Accessibility links
Stephen Thompson Stephen Thompson is a host, writer and reviewer for NPR Music and Pop Culture Happy Hour. He appears frequently on All Songs Considered and NPR newsmagazines.
Washington, DC - May 03, 2016: Stephen Thompson CREDIT: Matt Roth
Stories By

Stephen Thompson

Thursday

Road Trip: Songs to Drive By

Nine-Minute Road Trip

This brutally efficient five-song playlist serves as a soundtrack for when you want to leave your house, hurry to an on-ramp, roar down a short stretch of highway, and abruptly take the next exit to your extremely nearby destination.

Nine-Minute Road Trip

Listen
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/93875372/94057504" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Wednesday

Tuesday

Review

Song Of The Day

Horse Feathers: Enigmatic And Artfully Slurred

Horse Feathers' songs may have words, but in many ways, the band might as well play instrumentals. Its songs offer up rustic, vaguely doomstruck atmosphere more than they convey discrete hooks and distinct messages. With its gorgeous strings, "Curs in the Weeds" soothes even as it unsettles.

'Curs in the Weeds' by Horse Feathers

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/93525894/93525570" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Friday

Review

Song Of The Day

The Twilight Sad Gives Genius Its Due

Daniel Johnston's songs are all about deceptive simplicity: His work may be shrill and primitive, but his lyrical insight and innate gift for melody give him real justification to tote around the mantle of "genius." Covered here by The Twilight Sad, "Some Things Last a Long Time" says more than its surface would seem to indicate.

'Some Things Last a Long Time' by The Twilight Sad

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/93397852/93380147" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Thursday

Review

Song Of The Day

Fleet Foxes: Indie-Pop's Celestial Choir

Though Fleet Foxes' music often gets drenched in rich harmonies, "Tiger Mountain Peasant Song" shows how much sonic and thematic ground the group can cover with one pure vocal and a couple of acoustic guitars.

'Tiger Mountain Peasant Song' by Fleet Foxes

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/93370888/93368379" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Tuesday

Monday

Review

Song Of The Day

Sebadoh: On Love's Collapse, 'Soul and Fire'

By the time Lou Barlow opens his mouth to sing, Sebadoh's 1993 single "Soul and Fire" has already conveyed a knotty bundle of conflicting emotions: They're all there in the aching, deliberately paced opening notes. From there, Barlow catalogs a relationship's combustible ingredients before announcing, "I think our love is coming to an end."

'Soul and Fire' by Sebadoh

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/92513808/92512764" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Thursday

Tuesday

Review

Song Of The Day

Basia Bulat: 'In the Night' a Breezy Joy

Unabashedly cheerful, Bulat's "In the Night" is a perfect slab of shimmering girl-group pop, but it's no mere throwback gimmick. A young singer-songwriter from Toronto, Bulat invests the track with graceful effervescence and an innate understanding of momentum.

'In the Night' by Basia Bulat

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90398609/90386752" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Wednesday

Review

Song Of The Day

Karen Dalton: Blues from Beyond the Grave

Throughout "In the Evening," which Dalton would later record for her studio debut, she infuses a Leroy Carr song with bluesy, woozy weariness, drawing the sorrow out of every note. It's hard not to view the track through the prism of Dalton's haunted life.

'In the Evening' by Karen Dalton

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/91632808/91629853" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Monday

Review

Song Of The Day

Adem: Comforting 'Tears' for Yo La Tengo

Where Yo La Tengo's "Tears Are in Your Eyes" possesses the heavy-lidded feel of shared sorrow (with a reassuring hint of optimism), Adem's cover opts for a tone of comparative comfort. His version also functions as a sort of Cliffs Notes to what Adem is all about: a figurative glass of warm milk for a world of nervous stomachs.

'Tears Are in Your Eyes' by Adem

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/91546576/91546202" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Thursday

Friday

Review

Song Of The Day

Minus the Bear Finds Humanity in 'Alien'

Minus the Bear's mystifyingly titled "I'm Totally Not Down with Rob's Alien," from the newly remastered and reissued 2004 EP They Make Beer Commercials Like This, houses a gorgeous, warmly rendered reflection on alienation and the bliss of youthful solitude.

'I'm Totally Not Down with Rob's Alien' by Minus the Bear

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90987926/90988167" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Wednesday

Review

Song Of The Day

Ghostly and Ethereal, Bon Iver Finds Catharsis

As dark as it gets, "Skinny Love," with its unforgettable steel-guitar hook, is too gorgeous to function as a true downer. Shout-along fodder for melancholy late-night drives, it announces Bon Iver as a budding powerhouse, not so much promising as fully formed.

'Skinny Love' by Bon Iver

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/18331318/18164282" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Friday

Review

Song Of The Day

Shearwater's 'Rooks' a Chiming Pop Charmer

The band's new album is dark and graceful, intermittently rocking, and uniformly excellent, making it an ideal showpiece for a band five albums into its career, yet still largely unknown on a grand scale. Best of all is the sort-of title track "Rooks."

'Rooks' by Shearwater

  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90740088/90742250" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">