Now, lamb songs don’t have to be low energy to be soothing. They simply need a sunny disposition, a 74-degree mid-cycle feel. They shrink you down and plop you into a flute of champagne—plus you can breathe water now, easily as air. The bubbles give you quick little kisses as they pass. You only get drunk if you wish.

Philip Glass is one of those names—the name of perhaps the most famous living composer, of course—that you’ve either heard but never investigated or have read about so many times that your eyes are rolling already. His reputation lies halfway between never needing to be written about again and still needing everybody with a pen to do so.

Something preposterous happened in 1964: On the week of April 4, one artist had the top five songs on the Billboard Hot 100. It’d never happened before and it hasn’t been matched since. Mere weeks before, in the warming days of March, America found that no fewer than 60% of all records sold were songs by the Beatles.

We're back in time for the Oscar's this weekend, and I am once again highlighting the best use of music in film over the year—because the Best Original Song award just doesn't cut it anymore. We're talking best needle drops here, the best collective soundtracks, a celebration of the lost art of curating a vibe.

That first song you hear? That’s my #1 song of the year. That’s right—for the first time in Earwyrms history, I have made a best-of playlist from one to ten. Grief demands you do something different, and—like Soderbergh producing the 93rd Academy Awards—only time will tell if we fell for seductive folly or landed on love’s new paradigm.

Safe to say three of the most consequential albums of my life came out in 2013, and that list doesn’t even touch the dozen other nearly perfect albums from this year—Trouble Will Find Me, Modern Vampires of the City, Cupid Deluxe, Yeezus… 2013 changed music as we know it, and a lot of the biggest artists today cemented their status or debuted this year, from The 1975 to Beyoncé.

I do remember that this is the year I got a Nintendo Power subscription though. And I do remember one day, flipping through said Nintendo Power in the back seat of the family van, my parents slid a revolution into the CD player. That was the day I first heard Now!That’s What I Call Music! 14.

So for me, ‘93 was the first year of the 90s, and its evidence lies in several places: in the birth of the Riot Grrrl movement and third wave feminism with Bikini Kill’s “Rebel Girl”; in Nirvana’s dyspeptic final album before Cobain’s untimely death; and in Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), the harbinger for the soon-to-be golden age of hip hop.

Some stories of note in 1983: the invention of Detroit techno, as embodied by the single “Clear” by Cybotron; the birth of English indie rock as we know it with The Smiths debut and follow up singles (“Hand in Glove” and “This Charming Man,” respectively); and the birth of American indie rock as we know it with R.E.M.’s Murmur.

If you want a little taste of what 1973 was like, go watch Licorice Pizza, the title of which refers to the old LP, a.k.a. the vinyl record—and boy, was this year firmly the middle of the Album Empire.

It’s time for the first of our Annivyrsaries, my favorite history class, and we’re starting with the sounds of 1963. So naturally, I want to focus on something that hasn’t been touched as much by scholars—the rise of the Surf Song.

Hear me out—Radiohead is a Halloween band. I think this is important. This is important because, for one of the biggest rock bands in the world, I think there’s still a lot of “I don’t get Radiohead” out there. I was on that side of the fence for like 15 years.

This weekend, I urge you to press pause on the spooky movies for only a moment to go see Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon at your favorite theater—I want to get this baby over the $100 million mark on its opening weekend. Wouldn’t that be great? We could all save cinema, together.

If you happen to be celebrating today’s holiday appropriately—that is, strolling amongst graves, raking in the leaves, or running in jeans—I made a little neo-classical mood music for your Friday the 13th adventure. There’s a little bit of pumpkin synth, a little dark ambient, and a whole lot of attitude for your hallowed eve.

Welcome, ghouls, to another season of creeps. Grab your theremin and your howling cat, because we’re taking this train all the way to hell (the fun one, not the torture one).

We’re staring down the barrel of another October, but before we take our first step down the staircase to the crypts, I thought we’d take one last look at a bevy of excellent new releases that have come out this week.

The National put out their second album of 2023 last week, a companion to this spring’s First Two Pages of Frankenstein. The record is called Laugh Track, and right down to the guest stars, Swiftie production sound, and variant album cover, this feels like Frankenstein’s twin brother.

Already we’re dancing in the fallout from Olivia Rodrigo’s juggernaut GUTS, and coming soon are what promise to be great releases from Slow Pulp, Armand Hammer, Lilts, Sampha, and L’Rain. Check out these cuts from the fall’s most promising.

Again, I’m celebrating Dragon Con with a playlist of phonk, the coolest nerd music on the market today. This is the realm of the self-proclaimed prodigies, of autodidacts and blue-collar futurists. Welcome to the new age of fingerless gloves, the soundtrack to the getaway drive.

This month, we’ve had a new song by Sufjan Stevens that harkens back to Carrie & Lowell; a Zach Bryan album that might sell stadiums and speak human at the same time; another fuzz-and-buzz single from MJ Lenderman; and a Julie Byrne masterpiece, the most cauterizing grief album since the aforementioned by Sufjan.