Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker recorded Sleater Kinney’s tenth album, Path of Wellness, in Portland, Oregon, last summer against a backdrop of unrest. For weeks, protesters marched through the city, demanding racial justice while being tear-gassed by the Portland Police Bureau. Brownstein and Tucker split their time among the numbing routines of life in quarantine, protests, and the studio. “It’s not the summer we were promised,” Brownstein croons on “Down the Line,” a gritty rocker situated in the closing stretch of the new record. “It’s the summer that we deserve.”
For Brownstein and Tucker, the album is a recommitment: the band’s first since 1996 recorded without drummer Janet Weiss, who left Sleater-Kinney in 2019 because she felt she no longer had an equal say in its direction. (Brownstein said at the time that this came as a surprise.) The pop-oriented songwriting of the last album with Weiss, The Center Won’t Hold, looked to some fans like a curveball. In contrast, Path of Wellness, the first album Brownstein and Tucker produced themselves, takes cues from Sleater-Kinney’s forebears in punk and classic rock. “It was like restarting the band again, in a way, during such intense chaos and crisis,” says Tucker. “But it was also something that was joyful.”
Does creating music during rapidly changing times throw a wrench into the process? Do you feel like more is asked of you as a band celebrated for its politics?
Denne historien er fra May 24 - June 06, 2021-utgaven av New York magazine.
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Denne historien er fra May 24 - June 06, 2021-utgaven av New York magazine.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Trapped in Time
A woman relives the same day in a stunning Danish novel.
Polyphonic City
A SOFT, SHIMMERING beauty permeates the images of Mumbai that open Payal Kapadia's All We Imagine As Light. For all the nighttime bustle on display-the heave of people, the constant activity and chaos-Kapadia shoots with a flair for the illusory.
Lear at the Fountain of Youth
Kenneth Branagh's production is nipped, tucked, and facile.
A Belfast Lad Goes Home
After playing some iconic Americans, Anthony Boyle is a beloved IRA commander in a riveting new series about the Troubles.
The Pluck of the Irish
Artists from the Indiana-size island continue to dominate popular culture. Online, they've gained a rep as the \"good Europeans.\"
Houston's on Houston
The Corner Store is like an upscale chain for downtown scene-chasers.
A Brownstone That's Pink Inside
Artist Vivian Reiss's Murray Hill house of whimsy.
These Jeans Made Me Gay
The Citizens of Humanity Horseshoe pants complete my queer style.
Manic, STONED, Throttle, No Brakes
Less than six months after her Gagosian sölu show, the artist JAMIAN JULIANO-VILLAND lost her gallery and all her money and was preparing for an exhibition with two the biggest living American artists.
WHO EVER THOUGHT THAT BRIGHT PINK MEAT THAT LASTS FOR WEEKS WAS A GOOD IDEA?
Deli Meat Is Rotten