Stephen Thompson
Stephen Thompson is a writer, editor and reviewer for NPR Music, where he speaks into any microphone that will have him and appears as a frequent panelist on All Songs Considered. Since 2010, Thompson has been a fixture on the NPR roundtable podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour, which he created and developed with NPR correspondent Linda Holmes. In 2008, he and Bob Boilen created the NPR Music video series Tiny Desk Concerts, in which musicians perform at Boilen's desk. (To be more specific, Thompson had the idea, which took seconds, while Boilen created the series, which took years. Thompson will insist upon equal billing until the day he dies.)
In 1993, Thompson founded The Onion's entertainment section, The A.V. Club, which he edited until December 2004. In the years since, he has provided music-themed commentaries for NPR programs such as Weekend Edition, All Things Considered and Morning Edition, on which he earned the distinction of becoming the first member of the NPR Music staff ever to sing on an NPR newsmagazine. (Later, the magic of AutoTune transformed him from a 12th-rate David Archuleta into a fourth-rate Cher.) Thompson's entertainment writing has also run in Paste magazine, The Washington Post and The London Guardian.
During his tenure at The Onion, Thompson edited the 2002 book The Tenacity Of The Cockroach: Conversations With Entertainment's Most Enduring Outsiders (Crown) and copy-edited six best-selling comedy books. While there, he also coached The Onion's softball team to a sizzling 21-42 record, and was once outscored 72-0 in a span of 10 innings. Later in life, Thompson redeemed himself by teaming up with the small gaggle of fleet-footed twentysomethings who won the 2008 NPR Relay Race, a triumph he documents in a hard-hitting essay for the book This Is NPR: The First Forty Years (Chronicle).
A 1994 graduate of the University of Wisconsin, Thompson now lives in Silver Spring, Md., with his girlfriend, his daughter, their three cats and a room full of vintage arcade machines. (He also has a large adult son who has headed off to college but still calls once in a while.) Thompson's hobbies include watching reality television without shame, eating Pringles until his hand has involuntarily twisted itself into a gnarled claw, using the size of his Twitter following to assess his self-worth, touting the immutable moral superiority of the Green Bay Packers (who returned the favor by making a 22-minute documentary about his life) and maintaining a fierce rivalry with all Midwestern states other than Wisconsin.
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Two of 2024's biggest new hitmakers consolidate their hold on the top of the pop charts, while a pair of stars from a previous generation — Katy Perry and Lady Gaga — both stumble with new work.
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This week, the rapper Future hit #1 on Billboard's albums chart for a third time in the last six months. Meanwhile, on the songs, chart, stasis is becoming the coin of the realm.
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Since its re-release earlier this month, Travis Scott's album Days Before Rodeo has been bouncing up and down the charts, finally landing at No. 1.
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A 10th week at the top of the Billboard pop chart is quite an accomplishment. Before the 2000s, that was the rarest of feats. In the days of streaming though, it's become more common.
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All summer, a wide range of hits were in the running for the biggest songs of the season — country singalongs, rap diss tracks, pop kiss-offs and rock epics. But two took the race down to the wire.
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After scoring two huge hits this summer with "Espresso" and "Please Please Please," Sabrina Carpenter's new album just debuted at number one -- against an interesting challenger.
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After scoring two huge hits this summer with "Espresso" and "Please Please Please," Sabrina Carpenter's new album just debuted at number one -- against an interesting challenger.
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Sabrina Carpenter was expected to have a massive week. Still, her journey to the top of the album charts was fraught right up to its final moments, as she fended off a furious challenge from rapper Travis Scott.
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It's still summer, but signs indicate that the season of Taylor Swift's album chart dominance may be coming to an end. This week's harbinger: a certain face-tattooed rapper-turned-country star.
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The British rock band Oasis will be reuniting next year to play a series of shows. It's a joyful moment for fans, but there are doubts about whether it will endure.