The Nelson George Mixtape
Nelson George maps three waves of Black Hollywood presence — blaxploitation, the Spike Lee era, BLM — and argues each opened doors that closed just as fast. With Warner Discovery folding into Ellison's empire and Trump back in office, he sees the pattern repeating: tech-sector gatekeepers have replaced studio ones, with even less commitment to voices outside the mainstream.
Why is this interesting?
Why is this interesting? uses Jung's enantiodromia — the idea that systems pushed to an extreme flip into their opposite — to trace the cultural whiplash from Mötley Crüe to Nirvana's Incesticide liner notes. A personal essay that earns its theory.
Katherine Needleman Oboist's Substack
Katherine Needleman examines the career of horn player Philip Farkas and the treatment of female horn player Kotas in the Chicago Symphony under conductor Artur Rodzinski. The piece explores how professional networks and gender dynamics operated in mid-20th century orchestra management.
i-D
A festival report from a journalist covering their 10th Cannes Film Festival. The piece reflects on changes at the festival over the years, critiques the main competition as an old boys' club, and highlights emerging filmmakers and new stars in the sidebar strands.
Katherine Needleman Oboist's Substack
Blind auditions were supposed to be the fix — Elayne Jones helped invent them. This Substack piece recovers her story: the first Black principal-chair musician in a major American orchestra, denied tenure in 1974 by an all-white committee that gave her 169 out of 700 points, while six white colleagues hired the same year sailed through. Pegged to Elim Chan's appointment at the SF Symphony.
The Believer Magazine
Rafia Zakaria discusses winning the 2026 National Magazine Award for her essay "Water Pressure" about her father's search for clean water in Karachi, Pakistan during a climate crisis. The interview explores the inspiration behind the personal essay and the challenges of developing the piece.
Ottessa
A nostalgic look at an email chain from 2006 between the author and her college best friend 'Lauren' discussing plans to see Bridge and Tunnel and coordinating their schedules. The piece captures absurd mundane moments from the early 2000s correspondence.
Feed Me
A curated summer reading list of novels with reader commentary and personal anecdotes about the reading experience. Features recommendations including works by James Baldwin, Lauren Groff, Ian McEwan, and others, accompanied by vivid descriptions of where and how readers experienced these books.
