What Happened in the World of Music Last Month

“More music is released in a single day now than in the entire year of 1989,” said Will Page, former chief economist at Spotify, in a report by Music Radar on the current state of the industry. With the constant flow of songs, albums, news, and events, it’s easy to lose track and move on too quickly. This is the result of a market that looks more at quantity, newness, and consumption than artistic quality, with the risk of a great work falling into oblivion.

This new column offers five (plus one) shout outs, notes, reflections and discoveries to help you understand what happened in the world of music during the course of the last month.

Headliner

Red Hot Organisation, TRAИƧA

The Red Hot Organisation on 22 November announced a new compilation album, TRANSA, (spelled TRAИƧA), which brings together the musical experiences of more than one hundred artists, spread across eight chapters for 46 tracks in total. The twenty first project of the NGO – which has been promoting public health and diversity through various artistic works since 1989 – is a journey of the trans and non-binary experience in many paths, forms and nuances, ordered through eight chronological phases: birth in the “womb of the soul”, “survival”, the acquisition of consciousness during a dramatic “dark of the night”, then “awakening”, “grief”, “acceptance”, “liberation” and finally “reinvention”. 

The result is a patchwork of cover versions and unreleased tracks that start with folk, cross over into avant-jazz, pop, indie rock and ambient rooms. Among the trans and non-binary artists involved, many came in solidarity, forming pairs or trios: Devendra Banhart collaborates with Blake Mills on the cover of Caetano Veloso’s You Don’t Know Me (taken from the 1972 album of exile Transa, the inspiration for the compilation’s title); Jeff Tweedy and Claire Rousay do a carillon of a Fugs song, composed to the lyrics of William Blake’s How Sweet I Roamed; Bill Callahan and Hand Habits cover Kate Bush’s Deeper Understanding, while a spoken word by actress Hunter Schafer over a carpet of woodwinds and brass with a sombre avant-jazz feel takes the listener into a moment of extreme darkness and pain that will continue with contributions from Moses Sumney and ANOHNI who remake SOPHIE’s Is It Cold In The Water. 

Other contributions include an almost 30-minute track by André 3000, an unreleased song by Sade – the first in several years – and then Sam Smith, Adrienne Lenker, Perfume Genius, Clairo, Sharon Van Etten and the Fleet Foxes, ending with a hymn to new life from Beverly Glenn-Copeland’s song Ever New, included in Keyboard Fantasies in 1986, and which here literally takes on new life thanks to Sam Smith’s voice.

Listen/Buy via Bandcamp

Album of the month 

Jeff Parker ETA IVtet – The Way Out of Easy

Jeff Parker has reaffirmed his place as one of the most vital musicians of our time. With The Way Out of Easy (International Anthem/Nonesuch), the sophomore release from his ETA IVtet – featuring saxophonist Josh Johnson, bassist Anna Butterss and drummer Jay Bellerose – Parker offers a work that both defies expectations and redefines the possibilities of jazz in the modern era. 

Released via the adventurous Chicago label International Anthem, The Way Out of Easy captures the raw energy of late-night jam sessions at ETA, a Los Angeles club where the quartet used to hold a weekly residency. These performances were shaped into the album’s four expansive, instrumental tracks. With the help of sound engineer Bryce Gonzales, whose handcrafted techniques deliver a crystalline, authentic audio experience, the record feels both immediate and timeless.

The music vibrates, blending the improvisational freedom of jazz with hypnotic loops and grooves drawn from the structures of hip-hop and dub. It’s a sound that feels deeply organic yet carefully crafted, invoking the spirit of Madlib’s layered production – a declared inspiration from Parker – and the creative freedom of the masters of Fire Music, while carving out a wholly unique identity. Each track unfolds at its own pace, inviting the listener to immerse themselves in its rich textures and shifting dynamics.

This album isn’t battling for mainstream visibility – it’s a spectral presence which haunted the year-end charts in 2024, quietly asserting its significance. Released without concern for commercial timing, The Way Out of Easy stands apart as an emotional and undeniably powerful statement. And that’s Jeff Parker’s magic: his work doesn’t clamor for attention; it rewards those who take the time to listen.

Listen/Buy via Bandcamp

Reissue

Tv On The Radio – Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes 20th Anniversary Edition 

On November 15, TV On The Radio commemorated the 20th anniversary of their iconic album Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes with a reissue. Initially released on 9 March 2004, the album established the band’s reputation as indie pioneers.

In Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes 20th Anniversary Edition, the track order has been changed to reflect the original sequence conceived for vinyl. This change sees the initial duet of ‘The Wrong Way’ – “the best song ever written about the complexities of being Black in America surrounding the dawn of the 21st Century,” according to Martin Douglas of KEXP – and the chart-topping hit Staring At The Sun discontinued. The latter was moved to the album’s second-last position (just before the five new bonus tracks), making Dreams the album’s new second track. In order to celebrate the 20-year milestone, an unreleased track entitled Dry Drunk Emperor, recorded in 2005 and originally released only as an MP3, was also included.

Tv On The Radio haven’t released an album since Seeds in 2014, and in terms of live shows they had been on a five-year break, but with the announcement of the Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes reissue they made fans happy twice as they also unveiled a series of live shows between the US and UK. And for those who just can’t do without Tunde Adebimpe’s falsetto, watch out this year: the TVOTR frontman has just signed to Sub Pop Records, with whom he will make his solo debut in 2025, anticipating the release with a single.

Listen/ Buy via Bandcamp

Single track

Panda Bear + Cindy Lee – Defense

Diamond Jubilee by Cindy Lee was one of the standout records of 2024 – a sprawling, two-hour opus that ignored streaming platforms in favor of a retro Geocities-style site dripping with 90s nostalgia. Now, Cindy Lee collaborates with Panda Bear’s Noah Lennox on Defense, the first single from Lennox’s upcoming album, Sinister Grift, set for release in February 2025. The track brings together Cindy Lee’s fiery, unpredictable style and Lennox’s meticulous production, with contributions from all members of Animal Collective shaping a distinctive sound. An exciting preview of what’s to come.

Listen via Bandcamp

Book

Marisol Negrón – Made in NuYoRico

Sixty years ago in NuYoRico, the New York of the Latin diaspora, Fania Records was founded, planting the seeds of what would become one of the most influential musical movements of the 20th century. Often described as the label that invented salsa, Fania Records was more than just music – it was identity, community, and revolution. Marisol Negrón’s Made in NuYoRico: Fania Records, Latin Music, and Salsa’s Nuyorican Meanings (Duke University Press, 2024) delves into this crucial cultural moment, offering a broad but detailed exploration of the birth of salsa and the profound role it played in shaping NuYoRican identity.

Negrón – associate professor of American and Latin Studies at the University of Massachusetts – reconstructs the story of the pivotal years of salsa in 1960s and 1970s New York, tracing its roots to the establishment of Fania label by musician Johnny Pacheco and lawyer Jerry Masucci in the summer of 1964. The book examines how Fania harnessed the power of the “NuYoRican imaginary” to transform a local cultural expression into a global phenomenon. Through interviews with label owners, musicians and fans, as well as a rich analysis of songs, album artwork, films produced by the label and the personal and professional trajectories of salsa’s key figures, Negrón reveals how the social and cultural histories of Nuyoricans became inseparable from the music itself.

One of the book’s most compelling insights is how salsa served as both a mirror and a megaphone for the cultural experiences of diasporic communities in New York during those years. Tracks like El Cantante by Héctor Lavoe as well as his artistic trajectory, Willie Colón’s gritty, macho gangster imagery, serves as both an index and a counterpoint to the struggles and daily lives that were distinctly NuYoRican. Negrón explores how these narratives shaped the identity of salsa, while also resonating with audiences far beyond New York, creating – and, just as importantly, commercializing – a genre that was universal yet deeply personal.

Made in NuYoRico is not a celebration of salsa but a critical examination of its commercial and cultural trajectories. The result is a layered portrait of how music becomes a vessel for cultural history, carrying the voices and stories of a community across decades and continents. As salsa continues to evolve and inspire, this book reminds us of its roots, and the NuYoRican heartbeat that brought it to life.

Marisol Negrón, Made in NuYoRico. Fania Records, Latin Music, and Salsa’s Nuyorican Meanings, Duke University Press, pp. 344

BONUS TRACK

Why do we like song?

Justin Vernon’s Bon Iver, in an interview with The New Yorker, asks if it is really the songs we like or the people who sing them. For him, “it’s about the song and what the music does” and maybe that’s why on the back of his latest EP SABLE, released in mid-October, you can find a website url, Counterpart, which hosts covers of his songs. The site states: “Counterpart is a site documenting creative expression with and as Bon Iver. Please share your photo, audio, or video in response to our prompts. New prompts and your submissions will appear at random”. 

The reason behind this initiative is unknown, but perhaps it’s all in the question: do we like the songs or the people who play them?

Header image taken from Marisol Negrón, Made in NuYoRico. Courtesy of Duke University Press.