The English duo Children of Zeus spin a cocoon of neo-soul on “No Love Song,” a single from their new album, Balance. This track is a magnificent bummer, a laundry lists of flaws, failings, and shortcomings. The first line is a warning: “The emotions of a stone expectin’ me to …
Read More »
Paloma Rocío Castillo Astorga was just 18 when she wrote her first song. She self-released it as a single — “Not Steady,” a gauzy, Spanglish R&B reproach to an overzealous suitor — with a music video that she filmed in the parking lot of her tía’s apartment complex. Within a …
Read More »
Leela James applies her gale-force voice in precise, leveling blasts in “Complicated,” a bouncy, lavish love song that marks her first release since 2019. This is a track about tearing through, if not obliterating, the red-tape that’s been standing in the way of a romance. James reduces everything to the …
Read More »
A few years ago, the producer-songwriter-multi-instrumentalist Dernst Emile II, known as D’Mile, was on the verge of quitting the music business. He was writing and producing at the highest levels, and had been for more than a decade, landing credits on albums from Janet Jackson, Justin Bieber, Usher, and more. …
Read More »
R&B is wallowing in its past: It feels like nearly every commercially successful R&B single at the moment is built on a prominent sample or a conspicuous interpolation of an old hit. It’s not the act of sampling itself that’s troubling. The sampler is one of the more extraordinary inventions …
Read More »
Tinashe is no longer signed with the record label RCA, according to her longtime manager, Mike Nazzaro. Contrary to reports circulating on the internet, “she wasn’t dropped,” Nazzaro says. “We initiated for her to be released. It was a positive split for her. It’s giving her back creative control.” He …
Read More »