Melissa Kacar

When Suki Waterhouse released "To Love" in 2023, she called it "...a very distinct portrait of my heart right now that I wanted to share." The song beautifully captures the rare and special feeling of finally finding your soulmate, of being understood by someone else on a level you didn't know was possible.  This song marked a noticeable shift for Suki, stepping away from her usual more melancholic tone that much of her music tended to gravitate toward up to that point. "To Love" is a beautiful ode to this stage of her life and the power of true love. It is deeply honest and so romantic lyrically. The production by her frequent collaborators Findlay and Jules Apollinaire is so cinematic and expansive, it is truly such a highlight in her discography. "Is there a universe where our paths never crossed? Or where I caught your eye, but then someone arrived and we both forgot?" she sings in the opening lines of the song. "I traveled all corn...

Irish alternative rock band Inhaler recently performed their first-ever show in Allentown, PA, closing out the Open Wide North American Tour with an unforgettable night. I've been wanting to see Inhaler live ever since I first discovered their music in 2022, and I'm so happy I finally got the chance to experience their show in person. This Fall 2025 leg of the tour focused on cities across the U.S. that the band hadn't visited before, and I was very excited to see my hometown on that list. It was in support of their latest album Open Wide , which has quickly become one of my favorite releases of the year. Hearing those songs brought to life on stage only made me love them even more than I already do! They performed at Archer Music Hall, a brand-new venue that opened earlier this year.  A local band from the Lehigh Valley called Just also opened the show and I loved getting introduced to their music through this show and can't wait to dive into more of their work in the ...

"Posing For Cars" serves as the closing track of Japanese Breakfast 's third album, Jubilee , released in 2021. The album arrived soon after the release of Michelle Zauner's debut memoir Crying In H Mart , a which remains one of the most devastating and moving books I have ever read. The way she tells her story with such precision, which is centered around the heartbreak of losing her mother, made me fall in love with her as a writer and artist. Both the memoir and Jubilee  reflect beautifully the way she is able to use art as an outlet to process these intense, complicated emotions.  Michelle wrote "Posing For Cars" the same day she composed the album's opener, "Paprika". Though the two songs are very different in tone and style, they beautifully bookend  Jubilee  in a way that feels so meaningful, as both songs are heavily derived from inside jokes between her and her husband, Peter. The title for "Posing For Cars" was inspired by o...

Halsey begins their 2020 album Manic with her name, "Ashley" , and ends it with her birthday, "929", creating a full‑circle narrative arc that beautifully captures just how deeply personal the album is. The closing track is a raw, diaristic look at her life and her journey, told through a free‑flowing, conversational reflection of memories, lessons, and wisdom that she has picked up along the way.  Produced by her frequent collaborators Jasper Sheff and John Cunningham, "929" perfectly encapsulates the personal journey Manic takes the listener on. This record is one of self-discovery and acceptance of every side of yourself, in the most unfiltered way.  "I really was born at 9:29 AM on 9/29, you think I'm lying, but I'm, I'm being dead serious," she jokes in the intro, speaking casually in the studio when working on the album. The rest of the song goes into a stream-of-consciousness style of confessional that is so unguarded and self...

"Mr. Mountebank" by Djo The Crux (Deluxe) gives so much more insight into the journey Djo took while writing this album and all of the different directions he could've taken with it narratively. It's more than just a regular deluxe album, it's more so a companion project of twelve songs that were written during the same creative period as The Crux , but didn't make the initial cut. That said, they don't feel like leftovers. Each track truly feels like a natural expansion of the time in his life that inspired this music, and collectively, they feel like a culmination of some of the more unhinged parts of himself that he had to work through to arrive at the final version of The Crux . "Mr. Mountebank" is one of my many favorites, he goes fully Djo XCX on it, diving into a wild and abrasive hyperpop sound that's completely different from anything he's made before. It offers a sharp commentary on fame and virality, especially in the wake of ...

As a part of her seven-date record store promo tour celebrating the release week of her long-awaited sophomore album Am I The Drama? , Cardi B made a stop at one of my favorite local record stores for a special meet and greet event. Spin Me Round, located in the Palmer Park Mall in Easton, Pennsylvania, was the second stop, the day after her album was released. It was so exciting to see one of my favorite local record stores included on this tour and I couldn't believe that she was actually in person for this event! Spin Me Round has built a massive platform across TikTok and Instagram and have definitely garnered a reputation as one of the most popular independent record stores in the North East. This is always one of my go-to record stores to visit for Record Store Day , early listening parties, and vinyl shopping in general, so it was cool to be able to see an artist as big as Cardi there! The price of admission was only about $15 and preordering a CD copy of Cardi's new al...