
If you’ve been reading the music press this week, there was some alarm or peevish glee (depending on where you were doing your reading) that vinyl sales had dropped. A Billboard piece stated that vinyl sales dropped by 33%, which is not insignificant. That’s selling 34.9 million units, down to 23.3 million in 2024. Are…

At the country music awards, they didn’t nominate Beyonce for anything despite her all-conquering country LP and while many shrugged, many were irritated by the whole thing. The irritation came from all sides, but more importantly, so did the shrugs – apart from something for the shelf in the spare toilet or a sticker to…

There’s something about golden era rap that just loves a fancy action figure, to place on your shelves next to your collected essays from hip hop journalism, tchotchkes, rap comics and high-end record middles and the like. It’s very wholesome, honestly. Well, Doom’s ‘Mm… Food’ is getting a reissue for its anniversary on November 15th,…

Once upon a time, music retreated away from the bombast of Britpop and US rap-rock, and all over the place, more introspective bedroom producers were making tricky electronic music and singer-songwriters gravitated toward the acid-folk of the ’70s, focusing more on cottage industries and community. Tunng managed to straddle both worlds, with critics dubbing their…

Look, most bands put a song out to let you know new things are coming, but not 2nd Grade. The power poppers from Philadelphia have chucked THREE whole songs at our ears and mercifully, they’re all really fun and filled with skuzzy pop hooks and jangly guitars. The revival of power pop is very welcome…

Today is John Lennon’s birthday – he would have been 84 – and to celebrate this, we’ve been treated to something rather surprising. While a lot of repackaged music from musicians can feel a little exploitative at times, churning out old stuff without much new going on, that’s not the case with this latest Lennon…

The excellent GULP are having a party for the 8th instalment of their broadsheet counter-culture magazine, which features all the wonderful words, tidbits, diatribes and cool design we’ve come to expect from them now. The issue drops on Friday 11th October and you can get down in person at The New Cross in Manchester’s Northern…

When people acting in bad faith start complaining about pop going woke, it’s funny to think about how political pop used to be and just how much politicians hated people who spoke out about them. John Lennon and Yoko Ono had a literal FBI file on them and Elvis snitched to Nixon about the pair,…

Kaytranada is great – everyone knows that. So it is great news that there’s new music to sink our teeth into, right? Well, there’s going to be a new LP called ‘Aint No Damn Way!’ on Friday! That’s tomorrow! Surprise! To whet the appetite, here’s the boogie neon gem ‘Space Invader’ to listen to. A…

No, not a snuff movie – don’t be silly now. Depeche Mode have teamed up with Mexican director Fernando Frias for a new movie which looks at the Mexican relationship with dying, with the group squarely in the film itself. Rather than acting, ‘M’ will revolve around live footage of the group during their ‘Memento…

Rochelle Jordan is one of the best artists around and she keeps releasing great music to underline how great she is. The singles that have preceded the imminent album have all been excellent and the new one is doing bits too. The new track is called ‘Doing It Too’, taken from the sure-to-be brilliant album ‘Through…
THERE’S NO MONEY IN THIS GAME ANYMORE, BUT IF YOU WANT TO WRITE SOMETHING FOR THE POP CORPS, YOU ARE WELCOME TO GET IN TOUCH. HAPPY HUNTING.
POP CULTURE IS WORTH TALKING ABOUT.
CONTACT: HOWDYPOPCORPSATGMAILDOTCOM