When the jury found in my favor, the man who sexually assaulted me was court-ordered to give me a symbolic $1. To this day he has not paid me that dollar, and I think that act of defiance is symbolic in itself. | | | | Robyn at the MTV O Music Awards in Los Angeles, Oct. 31, 2011.
(Chelsea Lauren/WireImage/Getty Images) | | | | |  | “When the jury found in my favor, the man who sexually assaulted me was court-ordered to give me a symbolic $1. To this day he has not paid me that dollar, and I think that act of defiance is symbolic in itself.”
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| | rantnrave:// Loaded, leading, uncomfortable question of the day: What's TAYLOR SWIFT doing on the cover of TIME MAGAZINE's "Silence Breakers" issue? Loaded because it assumes Swift is less of a sexual assault victim than other sexual assault victims, as if some sexual assaults are more OK than others. Leading because it takes for granted that you agree with that. Uncomfortable because, well, there's lots of history to unpack here about how Swift has, and hasn't, used her voice—history that can't be casually dismissed—and because this is supposed to be an uncomfortable discussion. The WASHINGTON POST's MOLLY ROBERTS, who doesn't think Swift belongs on a magazine cover with ASHLEY JUDD, SUSAN FOWLER, ADAMA IWU, ISABEL PASCUAL and the arm of an ANONYMOUS VICTIM, does a nice job of laying out both sides of the debate. On the one hand, Swift is a victim. Full stop. She confronted her assaulter in court in 2017, she spoke out sharply, she inspired a lot of women. RAINN attributed a huge spike in calls to its rape crisis hotline directly to Swift. She sent a message to men even before HARVEY WEINSTEIN and the #MeToo movement. On the other hand, Swift has been highly selective about how and when she speaks out (too often, it's "when it benefits her brand"), and hasn't been anywhere near the center of the actual movement that Time is honoring as its Person of the Year. And then there's the sensitive question of how Swift has, or hasn't, spoken out about the man who was runner-up for Person of the Year. But is that Taylor Swift's job? It's easy, in any case, to argue that the world is full of women who are more badass than Taylor Swift—including, perhaps, KESHA, who commiserated with Swift when she was in court, and who Roberts says may have been a better choice for the cover if Time needed a pop singer. Maybe. But maybe what Time wanted was one ginormous celebrity. One who would resonate with young American girls. One who might inspire them to open the magazine and learn about all those other courageous women. Maybe even inspire young boys to learn a thing or two about appropriate behavior. Maybe she isn't a silence breaker but *can* be an ice breaker. Is that enough? Will it be enough going forward?... "Gender is not a genre," says CAROLINE POLACHEK and, no, she does not want to be part of your "female, transgender, and non-binary" music festival. No matter how awesome that lineup might be... QUINCY JONES launching the NETFLIX for jazz... EPITAPH's DAVE HANSEN is the new chairman of MERLIN... Oh what a difference it made when the guys in KISS learned how to tune their guitars. Or when BIG BOI came up with that hook in his bedroom studio and decided that ROSA PARKS would be a pretty good title for it. We love oral histories here at REDEF and we could hardly help ourselves with this one. MusicSET: "Yo! Bum Rush the Studio: Album Oral Histories Vol. 1." | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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 | POLITICO Magazine |
| One of the world’s biggest pop stars doesn’t want to talk about politics. Is that OK? | | |
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 | The Daily Beast |
| Because of her spineless feminism and political passivity, Taylor Swift is hardly the figure of female empowerment that "Time" magazine is making her out to be. | | |
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 | The Baffler |
| Can music still save your mortal soul? | | |
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 | REDEF |
| How Kiss learned to tune their guitars. How Rosa Parks found her way into that OutKast song. Why cars were so important to Public Enemy. And more first-hand stories from inside the control rooms where your favorite albums were made. | | |
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 | The Ringer |
| "I apologize / For all the stillborns / 'Cause I wasn't present, your body wouldn't accept it." And there you have it: the hardest rap lyrics of the year. The most emo, the most metal. No dead-eyed 21 Savage threat, no croaked Future boast, no imperial Kendrick Lamar proclamation could compare. | | |
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 | Consequence of Sound |
| Fun fact: These Australian rockers released five albums in 2017. | | |
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 | Billboard |
| He teamed up with his friends and blockchain technologists to create a platform that gives artists complete control over their product as well as a platform upon which to share that product direct to consumers for proper compensation. | | |
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 | The New York Times |
| On the road with the king of ‘bro country,’ who has been testing the sonic limits of the genre for a decade. | | |
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 | Post-Punk.com |
| Before post-punk and Goth in the early days of Punk, British film director, DJ and musician Don Letts pretty much ran the scene at The Roxy in London, spinning primarily reggae and ska music to patrons of all colours. | | |
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 | TIME |
| Read Time's Person of the Year interview with the pop star about her sexual assault trial. | | |
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 | Noisey |
| What did their musical experience have to do with recent political wins by metalhead Danica Roem and hardcore vocalist Justin Brannan? | | |
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 | DJ Tech Tools |
| What is the big deal with net neutrality? For a generation of musical creatives that rely on the internet to share their artistic works, having equal access feels like a fundamental right. But that's under threat in the United States -- keep reading to learn more about what net neutrality is, how it's under threat, and what a world without it could look like for DJs and producers. | | |
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 | Vulture |
| Sonny Rollins is, inarguably, on any short list of greatest living American musicians. So vast, intelligent, and witty is his improvisational skill, and so satisfying the sheer, sensuous life force of his saxophone playing. | | |
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 | The Root |
| Let me make this clear: I'm not team #FreeMeekMill, but I am team #FreeRobertRihmeekWilliams. There is a difference. Meek Mill is a highly touted street dude-turned-rapper from Philly. Robert Rihmeek Williams is a Philadelphia man many believe has been wrongly incarcerated by an overzealous judge who is using her influence and judicial power to keep the man down. | | |
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| The Daily Beast |
| The "French Elvis" loved the U.S., and lived there on and off for years. But the only country that every truly loved his music was France. His death marks the end of an era. | | |
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 | Genius |
| Lyrical dexterity sometimes takes a backseat to melody and flow, but it’s not the first time. | | |
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 | The New Statesman |
| If you’re the right age, these sounds whirl you back in time to those first records you owned. | | |
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| Consequence of Sound |
| Three top music critics discuss a year full of allegations against bands they loved. | | |
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 | The Omnivore |
| There isn’t much of a hip-hop scene in the remote archipelago, but Silvurdrongur is doing his best to change that. | | |
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 | The Guardian |
| A soundtrack to an erotic feminist film, the crunch of crisps in your own mouth, a composition for ‘strap-on and electric guitar’ … meet the women who are making music and telling stories on their own terms. | | |
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 | YouTube |
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