Critical Listening

WE’RE BACK. Today we start the year with a dispatch from what some may call the front lines: a bunch of AI-related panels at a European music biz trade conference. It’s also our first episode recorded in person!

We are starting our new season with two episodes recorded in the city of Groningen in the Netherlands, where we were invited to participate on some panels and to host a live taping of the show at the annual conference and f...

As 2025 comes to a close, so does the first season of Critical Listening. And with us to send off the year, we have none other than the internet's busiest music nerd himself: Anthony Fantano of The Needle Drop. We discuss how public perception of streaming culture discourse has shifted this past year, his efforts to offer a critical perspective on the music industry in his videos, the state of on-screen music journalism in 20...

We are back for our penultimate episode of Season 1 of Critical Listening! Recorded on November 13th at the coveted Stood at Purchase College, we're discussing the latest developments in the Spotify deal to create "artist first" generative AI tools in partnership with major labels and distributors. We also review the platform's continued growth as it rounds out its second full year of profitability and what that means for both arti...

For Episode 8 we have composer, educator, curator, and activist Amirtha Kidambi stopping by. We discuss Amirtha's various musical outputs, including her Elder Ones ensemble and her recent duo release with Matt Evans as Neti-Neti. We discuss the inseparability of politics from pedagogy as teaching artists, the importance of solidarity amongst working artists and the need for us to Do-It-Together rather than simply DIY. Amirtha has a...

We’re back with another headlines ep, where Liz and Max each bring one story from across the music-tech biz press to summarize and contextualize. On this ep we are unpacking the imminent major label deals with gen-AI companies. At the time we recorded, those reportedly landmark deals were thought to be signed within weeks, and since recording we’ve already started to see more details emerge. We discussed some implications of Spotif...

We're back from a month of touring and we missed you! We are thrilled to have musician and author Damon Krukowski on the show to discuss his upcoming book "Why Sound Matters", available everywhere on October 21st from Yale University Press. We discuss Galaxie 500, Damon & Naomi, the acoustic ecology writings of Bernie Krause, the Boston independent music scene in the 1980s compared to today, and how much of the material aspects...

Max & Liz return for another installment of their series diving into some intriguing headlines from across the music, tech and business hellscape. What does it mean for organizations representing independent record labels to be inking deals with gen-AI companies? How are AI-driven tech platforms impacting the realm of music education? Never fear, we’ve got a bloomscroll in there too. Check it out and support the Patre...

We're back with another esteemed guest! With us today we have writer, musician, and co-founder of the worker owned music publication Hearing Things, Andy Cush. We discuss with Andy his articles on the various artists and labels who have not only decided to leave streaming, but are reimagining their relationship with digital music as a whole off these major platforms. We also dive into the detrimental effects streaming has made on t...

We’re back with the first installment of what we’re calling “Headlines,” diving into a few stories from across the music and tech biz press this month. For July, there were some headlines that just seemed impossible to ignore. You guessed it: Ek’s recent investment into AI weapons company Helsing, and that gen-AI classic rock band with millions of streams. We end by searching the internet far and wide for a glimmer of ho...

How are musicians building collective power in a freelance economy that still worships the grind? In recent years the Union of Musicians and Allied Workers have made headlines for its work around streaming, through both the Justice at Spotify campaign and the Living Wage for Musicians Act, which the group co-authored with Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib. Since these are likely to be recurring topics of conversation on Critical...

Welcome to episode one of CRITICAL LISTENING, a new podcast about music and technology hosted by Liz Pelly and Max Alper. 

How does a band survive 30 years of industry hostility to art? For our first episode, we’re chatting with Greg Saunier, the drummer of Deerhoof, who just released Noble and Godlike in Ruin, their 20th record across 30 years as a band. We talk about the political themes of the group’s recent material, resisting ...

Critical Listening is a new podcast from journalist Liz Pelly and musician/educator Max Alper exploring music, technology, and culture.

This is episode zero, a short introduction where Liz and Max discuss how the show came to be and what they plan to cover in future episodes. What has Liz been learning on the road promoting her book Mood Machine? What's the deal with Max's online alter ego La Meme Young, and why is he backing away ...