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Music

  • Back to black … St Vincent

    Alexis Petridis's album of the week
    St Vincent: All Born Screaming – the unmasking of a great American songwriter

  • ‘Running tens of thousands in debt from the tour and I’m being told that it’s normal’ … Arooj Aftab performing in Brooklyn in June 2023.

    ‘The working class can’t afford it’
    The shocking truth about the money bands make on tour

    As Taylor Swift tops $1bn in tour revenue, musicians playing smaller venues are facing pitiful fees and frequent losses. Should the state step in to save our live music scene?
  • Tupac Shakur pictured in 1996.

    Tupac Shakur
    Estate threatens legal action against Drake over AI diss track

    Drake used AI to simulate the voice of the late rapper and have him chide Kendrick Lamar, which the estate calls a ‘flagrant violation’
  • A man and two children sit on a wall with a wall of speakers to their left

    News
    Young researchers need greater access to Britain’s rich archives, says curator

  • Megan Thee Stallion pictured in 2022.

    Megan Thee Stallion
    Rapper accused of ‘abusive work environment’ including sexual harassment

  • Lisa Stansfield performing at the Northern music awards at the Albert Hall in Manchester.

    News
    Northern music awards winners call for more help for region’s emerging talents

  • A close-up, sepia-toned shot of Taylor Swift.

    From Taylor to Ariana, pop’s overreliance on gossip is choking the life out of it

    Laura Snapes
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Interviews

  • ‘An exhale’ … (L-R) Mathieu Ball, Robin Wattie and Tasy Hudson of Big Brave.

    ‘We’re sick as a species’
    Montreal metallers Big Brave on doom, despondency and Emily Dickinson

  • ‘It was crazy and it was freezing’ … Lil Nas X’s tastefully pixelated Industry Baby video.

    ‘I want to show more crotch!’
    Sean Bankhead on his raunchy dances for Beyoncé, Cardi B, Lil Nas X and more

  • Lauren Mayberry photographed in London by Suki Dhanda for the Observer New Review, February 2024.

    Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry
    I was fixated with death… I needed to live in reality

  • #youtoo? Creating a More Inclusive Music Industry - 2019 SXSW Conference and Festivals<br>AUSTIN, TX - MARCH 15: Shirley Manson attends #youtoo? Creating a More Inclusive Music Industry during the 2019 SXSW Conference and Festivals at Austin Convention Center on March 15, 2019 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Mike Jordan/Getty Images for SXSW)

    Sunday with Shirley Manson
    I impersonate my mother by making a chicken dinner

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Album reviews

  • Efficiency and wit … Taylor Swift.

    Alexis Petridis' album of the week
    Taylor Swift: The Tortured Poets Department – fame, fans and former flames in the firing line

  • Black and white portrait of Taylor Swift

    Kitty Empire's artist of the week
    Taylor Swift: The Tortured Poets Department – a whole lotta love gone bad

    • Global album of the month
      Lord Spikeheart: The Adept – Duma star’s relentless metal isn’t for the fainthearted

    • A Certain Ratio
      It All Comes Down to This – punk-funk stalwarts on a euphoric high

    • Pearl Jam
      Dark Matter – the faithful will rejoice

    • Alexis Petridis's album of the week
      Nia Archives: Silence Is Loud – bold, fresh jungle unbound by tradition

    • Still House Plants
      If I Don’t Make It, I Love U – inspiringly fearless and free art rock

    • Girl in Red
      I’m Doing It Again Baby! – ambitious alt-pop overshadows candid lyrics

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Live reviews

  • Romy singing on stage at the Roundhouse.

    Kitty Empire's artist of the week
    Romy – a masterclass in bittersweet feeling

  • Uncomfortable in the spotlight … Sky Ferreira performing in 2022.

    Sky Ferreira
    Roughed-up stadium glam from pop’s prodigal daughter

    • Slash featuring Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators at Resorts World Arena, Birmingham.

      Slash featuring Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators
      Boisterous, blues-soaked rock’n’roll

    • Ghetts on stage.

      The Observer's artist of the week
      Ghetts – a founding father of grime commands the stage

    • Relatable showgirl … Caity Baserat O2 Academy, Leeds.

      Caity Baser
      Cartwheeling celebration of chatty, bratty girlhood

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Add to playlist

  • four members of the band english teacher around a table, two seated, two standing, including lead singer lily fontaine

    One to watch
    English Teacher

  • Glass Beams

    One to watch
    Glass Beams

  • six young korean people in mathcing red jackets and trousers standing in a line, one in front of the other

    One to watch
    Balming Tiger

  • School of rock? … (L-R) Little Richard, Joanna Newsom and Metallica.

    Pop! goes the curriculum
    Songs to inspire primary school children

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Obituaries

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From the archive

  • Lorde: ‘It’s my joy to be patient zero on a harmony virus.’

    Lorde
    I’m not a climate activist. I’m a pop star

    As Lorde's debut album Pure Heroine turns 10, revisit our interview with the New Zealand musician on the cusp of her underrated third album, Solar Power
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  • Flouting censure … Taylor Swift.

    Taylor Swift’s new album is about a reckless kind of freedom. If only it sounded as uninhibited

    Laura Snapes
  • Anti Criminal Justice Demonstration in Trafalgar Square, London, May 1994. PLEASE CREDIT AS Mattko/Matthew Smith in print and @mattkosnaps in digital

    ‘We went from naive, hippyish protesters to hardcore anarchists’
    The criminal justice bill protests, 30 years on

    It’s three decades since the government’s attempt to ban raves radicalised an oddball coalition of dance fans, squatters and ‘new age’ travellers. What became of the protesters who tried to kill the bill?
  • ‘I cry a lot but I am so productive / It’s an art’ … Taylor Swift performing in Florida, 14 April 2023.

    Breakups, fantasies and her most cutting lyrics
    Inside Taylor’s Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department

    What are the big takeaways from Swift’s new album? She’s refining her sound, confronting elements of her fanbase and done with romantic idealisation
  • ‘Then – bingo!’ … James Briggs delves deep at Chestnut Tree House.

    ‘After eight hours, my feet and fingers throb’
    My epic treasure hunt for vinyl gold

  • Marisa Abela as Amy Winehouse in Back to Black.

    It’s a grotesque insult for Back to Black to suggest Amy Winehouse died of heartache over her childlessness

    Laura Snapes
  • People watch the Serenity Club

    ‘New music and a good night out’
    Amy Winehouse film shows vital role of small venues

  • IMG 7896 I am my voice project run by Tajalla for Music and Arts, a cultural organisation founded by Russol Al Nasser, in Al-Weibdeh, Amman, Jordan

    ‘We searched for ladies over 70’
    On the trail of Jordan’s forgotten folk music

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