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Album Review: Papercut by Imani Imani
On her surprise pgLang debut, Imani Imani sings desire as a flat demand and turns it into a study in control.
 • Shatter the Standards and Maya LeRoux
Album Review: Family Over Fame by J Nolan
His most personal album is cutting in the working life and softest when it reaches the flex template. Faith braided with hustle gets him further here…
 • Shatter the Standards and Zachary Penn
Album Review: 5786 AM: Easy Listen by Mach-Hommy
Some of the densest, funniest writing of Mach-Hommy’s career is locked on a physical-only record built to keep most people out.
 • Shatter the Standards and Lance “LX” Brooks
Wednesday Roundups #152: 22 New Projects You Should Listen to Now
Listen to new releases from Brian Jackson, Skye Newman, Ye Ali, 38 Spesh, Saint Hairson, Phoenix James, MALIA, Le$ & DJ Mr. Rogers, Cecily Wilborn…
 • Shatter the Standards
Dexter Wansel Brought the Synthesizer to the Sound of Philadelphia
Dexter Wansel’s four solo albums chased the cosmos; his most durable songs went out under other singers’ names.
 • Shatter the Standards and Reuben Dara
The 50 Best Rap Albums of 2026 So Far
Rap had its best year in recent memory, and the discourse spent it relitigating one major-label letdown nobody plays for fun. It could have run a…
 • Shatter the Standards
The 50 Best R&B Albums of 2026 So Far
Anyone still typing that R&B is dead skipped the part where fifty of its best albums showed up before the year hit its midpoint. Veterans came back…
 • Shatter the Standards
Album Review: K-POPS! (Music from and Inspired by K-POPS! Motion Picture) by Anderson .Paak
A soundtrack that flirts its way through seventeen tracks and only stops flirting twice, when a kid sings and a father answers.
 • Shatter the Standards and Rosa Delgado
Album Review: Road Trip to Amsterdam by Smoke DZA
On another city-titled tape, the Kush God sets the weed aside to grieve his dead, and that grieving is the realest writing of his career.
 • Shatter the Standards and Nia Lattimore
Milestones: Sparkle by Aretha Franklin
A man wrote every word and a woman made all of it hers. The best Aretha Franklin album in years almost didn’t survive the sessions.
 • Shatter the Standards and Kendra Vale
At the Heart of Earth, Wind & Fire
Welcome to the wondrous world of an extraordinary musician fascinated by John Coltrane, Elvin Jones, and Miles Davis. His name? Maurice White. He…
 • Shatter the Standards, Brandon O'Sullivan, and Phil
Earth, Wind & Fusion
Riding the wave of Earth, Wind & Fire's success, Maurice White invested himself in several jazz-fusion albums during the second half of the 1970s. A…
 • Shatter the Standards and Reginald Marcel
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