July 10, 2025, 9:35 a.m.
your big break volume 1
passing the mic to the readers for the first time
My Big Break
good morning ~
trying something new today: for the first time I’m turning over the content of this newsletter to its readers, thus Your Big Break.
adding interviews to the formatting this year has been an excellent move for me - I’ve really enjoyed having those conversations and publishing them here has really increased the amount of other people’s voices and perspectives. and this exercise feels like more of that opening up the stage - it’s the my big break open mic and we got some good stuff on deck this week
starting off, a lovely photo from a recent trip to New Orleans sent in by Jeremy Shatan - he runs the excellent blog An Earful and can be found on Instagram right here
And today’s first piece of writing comes from Will LaPorte, a musician, photographer, and structural engineer who I know best as one of the members of Overheard, a good band of incredibly sweet people. Will sent along an essay considering mixes and playlists in the age of streaming - how can you give context to something stripped of its physical format? Here’s an excerpt:
“Answer: we are mostly better than the big evil corporation, we don't have the means to shovel coal into the artist-value-extraction machine and wring working musicians dry for our billions. But we should probably be listening to music and engaging with art a little more intentionally. The song that a whole bunch of musicians and producers and artists worked on probably shouldn't be treated the same as a painting you pick up at Target, simply filling space and giving the impression of art, while made by nobody for nothing in particular.”
You can read the entire essay, find a few extremely well selected Apple Music playlists, and follow them in a variety of ways here:
Mixtapes, Mood Machine, Memory, and Me - Ghost Down
If you've been within one hundred feet of me over the past month, you've likely heard me babbling incoherently while waving Liz Pelly's book Mood Machine about like a street...
Today’s second piece of writing comes from Adam Tinkle, surely one of the most feverishly creative people to ever bless New York’s Capital Region.
Dovetailing surprisingly well with the writing Will submitted, Adam contributed his review of the new album by Oropendola, which I had yet to hear but am now really enjoying - you can listen to it here:
And here’s an excerpt from Adam’s writing:
“Artists have always asked: How might I express myself in ways that might reach people? Today, though, this question simplifies to: how do I do so in ways which will be algorithmically advantageous? Once written, tracked, produced, mixed, mastered, uploaded to all 31 platforms (now including Roblox, according to my last glance at my own Distrokid Dashboard), I next need to wonder which 30 seconds of this best slaps as a Reel? Which instant of ear candy will grab the ears of scrollers, and how many such moments should a song be cut up into? If the beats I underlay shimmy just right, will the tweens assign it the status of a bop?”
You can read the rest of his thoughts - and also get a thorough look into his various projects (his July is particularly busy) at this link:
A new Seven Count album, a month of shows, open call from a new microcinema + a bonus review
How will I know if I overpacked if the zipper hasn't popped?
Lots to check out, lots to read, a lot of anxiety among musician friends about what it means to try and deliver meaningful sounds to other human beings these days - - hope you enjoyed this format, let me know if you did, and I’ll sign off with one of the most beautiful sounds I’ve heard in a long time, the mournful steam whistle of Mexico City’s camote carts: