Caroline Shaw is a fairly young person who's done a lot of interesting music. She has focused on voices in the past.

However, to say she's a vocal composer is wrong. She's composed and arranged a lot more interesting music than that.

For example, here's the entire soundtrack for the TV-series Fleischman is in Trouble:

Her vocal arrangements at times remind me of both baroque voices and what Hildur Guðnadóttir did with some music she composed for Chernobyl.

However, Shaw's most recently-released work, or, The Whale, which she's made with Andrew Yee, is very good in ways different to her earlier work:

Here's a live session with Shaw and Yee from 2023:

Here's a 22-minute interview with Shaw on her musical roots, creativity, and collaboration.

#music #MusicTips #CarolineShaw #NeoClassical #soundtrack

When I started reading Patrick Radden Keefe's new book, London Falling, it says 'This is a true story.'

I think there's a story to be heard here; a true story, not the true story. The subtitle of the book is 'a mysterious death in a gilded city and a family's search for truth'.

Manic Street Preachers released This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours. The title says a lot.

What is truth?

Merriam-Webster define truth partly as

the body of real things, events, and facts. also the real facts about something

As any old quantum physicist and philosopher could tell you, truth is subjective unless it is defined; when truth is defined, it can still be interpreted differently by different people. Hard to come to terms with at times.

Underworld have started releasing what I think are new versions of old songs. First this, 'Kittens', today there's 'Pearl's Girl' which isn't available to share. Underworld are one of my favourite electronic-music bands. When I saw them live in the mid-1990s, I had to choose between taking the last bus home or spend the night under the stars. I danced to their gig, left happy, found a t-shirt-selling Englishman who'd overdosed on cannabis, then spent the night in his and his mate's t-shirt-filled tent.

I've also spent the morning listening to Sepultura's wonderful album Chaos A.D.. I discovered the greatness of Sepultura in 2025 and I'm making up for lost time. Their debut album, Beneath the Remains, is a thrash-metal masterpiece.

Let's not forget Nathan Micay. His soundtrack for TV-series The Industry, season 4, sometimes bests what Daniel Lopatin (a.k.a. Oneohtrix Point Never) did with his soundtrack for Marty Supreme and what Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross did in their soundtrack for, mainly, The Social Network and also the one for Challengers.

#music #soundtrack #philosophy #Underworld #NathanMicay #DanielLopatin #TrentReznor #AtticusRoss #MusicTips