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    9 Great Songs Recorded at Electric Lady Studios

    A new documentary spotlights the Greenwich Village creative hub. Listen to tracks by Jimi Hendrix, Patti Smith, Frank Ocean and more that were recorded there.Patti SmithVagabond Video/Getty Images.Dear listeners,I’m a sucker for any documentary that features scenes of people at a recording studio’s mixing board, isolating tracks from a great, intricately layered song.* Over the weekend, I watched a new film that, I am happy to report, features plenty of such footage: “Electric Lady Studios — A Jimi Hendrix Vision,” a recently released documentary that charts the origins of the famed, still vital Greenwich Village landmark.Located at 52 West 8th Street and formerly an avant-garde nightclub, the property that would become Electric Lady was purchased by Jimi Hendrix and his manager in 1968. Over the next two years, they poured somewhere around $1 million of their own money into its construction. (When the cash flow dried up, Hendrix would go play some live gigs and return with enough dough to pay the contractors.) Hendrix initially dreamed up Electric Lady as his own personal recording studio, a place where he and his friends could experiment freely without incurring exorbitant hourly rates. But, tragically, Hendrix did not live long enough to use it much at all. Construction was finally completed in August 1970; Hendrix died, at 27, on Sept. 18 of that year.Word had already gotten out that Electric Lady was special, combining state-of-the-art technology with a groovy atmosphere that made it a more comfortable place to hang out than most cramped, sterile recording studios. Thanks to some early bookings by marquee artists like Carly Simon, Led Zeppelin and Stevie Wonder, Electric Lady managed to stay afloat in those precarious first years after Hendrix’s death. More than 50 years later, it has survived ownership changes, gentrification and huge shifts in recording technology, remaining a crucial link between popular music’s past and present. Today, it’s arguably as busy as it’s ever been: Taylor Swift, Zach Bryan and Sabrina Carpenter are just a few stars who have recently laid down tracks there.Today’s playlist traces Electric Lady’s decades-long history via nine very different songs recorded within its hallowed walls. I’ve arranged them in chronological order, so you can gradually hear the way the sounds of pop music have changed over time. I hope that you’ll also hear certain echoes between now and then — similarities in the soft-rock confessions of Simon and Swift, or the genre-blurring explorations of Wonder and Frank Ocean.These are, of course, just a sampling of the thousands and thousands of songs that have been recorded at Electric Lady throughout the years. Next time you find yourself scouring a favorite LP’s liner notes or Wikipedia credits, don’t be too surprised if you see that familiar address.This is our place, we make the rules,Lindsay* (The Fleetwood Mac episode of “Classic Albums” where Lindsey Buckingham pulls up individual vocal and instrumental tracks from “Rumours” is my personal gold standard.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    The 15 Songs That Hit No. 1 This Year (So Far)

    Hear tracks by Shaboozey, Sabrina Carpenter, Kendrick Lamar and more.Shaboozey reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 this week for the first time with “A Bar Song (Tipsy).”Daniel PrakopcykDear listeners,It’s Caryn the editor here again, seizing control of the playlist one more time (don’t worry, you’ll have Lindsay back next week).On Monday, Shaboozey reached the top of Billboard’s Hot 100 with “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” making him the second Black artist to hit No. 1 on both the all-genre singles chart and Hot Country Songs. Somehow both milestones came this year: Beyoncé did it first with “Texas Hold ’Em.”The news got me scrolling through what’s topped the Hot 100 so far in 2024 — over the last 27 weeks, 15 songs have done it. And we’re going to listen to all of them in The Amplifier today.It’s always interesting to see how the official chart stacks up against cultural vibes. It may feel like the summer of “Espresso,” but Sabrina Carpenter’s Certified Bop hasn’t hit No. 1 in the United States (yet). It doesn’t just seem like Taylor Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department” is dominating 2024: It is, with 11 straight weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart. But only one of its songs — its opener, “Fortnight,” featuring Post Malone — has spent any time atop the Hot 100. Ariana Grande’s “Eternal Sunshine” has had two songs summit the singles chart; Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” had the one. Billie Eilish and Chappell Roan haven’t hit No. 1 yet this year, but I wouldn’t count them out.The longest run belongs to “I Had Some Help,” by Post Malone featuring Morgan Wallen (six weeks, five of them consecutive). Two songs from the Kendrick Lamar vs. Drake beef hit No. 1; perhaps unsurprisingly considering the outcome, they were both Lamar’s.So let’s take a trip through the recent past together — and for fun (or counterprogramming), see how the biggest songs of the year (so far) compare to our critics’ best songs of the year (so far).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Popcast (Deluxe): Will There Ever Be Another Global Pop Icon?

    Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTubeThis week’s episode of Popcast (Deluxe), the weekly culture roundup show on YouTube hosted by Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli, includes discussion of:The current Hot 100, which features newcomers like Tommy Richman, Shaboozey, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan and othersWho has emerged, besides Taylor Swift, as a true cross-platform pop superstar in the last decade — Bad Bunny? Drake?How centrist pop has become an aggregation of several styles rather than one coherent soundHow pop superstars of the ’80s and ’90s aggregated superfans and casual fansWhether there is a path for a new star to get famous enough to play something like the Super Bowl halftime show a decade from nowConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica. More

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    Plant and Krauss Cover a Led Zeppelin Classic, and 12 More New Songs

    Hear tracks by Soccer Mommy, Tems, Floating Points and others.Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new tracks. Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes) and at Apple Music here, and sign up for The Amplifier, a twice-weekly guide to new and old songs.Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, ‘When the Levee Breaks’No one is more entitled to cover Led Zeppelin than its singer, Robert Plant. His close-harmony duo with the singer and fiddler Alison Krauss excels at making songs sound far older than they are, and even in 1971, “When the Levee Breaks” harked back to a vintage blues by Memphis Minnie. This live recording is stark, resonant and rumbling, with a fiddle solo by Stuart Duncan that looks toward both Ireland and Morocco and a cranked-up guitar stomp that builds toward — alas! — a frustrating fade-out. JON PARELESCarly Pearce, ‘Truck on Fire’The spoiler is in the title of “Truck on Fire,” a swinging country revenge song from Carly Pearce’s new album, “Hummingbird.” Her voice seethes as she recalls “the way that you laughed it off when I was catching on/Said it was in my head,” and there’s a dark glee (and a product placement) while she watches the “flames rolling off of your Goodyear tires.” PARELESSabrina Carpenter, ‘Please Please Please’We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan Saw a Gap in Pop, and Filled It

    Two pure pop songs, “Espresso” and “Good Luck, Babe!,” may give the aspiring stars behind them a boost from music’s middle class to the big time.The caffeinated drink of the summer isn’t cold brew or iced matcha — it’s “me espresso,” a weird and strangely brilliant neologism coined by the pop singer Sabrina Carpenter in her ascendant hit “Espresso.” The track — sugary sweet, fiendishly catchy and meme-ready — has been out for only a month and change, but it is already one of the defining songs of 2024.It’s also one of the defining songs of Carpenter’s career so far. Last year, I described her as a member of “pop’s middle class”: a group of internet-beloved artists creating music that makes winking reference to pop history, whose celebrity vastly outmatches their commercial success. Although she is a new star in the minds of many, Carpenter, 25, is by no means a fresh arrival: “Espresso” was released almost 10 years to the day after her debut EP, “Can’t Blame a Girl for Trying.” Carpenter was 14 years old then; four more full-length albums have followed.Her career has been unusually slow-burning in the context of the well-oiled pop machine, and “Espresso” is a bullish breakthrough after a string of songs, including the Billboard-charting “Nonsense” and “Feather,” that had some radio and TikTok success but failed to permeate pop’s center. (“Espresso” reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and is still in the Top 10.)She’s not the only middle-class pop star having a brush with more tangible success. Chappell Roan’s “Good Luck, Babe!” has quickly become her first hit on the Billboard Hot 100. Roan, 26, loosely fits a similar mold: Her music is funny and oftentimes covertly acerbic, and on her 2023 debut album, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess,” as Carpenter did with her 2022 breakthrough “Emails I Can’t Send,” Roan tried on a variety of styles that each seemed to pay tribute to a different era of pop, sometimes even a specific diva.Chappell Roan leveraged the spectacle of her live shows to make herself omnipresent on short-form video platforms over the past year. Scott Kowalchyk/CBS, via Getty ImagesRoan first signed to a major label at 17 and was dropped five years later, a setback that compelled her to move back to her Missouri hometown and work as a barista to fund her career. She has since signed to Amusement, an imprint of Universal Music Group started by the producer Daniel Nigro specifically to release Roan’s music. “Good Luck, Babe!,” a kiss-off to an ex with a queer twist, has been streamed over 106 million times on Spotify since its early April release; for context, that’s far more than any song on Beyoncé’s splashy “Cowboy Carter,” which arrived a week earlier, with the exception of its lead single, “Texas Hold ’Em.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Popcast (Deluxe): Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan + Editing Taylor Swift

    Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTubeThis week’s episode of Popcast (Deluxe), the weekly culture roundup show on YouTube hosted by Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli, includes segments on:How “The Tortured Poets Department” has aged with the passing of one week since its releaseThe huge commercial success of “The Tortured Poets Department” so farThe contemporary expectations of immediate album reviewsHow Swift’s pandemic albums “folklore” and “evermore” introduced a new generation of hard-core fansJon and Joe’s picks for the best songs from “The Tortured Poets Department”The rise of a pair of pop’s middle-class stars, Chappell Roan and Sabrina CarpenterCarpenter’s emergence into the shadow of Dua LipaThe success of “Espresso”Chappell Roan’s meteoric six-month rise and her relationship to drag cultureRoan’s diaristic and specific songwritingSongs of the week from Tommy Richman, Cash Cobain (featuring Bay Swag and Ice Spice) and ShaboozeySnack of the weekConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica. More

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    A Brief Tour of Pop Music’s Caffeine Addiction

    Hear songs by Sabrina Carpenter, Squeeze, SZA and more.Sabrina Carpenter’s perky bop “Espresso” is … a bit addictive. (We’re sorry.)Valerie Macon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesDear listeners,A few weeks ago in our Friday feature the Playlist, I recommended a bubbly new single by the pop artist Sabrina Carpenter and made a bold prediction: “Get ready to hear this one everywhere.” Even more quickly than I imagined, the prophecy has come true. Last week, “Espresso” debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100, making it Carpenter’s highest charting hit yet. More important, it has taken over the nation’s psyche. You can hardly go anywhere these days without hearing someone quoting the song’s infectious hook “That’s that me espresso” or wondering aloud, “what is a ‘me espresso?’”That’s a profound philosophical question for another day. Today, we are simply honoring the absurdist joy of “Espresso” with a playlist of songs about caffeinated beverages.Coffee has been a consistently evocative theme throughout pop musical history, so this mix travels from 1940 right up to the present moment. That trusty beverage is often used to describe a sophisticated kind of romance (as it does on Otis Redding’s swooning ballad “Cigarettes and Coffee”) or perhaps the idle hours waiting around for said romance to occur (see Peggy Lee’s sultry take on the 1948 standard “Black Coffee”). Chappell Roan tries to use it as a shield against romance on a track from her 2023 album “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess,” reasoning with a former flame, “I’ll meet you for coffee, ’cause if we have wine/You’ll say that you want me, I know that’s a lie.”In “Espresso,” Carpenter uses the caffeine metaphor to suggest how restless she makes a guy she has wrapped around her finger: “Say you can’t sleep? Baby, I know.” Also, crucially, she understands that “espresso” rhymes with “I guess so.” That’s poetry.It’s time for the percolator,LindsayListen along while you read.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Sabrina Carpenter Drops a Perky Bop, and 10 More New Songs

    Hear tracks by girl in red, Margo Guryan, Phish and others.Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new tracks. Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes) and at Apple Music here, and sign up for The Amplifier, a twice-weekly guide to new and old songs.Sabrina Carpenter, ‘Espresso’The rising pop artist Sabrina Carpenter scored a hit with the breathily sung disco throwback “Feather,” but she seems poised for an even bigger smash. Enter “Espresso,” a cheeky, summery tune that just might have the juice to propel her to the next level. Atop a mid-tempo beat that lightly recalls the muffled retro-funk of “Say So,” the song that made Doja Cat a star, Carpenter plays the unbothered temptress with winking humor: “Say you can’t sleep, baby I know, that’s that me, espresso.” Make it a double and get ready to hear this one everywhere. LINDSAY ZOLADZgirl in red, ‘I’m Back’In “I’m Back,” girl in red — the Norwegian songwriter Marie Ulven Ringheim — defies the cycles of depression. “It’s not like I wanna die,” she whisper-sings. “At least not now/I love being alive.” Quasi-Baroque keyboard arpeggios pace a track that holds back, recognizes that “Time doesn’t stop for a sad little girl” and surges as she decides, “This time I think I’m found.” One-syllable words; deep breakthroughs. JON PARELESWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More