| June 7, 2025 
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When Taylor Swift announced last week that she had reacquired the rights to her first six albums, I had a feeling what Jon Caramanica might do next: write this very entertaining and sharply argued notebook about the nature of her rerecordings project through the lens of the one album she didn’t remake, “Reputation,” a NYT pop team favorite. Jon also wrote about the blockbuster TikTok sensation turned budding pop star Addison Rae, who sat for a Popcast interview with him and Joe Coscarelli last month. “When I reflect back on that time,” she said of her early days posting on the platform up to eight times a day, “I’ve recognized how much choice and taste is kind of a luxury.” Eric Ducker wrote about the stalwarts of the early 2000s indie-rock boom (Dirty Projectors, Interpol, Animal Collective and more) who have made headway in a new realm: film scoring. And Mesfin Fekadu profiled Jesse Collins, the longtime executive producer of the BET Awards, which will celebrate their 25th anniversary on Monday night. “Listen, I’ve been in these super high spaces for quite some time, and you never see a Black producer in control of everything,” Oprah Winfrey said. (Cardi B had some nice words for him, too.) Plus: Esther Zuckerman got a first look at the upcoming Billy Joel documentary, Ben Sisario and Julia Jacobs brought us daily updates from the Sean Combs trial (and Ben and Anusha Bayya painted a fascinating portrait of what Combs is like in the courtroom), and Jon Pareles has the week in new music in the Playlist. |
