Alan Light

2024 was dominated by an explosion in subversive girly pop—Charli XCX, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan. But what will follow in its wake?

From cowboys to X-Men, race cars to rock stars, he’s pulled off era-defining films in virtually every genre. Here the powerhouse filmmaker tells us how he won over Bob Dylan and—after a five-year journey—created an epic folk-rock fable.

The albums that made it to the top represent a wide range of styles and the continual blurring of genres in our shuffle-and-playlist universe.

From Pakistan to Compton, from one artist who reached legal drinking age this year to another in his seventh decade of stardom, each of these songs was a mood.

152 shows across 18 months and five continents. Nearly $2 billion in revenue and, potentially, 10 million tickets sold. But what did it all mean? And, for real for real, is it over now?

The Martin Scorsese–produced documentary reminds us that the frenzied response to the group’s arrival in America changed the course of the country, the culture, and the world.

The country music superstars sat down to talk about Reboot II, the legacy of ‘90s country, their mixed emotions about releasing new music, and the songwriting foundation that keeps them honest.

The fact that the rapper can navigate this range of country voices—Dolly Parton! Morgan Wallen! Billy Strings!—and styles without seeming like a guest on his own album is a real accomplishment.

It’s a fascinating, confounding, messy, sometimes frustrating, and bravely strange collection with unexpected revelations about the world’s most dominant cultural figure.

For years, Chris and Rich Robinson weren’t even speaking, let alone playing together. Now they’re out with their first new release in more than a decade. How’s that sound?

If this is the end, you couldn't do it any better.

Country music’s most unpredictable superstar weighs in on a politically charged era, his next round of songwriting (“wilder”), partnering with Michael Jordan, and why he’s making a whiskey called JYPSI.

“I've always been a proponent of dealing with stuff that's taboo, to talk about what nobody wants to discuss,” the singer and songwriter tells Esquire.

The best country singer of his generation, the 33-year-old has broken out—big—with a surprising tactic: leaning into old-school, traditional country sounds.

With their first release in six years, Ireland's Finest reinterpret forty (!) songs from their catalog—a big swing from a group that’s never been afraid to take big swings.

The young Dubliners have enjoyed one of the buzziest debuts of the century in the UK. Next up: America.

The stylish Italian rockers have stadium-sized hooks, a punk rock attitude, and dreams of global (super)stardom. It's a recipe the world just might be ready for—again.

The Philosophy of Modern Song is, as a title, almost entirely untrue. But the work is revealing nonetheless.

More a refinement than a reinvention, the pop pacesetter's most cohesive, revealing album yet confronts her own fame and fortune.

With her new book, Feels Like Home: A Song for the Sonoran Borderlands, out today, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer opens up about revisiting her roots.

Ashley McBryde gathered an ace team of writers at a (maybe) mythical cabin in Tennessee, looking to write a batch of songs about real-life, small town America. They found something more.

Knowing what you want to avoid is different from knowing what you want to say, and director Brett Morgen’s meditation on David Bowie, a complicated, monumental creator, is largely one-dimensional and repetitive.

With a new box set, out now, the Blondie founders dish on touring with Iggy and Bowie, hanging with Warhol, and the making of "Heart of Glass.

"You know how there's heat-seeking missiles?," asks the singer. "I'm like a new-experience-seeking missile."

“There was no way to know what the country will be feeling like on Saturday, let alone Thursday or Friday,” said writer Chris Kelly of scripting Saturday Night Live the week after Trump won the presidency in 2016. They went for it anyway.

She’s been a reality TV singing contestant, a tabloid fixture, a record-breaking award winner. But she’s always stayed true to her music—and never gotten above her raisin'.

"I think of myself as someone who has the privilege to do this job, and the responsibility, and I do it the best I can, no matter what the circumstances," the 75-year-old icon tells Esquire.

If you’re sick of the rapper, I can’t blame you. But skipping the new three-part film means losing out on an unprecedented portrait of a towering, infuriating musical icon as a young man.

What the singer seemingly fails to realize in a new, two-part documentary is that telling a story selectively doesn’t make the hard questions go away.

The narrative construction is impressive enough; the fact that it’s matched by a similar musical progression is downright masterful.

In 1981, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were barely speaking, much less writing music together. But with an impending tour, they needed a new record. How the album—famously considered their last great one—came together is now the stuff of rock n' roll legend.

"You just want to press the button and talk to them. And you realize you can’t—it’s heavy."