Nia Recommends These Stories

26/100 New Albums in 2023 — Like the first artist I dove into in 2023, the British girl group Flo, I was introduced to the Italian rock band Måneskin on TikTok. Their cover of the track “Beggin,” originally released in 1967 by The Four Seasons, went about as viral as you can go on TikTok, with…

7/100 New Albums in 2023 — One of my Twitter homies recommended I listen to Duke Ellington and John Coltrane’s self-titled album, released in 1963. (Go follow the homie, by the way.) When I started listening to the first song, “In a Sentimental Mood”, deja-vu swept through my body. I turned into that one meme of…

This transformed my morning routine. — My favorite mindfulness practice is drinking my morning tea. I drink a specific kind of tea in the mornings: an English rose-scented Black tea. Its box describes the tea as “smooth and fragrant balanced with delicate rose notes”. The five minutes my cup of tea and I share together are…

4/100 New Albums in 2023 — I, like many, have tried to sing Minnie Riperton’s “Lovin You,” including those pure, angelic, nearly impossible-to-pull-off high notes. Inevitably, like many, I crash and burn, sounding more like an asthmatic dolphin than the “Queen of the Whistle Register.” “Lovin You” is one of those songs embedded in music history…

1/100 New Albums in 2023 — My first introduction to Flo, a British girl group from London, was through TikTok. Armed with a catchy hook and a TikTok-ready dance, their single “Cardboard Box” quickly went viral. Now, months later, there are 1.2M videos on TikTok featuring the song. I always wanted to check out Flo but…

New year, new music (including a wrap-up of my 2022 challenge) — Can you believe that it is 2023? Not me. Last year, I announced my “aspirational and slightly unrealistic” New Year’s resolution of listening to 100 new albums in 2022. You know what people say: new year, new…music. The challenge was a huge success. Not only did I finish the challenge…

If President Obama can do a year-end list — then so can I. — If 2022 has to end (and good riddance to this wild-ass year) then let’s end it the right way with an end-of-year “best of” list. I’ll be sharing some of my favorite TV shows, albums, and books I’ve consumed this year. The list isn’t strictly for content released in 2022…

It’s most wonderful time of the year. No — for real. — Ah, December; the time of hot cocoa becoming a legitimate food group, a drop in temperature that tells you it’s winter winter, and everyone’s favorite data miner, Spotify, releasing its year-in-review extravaganza Spotify Wrapped. What better way to commemorate this year, albeit feverishly strange and unpredictable, than oversharing my music…

You’ll probably here “Aw, here it goes!” in your head the entire day — sorry not sorry. — Last night I watched Keke Palmer’s episode of Saturday Night Live and I couldn’t believe how hard it made me laugh. I’ve had love for Keke Palmer for what seems like my whole life. I remember being so obsessed with the 2006 movie Akeelah and the Bee growing up, Keke…