandler style, is an irreverent comedy about a 30-something alcoholic whose life is spiraling out of control. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/a42bb9e9-397f-491e-9ade-8a67e6451dc6/It%27s+A+Wondeful+Life.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide If you have any interest in whatever it is that makes the holidays special, and you haven’t seen It’s a Wonderful Life yet, I would be skeptical of that interest. The film follows Goerge Bailey as he contemplates suicide. Heaven sends an angel to George to help him through his difficult time in a sense reversing Dickens’ classic A Christmas Carol. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e0bdb6ba-e9cf-4a22-a3fe-153883adfac0/Home+Alone.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Home Alone addresses the Christmas spirit while somehow having a plot that rarely mentions anything traditionally related to it. Kevin McAllister learns the value of family only after fully realizing their absence. Left alone over winter vacation, when his parents forget about him, Kevin has to fend for himself, which is exactly what he wanted. Things get more complicated when two thugs try to break into his house. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/3c5746dc-9f5e-46df-86d8-9eb1b6fdc4e2/carol-duh.jpg Guides - Watch Guide Carol is based on a 1952 romance novel called The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith, author of The Talented Mr. Ripley. This Todd Haynes film, starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, chronicles an unexpected romance during the holiday season. Blanchett hailed Hayne’s exploration of the female gaze, which he gleaned from studying underground female photographers from the 50s. Needless to say, Carol passes the Bechdel Test. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/4fecaa00-1d94-4d93-9f6c-dca9450f0660/Dune.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide “The ‘31 Nights of Halloween’ Schedule: Freeform Updates.” Freeform https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b4db9cf8-62fb-4667-8faf-b22ffd8e50e7/Planes%2C+Trains+And+Automobiles.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide If you’re looking for something more explicitly seasonal, check out the Thanksgiving Classic Trains, Planes and Automobiles. The film stars Steve Martin and John Candy and was directed by John Hughes, who also made Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Home Alone. The misadventure comedy follows a marketing executive’s journey home for Thanksgiving. Roger Ebert included the film in his “Great Movies” collection and said about the film, “Steve Martin and John Candy don’t play characters; they embody themselves.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1d036a04-1a1b-4762-9aa9-cf4ab8af92de/C%27mon+C%27mon.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide C’mon C’mon is a black and white A24 flick written by the director of Thumbsucker, a lesser-known Keanu Reeves movie. Critics love the story of an unexpected relationship between a man and his young nephew as they bond over a road trip. It’s Phoenix’s first film since his contentious role as the Joker. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b5371810-980d-4272-a642-b701c00d1b52/hoo-ah.jpg Guides - Watch Guide Scent of a Woman is about a prep school student who accepts a weekend job to look after a blind former army colonel over Thanksgiving break. It’s based on an Italian film of the same name which was adapted from a book. Al Pacino carries the film with support from Chris O’Donnell and Phillip Seamore Hoffman. Pacino’s Academy Award-winning performance is guaranteed to make you say “hoo-ah!” by the end of the film. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/09941d2d-7e07-4640-ad58-1e9e50d6d9af/The+Nice+Guys.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide One of the most wholesome rated-r films ever made, The Nice Guys, is now available on Hulu. This cult classic is a great way to break the tension between you and your parents after returning home for the Thanksgiving weekend. You and your family can investigate the complex plot with Russel Crowe and Ryan Gosling, whose witty banter made the film a slow-burning success. Gosling’s loveable goofball creates a winning chemistry with Crowe’s overdramatic hard-boiled ego. Critics have compared it to Inherent Vice for the film’s nod to the genre of hysterical realism. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1634514650222-IBWD0IZ3MEFBE153PWVW/Malignant+2021.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide Annabelle Wallis from The Tudors, Peaky Blinders, and Annabelle returns to the horror genre to star in James Wan's Malignant. Wan is the man behind the Saw franchise and The Conjuring movies. Wallis portrays Madison Lake Mitchell, who begins to see visions of murders after her abusive husband injures her head. Once she realizes these visions are actually happening, Madison approaches the authorities to help discover who is responsible for a series of murders. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1634515237608-HBD6NQFDR7MOKLG06DGT/Venom+Let+There+Be+Carnage+2021.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide If you're looking for some mindless entertainment, the Venom franchise returns with Venom: Let There Be Carnage. The first installment grossed $856 million worldwide despite getting panned by critics. The film, which is carried by Tom Hardy, is more about having a good time than headier entertainment. Andy Sirkus, or Gollum as most people know him, directs Let There Be Carnage, and it's based on a story co-written by Hardy himself. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1634515584710-YEMEIOKL7LG6JOPBKYFN/Titane+2021.jpeg Guides - Watch Guide For a more thoughtful way to scratch your spooky itch this month, check out Titane. Titane is a body horror film directed by Julia Ducournau, responsible for the coming-of-age horror drama Raw. Titane made Ducournau the second woman to win the Palme d'Or award at the Cannes Film Festival. Titane's plot is filled with thrilling twists and turns, causing Rolling Stone magazine to refer to it as "genre-bending." https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1634516304826-TN6KH5T5BXHIB8OM12Q5/Squid+Game+2021+%7C+Netflix.png Guides - Watch Guide A gory Korean survival drama, Squid Game exploded on Netflix upon release. Squid Game is about a contest where 456 members play various children’s games like Red Light, Green Light, Tug of War, and Marbles for a cash prize reward. It sounded simple to the main character, Seong Gi-hun, until he found out the penalty for losing each game was death. Director Hwang Dong-hyuk first pitched the nine-episode series in 2008 but was unable to find support until 2019, when Netflix picked up the script to grow their foreign programming selection. https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/read-guide monthly 0.5 2024-06-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5ecf83e4-4d4e-42fe-a5bd-a7dcd0345f98/65E1ACFC-D0F5-49FF-BFF1-8FDBF8CC0F6E.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/4aff9333-81e7-4965-9070-b397fe210339/4F206991-C4E7-4C0A-910A-8575119BBB24.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9839bf0d-8216-43bf-a98d-3dd97a9fbf52/C499FEDF-1338-4F82-AE70-65BB098602DE.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/98aff47f-c272-43c4-8ea3-16482c2ecbdf/0B7F5332-3E88-4BEA-911B-5FD926D7AF87.jpeg Guides - Read Guide Despite being married and fathering two sons, Oscar Wilde was secretly gay. After starting an affair with a poet, Alfred, who was 16 years younger than him, he was essentially outed by his lover’s father via a calling card in which he referred to Wilde as a “posing somdomite,” misspelling sodomite. Sodomy was outlawed in England at the time in the late 1800s. Despite this, Wilde tried to sue his lover’s father for libel. The defense used The Picture of Dorian Gray to imply that Wilde seduced Alfred with erotic themes in the novel. It resulted in Wilde serving two years in prison. Dorian Gray is about a man who wishes to sell his soul so that a painting of him ages instead of him. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/31a08dde-e247-4463-9554-5c4769b9729c/giosroom.jpg Guides - Read Guide James Baldwin was an American writer and Activist who also moved to France. Giovanni’s Room is about an American living in Paris named David. The book covers a lot of different subjects, like identity, isolation, gender, and sexuality, but the main focus is David’s relationship with the eponymous Italian bartender, Giovanni. From this description, Giovanni’s Room seems semi-autobiographical or some form of autofiction. But Baldwin insists that, despite being influenced by his life in Paris, the book is not autobiographical. David is actually a blonde man Baldwin met who was later executed. Thus it’s easy to presume Baldwin did not base Giovanni on one of his partners. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/76c6e3f3-7fe5-4d77-b2e2-957dd4eb4e03/4E4ED979-F7B7-4609-8351-FCCE9BC55E08.jpeg Guides - Read Guide Queer is technically William S. Burroughs’ second novel and a spiritual sequel to his first, Junkie; however, it wasn’t published until 1985 because, in 1953, when he finished writing it, the explicit homosexuality in it was seen as obscene. His next and most famous novel, Naked Lunch, was published in a timely manner in 1959 and landed him in a Boston obscenity trial. Naked Lunch remains the last work of literature consisting of only words to face such a trial in history. Queer is a relatively short autofiction that follows protagonist Lee in his futile pursuit of a man named Gene Allerton. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d7d5e043-87f6-4362-9a53-c5339d0effb0/choke.jpg Guides - Read Guide Chuck Palahniuk found unexpected success with his first book, Fight Club, which I’m sure you’ve heard of as he sold the rights for its adaptation into a wildly popular film starring Brad Pit and Edward Norton. Palahniuk reluctantly came out in 2008. He was concerned an interviewer he confided in about his partner off the record would out him. Though his work does not often feature explicitly gay characters, most of his characters are working through being marginalized in some way. Choke, probably his second most extolled novel is about a sex addict turned con man to help support his mother. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9961a533-0377-481b-a043-59209803539f/04F3B905-86DF-43F1-ADBB-55186E373CA1.jpeg Guides - Read Guide Gertrude Stein was an American modernist writer, though she moved to France in 1903. Tender Buttons is probably her most famous work and an excellent introduction to her writing style. Stein’s technique of recontextualizing everyday objects was called “verbal cubism” by Poets.org. Though poetry is decidedly subjective, especially when it is as novel as Stein’s, many people interpret the poems to have an underlying theme of lesbianism. It’s hard to deny the sexual-sounding nature of the title. Personally, I found her poems to be much deeper than sexuality, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be multifaceted, either. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b30f130f-b28b-4334-ac33-25f65c394e3a/oscar-wow.jpg Guides - Read Guide The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao has won several awards, was praised by many critics, and sold almost 40 thousand copies in the first three months of its publication. It follows the titular character through his undergraduate career at Rutgers. Oscar struggles with finding love and having a social life as an overweight mixed-race Dominican-American nerd. The book also follows his travels back and forth between his hometown of New Jersey and the Dominican Republic. Junot Díaz wrote Oscar Wao in Spanglish without offering translation for the Spanish segments. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/7fbcbb34-6cb5-484c-a74b-1ead05330e15/this-is-wat.png Guides - Read Guide This Is Water is an essay David Foster Wallace read as a commencement speech to Kenyan College in 2005. Wallace later published it into a short 138-page book in 2009. His speech offered a uniquely sympathetic perspective on adult life to the 2005 graduating class. The part that stood out to me most when I read it was his parable of being stuck in rush hour traffic only to wait in the post-work rush grocery store line in this endless cycle of mundanity and how now one explained to him growing up that this was a large part of adult life. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1ebae072-7f6c-4ef8-8d4c-210c433c6410/AE6CA9D2-6859-45B8-81FF-95A94F3A08F9.jpeg Guides - Read Guide Now that you’re an adult, it’s probably a good idea to understand personal finance. Tiffany Aliche has got you covered. Known as “The Budgetnista,” Aliche is a personal finance expert. Her passion for personal finance arose after losing her job as a teacher in The Great Recession. It eventually led her to create The Budgetnista, a personal finance education company dedicated to empowering women. Get Good With Money is her ten-step guide for achieving financial stability. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/a4b962a2-b7ef-462c-aeb8-a9311cbbfb49/rules-of-att.jpg Guides - Read Guide You probably know Bret Easton Ellis best from his book American Psycho which Edward R. Pressman made into a film starring Christian Bale. It’s an odd occurrence of a film adaptation made as good as the original text without making it obsolete. The film took on a life of its own, but the book is this cerebral work of stream-of-conscious writing. Rules of Attraction is written in the same style, starting and ending mid-sentence. Rules of Attraction follows Sean Bateman in his fictional liberal arts undergraduate program. Sean’s older brother becomes the main character in American Psycho. It’s a satire of college culture. After you read it, you’ll realize that these were possibly not the greatest years of your life, as people often say. It’s just the beginning. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/51fd8d8b-5a11-4a67-8686-001f2edaa698/leaves-n-grass.jpg Guides - Read Guide If you weren‘t already aware, Walt Whitman was an American romantic poet living during the 19th century. Though romanticism started in Europe, one of its fundamental tenets is the appreciation of nature. America in the 19th century had an abundance of raw land, as it turns out. Leaves of Grass is a collection of poems that explores Whitman’s humanistic philosophies. Like Thoreau, Whitman was part of a movement of secularization that was concerned with deifying nature, shifting focus from religion to the material realm. Whitman described early cover art for the collection as symbolizing “being one with nature.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/cd679656-7b65-4fd4-868a-91831f39873b/walden-out.jpeg Guides - Read Guide Henry David Thoreau was a philosopher, an essential figure in the transcendental movement, and a close friend to its founder Ralph Waldo Emerson. Transcendentalism is a philosophical movement that started during the late 1820s in America. Transcendentalists were secularists who saw divinity in nature and believed people to be inherently and independently good, only corrupted by society’s institutions. Though Emerson founded the movement, Thoreau was more extreme and jailed for refusing to pay taxes. Walden is about that social experiment. For two years, two months, and two days, Thoreau sequestered himself in a cabin in the woods owned by Emerson, recording precise observations on nature, living alone, and providing for himself. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/3c621543-9c9f-4864-813e-c923fc9a06c9/blow-up-a-pipe.jpg Guides - Read Guide How to Blow Up a Pipeline: Learning to Fight in a World on Fire is a critique of pacifist climate activism. Andreas Malm is advocating not for assassination or warfare but sabotage. How to Blow Up a Pipeline started as an inquiry into the lack of climate activism. But what Malm ended up taking issue with was the quality of climate activism. It’s unarguably an original stance and particularly interesting given the recent Black Lives Matter protests over lockdown. With an existential threat like climate change that affects humanity as a whole, it’s a wonder no one has even thought to suggest anything other than nonviolent protest and education. Most criticism of the book is nuanced, praising Malm for his valid points and questioning whether sabotage could do more harm than good. While Malm doesn’t explicitly describe how to sabotage, focusing more on why to do so, How to Blow Up a Pipeline has still been met with reproval from more right-leaning interpreters. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/a32f2ba9-81cb-4f70-9267-9f4e36bd0ac5/sixth-extinct.jpg Guides - Read Guide In The Sixth Extinction, journalist Elizabeth Kolbert argues that the earth is experiencing another mass extinction event, like what happened to the dinosaurs. Mostly, Kolbert finds climate change to be a chief factor in causing widespread extinction during the Anthropocene era, the Anthropocene being the geological epoch during which the earth started to become significantly impacted by the presence of humans. As a journalist and not a scientist herself, Kolbert’s work relies on interviews and extensive research of her own. Kolbert explores some nonhuman-related extinctions but mostly covers species wiped out by human activity. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/a23d8c83-dd37-4eb8-9660-efa4608dd434/Inanna.jpg Guides - Read Guide It’s women’s history month. Why not read the earliest known author in human history? That is correct, folks; the first writer in recorded history was the poet Enheduanna, the priestess of the moon in ancient Sumeria. Enheduanna wrote hymns inscribed on clay tablets dedicated to various Sumerian deities. The most recent translation of her work was published in 2000 and comes to about 250 pages. While this is the most lauded on Goodreads, it is not without some criticism. Mostly if readers took issue with it, they condemned the translator’s personal interpretations, not the translation itself. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/c591f891-6652-4c35-9be4-a952b029ca85/The+Handmaid%27s+Tale.jpeg Guides - Read Guide The Handmaid’s Tale is an easy, linear read. I was assigned it in high school and found it to be quite compelling. At the time, I was really into dystopian fiction for some reason. In Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood takes misogyny to a logical extreme. In the exposition, an extremist regime takes over the US and reduces civil liberties, particularly for women. Coincidentally, pollution has made fertility rare among women, so the government creates a caste system in which fertile women serve essentially as childbearing vassals for commanders. The book has won several awards. Atwood sold the rights for the book’s adaptation to film, opera, and, most recently, television. After the television series was released, Atwood published a sequel called, The Testaments. Transpiring 15 years after Handmaid’s Tale, The Testaments’ narrative form assumes the perspective of three women, one of whom was also in the previous book. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5c50daa9-2a24-4b53-aa27-0791c1596e84/time-is-mothering.jpg Guides - Read Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/2f6b539a-516c-472a-ad70-6d5d12febe31/A+Room+of+One%27s+Own.jpeg Guides - Read Guide Though I do jump at any excuse to talk about Virginia Woolf, it’s actually relevant this time. A Room of One’s Own is an almost 200-page essay based on a couple of lectures Woolf gave at two different women’s colleges affiliated with Cambridge. The book is about how society does not nurture women in the same way that men are to become great writers and probably a lot of other professions. This is summed up in the title, which references an excerpt of the essay, “A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.” A good chunk of the book explores the idea of a female Shakespeare and whether society is capable of producing one, at one point creating a hypothetical character, Judith Shakespeare, Shakespeare’s sister. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1d44a031-393d-4c69-85b5-370f0f3473b5/twelf.jpg Guides - Read Guide Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/ce81f31c-6803-45d7-964f-7c8318dd1dee/richard-yates-tao.jpg Guides - Read Guide Tao Lin is known for blending fiction and reality with his brand of Kmart realism. Kmart realism has been around since the 80s. It is a form of minimalist literature that portrays the lives of its characters as being consumed by capitalism or entrenched in consumer culture, if you will. Lin’s style often involves writing what would be straightforward autobiographies if not for the characters having different names and other minor artistic liberties. Lin based Richard Yates on a long-term relationship with a 16-year-old when he was 22. The two characters converse extensively through the Gmail chat client. It landed Lin in some trouble when the 16-year-old in the relationship, who now goes by E. R. Kennedy, accused him of abuse on Twitter. Though once feminist magazine Jezebel reported on this, Kennedy deleted the tweets and asked them to remove the article. While Taipei features what is probably a healthier relationship with a character based on Lin’s ex-wife, Megan Boyle, it feels less focused on the relationship and more on his life at the time in general. Richard Yates exclusively focuses on one romantic relationship. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/3539522b-37f7-4a54-809e-6bc862b74a4d/great-gats.jpg Guides - Read Guide If you didn’t read this in high school, there’s no time like the present. Though somewhat of a tragedy, there’s no doubt that love fuels The Great Gatsby. Love, unfortunately, ends up seeing its demise to capitalism, class politics, and conspicuous consumption as we see two characters, pulled apart by social circumstances, find themselves in a distressing situation when they try to be together. The book seems to reflect F. Scott Fitzgerald’s own struggle with trying to find love without wealth. Several films have been made of The Great Gatsby, but none of them garnered particularly favorable reviews, one even earning the direct scorn of the author and his wife. Apparently, they’re trying again, this time as a CGI animated feature. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8ba1eb7e-b789-4353-bbd8-81802af9d400/pisces.jpg Guides - Read Guide Melissa Broder is a poet, author, and essayist. She has a viral Twitter account called “so sad today” with almost 100k followers. Previously having written only poetry and essays published in Vice, The Pisces is her first prose work. It follows the story of a graduate student’s love affair with a merman. The merman character can be seen as an analog for her real-life husband, who has a neuroimmune disease that forces him to stay in bed for extended periods of time, depending on Broder to care for him. Broder goes into more specific detail on their relationship in her podcast Eating Alone in My Car. Lionsgate picked up the book, and Broder is in the process of adapting it to a film script. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/599499ee-5a2d-458a-8d8d-e615118912a2/magical-thinking.jpg Guides - Read Guide This December, we lost award-winning investigative journalist Joan Didion at age 87. Now seems like a better time than ever to read her Pulitzer Prize-winning autobiography, A Year of Magical Thinking. Magical Thinking is about the sudden death of her husband, John Dunne, and her daughter’s fatal illness. Dunne was a journalist himself, and they often collaborated on work. He died of a heart attack while their daughter Quintana was in the hospital with pneumonia. Joan didn‘t know it at the time, but Quintana would die soon after she published this book. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/687349ea-656a-4409-8b4b-b13d5761b227/takin-over.png Guides - Read Guide Most people know Brandon McCartney as Lil B, “The BasedGod.” McCartney has recorded thousands of tracks since splitting from his group The Pack in 2009. That same year he released his self-help book, Takin’ Over: By Imposing the Positive! My Personal Rap to You. Released at the beginning of his solo career, Takin’ Over lays the groundwork for the philosophy present in a lot of Brandon‘s work, an introduction to BasedWorld, if you will. The main thing about Brandon‘s “based” philosophy is boundless positivity. Reviews on Goodreads compare Takin’ Over to the Bible, calling it “the most valuable book ever created.” One reviewer noted, “I feel strangely at ease now.” Takin’ Over is a great way to bring in the new year if you can manage to find a copy of it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/19868601-4975-4335-9645-2b86f23d3333/will.png Guides - Read Guide Will Smith is the titular character of his own story in his new book Will. Will is the motivational, true story of a man who made it big in Hollywood, that man, of course, being Will Smith. Will Smith wrote the memoir with Mark Manson, the self-help author who defined himself from the mountain of other self-help authors by using the “F” word in the title of his two novels, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck and Everything Is Fucked: A Book About Hope. If that wasn‘t enough positive energy, Smith also recorded a reality television show while writing the book called Best Shape of My Life about, you guessed it, getting back into shape after lockdown caused him to lose his action-hero physique. The show is available for free on YouTube. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/66099d19-413e-4403-a7be-0f067d0796d0/atomic-habs.jpg Guides - Read Guide Atomic Habits is a wildly popular self-help book by James Clear. Clear is a former athlete and weightlifter awarded the ESPN Academic All-American title for pitching in baseball. Atomic Habits is Clear’s first book, released in 2018 and has nearly 60 thousand positive reviews on Amazon. Clear‘s self-help method revolves around controlling habits, replacing bad habits with good habits. Clear motivates his readers by asking them to think hypothetically about improving their life. If it were possible to improve by 1% each day, “you would end up 37 times better at the end of the year.” Clear asks his readers to set tangible goals for themselves to become the person they want to be and envision themselves failing, so they can make detailed plans to reach those goals. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0596a865-e239-4bfc-8e1b-4dfd7a4cf880/skipping-christmas.jpg Guides - Read Guide John Grisham is known for his legal thrillers, but this book is quite different for him. Grisham imagines a couple who opts to eschew all holiday festivities one year and instead book a cruise to the Caribbean. The novel was adapted into a film called Christmas with the Kranks. Critics panned the film version, but it has 20,000 five-star reviews on Amazon, so make of that what you will, and have a great holiday! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0e3827f0-4423-476c-8b24-3fedaba6fdcf/all-others-pay.jpg Guides - Read Guide “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid!” That iconic phrase from the 1983 film A Christmas Story finds its origin in In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash by Jean Shepherd. Shepherd rose to fame on the radio in the late 40s and 50s. As a humorist, Shepherd didn‘t consider himself a writer when children’s poet Shel Silverstein tried to convince him he was. To prove this to him, Silverstein transcribed several of his stories. This inspired Shepherd to start writing, publishing long-form essays regularly in Playboy. This book is a collection of those essays and some of his more popular radio stories. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8f3e607f-40c5-48f2-8b5c-0dbd79187fc9/mrdickens.jpg Guides - Read Guide You’ve probably experienced A Christmas Carol in a number of ways by this point in your life. Samantha Silva’s book explores how Charles Dickens came up with the quintessential Christmas classic. You can also check out Les Standiford’s take on the same phenomenon called, The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens‘s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits. Standiford’s book focuses on how Dickens effectively popularized the holiday. It’s received slightly less glowing reviews but has recently been turned into a film. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0a2621ea-64ff-4850-a71a-21fe3f342637/letters-from.jpg Guides - Read Guide Also known as The Father Christmas Letters, this book was released posthumously by the Tolkien estate in 1976, originally written and illustrated by Tolkien for his children. Tolkien frames the story in the form of letters between Santa and his elf secretary. It features a battle with goblins, which many interpret as reflecting Tolkien's views on the Nazi Party. I had the smaller copy growing up, but I've heard the newer, larger version gives you a better look at the illustrations. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0f5a6cd0-f17c-48f4-b19a-25b8e2202e91/thnxgiving-viz.jpg Guides - Read Guide Truman Capote’s The Thanksgiving Visitor is a sequel to A Christmas Memory. A Christmas Memory was an autobiographical short story has become a holiday classic that was broadcasted, recorded, filmed, and staged several times. The Thanksgiving Visitor is a tale about a boy and his bully. It was also adapted to film the same year it was published with Geraldine Page, who won an Emmy for her performance in it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/58573925-b4be-43d1-953c-df935794e395/abe-linkedin.jpg Guides - Read Guide A lesser-known fact about Abraham Lincoln is that he wrote poetry. Since he’s essentially responsible for Thanksgiving, November seems like an appropriate month to delve into this president’s side project. There’s probably no insight into the spirit of the holiday, but his work is generally regarded by critics as being worth reading. Lincoln’s love of literature was a point of contention for his family, who considered him lazy for reading so often. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/848a785e-460d-4a1c-8d3e-66629750bf61/crack-up.jpg Guides - Read Guide If you’re looking to read something more festive, check out F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Crack-Up. The Crack-Up is a collection of essays written by Fitzgerald. The collection includes unpublished letters, notes, and three essays originally published in Esquire. You can read the titular one on Esquire’s site if you already have a subscription. The Crack-Up features instructions for Thanksgiving leftovers and a three-page recipe for turkey. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8dc94689-ffc9-48e8-935e-1997d6d3d955/ring-shout.png Guides - Read Guide A Ring Shout is a religious ritual performed by African slaves in America where worshipers shuffled in a circle, stomping, clapping, and occasionally shouting was incorporated. It’s also the title of P. Djèlí Clark’s latest book. Aside from being horror, Ring Shout is in the alternative history genre. It is about a quest to fight demons summoned by the Ku Klux Klan in 1922. NPR said the book was driven by history and hatred and that history was as much a part of the book as fiction. The main inspiration for the novel is The Birth of a Nation, a silent film about the assassination of Abraham Lincoln that has been called “the most reprehensibly racist film in Hollywood history.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b0d8fd79-19ce-49f1-876c-f23ed050f1fe/american-psycho.jpeg Guides - Read Guide You’ve seen the memes. Maybe you’ve even seen the movie, but have you read American Psycho? American Psycho is indeed about a playboy investment banker who has had everything handed to him, descending into madness and becoming a serial killer. The film is fantastic in its own right. Christian Bale really takes to the character. The book is more about Ellis’ writing style. Written as a stream-of-consciousness narrative, American Psycho takes you on a roller coaster through the main character’s mind. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0b7a4510-6f95-4178-bb16-c373403a9f26/king-institute.jpg Guides - Read Guide It’s the perfect time to check out Steven King’s last horror novel. It wouldn’t be a Halloween reading list without Stephen King. Institute is actually King’s third newest book. His latest two books are crime novels, and being prolific as always he has another one slated for next year. The New York Times called Institute King’s scariest novel to date. The book is about a 12-year-old named Luke. Intruders break into Luke’s house, kill his parents, and kidnap him, taking him away to a facility with a bunch of other kids who have been kidnapped for the same reason. They all have telekinetic powers. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8c49d7a6-4ade-47fb-9bed-cf553a784508/house-leaves.jpg Guides - Read Guide House of Leaves is a sprawling novel about a family that moves into what is essentially a haunted house. What exactly is haunting the house isn’t a ghost, however. Instead, the house is somehow larger inside than it is outside. But hold on because there are actually two stories. The plot in House of Leaves is nestled in a story about a tattoo artist who finds what is read as the main story in the form of a manuscript left in his new apartment when he moves in. The novel features commentary from the tattoo artist and follows him on his own journey as he reads about the house himself. https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/listen-guide monthly 0.5 2024-06-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/bd66c7ac-e897-4fdc-af90-0bdf87939a1a/5C1824CC-0BE1-4933-B387-20EAB8140CC2.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide In terms of Father releases, I must admit that this one isn’t a high point for me. Centel Mangum’s flows aren’t weak, but I’ve already heard most of it. Maybe it’s just me, but I can’t stand when artists drop a bunch of singles instead of an album. It’s even worse when their next album comprises all those singles. Out of the 12 tracks, there’s one interlude and then six tracks Mangum released as singles. So it doesn’t feel new to me. I want to stress that this record is only anticlimactic to me because I had previously played those singles so many times. I’m mostly just griping about how it was released. If you haven’t been keeping up with his releases, it’s perfect summer listening, and so is most of Father’s extremely laid-back discography. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d884aa36-fe21-4de4-be5f-ceabf5da8306/3F532A28-8971-492E-839A-38708F983E06.png Guides - Listen Guide Noah Lennox came up in the scene with the psychedelic experiment group Collective, but he changed the game with his second (or third if you count his underground album) solo album, Person Pitch. Lennox used samples to create psychedelic pop songs in a way no one had before. If you listen to all his releases, you’ll notice he switches from all synth to guitar and synth every other album. Tomboy is one of his mixed medium pieces. It’s kind of like an ode to surf rock with a lot of heavily reverbed chords played on a jangly Fender. With tracks like “Surfers Hymn” and “Last Night at the Jetty,” it’s giving beach vibes. Not to mention the rest of Lennox’s discography often presents an island aesthetic, which may be a result of his influences from world music and The Beach Boys. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8ab05722-f824-4c6a-9a29-18bb821945fc/BCD15CC6-7CAD-46A8-87C6-DE8157A4BAB0.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Petrol Girls’ lead woman Ren Aldridge is angry, and she has reason to be. If there’s one motivation to listen to Baby, it’s for the scarily prescient track “Baby, I Had an Abortion,” which the group released as a single in February. Petrol Girls seem to draw a lot of influence from the Riot Grrrl movement, with most of the tracks featuring Ren shouting, at least tangentially, about women’s rights. It’s a little preachy at times, but it’s something we all need to hear this summer. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5fbe1bd8-82bb-4257-a832-c9865af0fffc/38B90B23-B33A-4CCF-A436-98579A5C5E9B.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide This is essentially the first dub album. Dub is a subgenre of Reggae, though usually it’s instrumental and consists primarily of drum and bass. In a sense, it’s a precursor to the genre of drum and bass, but 90s drum and bass music typically had a faster bpm. Some big staples of dub are heavy use of reverb and delay echo effects. Perry passed away last year in late August. This collaboration with King Tubby is the perfect mood music for a relaxing summer. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/56a88e36-d3f1-4797-bd91-8f803f2a44f3/A4041876-0321-4346-8A29-0294BDF70F57.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Everyone is freaking losing their mind about how the Weeknd is bringing back 80s synth sounds with a neo-retro artistic twist, but Neon Indian has been doing this since 2009. Well, at least until he effectively quit music in 2015. Psychic Chasms kicks off with “Deadbeat Summer” after a short intro. A pioneer of chillwave, Alan Palomo, will melt your brain with his washed-out lo-fi synths making it a perfect soundtrack for another summer of record-breaking heat. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/eb9d58b2-1030-4b32-bd35-9084372bf493/EA5AFE94-90A7-4A8D-9F3E-4F122102DF66.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/94f4fd5a-a80c-4cdb-8dff-327897423e2e/F4A6328F-2D65-4422-B1DB-EB2564D51AA3.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Sean Bowie’s first two albums are ambient electronica with occasional light vocals. They dropped their first vocal album, Safe in the Hands of Love, in 2018, followed by Heaven to a Tortured Mind in 2020. Safe continues they’re electronic exploration into plunderphonics, but in 2019 Bowie hired some recording musicians to help with Heaven, showing a return to tradition with more psychedelic, glam, and experimental rock-sounding tracks. In 2021, they dropped an EP called The Asymptotical World, which continues this sonic investigation. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e66fed64-2894-4a26-80e7-6fbd21454f79/183BFD4C-5A02-41E5-ADF7-9FBBDF4CF8A1.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Mykki Blanco started as a Youtube persona that eventually culminated in a music career in 2012, but not before she published a book of poetry called From the Silence of Duchamp to the Noise of Boys. Her influences range from Lil Kim, GG Allin, Rihanna, and Marilyn Manson, to Anaïs Nin, Jean Cocteau, the riot grrrl movement, and queercore. The most notable thing about Blanco’s music is her distinct voice and lyrical content. She’s been HIV-positive since 2011. She received some backlash for not coming out earlier, which resulted in her temporarily deactivating her Twitter. You might recognize Blanco from her collaborations with Blood Orange, Teyana Taylor, and Kanye West. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d1bb2f42-8d17-446e-8930-fc5c36952c89/6ECB699D-A7C2-4D0F-9B12-4BE1F86601F0.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide I forget exactly how I navigated to Dorian Electra on the internet. I think I just saw a thumbnail on Youtube and thought it looked interesting. I guess I have the algorithm to thank for showing me “Jackpot.” It’s probably my favorite song by them. I just really dug the synth tones used in that track. If you like electronic music as much as I do, you’ll love Dorian. They’re quite solidly in the genre of hyperpop and have collaborated with 100 Gecs, Charli Xcx, Alice Glass, The Garden, and Rebecca Black, to name a few. Electra identifies as queer and genderfluid, often performing in drag with a drawn-on pencil stache. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8a582fb2-25a4-46fe-b6e1-b0fc09d47004/CC1B011C-20C3-41E5-A8E7-AB731701BE6E.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Deerhunter is an experimental rock band from Atlanta fronted by Bradford Cox, who also creates music as Atlas Sound. Cox struggled with Marfan syndrome in his teens, spending a lot of time in and out of hospitals. He found the experience desexualizing and for many years identified as asexual before coming out as gay in a 2011 Rolling Stone interview. In 2019 he came out as nonbinary and started wearing wigs on stage though he’d been performing in dresses since the early days of Deerhunter. Cox has shown immense love for music through his vast representation of genres in his work. Deerhunter progressed from a punk band with their first album, pivoting from shoegaze to psychedelic pop, which peaked with Halcyon Digest, followed by an explosion of southern rock in Monomania. In 2018 they released a lo-fi instrumental cassette called Double Dream of Spring. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/bd597ece-922b-4c90-adfd-76e513a5907e/F6A1A0F6-687F-4BD9-B589-8052C1636DE4.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Michael Hadreas dropped out of high school after receiving death threats for being openly gay. After working as a doorman in Williamsburg for some years, he eventually moved back home to Seattle, where he started producing music under a moniker inspired by the film Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. Hadreas’ breakthrough album was No Shape. Up until that time, his albums were mostly stripped-back ensembles of vocals and keys. No Shape introduces a vast array of synth sounds, followed by his more traditional though still lush-sounding Set My Heart on Fire Immediately, which has a somewhat David Bowie, or at least 70s, vibe. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/593c4d7e-9266-491c-91d5-cf9991dfbac3/DFE6496C-7B64-4937-A847-DD0A090CDEEE.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Jamie Stewart started Xiu Xiu in 2002. Stewart has created some of the most sincere and difficult to listen to music. His style ranges from cacophonous percussion and blaring synths like in “Don Diasco” to a raw, intimate, almost whispering delivery like in “Fabulous Muscles.” Stewart’s vocals are often quivering, like Connor Oberst and many other emo singers, but his instrumentation doesn’t match this style. Stewart will often employ a poetic delivery like on the tracks “Support Our Troops, OH!” and “Mary Turner Mary Turner.” Steward makes it clear he wants to challenge his listeners by forcing them out of their comfort zone, often throwing in off-beat interludes if the music gets too predictable. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e3efd97d-ed42-49d8-ae1c-49cbd4b88c96/R-22872053-1649895694-3942.jpg Guides - Listen Guide This was the first Billy Woods album I’d heard. On my initial listen, I thought it reminded me most of Earl Sweatshirt, and it turned out he appeared on Earl’s last album. After learning that Woods has been around for much longer than Earl, I decided to delve into his work with Armand Hammer. Before meeting his bandmate, Elucid, Woods’ style was much more old-school influenced. While Elucid had a clear effect on Woods’ development as an artist, this album was definitely influenced at least somewhat by Earl. Aethiopes’ eclectic beats and recitation-like raps blend to form a heady sound. It’s not something for the club. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0b460b48-69c8-464a-9978-0fc7c56a4925/mr+mixondo.jpg Guides - Listen Guide DJ Travella’s Mr Mixondo decidedly is for the club. Well, sort of. I found Travella through composer and music educator Max Alper’s Instagram @la_meme_young. Alper posted a video of Travella djing what looked like a third-world rave outdoors in Africa. His command of the crowd was astounding. They were going completely bonkers. The actual song he was playing does not appear on the album. It sounded almost like he was cycling through effects and beat changes, but in a way, you’d expect to hear from experimental groups like Black Dice. Travella shows stunning resolve, creating beats on ancient Windows laptops and cell phones. The result is an experimental sound birthed out of legitimate necessity. It sounds most similar to footwork music from the States. It’s also reminiscent of nightcore with his use of high-pitched sped-up samples. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/98c286b2-7644-49f5-83f3-471fb5614892/387C0D52-9245-40E0-B03D-8B2EE6D0BF5E.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Do I need to tell you there’s a new Kendrick Lamar album? Well, I’m going to anyway, just in case. Kendrick hasn’t released an album in five years unless you count his Black Panther album, with music from and inspired by the Marvel film. Critics have almost universally lauded Kendrick since he dropped Good Kid, M.A.A.D City, but Damn. really had an effect on people, and you can tell by the way the album art was stylized that he intended to be distinct. Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers is his highly anticipated follow-up to that, and it’s a double album. Kendrick writes what’s known as conscious hip hop, which means his focus is on lyrical content centered around social issues, despite narrowly eschewing politics. Beat-wise, it’s not much to be desired, but “We Cry Together” is written in an experimental format that mimics a domestic dispute. My favorite track was “Silent Hill,” which was a nice balance between lyrical content and melodic style. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/febe9fd7-e94f-4d70-b495-c205da6b4201/almost+guy.jpg Guides - Listen Guide It’s been a minute since we got a full-length Pusha T album. 2018 feels like a different period of time after roughly three years of covid, but DAYTONA remains an excellent display of Pusha’s prowess as a rapper. It was also the year of his beef with Drake, which eventually culminated in Pusha outing Drake as a father with his diss track, “The Story of Adidon.” Almost Dry’s tracks are tag team produced by Kanye West and Pharell Williams. It’s hard to top “Infrared,” but I actually preferred Pharell’s beats over West’s on this album. Also, the Nigo track that appears on the album mentioned in last month’s list is featured here. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/f13b6d75-38e3-4674-842a-6a6c4f59795d/E7291594-6327-4D47-BB8A-E9805A0C0475.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide One time I described Future to someone as a machine because of his consistent, prolific production of music content. Future doesn’t always make the most memorable albums. There’s not a ton of variety in the sound between them, but that’s not necessarily bad. In a sense, he’s dependable. The only album I’ve heard from him that I couldn’t stand was HNDRXX, which is interesting because, Future, released earlier that year, was his album that stood out the most in a good way. I Never Liked You continues Future’s story as a toxic rich guy fueled in his debaucherous endeavors by his checkered past. He’s not pushing any envelopes at this point, but his tendency to not stand out too much creates the perfect party ambiance. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/cf5e39b7-3787-4273-bf83-f6125afb931d/AD953534-5B77-4267-86BC-195B0F7E8D23.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e1b3a83a-785b-4575-bb95-ed13c5ca8ad9/https___images.genius.com_680d35f24c38b2e33b7a102cc42bcccc.1000x1000x1.jpg Guides - Listen Guide I thought that aside from the bands I occasionally revisited from my youth, I would never be inspired by a hardcore band again. That was before I listened to Diaspora Problems. I saw the video for “Jump!! (Or Get Jumped!!!)((by the future))” and was not particularly impressed. Something about the album drew me in, though. I think a lot of it has to do with Soul Glo’s attitude, starting with their band name, which references a fictional hair product from Eddie Murphy’s comedy Coming to America. Hardcore music has to have a certain level of goofiness to balance out the otherwise harrowing tones and shrieks. It‘s something you notice from bands like The Locust. Soul Glo do not take themselves too seriously; that makes Diaspora Problems a supremely fun listen. I have no idea what he’s saying. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8429708b-26c7-4284-94cf-f1b8ecd2c248/https___images.genius.com_27e5552678c8bc0f5462de3c64e5b252.1000x1000x1.jpg Guides - Listen Guide Though the band officially broke up in 2011, Sonic Youth quietly released several compilations over the years. In/Out/In is one of those compilations of what sounds like unmastered tracks left on the cutting room floor between 200 and 2010. I like to think of this as an instrumental album, despite one jam out of the five having vocals. It accentuates what I like about Sonic Youth, which is their instrumentals. They’ve never really had groundbreaking lyrics. Growing up, I was blown away by their innovative guitar techniques. Now that I don’t really play anymore, it’s nice to hear some of their more ambient guitar work. I’m actually craving more of this. As I usually spend hours listening to ambient electronica, these microtonal, meditative, organic string sounds offer a welcome change of pace. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/f6660de8-0371-4bdc-8b3b-ad08ef8a31d7/https___images.genius.com_60637b7ce5771c287eb8582e811a445b.1000x1000x1.png Guides - Listen Guide Tomoaki Nagao is a Japanese fashion designer and record producer known for founding the streetwear brand A Bathing Ape (Bape). Nigo started his hip-hip career making beats for the Teriyaki Boyz. His first solo release dropped in 2000. I Know Nigo is his second solo release and first to feature primarily American rappers. I Know Nigo has big names spitting some quality verses. The album features multiple appearances from ASAP Rocky, Tyler, The Creator, Pusha T, Pharrell, and more. There’s even a track with the original Teriyaki Boyz. I wasn’t really expecting to enjoy this as much as I did because, unlike other producer-centered albums like those by Metro Boomin or Calvin Harris, I’d never heard his work before. But the rappers really brought the energy to this, and the beats didn’t slouch either. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1449a1a2-ea95-4ff1-8904-99b80486dc24/https___images.genius.com_3f07f0f2ee3a75dbc3a549d7149ae04f.1000x1000x1.png Guides - Listen Guide I was always a little unimpressed by Denzel, though his albums have received critical acclaim. For example, I expected to really like his last album, Unlocked, because it was a collaborative effort with producer Kenny Beats, but I found it too derivative. I have some memory of one of them claiming inspiration from MF DOOM for it. I thought they were emulating him too much. Melt My Eyes See Your Future has the potential to be the best hip-hop album of the year. To me, this is by far his best work. The beats are so clean; his flow is effortless. It really reminds me of Nas or 2Pac but in a good way. He makes several references to Pac too. Melt My Eyes feels a lot more modern than Unlocked did. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1e7a8312-4b0f-49bf-91ca-6172f9bfad49/https___images.genius.com_71697cf7f00c26c33d54b1bc59a3d31d.1000x1000x1.png Guides - Listen Guide Charli’s been on a roll since 2019. Charli’s main inspo for this was 80s music, referring to it as her Janet (Jackson) album in its nascent stages. There are also parts that remind me of Taylor Dayne and a pretty big nod to New Order’s “Bizarre Love Triangle.” Crash features vocal appearances from Caroline Polachek and Rina Sawayama and production from Daniel Lopatin, who also produced the last Weeknd album, regularly performing as Oneohtrix Point Never. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/7dd7dfb8-3f99-4f4e-9cab-63cf6e950ff2/https___images.genius.com_256c3f06b722a602d21f7a2ea48bde67.1000x1000x1.png Guides - Listen Guide Bladee and Ecco2K come from a group of Swedish rappers called The Drain Gang, affiliated with Yung Lean, often referring to themselves as Sadboys. Their style has been categorized as cloud rap or emo rap with ethereal vocals and dreamy beats. In early Lean tracks, you can hear him running out of breath. Bladee similarly raps in a barely-there style. I’ve never been a huge fan of Bladee, and I lost interest in Yung Lean after his first two releases as his style, from the beginning, was borrowing pretty heavily from cloud rap pioneer Lil B. This collaboration between Bladee & Ecco2k is so interesting, though, because they’re not even rapping on it. It’s basically an electropop album. Crest gives carousel vibes blissfully flowing from one track to the next. It sounds new and original. British electronic music producer Iglooghost creates the most similar style I’m aware of. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/dba0c6bc-d7f2-454e-b459-9a17ab2dffae/glitch-yeule.jpg Guides - Listen Guide This album is an experimental sonic exploration that really carves out its own space. Yeule has been compared to Sophie, Grimes, Enya, and Björk. She really has developed her own voice in this release. She’s not hyperpoppy like Sophie; she’s more focused than Grimes, edgier than Enya; she’s less orchestral than Björk. It’s really jarring to hear instrumentation that is so experimental with melodies that are so catchy they almost sound familiar. The album is broken in half nicely by an acoustic track that employs a cadence technique that one might hear in a Midwest emo song where the words sound like they’re tripping over each other. The album ends with a five-hour-long ambient track. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/ef922342-d873-4d3f-9e6f-da859930cda6/sketches.jpg Guides - Listen Guide This Matt Mondanile album came only a couple of months after the last one, Impressions. Mondanile tends to release everything he makes as an album instead of classifying certain tracks as b-sides. Sometimes he releases everything as a big compilation, like Hard Rock Cafe Chernobyl. The songs on Sketches are like the spiritual b-sides to Impressions. Most of the album is instrumental, but the dreamy, nostalgic production is nothing worth turning off, and the vocal tracks really carry the album. It sounds a little like being trapped in the elevator of a derelict mall. This album isn’t new, but I wrote this a while ago and kept pushing it back. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/8be954f2-1ba6-4000-ba92-8e2d4dd1a257/sick-earl.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide I found Sick to be a better effort than Feet of Clay, Earl Sweatshirt’s last release, but it’s harder to say if Sick tops Some Rap Songs. To me, Sick is Earl’s most MF DOOM influence work, whom he has cited as an influence. It’s also Earl’s first release since DOOM’s death in October of 2020. Interestingly, Earl has never been classified as a mumble rapper being that he’s employed a style of rapping that literally incorporates mumbling in parts. His style, however, gives off an impression of pensive introversion you don’t see with most mumble rappers. This is something he started in 2015, though, which really shows on his underground release Solace. He has more of a literary style. You could say he inherits this from his father, a Johannesburg poet, but that might be unfair to the artist himself, but his father has likely had some influence on him, being that Earl sampled him in Some Rap Songs. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/31d9678c-d0c7-4bb5-a5e8-4af29baf86f7/preyiv.jpg Guides - Listen Guide Alice Glass’s sound has evolved a lot since she left Crystal Castles. She’s taken her voice to a more industrial electropop sound, though the witch-house hip-hop style drums pervade much of the record. The breakup seems to have awakened a drive in her that wasn’t present before. It’s nice to hear vocal style accentuated and pushed forward with tracks that feel more cohesive. Crystal Castles sounds insubstantial in comparison. I’d been anticipating a full-length solo album since she dropped her first solo EP in 2017, which I found shocking and refreshingly different from her work with Crystal Castles. Her abusive relationship with previous band member Ethan Kath has inspired a lot of her lyrics since the breakup. Prey, and her last EP, were produced by Jupiter Keyes from HEALTH, whom Crystal Castles remixed on their first album. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/28b56318-210d-488a-98db-7d84b92b98c1/dragon-big.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/df3c151b-75fa-4e97-8165-f0dc83b26e1e/capri-sun.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Caprisongs is a really great follow-up to Fka Twigs’ last album. I found Magdalene to be much more ambitious or epic. Caprisongs is more grounded in reality with tracks like “tears in the club,” lots of features from rappers, and interludes of conversations from the studio. The conversations scatter what is otherwise a pretty straightforward pop album, and a good one at that. They allow the songs to breathe while also providing an urban setting, whereas Magdalene strived for a more otherworldly vibe. Despite being a decidedly pop effort, Caprisongs wouldn’t be a Twigs album if it didn’t retain a significant amount of the avant-garde. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9fb267e9-5128-4eb3-8887-4a1e3831ff2c/blonde-ocean.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide Nothing can get you in the mood for loving like some R&B and soul. For some reason, and I think James Brown had a big part to play, those genres became strongly associated with sex. Frank Ocean’s avant-garde approach is stripped-down, minimalistic, and spotlights his sultry, soulful vocal presentation. Those who are familiar with the intimate murmurs of Elliott Smith, who might have made it on this list if he wasn’t so depressing, thus being better for breakups, will recognize his influence on Ocean which becomes painstakingly clear on the track “Seigfried.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/3633283c-1b45-4db9-baa1-6f1f26232f2a/dirty-prince.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Is there a more sexual artist than Prince? I certainly can’t think of one. Like many other artists mentioned here, there are numerous options in Prince’s catalog that make for great Valentine’s Day music. Prince was the hardest to narrow down. Obviously, Purple Rain is his biggest album. I also read that his self-titled or Dirty Mind could be his “sexiest” album. I think his self-titled is a little lacking in cohesion. And Dirty Mind, though truly genre-defying, is a little too upbeat for romance, probably better for the car ride to the date or dancing. I’m going to say Sign O’ the Times is his most romantic work. Esquire rates it second behind Purple Rain on a comprehensive list of his albums. Purple Rain has quite a bit of tension, though, and seems to be describing a relationship with a lot of conflict. Every track on Sign O’ the Times, save for a few songs, suggests hopeless devotion to another soul. “Adore” really punctuates that sentiment. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e7f9095a-6f36-4ac3-8fe8-36e0e695a15e/endless-honeymoon.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Endless Honeymoon is a call-in show with married couple Natasha Leggero and Moshe Kasher. The hosts comedically help their listeners navigate their love lives. The show is exclusive to the Apple podcast app where it holds 4.8 stars from 3.5k reviews. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/52601960-0037-4752-8db7-9eb8637e6f99/love-letters.png Guides - Listen Guide - Love Letters is a podcast hosted by Meredith Goldstein, who, for nine years leading up to the launch of the podcast, wrote an advice column by the same name for The Boston Globe and continues to do so. The podcast features stories from guest speakers on a broad range of subjects related to love and sexual relationships. Goldstein investigates subjects brought up by listeners in search of advice by interviewing experts as well as offering her own personal input. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/969c1d9b-52eb-41b6-9cc0-9cb3c10d73bd/loveless-mbv.jpg Guides - Listen Guide Valentine’s Day can be a bit of a polarizing holiday for people. Nonetheless, it occurs this month, and it would be sacrilege not to mention a band with the holiday in their name. While their first album, Isn’t Anything, seems more explicitly related to the celebration of love with songs like “Cupid Come,” “Feed Me with Your Kiss,” “Soft as Snow (But Warm Inside),” (I wonder what that’s about) and “I Can See It (But I Can’t Feel It),” (same question) it’s interesting that Loveless shows up more on forums and lists as the best album to make out to. I guess it comes down to its vibe, which is more ethereal and downtempo than their first punkier sonic expedition making it more conducive to feeling someone up. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/a97817e9-47ff-4847-8004-bae0043b5c44/savage-love.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Dan Savage is an author, journalist, and activist. Like Meredith Goldstein, he writes a sex and relationship advice column that has a companion podcast; however, his has been around for much longer. Aside from relationship advice, Savage also explores political topics and sex and relationship-related news. A longer version of the podcast is available on the show’s website. Savage generally takes a position of support and acceptance of all kinks and offers his listeners advice on safely exploring their sexual identities. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/feeb5902-d643-4c36-b939-2fc216128e99/wish-cure.jpg Guides - Listen Guide The Cure is a band for lovers. While I’m personally guilty of making out pretty excessively to their self-titled album in high school, I went with Wish. I also didn’t choose Disintegration despite the single “Love Song” being on that one because it gets kind of gloomy. Of course, a lot of their earlier work is more danceable, post-punk. Wish is an amazing album in that it can be extremely cerebrally passionate, but also features more upbeat tracks like the single “Friday I’m In Love,” a jangle-pop anthem that famously was sped and pitched up by accident and intentionally left that way on the final press of the record. It’s something you listen to with someone you really love. The Cure strike a perfect balance of the different styles they cycled through over the years, managing to sound clear despite the abundance of guitar effects and synthesizers, unlike MBV’s murky, washed-out approach. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1d498ba7-24aa-4caf-91c7-0ada360c6270/devo-beach.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Another popular choice that came up often in my research was Beach House’s Devotion. Devotion is more of an indie take on dream pop. Despite only consisting of two people, the band manages to produce a full and rich sound using keyboards, drum machines, and reverb. Like Portishead, Beach House combines sensual vocals with dark synth tones. But Beach House has more of a mystical sound. The beats aren’t as accented, making it notably more ambient and airy. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e610b942-7101-47f3-bc6a-6f42cb682c81/love-sade.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - It’s hard to narrow down the best albums about love as all of them seem to be. It’s also hard to narrow down Sade albums. I went with Love Deluxe because it has most of my favorite songs, though the one everyone knows, “Smooth Operator,” is on her previous record. The Best of Sade has a pretty good mix of both, but the best-of albums don’t feel incredibly romantic to me. Honestly, though, it feels like Sade was purposefully making music for passionate lovemaking. In case you somehow haven’t heard “Smooth Operator,” yeah, Sade is smooth jazz, but don’t call it lounge music. Wikipedia also labels it sophisti-pop and quiet storm, a subgenre of R&B, if that helps. I was surprised to find Love Deluxe also categorized as trip-hop, as it generally lacks the hip-hop angle, but I think a lot of the other aspects are present. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/7da0f77f-2367-4e62-9c86-6970ff40c788/dummy-port.jpg Guides - Listen Guide Dummy was another popular one on forums and lists. Portishead is probably the quintessential Trip-Hop band, a genre that originated in the 90s combining funk, dub, soul, jazz, and R&B, usually with hip-hop style beats and instrumentation in a psychedelic fashion. Beth Gibbons’ extremely seductive voice matches effortlessly to the ominous sounds produced by the rest of the band, creating a unique neo-noir sound unlike anything before it and unlikely to be replicated. Not to say that it’s dated, but it doubtlessly sounds distinctly from the 90s. I suppose that’s a result of hip-hop moving on collectively from relying heavily on jazz samples, which of course, only add to the sensual tone in Portishead’s case. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b9e42b96-ee25-431f-9fdf-9fa9a372da3e/eps-tierra.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/46ea5fdb-3dd5-4464-b7c1-40236da957a7/faith-death.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - This vaporwave duo‘s been quietly dropping albums for about six years now. Not a lot is known about them. For the most part, they present as ambient electronic music, but there are vocals of some sort, though it’s unclear if they’re samples or sung. A lot of the time, it’s hard to distinguish specific words. I can‘t say how Faith In Persona compares to their other work because this is my introduction to them. They seem to be contributing something new to the zeitgeist, though, or at least they’re trying to. If you‘re inspired by innovative music, Death‘s Dynamic Shroud is without a doubt here to do that. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/37d10efc-91ac-4fa3-9c4c-9f70b6b9a867/noisebro-merzbow.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Masami Akita is a prolific Japanese noise musician who goes by the alias Merzbow. Akita has produced countless releases over the course of his career, dropping over 27 works just this year. The most recent available on streaming services is Noisembryo / Noise Matrix which is actually a compilation album. According to his discography page on Wikipedia, Akita released an album named Noisembryo in 1994. You can‘t hear it on streaming services, at least not in the US. It‘s easy to say all Merzbow records sound the same at first. They’re aggressive sound collages that assault your ears; some just have more compelling sounds than others, which, I guess, boils down to personal preference. If you like the feedback at the beginning and end of most Nirvana songs, you’ll love Merzbow. Merzbow sounds a little like if you miked John Coltraine, jerry-rigged the volume to be loud enough to break glass, and then shot him into space. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/54c9f443-4b32-466b-b546-a60b24294ec6/kick-arca.jpg Guides - Listen Guide Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/647379f9-59db-437f-a974-a073d5720c0c/dawnfm-wknd.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Abel is making serious genre choices with this one. Dawn FM is now his second album produced by vaporwave pioneer Daniel Lopatin. With features like Tyler, the Creator, Lil Wayne, Quincy Jones, Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys, one of the Safdie brothers, and, yes, Jim Carrey, you’d think Dawn FM would be pretty bullet-proof. So far, I can’t find a problem with it. It’s a little harder to digest than his last album packed with infectious hooks. It actually bears a striking resemblance to Lopatin’s most recent album, Magic Oneohtrix Point Never, in that they draw heavily from AM/FM radio aesthetics. Whether it comes from Abel or Lopatin is unclear, not that it really matters. What listeners get is either a more artistic pop album or a poppier experimental album, depending on how it’s viewed. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/fc683945-f091-4350-9f85-7d093aa0649a/antidawn-burial.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Burial just dropped his EP Antidawn. William Emmanuel Bevan is often credited with popularizing Dub-Step. Despite what many people have come to believe, Dub-Step is not about wobble bass. It’s more about syncopated beat patterns that often give tracks an off-kilter feel like it‘s about to trip over itself. Burial’s style combines this beat pattern with ghostly vocal samples to a haunting effect; however, that prominent rhythm is missing from Antidawn, straying from his earlier work. There are parts where samples of crackles from microphone static or fire or drops of water create a sort of implied rhythm, making the EP a nice collection of ethereal sounds. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/60f7cbf1-290c-45de-bbbb-8c204929bc3e/christ-weezer.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Just in case you’re an anarchist who also loves Christmas, there’s Christmas with Weezer. Weezer is known for breaking pop punk’s characteristically naughty aesthetic by recontextualizing it as nerdy: really reaching an apex with their recent cover album that applied the Weezer formula unexpectedly to several established hits. Christmas with Weezer is just one step in that direction, exploring the valley between cool and geeky. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/81322343-6c00-482a-999f-d43059c46efd/every-sia.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - The season wouldn’t be complete without a contemporary pop ode to it. Throughout the years countless artists have contributed to this tradition, but few hit the nail as squarely as Sia. The album captures many of the sentiments on this list. Sia presents 13 completely original Christmas carols for all the coming seasons. Rarely does one see this amount of artistic effort channeled into a Christmas album and Sia pulls it off. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/49f5e68f-6c08-49ed-aef2-242b6c60fc69/oscar-christ.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Many jazz greats offer their take on Christmas, but few put forth much more than a song or two. Oscar Peterson devotes a whole album to jazzifying your favorite Christmas carols. There’s something about this album that makes it universally appreciable. The absence of vocals ensures nothing is jammed down anyone’s throat. The lengthy musical interludes that scramble the timeless riffs of classic carols almost let you forget it’s a Christmas album making your holiday season feel a little more intellectual. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/64bfdbb1-c23c-4017-9c91-e83e4d2d2f07/christmas-bboys.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - I never fully determined how sincere The Beach Boys were about their goofy harmonies. It hauntingly comes together well on tracks like “I Just Wasn‘t Made for These Times,” where these guileless jovial voices that could only be taken seriously in a time before the American sexual revolution really took hold are expressing a sort of existential depression. To hear them carol about childhood fantasies like Santa Clause sounds much more at home but creates an absurd positivity. Describing Santa’s Sleigh as a “candy-apple red” hotrod, as if he’s some kind of American bad boy, the Boys deliver a very distinctly American-sounding Christmas experience so sincere you question its faith. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d83bf945-d9c5-4752-91c7-e33450abb760/good-christ.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - If you’re out of food ideas for your holiday party, look no further. Tom Kerridge, a Michelin-starred chef, guides you through 152 and counting recipes. Kerridge also hosts the regular Good Food Podcast, produced by Good Food Magazine. If that’s not enough, check out the Good Food App. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/aa79f43b-8530-416c-b254-0fc46768c142/funky-jb.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - This album is perfect for getting you in the mood for a holiday party, shopping, or decorating. Turn it on first thing in the morning to find James Brown’s energy is as present on this album as it is on any of his other releases. Who wants a boring Christmas with those same tired chorus chants? Brown’s bluesy Christmas carols remind you that you’re still alive and kicking this year. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/0663a949-d9d0-4897-af94-3b11e8083589/songs-sufjan.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Maybe you’re really passionate about Christmas. Sufjan Stevens has got you covered. Stevens’ Songs for Christmas is a serene folk music ode to the season. Stevens lends his ghostly voice to some of the classics and also writes some original tunes for the five-volume collection. It’s perfect for watching the snowfall with a cup of cocoa and someone you really love or doing the same alone, meditating on the past year. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/ba559240-6b18-4a9a-9ff8-041b17b66392/anthems.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - Hana Walker-Brown started Anthems to talk about women’s issues and, in general, to give a voice to underrepresented people in the UK. The New Yorker said Anthems offered “a purposeful corrective to the predominantly white, predominantly male podcasting sphere.” Each episode features a guest speaker who recites original manifestos, speeches, stories, poems, or rallying cries. Last season Anthems focused on LGBQ+ voices. For its third season, Anthems will feature exclusively Black voices. You can listen to Anthems on Spotify, Apple’s Podcast App, or whatever you use to listen to podcasts. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/59e86493-5f52-41c1-b7c5-dd13b9530e92/lp-jpg.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - It’s been two years since Peggy blessed us with a full-length album. Following the trend of his last two eps, EP! and EP2!, Barrington has named this new release LP! LP! has a different tracklist depending on the medium you listen to it on due to sample clearance issues. For streaming services, the album has only 18 tracks, and several of them are from EP! If you listen on Soundcloud, Youtube, or you buy it on Bandcamp, you’ll get 20 tracks of all-new songs, except the first track, “TRUST!” which was released as a single previously. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d8ffef33-e6f9-4694-a970-1035622b06a6/shade-grouper.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - The same day that LP! dropped, Grouper released her 12th studio album, Shade. Liz Harris is a psychedelic folk and lo-fi ambient musician from Oregon. She developed a cult following with her breakthrough album Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill in 2008. Harris continues developing her transcendental style on Shade with her barely murmured vocals and ghostly instrumentals. Shade alters between stripped-down folk songs and washed-out dream-pop tracks. The album feels extremely vulnerable; on one track, she leaves in her saying, “Don’t worry, I’m not recording” at the end of the recording. On another track, she has to start a verse several times before moving on. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d306005c-bc86-493f-9287-04d7c9d99728/beginner-suf.png Guides - Listen Guide - Stevens and De Augustine secluded themselves in an upstate New York cabin to produce this album. Every day they watched movies, and as a result, each track was inspired by a film. Anthony Fantano said A Beginner’s Mind was “a return to the ornate and whimsical folk music that put Stevens on the map in the first place.” Stevens has also released a five-disc instrumental compilation this year inspired by the death of his father. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5e8676ff-8cdf-48b5-82b0-17d4352b664f/somtimes-simz.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - British-Nigerian rapper Little Simz released her fourth full-length album early this September called Sometimes I Might Be Introvert. The title is a backronym of her nickname, “Simbi.” Simz told NME that despite declaring herself to be introverted in the title of her album, the album is a very personal expression; however, she did say that opening up was difficult for her. With lines like “Is you a sperm donor or a dad to me?” it’s easy to see what she’s talking about, but the album remains relatable for Black women on her tracks like “Women.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9443b792-9af5-4ff5-802b-853e1a9d7f98/songwrights-esp.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Esperanza Spalding’s new album dropped on the 24th of September. While not known for pushing any envelopes, Spalding continues to release high-quality, contemporary jazz that perfectly exudes a chill coffee shop vibe. Pitchfork said Songwrights Apothecary Lab was “ a strangely romantic, sometimes didactic effort to mold the often private experience of listening and feeling the healing power of music.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/f55271aa-c766-46d6-8da6-f159dc4117e6/problem-john.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/95cfe433-8691-4fb1-9201-834ae74452fc/friends-james.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - James Blake is back with his fifth studio album, Friends That Break Your Heart. Blake’s new album features appearances by SZA, Joji, and JID, and production by Metro Boomin and Nico Muhly, a classical composer who’s worked with Bonnie Prince Billy, Grizzly Bear, Sufjan Stevens, and Joanna Newsom. Pitchfork called Friends that Break Your Heart “Blake’s most traditional album,” giving it a slightly above average score of 6.6. Blake won better reviews from NME and The Guardian, earning five and four stars, respectively. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/81a1abbc-53a3-4feb-a055-781051d79e81/monoliths-sun.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - What could be spookier than Doom metal? Any Sunn O))) record would do the trick for a haunted house, but Monoliths & Dimensions was their big breakthrough. Attila Csihar's Hungarian accent just adds to the mood, with his low guttural chants that sound like an ancient demon awakening. The band also performs in black cloaks and has appeared covered in fake blood and scary masks. If this is the Halloween vibe you’re going for, you can also check out Sleep, another iconic doom metal band. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/e3d677e8-94a6-432f-9713-a8d1dd59166e/ghost-lussuria.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Lussuria is another great choice for haunted houses, especially if you want the haunted house to be less guitar-driven. Ghost Entanglement is not only aptly titled but also features 40 minutes of overtly disquieting sounds, including slightly slowed and barely audible whispers. Not much can be made out, though the words “scared to death” are clear at one point. Lussuria uses discordant ambient synth tones to agitate the listener into a state of ecstatic anxiety. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/dbea1961-a2d6-4a9f-ad80-b5dec0c3d252/allhallows-afi.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - All Hallows is an EP you’ve definitely seen if you ever walked into a Hot Topic in the aughts. AFI draws a lot of influence from horror punk bands from the 80s, specifically the Misfits, whose song they cover on this ep. You’ll also recognize the last two tracks if you ever played Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3. While AFI’s early work is awfully similar to the Misfits, you can also check out bands like the Cramps if you’re looking for something in the same vein. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/bf2bee1a-bde2-44fb-a5fb-550e8590a35d/too-skinny.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Skinny Puppy’s albums are harsh soundscapes of synthesizers and samples from horror films. Too Dark Park is their most popular release. Even the title is spooky. The band often performs in disturbing and elaborate costumes. Nivek Ogre’s vocals sound like they’re coming from a Peter-Jackson-style orc. It’s hard to say what distinguishes Too Dark Park from Skinny Puppy’s other albums because they’re all so chaotic. It seems to come together particularly well on this album. If you like this sound, you might want to check out Throbbing Gristle. Throbbing Gristle is artier and less gimmicky, making them less specific to Halloween though assuredly disturbing. For example, members of TG have performed at MoMA PS1. D.o.A: The Third and Final Report of Throbbing Gristle gave me a panic attack when I first listened to it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/bac4fe4f-bff9-48f1-a592-eaa1dc959270/downard-nin.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Another industrial band, Nine Inch Nails, certainly nails the feel of Spooktober, though many people regard this album as the spookiest. That might be because “The Becoming” features a sample of people screaming in agony warped into the rhythm. Some parts of this album sound like being lost in some dungeon from Quake, which is unsurprising because Nine Inch Nails’ only permanent member, Trent Reznor, composed the soundtrack for the game two years later. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/5c1699fe-5430-40fd-9ac5-9808b17d6cb9/turn-kim.jpeg Guides - Listen Guide - There aren’t a lot of pop albums that are as explicitly spooky as Kim Petras’ Turn Off the Lights. Even Thriller had eight other tracks that had nothing to do with horror unless you count “Beat It.” Petras goes so far as to feature Cassandra Peterson, the actress who portrayed Elvira. Released in 2019, Turn Off the Lights is a trap-inspired electro-dance-pop album that will electrify your Halloween party much more than the “Monster Mash.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b0a3abc1-891c-4af7-9fed-afcc63b418e8/year-death.jpg Guides - Listen Guide - Death Grips’ sound can easily be described as unearthly, and they’re likely to scare your parents too. Just looking at the album cover for Year of the Snitch should give you an impression of what you’re getting yourself into when you put it on. MC Ride’s lyrics are often gruesome and graphic. Despite this, he’s less likely to offend someone at your party than something like, say, Tyler the Creator’s Goblin unless, of course, they’re offended by the harsh and dissonant uptempo music. https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/cyberscam-protection monthly 0.5 2024-06-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/77e88098-ea79-4645-99d6-7c1514504e97/1dcea6043b0968919348a1afa84a00de.png Guides - Cyber Scam Protection https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/c9059786-7569-4179-ac3b-5363620f341e/bermix-studio-wJ7atxTNeQE-unsplash.jpg Guides - Cyber Scam Protection - Looking for a side gig to help me through grad school, I ended up in a Facebook group for people trying to find jobs. I found an offer for one with flexible hours, and all I needed was a driver’s license. After doing some math, I realized the poster promised to pay over 100k a year just to drive a pickup truck. His name and picture matched who he claimed to be on the company website. When I called, however, they said that gentleman was in no way involved in the conversation I was having. I realized I was being catfished. I reported and blocked whoever it was, even though I had already given him a scanned copy of my driver’s license. Who knows what would have happened if I had given him more personal information? https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/media-x-women monthly 0.5 2022-03-09 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1f18f48f-24ca-41e5-b202-1fac9c5f0c16/Media+x+Women https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/d66e6d3b-0fa1-4794-8641-a8854261285e/work+play https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/fe2928c3-544b-43fd-abac-0c38ceeb73e9/Media+x+Women+Team https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/04af8e6a-74cf-4633-a3f3-099f83a94225/Media+x+Women+How+She+Made+It https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/creator-spotlight-womens-history-month monthly 0.5 2022-07-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/7f21ec60-78a3-46d1-b44a-80df96c3d746/Busy+Phillips https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/b1bb5852-5764-4fce-a1c7-87f10eee00db/Ariana+DeBose https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/c30b26d2-39e1-4b1b-a53c-bfa001af0a6b/Jada+Pinkett+Smith https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/1176ded6-7ff8-4428-b576-bc671b3bd4b8/Tess+Holliday https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/cee54b87-cbe1-4f7f-b90e-8d16ed8b1148/Meena+Harris https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/cfb3e05b-5a2e-43ea-acf0-32ad26514a5f/2.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/24b942f3-3f63-4c10-a21e-e5e64da2a664/3.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/56381b94-5b9b-4ee3-8521-59cb510670ba/4.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/f0a3ef43-7ac3-47a0-96ae-6fbbb37e18b6/1.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/9c704c80-1f50-4fef-96c7-723d71cecd51/5.png https://www.mediasmartcitizens.com/guides/fitness monthly 0.5 2023-05-15 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/f4693372-89e0-47e1-aa59-35737dae5f56/MEDIA+%26TECH+solutions+logo+1.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/604bb7845a1aa80b9b033e8b/150efb34-eceb-433e-9b7e-c21dbdf689b8/6.png Guides - 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