Most musicians can only make money on the platform by writing songs inoffensive enough to get on to one of its vapid playlistsIn the hands of some of its most gifted practitioners, songwriting is a kind of emotional alchemy. For the past week, I have been returning to a perfect example: Every Time the Sun Comes Up by the US singer Sharon Van Etten, which was released in 2014. Its lyrics might be fractured and fragmented, but it is an almost perfect portrait of self-doubt and downward spirals: one of those songs that captures feelings so deep that they go way beyond words.I went back to that song as I read a superb new book that has both educated and profoundly depressed me. Mood Machine, by the New York-based journalist Liz Pelly, is about the music-streaming giant Spotify, and how it attracted its current 615 million subscribers, making a billionaire of its Swedish co-founder and CEO, Daniel Ek. But its most compelling story centres on what Spotify has done to people’s appreciation of songs and the people who make them – much of which is down to the platform’s ubiquitous playlists.John Harris is a Guardian columnist. His memoir Maybe I’m Amazed, about his autistic son James and how music became their shared language, is published on 27 March. For more information, visit maybeimamazed.substack.com Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2025-03-09 16:38:43 UTC ]
“I am determined to keep writing, it has never mattered to me more.” Hanif Kureishi on trauma, recovery and what it means to be a writer. | Lit Hub Memoir Just in time for Valentine’s Day: 25 writers explain the anatomy of a good sex scene. | Lit Hub Craft Pankaj Mishra on nationalism,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-11 11:30:21 UTC ]
More news stories like this
The Lit Hub Author Questionnaire is a monthly interview featuring seven questions for five authors with new books. This month we talk to: * Justin Haynes (Ibis) Shane McCrae (New and Collected Hell: A Poem) Haley Mlotek (No Fault: A Memoir of Romance and Divorce) Maggie Su (Blob: A Love Story)... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-11 09:57:52 UTC ]
More news stories like this
This story about a child with cerebral palsy is badly misleading – and a slap in the face for families like oursAmazing news from Netflix: there is an extraordinary treatment available for children with very severe neurological disabilities, one that, given the appropriate level of parental... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2025-02-11 08:00:11 UTC ]
More news stories like this
I’ve known Lauren Markham’s writing since her first book, The Faraway Brothers, came out in 2017. Then, a couple years ago, I got to know her a bit more as a person when a friend emailed the two of us and another writer to ask our thoughts on writing (and teaching) journalism versus memoir or […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-07 09:57:40 UTC ]
More news stories like this
In Sarah Chihaya’s memoir Bibliophobia, we enter into the moment of her breakdown—an event that she has seen on her horizon since childhood, but also seemed impossibly remote. As a child of Japanese and Japanese-Canadian immigrants to the US, Chihaya’s parents “didn’t really believe in the... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-06 09:56:18 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Sarah Chihaya’s unconventional memoir charts her troubled relationship with the literature that formed her. Continue reading at The Atlantic
[ The Atlantic | 2025-01-31 13:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Edmund White’s The Loves of My Life, Dorian Lynsky’s Everything Must Go, and Liz Pelly’s Mood Machine all feature among the best reviewed nonfiction titles of the month. Brought to you by Book Marks, Lit Hub’s home for book reviews. * 1. The Loves of My Life: A Sex Memoir by Edmund White... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-01-31 09:58:15 UTC ]
More news stories like this
This searing memoir recounts one woman's epic journey to trace the global slave trade across the Atlantic Ocean—and find her ... Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-30 12:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this
A new memoir by the tech mogul recounts a boyhood steeped in old-fashioned, analog pastimes as well as precocious feats of coding. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2025-01-30 10:05:04 UTC ]
More news stories like this
It’s among the more playful matters on his mind in “Shattered,” a memoir of the injury that took away his ability to turn pages — but not his hunger to tell a story. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2025-01-30 10:00:13 UTC ]
More news stories like this
At 84, Edmund White is ready to kiss (to put it mildly) and tell ... well, everything. Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2025-01-28 16:56:52 UTC ]
More news stories like this
By the time I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings hit shelves in the first days of 1970, buzz about the memoir had been building for some time. Newspaper stories about its author, Maya Angelou—a well-known dancer, singer, and political activist—had been teasing the book for years; both Ebony and... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-01-28 09:57:54 UTC ]
More news stories like this
A cozy fantasy bodyguard romance, a darkly funny memoir exploring the toll of sexism, a new detective duo, and more of today's best book deals Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-23 17:04:23 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Activist, Spy, and Icon Josephine Baker's memoir, a bookish memoir about mental illness and identity by a literature professor, and more. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-21 13:30:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this
This week's featured books include the follow up to IRON FLAME, new horror by 2024 Nobel Prize winner Han Kang, and a memoir by the most dangerous woman in Africa. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-21 13:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this
What roles do place and memory play in the construction of a narrative? In this conversation, memoirist Shze-Hui Tjoa and novelist Farah Ali talk about how these forces affect the storytelling in their respective books: The Story Game (Tin House, 2024), an interrogation of memory, childhood, and... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-01-13 09:56:58 UTC ]
More news stories like this
A Memoir About Having Undocumented Parents, One Woman Against the Hordes of Hell, a Chillingly Beautiful Mystery, and More of Today's Best Book Deals Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-11 12:30:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this