As the global music phenomenon turns 50 a hip-hop professor reflects on the word ‘dope’

Hip-hop pioneers redefined ‘dope’ as cool. But it endures as an expression of respect, praise and illegal substances.

AD Carson, The Conversation

· Apr 14, 2023 · 11:30 pm

How Kabir Suman’s album of urban ballads, ‘Tomake Chai’, caused a ‘culture-quake’ in Bengali music

A Bengali album 30 years ago spoke of those invisible to most, broke all syntax of music, and gave an entire generation a vocabulary of the present.

Sayandeb Chowdhury

 & 

Rajendran Narayanan

· Jan 15, 2023 · 11:30 am

From juju to Naija hip hop: What has shaped a century of Nigerian pop music

There’s much more to the country’s music than the Afrobeat of Fela Kuti.

Chijioke Ngobili, The Conversation

· Jul 23, 2022 · 11:30 pm

‘The Lyrics’: What Paul McCartney’s new book can teach us about harnessing our creativity

The book divulges the origins of 154 of McCartney’s most significant and enduring songs.

Edward Wasserman, The Conversation

· Nov 20, 2021 · 05:30 pm

‘Abbey Road’: The album that marked the end of the Beatles 50 years ago

Sonically, it was as much the first album of the 1970s as an artefact of the ’60s.

Adam Behr, The Conversation

· Oct 03, 2019 · 11:30 pm

Dr John (1941-2019): The Night Tripper belongs to the world – but more so to New Orleans

Skipping across genres, the voodoo-inspired musician mirrored the relationship between the city’s social fabric and its musical heritage.

Adam Behr, The Conversation

· Jun 11, 2019 · 09:30 pm

Song check: Atif Aslam yearns for a love lost in new single ‘Baarishein’

The song has been written and composed by Arko.

Scroll Staff

· Feb 13, 2019 · 04:03 pm

A new single by writer Zac O’Yeah’s Ändå pop collective finds a spot on a music chart

The single ‘Hey’ is about how ‘people are all doomed to die’.

Scroll Staff

· Nov 19, 2018 · 03:30 pm

How popular music is trying to find the sacred in a secular world

Nick Cave, Hozier and Dr G Yunupingu have led the way for the enquiry into sacredness in the 21st century.

Lyn McCredden, The Conversation

· Oct 06, 2018 · 11:30 pm

With ‘Lal Pari Mastani’, Sona Mohapatra and Ram Sampath are weaving music and magic on the web

Far away from the limitations of Hindi film music and with ‘Coke Studio India’ having ended, the husband-wife duo have turned to the internet.

Devarsi Ghosh

· Aug 09, 2018 · 08:15 am

Why the world is going ‘APES**T’ over Beyonce and Jay-Z’s new music video

Teeming with references to African culture and experience, the couple's latest work places 'blackness'at the heart of the Western canon.

Kirsty Fairclough, The Conversation

· Jun 23, 2018 · 09:30 pm

How The Beatles created the iconic album art for ‘Abbey Road’

Today marks the release of the Fab Four’s penultimate album, whose cover art has left behind a legacy of its own.

Shibika Suresh

 & 

Anmol Kanojia

· Sep 26, 2017 · 05:02 pm