Lindsay Zoladz, a pop music critic for The Times, cuts through the noise with The Amplifier, a newsletter that harks back to the days of mixtapes.
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“What should I listen to?”
Lindsay Zoladz, a pop music critic for The New York Times, says that’s the first question she gets when people find out what she does for a living.
She answers in The Amplifier, a twice-weekly newsletter that debuted today. In a time when people have millions of songs at their fingertips, the newsletter aims to cut through the noise with a must-listen playlist. In each edition, Ms. Zoladz will recommend about a dozen pop songs — tracks she hopes will surprise and delight listeners — and offer personal musings about music and pop culture.
In an interview, Ms. Zoladz shared how she curates the playlists and how “stan” culture has made the job of a music critic more challenging. Read edited excerpts below.
Can you tell me about the newsletter and what inspired it?
One of the founding principles of the newsletter is that we’re really trying to make this an alternative to the algorithm and the faceless playlists that have taken over a lot of streaming services. I really want this to be discovery with a human touch and the sort of digressions, random anecdotes and musings that you can’t necessarily get from a Spotify playlist or A.I.
I think that we’re consciously trying to amp up the humanity in this newsletter. There’s a real craving for that now. I miss exchanging a mixtape or a mix CD with a friend in high school. I want the newsletter to have that feel.
Do you have a certain audience in mind?
I don’t, but when you’re writing online, having a timely peg is often the only way something is going to get published. That can be really hard when writing about new music. If readers see a new artist that they’re not familiar with yet, they’re not necessarily going to click. Something I’m really excited about is getting newer artists and different types of music in front of people’s ears.
What is your secret to making a playlist?
Sequencing is really important. When I make playlists on my phone, I’m constantly testing them out to see if a song flows into the next. You really want a fun opening song that sets the tone, narrative or emotional arc to the playlist, and the right mix of genres and artists, while focusing on a central theme. That’s something I have been practicing since I was in high school making mixes for my friends.
Have you seen music journalism evolve in the last few years?
I think that the internet and streaming music are linked to the function of music criticism. A lot of early music critics or early pop critics were describing music that you could not hear as readily without purchasing the entire album or, at the very least, a single.
Music writing doesn’t need to be a consumer guide as much as it once was. The question people are coming to me with is “What is worth my time?” There’s just so much music out there now that the critic’s job has become more about finding and elevating what is worth your time. I hope this newsletter can give people ways to navigate the sometimes overwhelming mass of new music that comes out any given week.
You’ve been working on this newsletter for several months. What have you fine-tuned?
We’ve found that the more personal and idiosyncratic the newsletters are, the better they work — which is really exciting for me because I love that kind of writing.
One feature we’re developing: I am a big vinyl person, and I love record shopping. When I travel to any city, I’m someone who is trying to fit records in my carry-on. We’re going to do a feature that’s essentially my record haul at different places.
Where do you find your recommendation inspiration?
I look through other websites that post new music. I look through my inbox at what publicists and artists send me. I’ll listen to my friends, if they text me something that they think I might like.
In terms of older things, I’m working through record stores or reading and researching about other artists I’m writing about. I always like to keep my antennae up. I’m someone who really likes to follow random paths of curiosity.
Is there some aspect of music journalism that you don’t love?
I think nuance is in short supply a lot of the time. The rise of stan culture has made it extra challenging to give constructive criticism or to have a reaction to a piece of music that is somewhere between “Oh my god, this is the best thing ever” or “This is trash.” Realistically, most of our responses to music are somewhere between those two poles on the spectrum.
It can be challenging when you’re publishing opinions at a place like The New York Times. It can be hard to stick to your guns if you’re a younger critic who is a little daunted by all of that discourse. But I think that there’s still such a need and a desire from readers for those opinions that are nuanced.
To receive twice-weekly playlists and pop culture coverage, sign up for the Amplifier newsletter at nytimes.com/newsletters.
