Dirty Projectors’ Dave Longstreth and the genesis of a break-up album.

How an obsessive New Age hustler brought the sound of the ocean to millions of home stereos.

A woman thought a Coen brothers movie was a “true story” and tracked it to her death. Now someone’s made a fictional film about her, further blurring the lines between reality and artifice.

On singer-songwriters Harry Nilsson, Randy Newman and Van Dyke Parks.

I get the sense that the labels' attitude toward these guys wasn't altogether different from a parent's attitude toward gifted children: Get them through the system, but make sure to give them a clean little corner to doodle in and pat them on the head when they show you what they've done, whether you understand it or not.