Guest Author

Lucky Lo makes music for the gentle-hearted, turning traumatic experiences into organic-sounding alt-pop. Together with her band, the Swedish singer Lo Ersare is currently touring her recent album "The Big Feel". In this guest article, Lo writes about the realities of low-budget touring and mental health struggles on the road.

The alternative singer Laura Carbone shares her thoughts on the recently released winter single "The Good". Her writing journey takes her back to connecting with spiritual guides and her father's jokes. In this guest article, Laura muses about her songwriting process, finding inspiration in the spiritual realm and tapping into the unconsciousness.

The artists Rosa Anschütz and Lukasz Polowczyk (Aint About Me) met through common friend and producer Jan Wagner. Experimentation and creative freedom are central to their creative practice. To accompany their new releases "Interior" and "Glacier Gospel", Rosa and Lukasz share in-depth musings about music and art. The following conversation has been transcribed from a recorded Zoom call.

The alternative singer Laura Carbone is a NBHAP regular and back now with another release. The gloomy "Tuesday" is the latest single and it embodies a transformative experience of letting out female rage. In this guest article, Laura writes about the creation of the song from the first drone guitar sounds recorded in her bedroom to screaming her heart out in the studio.

Annika Henderson, known as Anika created an immersive stage performance as a commissioned work for this year's Pop-Kultur festival. Working with several international and interdisciplinary artists, the project "Lost Voices" gives space to frequencies and voices that are unheard and marginalized by a hetero-patriarchal and capitalist society. She shares thoughts on working with these complex topics.

Berlin-based sound artist and singer Dumama has a special relationship to XJAZZ!. Following the event in May, Dumama now shares a live video of their performances. Working with the body and voice as modes of tapping into ancestral vibrations, Dumama collaborates with many artists across Berlin's boundary-pushing music scene. Read her personal reflections on the festival below.

The German-Filipino singer and musician Ray Lozano just released her debut album "Pairing Mode". It is a collection of polaroids, or short stories, about being alone, longing, and belonging. Raised in Cologne between two cultural identities, Ray found a home in the music of Jill Scott. In her guest article, she writes about the influence of the RnB singer on her younger self, and how it continues to shape her until today.

The now New York-based folk artist Fenne Lily is back with her third record and while her tender acoustic aura hasn’t changed a bit, her latest full-length is more honest and authentic than ever, grappling the essence of this thing called love with new intensity and sincerity. In a matter of looking back at each song from first to last, these are her thoughts on how this album was conceived.