Hey friends!

I miss blogging. I guess I must, since I'm sending this out. Maybe it's giving in to feeling like I have to post online to prove that I exist, and I really don't want to be on Instagram for more than a minute a day. Maybe it's how 2026 has put me in a 2006 mood and that means having a little internet diary. Maybe it's that back in April, I heard "Ima Read" by Zebra Katz in the wild–on Wythe Avenue, no less–and it ignited a crisis about the passage of time. So, here we are! I have an abundance of free time (are there any jobs at your job?) and the state of the world is what it is and I may as well share a few things that I've been into more or less recently.

Sorry To Bother You is in my Letterboxd Rushmore, so my expectations for writer/director(/rapper/activist) Boots Riley's second feature I Love Boosters were high. Starring Keke Palmer, the film follows a group of women who team up to take down an exploitative fashion designer (Demi Moore). It's a galvanizing call to action and a total blast, loaded with Looney Tunes physical comedy, practical effects, twists you'll never see coming, and gloriously colorful costuming courtesy of Everything Everywhere All At Once vet Shirley Kurata. It's even funnier on a second watch. I Love Boosters is perhaps a little less cohesive than its predecessor, but it's undeniably a great time at the movies, and the opportunity to look inside one person's wildly specific brain is very welcome at a time when concerns about AI and corporate interference are rising. I Love Boosters is in theaters now.

Speaking of people who need eternal blank checks to just share whatever's going on in their noggins, the new Julio Torres special Color Theories on HBO Max is, of course, wonderful. Beyond expanding the comedian’s affinity for whimsical objects, I did wonder/fear if it would get me to do a deep dive on Real Housewives, but I have been spared so far.

From Search Party to Stress Positions, John Early is established as a comedic talent in front of the camera. Now, he's making his directorial debut with Maddie's Secret, which he also wrote. The film follows the eponymous character as she climbs the ranks at a food media company, going from dishwasher to beloved on-camera personality. However, her professional success leads to an eating disorder relapse, and her career becomes at odds with her health. Known for his physical comedy skills, Early plays Maddie himself in a wig and prosthetics. Inspired by the heightened tone of TV movies, there are plenty of laughs, but the film also handles the serious subject at its center with the gravity it merits. Maddie’s Secret opens theatrically in NYC on June 19, followed by a wide rollout.

Letterboxd users may have been wondering what Samuel was when it was all over the site's 2024 best-of roundup. (The reviews all being in French could have elucidated things.) If you're an American Netflix subscriber, you can now find out with the subtitles or dub of your choosing! Originally broadcast on Arte, the animated series follows the everyday trials of its eponymous protagonist, a middle school boy. There's a very charming DIY, indie graphic novel quality to it, and most of the episodes run between four and five minutes for a nice little snack, though you could also binge them as a feature.

Angèle + Justice = song of the year?

Or maybe it’s Sébastien Tellier featuring Juliette Armanet and Nile Rodgers.

About a year ago, the algorithm saw fit to serve me a video of Miki being interviewed for Elle France, and I found myself becoming the most invested in a new artist that I had been in a long time. Her sound has been lumped in with hyperpop, but personally, it directly targets the part of me that had Kitty Pryde on repeat in 2013. (Asfar Shamsi also scratches this particular itch.) My go-to song to share as an introduction is "Scorpion Ascendant Scorpion," from 2025's Graou EP. The track is largely about struggling with body image as a biracial, Korean-French person, but the Miki on camera in the music video is playful and relaxed. Around the same time, I was also reading Die Hot With A Vengeance and watching Materialists, and all of it together was making me way more aware of having a meat sack. Miki’s music possesses a notable sense of physicality that feels linked to having had to work hard to feel comfortable in her own body, and it’s a noticeable theme across Graou and her debut LP Industry Plant. As much as I like what she has to say, the songs are super catchy and the Gen Z breakout has so much undeniable star power that I think her appeal can transcend the language barrier. I'm also entertained by the possibility of someone who doesn't know French listening and not understanding a word before going "Wait, that's how you pronounce 'Oneohtrix'?"

Anyways, having spent more time contemplating how the ol' flesh prison impacts making music maybe primed my brain to finally start a deep dive on Nine Inch Nails. Yeah, it's a pretty drastic pivot to apply this mindset to a white guy who's defined a particular brand of carnality for about as long as I've been alive, but I suppose a lot of the songs are still about unease in one’s own skin. As much as I have a longstanding love for, say, HEALTH and various iterations of haunted club music, getting into NIN was just not something that I'd gotten around to before. (Please do not be mad at me for when I was born, for not having older siblings who also would not have been allowed to watch MTV, and for subsequently learning about the '90s from British people.) For some reason this did not happen in the midst of watching Challengers five times in the theater (low number tbh), but I stumbled into watching the Coachella livestream back in April and obviously was hooked. As a bloghouse millennial, I've more or less followed Boys Noize over the past couple of decades, so Alex Ridha teaming up with Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross as Nine Inch Noize for the stage in Indio and the new remix album has also presented a convenient entrance point. There is nothing novel I can say about Reznor being charismatic and the command he exerts over his body, but clearly it's still effective. Waking up and immediately listening to harsh industrial noise at 7:00 a.m. is probably a symptom of Going Through Something, but hey, it's 2026. At least in this context, I'm having a good time having a bad time! Of course the combination of provocation and pure muscle is irresistible. I feel like I could lift a car.

I've been regressing 20 years by revisiting a bunch of Bloc Party and Hot Chip and finding Daniel Radcliffe very delightful on The Fall And Rise Of Reggie Dinkins. I'm also fascinated by how the Itch make perfectly '00s music about having been too young to participate in indie sleaze. My immediate thought upon hearing "Space In The Cab" was "Huh, music sounds like this again?" Certainly, there are a lot of ways for remixing the recent enough past to not land, but the UK duo pulls it off in a way that doesn't make me want to roll my eyes. On their debut album It's The Hope That Kills You, there are shades of LCD Soundsystem, Bloc Party, Franz Ferdinand, and the Faint. White Rose Movement, if you're a real one. The lyrics sometimes recall early Arctic Monkeys songs about going out with your friends before Alex Turner started singing about how he's going to drive a car to the moon (complimentary). Yes, the Itch sound like a lot of artists I and probably you have heard before, but they're also doing their own thing, and it’s top eight worthy.

Heated Rivalry fever had me digging back into the Wolf Parade extended universe in a big way. (Yes, I bought the new t-shirt where the L is a hockey stick.) "I'll Believe In Anything" is a Spencer Krug-led song, and his new solo album Same Fangs is very enjoyable, but Dan Boeckner's extra-WP work has always felt a little edgier and more in line with my taste. Do you remember how much that Divine Fits album absolutely rips? I sure did.

Snotgirl finally came off of hiatus last year, and I did a full reread of the series before diving into the fourth volume this spring. Written by Bryan Lee O’Malley and illustrated by Leslie Hung, the comic is a noir murder mystery set in the world of LA fashion influencers with a humorous, surreal tone courtesy of the Scott Pilgrim creator. If you listened to the podcast Night Call, Snotgirl is probably for you.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve been placing increasingly large special orders at the French embassy bookstore, notably for stuff about the history of electronic music. I don’t think any of it is available in English, but I’m currently on Raphaël Malkin’s Music Sounds Better With You. I have read so many accounts of the 1997 Winter Music Conference.

I probably should have started this back up sooner, because I actually have had some notable things to share in this department over the past year! For Men's Health, I took a look at how Materialists approached body image, and I have to say that interviewing a leg-lengthening surgeon was one of the more memorable professional experiences I've had. More recently, I dove into the COVID-conscious music scene over at The Sick Times, and getting to share these stories and do so much in-depth reporting was really rewarding.

Thanks for maybe reading all that. Find me on Bluesky or whatever.

Until next time!