Music

The rapper Tekashi69 walked out of a federal prison on Thursday, four months short of his two-year term, thanks to a nationwide effort to stem coronavirus outbreak risks at jails and prisons, which health advocates fear might become a tinder box for infections.Tekashi69 (born Daniel Hernandez), 23, will finish the remainder of his sentence in home confinement, his lawyer, Lance Lazzaro, said.Last year, Mr. Hernandez — also known as 6ix9ine — pleaded guilty to a series of gang robberies and shootings, cooperating with authorities by testifying against his former associates in the gang Nine Trey Gangsta Bloods. He has asthma, which his lawyer argued gave him a heightened vulnerability to the coronavirus.U.S. District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer, who sentenced him, agreed, saying that the pandemic presented “extraordinary and compelling reasons” for a compassionate release of Mr. Hernandez, who, he wrote in his order on Thursday, “no longer will present a meaningful danger to the community if at liberty.”Last week, Judge Engelmayer wrote in a guidance to the Bureau of Prisons: “Had the Court known that sentencing Mr. Hernandez to serve the final four months of his term in a federal prison would have exposed him to a heightened health risk, the Court would have directed that these four months be served instead in home confinement.” More

The shelf life of a power-pop band is short. The Knack had an album and a half. Big Star had three. The Raspberries catalog could make for a fantastic first half of a CD.Fountains of Wayne, fronted by the songwriting and producing team of Adam Schlesinger and Chris Collingwood, seemed to have silos full of hooks. Like Lennon and McCartney, they shared joint credit, even if only one of them wrote a song. In five studio albums and one compilation, they sang almost exclusively about 18 to 28-year-olds living on the East Coast. They had one huge hit, “Stacy’s Mom,” but wrote dozens of funny or sympathetic songs about Gen X misfits, like an earthbound Beach Boys serenading the suburbs rather than the sea.In addition to his main band, Schlesinger, who died on Wednesday of the coronavirus, formed several side groups and wrote for the TV show “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” as well as the stage. Here are 30 of his essential songs. (You can listen to the playlist on Spotify here.)Fountains of Wayne, ‘Radiation Vibe’ (1996)Sung to a girl who’s with the wrong guy, by a guy who thinks he’s the right guy. The first song on the first Fountains of Wayne album is lightly adorned power pop that became richer on subsequent albums, while keeping the downtrodden, slightly resentful tone. As in a Randy Newman song, the narrator has a bit too much confidence.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Sick Day’ (1996)Nothing important ever happens in a Fountains of Wayne song. That’s kind of the point: The band wrote about the big dreams and tiny victories of people who never get anywhere. “Sick Day” describes a “hell of a girl” who’s stuck in a crummy office job, and while Schlesinger and Collingwood treat her with tenderness, the best they can foresee is that she might take a sick day (pause) soon. (The timing of that pause shows a keen comic sense.) It’s a gorgeous acoustic ballad, with a winking reference to “I Want to Hold Your Hand” after the third chorus, and it sketches out some ideas that came to perfection later in “Troubled Times.”Fountains of Wayne, ‘Leave the Biker’ (1996)Fountains of Wayne recorded its first album in a week, for only $5,000, and at times, the low budget is not only obvious, it’s charming. “Leave the Biker” starts with a panned chicka-chicka guitar riff that sounds like a 10-year-old warming up at Guitar Center. Once again, our narrator is in love with someone who’s dating higher on the food chain — a biker with “crumbs in his beard from the seafood special.” And there’s, you guessed it, another winking Beatles rip at the end.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Please Don’t Rock Me Tonight’ (1996)People who don’t like FOW complain that all it made is cute meta-pop full of references to other bands, but — ehh, you know what, that’s not wrong. This fourth selection from the band’s debut not only inverts the classic AOR imperative of rocking all night, it rhymes “care to” and “hairdo.”The Wonders, ‘That Thing You Do’ (1996)Tom Hanks wrote, directed and appeared in “That Thing You Do!,” a 1996 movie about a mythical Erie, Pa. band who have one big hit in the mid-60s before it all falls apart on them. Crucially, the film needed a great retro song that a) sounded credibly like a British Invasion-styled song from, specifically, the summer of 1964; b) was great enough to have been a hit; and c) could stand up to being heard over and over in the movie. About 300 writers submitted songs for consideration, and Schlesinger’s song won. It was nominated for best original song at the Academy Awards and at the Golden Globes.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Utopia Parkway’ (1999)Second album, they’ve brought in a drummer and a lead guitarist to fatten the sound, and they’ve got a recording budget. “Utopia Parkway,” a midtempo harmony fest with a buzzing, distorted guitar line (they’ve also moved from Beatles references to nodding at the Cars), is narrated by a smug outer-borough wannabe with a custom van and a cover band who has never turned from boy to man and his baby doesn’t understand.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Red Dragon Tattoo’ (1999)A nice guy can only stand so much rejection from the fairer sex before he gets drunk, buys some Bactine and a .38 Special CD, takes the train to Coney Island and signs up for a fierce-looking tattoo. The singer does it only to court a girl, who, you can be sure, will not be moved by the gesture. “Red dragon tattoo is just about on me/I got it for you, so now do you want me?” the dim bulb pleads. The band’s first absolute power-pop masterpiece.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Troubled Times’ (1999)The elegant pre-chorus is another indication of songwriting growth, and Collingwood brings the right amount of pathos and empathy to a lyric about a boy pining for a girl and imagining it will work out. Bittersweet enough to soundtrack a season-ending, broken teen romance for a series on the CW Network, and that’s high praise.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Laser Show’ (1999)They’ve moved from the Beatles to Wings in this brief, chunky rocker about a great tristate ritual for stoned tristate teens: the laser show at the Hayden Planetarium in New York City. Collingwood adds grainy excitement to his boyish voice as he sings, “We’re gonna sit back, relax, watch the stars/James and Jason, Kirk and Lars.” It’s not mockery, it’s not parody or irony, it’s a celebration of teenage thrills for kids from Bridgeport, Westport, Darien.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Prom Theme’ (1999)A new twist on songs about high school: It’s written from an older vantage of disappointment (“We’ll grow old and lose our hair/It’s all downhill from there”) but builds to a brave, innocent defiance in the chorus (“Tonight we’ll reach for the stars/We’ll rent expensive cars”). The arrangement is dominated by a dulcet string arrangement for two violins and a cello.Ivy, ‘Edge of the Ocean’ (2000)Schlesinger was part of a cosmopolitan pop trio fronted by Dominique Durand, a Frenchwoman who’d relocated to New York City. The highlight of its third full album is a shimmering ballad, focused on Durand’s soft-focus voice, which dives into contemporary trip-hop. Nearly as good, on the same album: “Lucy Doesn’t Love You.”Josie and the Pussycats, ‘Pretend to Be Nice’ (2001)Kay Hanley, who was the lead singing voice in the 2001 musical comedy film “Josie and the Pussycats,” wrote this on Twitter about Schlesinger, who penned the song: “His talent as a songwriter is so special, so enormous, it never overwhelms, only sweetens any airspace it inhabits.” Jabbing, on-the-beat guitar catapults this track, and the girl can’t figure out why the boy, who’s patently a shlub, won’t compliment her or laugh at her jokes.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Mexican Wine’ (2003)Fountains of Wayne commemorated the post-recession bubble with a deft third album about young office workers in the midst of quiet crises — often restless, usually unfocused and probably drunk. It’s part John Cheever, part John Hughes. This slow-building rocker cycles around a great description of someone stuck in place: “I tried to change, but I changed my mind/Think I’ll have another glass of Mexican wine.”Fountains of Wayne, ‘Stacy’s Mom’ (2003)Top 40 needed a song about hot moms, and this was the band to do it. Fountains of Wayne didn’t have a record deal when it wrote this (Schlesinger paid for the recording sessions), and the group shopped it to “just about everybody,” he said. Only S-Curve offered them a deal. The song hit No. 21 on the Billboard singles chart and earned a Grammy nomination.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Little Red Light’ (2003)When Ric Ocasek of the Cars heard “Stacy’s Mom,” he thought the band had sampled his own “Just What I Needed.” What could he have made of this, the most blatant, loving, skillful Cars rip-off in the band’s repertoire? The singer has a boring desk job and a girl who doesn’t love him, but at least he has his cordless phone. Hilarious, tragic.Fountains of Wayne, ‘All Kinds of Time’ (2003)The title is a cliché football announcers use when a quarterback isn’t being pressured by the defense, and Schlesinger gave the music a slow-motion tempo and arrangement, including lots of tremolo guitar effects. The narrator, who’s older than the self-assured quarterback, knows something the quarterback doesn’t: No one has all kinds of time.‘Music From the Motion Picture “Music and Lyrics,”’ ‘Way Back Into Love’ (2007)Another very specific challenge from Hollywood: if a washed-up 1980s superstar were trying to make a comeback two decades later, what would his songs sound like? There are no jokes or clever quips in this power ballad, just a skyborne melody that, in the film Music and Lyrics, brings Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore together, and later, back together.Fountains of Wayne, ‘’92 Subaru’ (2007)On Fountains of Wayne’s fourth album, it spent less time referencing the ’60s and ’70s bands it loved and more time seamlessly synthesizing them. “’92 Subaru” is an ecstatic rocker that evokes the Doobie Brothers’ “China Grove” and revisits the guy from “Red Dragon Tattoo,” who’s now fixing up his junker, on a budget, so he can win back a girl. Psst, it won’t work.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Michael and Heather at the Baggage Claim’ (2007)The melodies weren’t vanishing but the inspiration was, as people started writing off FOW as a one-hit wonder, which was besides the point. The songs were getting more adult, including this one, with brushed drums and layers of instrumental harmonies, about a couple who overcome the agonies of baggage claim. It was written and named for a record executive they’d worked with and his wife.Fountains of Wayne, “Strapped for Cash” (2007)No one ever called FOW the voice of a generation, but no group wrote more songs about the economic tribulations and uncertainty of Gen X. The arrangement is tight — quarter-note piano, clipped organ hook, a trumpet section — there’s a loving Billy Joel reference (“Heart attack-ack-ack”), and our hero avoids a beating from his loan shark, at least for now.Fountains of Wayne, ‘New Routine’ (2007)It starts with a couple of old codgers in a diner, sends their waitress off to live in Liechtenstein, sends her German boyfriend all the way to Kentucky, and returns to the codgers. Everyone’s moving, no one’s content. Why hasn’t this been turned into a movie?Tinted Windows, ‘Kind of a Girl’ (2009)Schlesinger was game for most anything, including a supergroup. He played bass in Tinted Windows and wrote most of the songs, James Iha of Smashing Pumpkins played guitar, Taylor Hanson of Hanson sang and Cheap Trick’s Bun E. Carlos manned the drums. This single from their lone album is like a term paper on the curative powers of whoa-whoa background vocals.Fountains of Wayne, ‘Richie and Ruben’ (2011)Their fifth and last album could’ve been called “More Songs About Tough Times and Bad Decisions.” Pals Richie and Ruben (rhymes with “don’t know what they’re doin’”) open a bar, it goes bust fast, and then we discover the narrator of this jazzy, bouncing song invested in that bar, and even gave them more money for a clothing line.Neil Patrick Harris, ‘It’s Not Just for Gays Anymore’ (2011)As host of the Tony Awards in 2011, the former Doogie Howser needed a big opening song. With “The Daily Show” writer David Javerbaum, Schlesinger devised this cheeky pitch for Broadway (“It’s no longer only for dudes who like dudes/Attention every breeder, you’re invited to the theater”) with a cleverness that never flags.‘Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,’ ‘Gettin’ Bi’ (2016)Over the course of four seasons, Schlesinger wrote or co-wrote 157 songs for this groundbreaking music comedy, an astoundingly fecund pace, in a huge variety of styles. The references in these songs were always clear within the first eight bars, and “Getting’ Bi,” a celebration of bisexuality from Season One, paid homage to Huey Lewis and the News (a bit of “Hip to be Square,” a smidgen of “The Power of Love”). “I Could if I Wanted To,” a loser’s self-deceiving lament from the same season, evokes second-level grunge ballads, and “What’ll It Be?” couldn’t love Billy Joel any more if it were married to him.From Season Two, “We Tapped That Ass” takes a vaudeville approach to a duet between two male characters who recollect all the places they had sex (“On the table, you were willing and able”) with the show’s conflicted main character, Rebecca. And “Where’s the Bathroom,” a musical theater patter song for Rebecca’s awful mom, played by Tovah Feldshuh, is history’s greatest catalog of passive-aggressive behavior (“I see your eczema is back”). “The Fiddler on the Roof” violin pushes it over the top.Robbie Fulks, ‘Fountains of Wayne Hotline’ (2005)Here’s a ringer: not a song by Schlesinger, but a hilarious song about him, by the alt-country loose cannon Robbie Fulks. The guitar intro and his upper-tenor voice mimic Fountains of Wayne; the narrator, who’s stymied by a song he’s trying, phones up a hotline that gives arrangement advice by recommending the tricks that repeat throughout Fountains of Wayne songs. It’s not snide — you can’t emulate a band this closely unless you love them. Enduring advice for songwriters: “Try a wider interval!” More

This obituary is part of a series about people who have died in the coronavirus pandemic. Read about others here.Bucky Pizzarelli, who after many years as a respected but relatively anonymous session guitarist became a mainstay of the New York jazz scene in the 1970s, died on Wednesday in Saddle River, N.J. He was 94.The guitarist and singer John Pizzarelli, his son and frequent musical associate, said the cause was the coronavirus.A master of the subtle art of rhythm guitar as well as a gifted soloist, Mr. Pizzarelli was sought after for recording sessions in the 1950s and ’60s and can be heard on hundreds of records in various genres, although he was often uncredited. He also toured with Benny Goodman and was a longtime member of the “Tonight Show” orchestra. But he was little known to all but the most knowledgeable jazz fans until he was in his 40s.When Johnny Carson moved “The Tonight Show” to California from New York in 1972, Mr. Pizzarelli stayed behind. He explained at the time that he did not want to uproot his four school-age children from their New Jersey home. Freed of the responsibilities of a regular job, he began performing more frequently in New York nightclubs.Among those clubs was a Midtown Manhattan spot appropriately named the Guitar, where he had already attracted attention in a duo with his fellow guitarist George Barnes in 1970. Reviewing one of their first performances, John S. Wilson of The New York Times wrote: “This is a brilliant and unique team. Mr. Barnes and Mr. Pizzarelli can be dazzling and they can be sensuously brooding. They sparkle with excitement, leap with joy or relax with a warm romantic glow.”After Mr. Pizzarelli and Mr. Barnes parted ways in 1972, Mr. Pizzarelli began performing and recording in a variety of high-profile settings: unaccompanied, as the leader of small groups, as a sideman with leading jazz musicians like the saxophonists Zoot Sims and Bud Freeman and the violinists Stéphane Grappelli and Joe Venuti.In 1980 he began performing with a new duo partner: his son John, 20 years old at the time, who went on to become a jazz star in his own right. “That’s where he got his baptism of fire,” Mr. Pizzarelli told an interviewer in 1997. “With me giving him dirty looks when he played a wrong chord.”The two Pizzarellis would perform and record together many times over the years, often joined by Mr. Pizzarelli’s other son, Martin, a bassist, and the vocalist Jessica Molaskey, John’s wife. John Pizzarelli once described them as “the von Trapp family on martinis.” As John’s star ascended, he frequently employed his father as a sideman.Mr. Pizzarelli’s sons survive him, as do his wife, Ruth (Litchult) Pizzarelli; two daughters, Anne Hymes and Mary Pizzarelli; and four grandchildren. More

For most performing artists, the daily routine is roughly the same: rehearse, perform, rinse and repeat.But with the coronavirus shuttering live shows around the world, musicians, dancers, actors and others have had to adapt to a new reality — without an audience to prepare for. We talked to some about how they’re staying in shape and honing their craft while working from home.‘You can’t sit still for long.’Constance Stamatiou, dancer, Alvin Ailey American Dance TheaterVideoConstance Stamatiou’s workday as an Alvin Ailey dancer would sometimes stretch 12 hours, between morning ballet classes, seven-hour rehearsals and evening performances. More recently, Ms. Stamatiou has had to find new spaces for dance, in and around her New Jersey home — the parking lot outside, her daughters’ playroom, the kitchen — where she can improvise new pieces and follow along with virtual ballet classes broadcast on Instagram. A high-top table in the kitchen has become a home ballet barre; a broomstick and water jugs, a new way to lift weights. Ms. Stamatiou is also learning new choreography with her daughters on TikTok. (She has yet to master the Renegade, which she finds a bit intimidating.)‘My relationship with the instrument can really go back to square one.’Max Zeugner, associate principal bass, New York PhilharmonicVideoBefore the New York Philharmonic canceled its season, Max Zeugner’s practice time was filled with short-term scrambles to learn the right notes for the next concert. Now, he’s found a silver lining in getting to do something he hasn’t done since high school: playing music just for fun. Mr. Zeugner has opted for warming up with Bach phrases rather than scales or arpeggios — a meditative routine, he said, that comes close to prayer. (And the nine-person Philharmonic bass section now has a group chat: “Just trying to keep it light for the end of the world. A few jokes here and there. I’ll leave it at that.”)‘I’m using this time to get back to singing just for fun.’Lauren Patten, actor, ‘Jagged Little Pill’ on BroadwayLauren Patten has heard complaints about singing too loud in her New York apartment. After all, she’s had to practice the heavy rock score of Alanis Morissette’s music in “Jagged Little Pill.” But after Broadway shut down, Ms. Patten retreated to an Airbnb in a small Vermont town surrounded by farmland — with plenty of open space and distance from neighbors. She is taking the time away from the city to sing for fun and keep her repertoire diverse with “more legit musical theater stuff.”‘This is one time where I do get to just say, “Hey, you know what? I don’t want to practice today.”’Angel Blue, opera singerVideoAngel Blue usually rehearses in transit from one performance to another: She learned her title role in “Porgy and Bess” on an airplane, flying home from a concert in Kazakhstan, and “Faust” en route from Singapore. With her performances across the country canceled, she has time to learn two new Verdi roles at home in New Jersey, at her own pace: Leonora in “Il Trovatore” and the title character in “Aida.” At home, she’s equipped with a thick sound-absorbing rug and a piano — and her family has space downstairs to retreat.‘If a miracle were to happen, I want to make sure that I’m ready to go.’Zachary Noah Piser, actor, ‘Dear Evan Hansen’ on BroadwayVideoZachary Noah Piser learned his lesson the hard way. In the three-month hiatus he had between performing in an international production of “Dear Evan Hansen” and joining the show’s Broadway cast, he figured he would remember Evan’s extensive dialogue without having to run lines on his break. But with this unexpectedly large gap in performances, Mr. Piser is reciting his lines to himself on (social-distanced) runs and walks outdoors, and on video chats with other cast members. He is also trying to stick to his usual warm-up regimen in his apartment by using a vocal steamer, doing exercises at his piano and singing through a song or two from the show.‘I like to fall back on just the basics.’Judith LeClair, principal bassoon, New York PhilharmonicFor Judith LeClair, “just playing orchestral works isn’t going to do it.” She’s returning to the fundamentals in her time away from performing, playing 10 études a day in her home studio. But bassoonists also need to devote at least half their time to the tedious process of making their own reeds from raw cane. In addition to making her own, Ms. LeClair is using this period to make reeds for her Juilliard School students who don’t have their own equipment at home. More

Every so often a moody British thriller, set in an impossibly idyllic village harboring dark secrets, is anointed the new “Broadchurch.”And “Deadwater Fell,” an Acorn TV mini-series, is the latest — perhaps because like “Broadchurch,” it also stars David Tennant. Only this time the script is flipped, and instead of playing a police detective hunting a murderer, he’s a Scottish doctor whose wife and three daughters die in a house fire.Recently, Tennant was holed up with his family in London after the Cape Town production of “Around the World in 80 Days,” a series in which he’ll play the eccentric adventurer Phileas Fogg, was halted by the coronavirus pandemic. Which gave him plenty of time to think about the 10 things he’d rather not do without. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.1. Tim MinchinI feel slightly proprietorial with Tim Minchin because he’s one of those people that I went to see in small comedy clubs when he wasn’t Tim Minchin, International Superstar. And I got to know his quirky, barbed, hilarious songs before most people did. Then he started writing Broadway musicals [“Groundhog Day,” “Matilda”] and starring in movies and taking over the world, quite rightly. He’s got one of those brains that I envy, and I adore listening to whatever chunk flows out of it.2. “Dear Evan Hansen”I managed to get tickets to see the original cast in New York maybe three years ago. My wife and my eldest son and I went knowing that this was very much the hot ticket but not really knowing why. And we just sat there transfixed. Ben Platt was extraordinary with his kind of chocolate voice, and there’s an amazing story that’s told with such energy and these fantastic tunes.There’s something very exciting when you feel like you are ahead of the curve of your peer group — to go home and brag about having seen something very special — because it was years before it would come here. Then last year, I went to see the opening in London, with a brand-new guy called Sam Tutty, and he’s equally exciting.3. “Pod Save America”As the world has politically gone to what some might call hell in a handcart, I find myself more and more obsessed with following the ins and outs on both sides of the Atlantic, and what happens next — because your politics are so inextricably linked to ours. Of course, [this podcast] is unashamedly partisan. The four guys [Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, Dan Pfeiffer and Tommy Vietor] used to work for Obama, and it comes from a left-wing, Democrat perspective. But it does it with a wit and a clarity and a slight anarchy that I find very useful to understand how American politics works.4. Marvel ComicsI used to get a Hulk comic when I was little, and it was always Marvel Comics over DC Comics. I never quite connected with Batman and Superman. I realize these are slightly preposterous words to use, but I find Marvel characters somehow more believable. I abandoned them for a bit as a young man trying to be windswept and interesting. But in my slightly more mature years, I’ve allowed myself to admit that I like having Marvel Comics in my life. Of course a few years ago I got to be one of those characters [Kilgrave in Netflix’s “Jessica Jones”], which was a strange through-the-looking-glass moment.5. “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich”I’m doing this play called “Good” [scheduled to begin in October at the Playhouse Theater in London], which is about a genuinely good man in the run-up to the Second World War, the rise of Hitler, and how he comes to terms with life under that regime. And how human beings adapt and find what they formerly found appalling perfectly acceptable — to overlook the occasional immorality because it’s easier than standing up and fighting it. I’m trying to get my head as deep into that world as possible, so I’m reading the largest book I’ve ever tried to consume. It’s an absolute doorstop. And this extraordinary retelling of those events sends a chill. It feels much more like a warning of things that might come back.6. “Ed Reardon’s Week”This radio comedy series has run on the BBC for something like 15 years. I’d never really paid it a blind bit of attention, and then I caught a random episode. And it’s fantastic, about this very, very down-at-heel writer who had some mild success, and from then on life has been a series of disappointments. And he now finds himself living in a sort of manky bedsit, scratching around to find the next meal, the next cigarette, the next bottle of whiskey. It’s co-written by a chap called Christopher Douglas, who plays this part magnificently. He’s just this very unpleasant curmudgeon, a narcissistic, selfish man in his late middle age, and yet there’s something terribly endearing about him. It’s very funny, very dark, very bitter and bleak. And there’s something about the misery of it that I find it weirdly comforting.7. Cigarettes After SexI do mean the band rather than the act. I discovered them listening to KROQ in Los Angeles. Every time I would get in the car they’d be on heavy rotation, and I got absolutely mesmerized by their music. It just takes you somewhere that’s got an out-of-body, spine-tingling feel to it, sung by this wonderful androgynous voice. I mean, it’s not what you want to play to pull the cobwebs away. But if you want to lie down in a corner and be consumed by cobwebs, it’s that kind of a vibe.8. Dinner by Heston BlumenthalIt’s a restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental hotel in London, and I’d say that’s been my most exciting dining experience. All the food is based on the earliest English recipes they could discover. So there are items on the menu that were plucked from Richard II’s cookbook, but then given the Heston Blumenthal treatment. For instance, “meat fruit,” which is actually meat pâté constructed to look exactly like an apple or an orange. Because of the heritage of all these dishes, everything has got a story to it and a reason why it’s there, and it’s so beautifully crafted and tastes extraordinary. It’s a real journey into the unknown.9. The ProclaimersThey’ve been the soundtrack of my life, and they continue to be. And with every new piece of music they release, I rekindle my love for them. People probably know them from one or two hits, and yes, they’re very good at making a big party. But they also have a way of writing love songs like nobody else and they put together these wonderful, heart-stopping melodies. I just think they are one of the undervalued pieces of art of our time.10. “Succession”It’s the best TV I’ve seen in ages. There’s just nothing touching it. It’s so good. Every part is so beautifully inhabited. They’re so vile and they’re so hateful — and yet you’re kind of rooting for them. I can imagine as an actor receiving one of those scripts and going, “I cannot believe this has landed in my inbox.” I mean, what a treat to get to say those words. More