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As cultural publications around the world continue to collapse due to advertising revenues running dry, we’re ever more reliant on direct support from you to continue bringing you the best writing there is..

Exceptional art deserves exceptional insight from thoughtful critics. By supporting The Quietus, not only do you help us keep the number of ads on site to a minimum and the lights on at the great server farm in the cloud, you ensure we can continue to pay our brilliant writers.

There are no corporate media owners or shareholder profits to pay out. 100% of your subscriptions goes directly to those who contribute, keeping The Quietus independent and focused on never watering-down our cultural coverage.

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Monthly Playlist

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Monthly Spotify, Apple Music & Tidal playlists rounding up the music we’ve been writing about on the site.

Recent Monthly Playlist

tQ’s Exclusive Monthly Round-Up Playlist: March 2025

Here's everything we've covered at The Quietus this month, compiled for the listening pleasure of tQ's subscribers

tQ’s Exclusive Monthly Round-Up Playlist: February 2025

Here's everything we've covered at The Quietus this month, compiled for the listening pleasure of tQ's subscribers

tQ’s Exclusive Monthly Round-Up Playlist: January 2025

Here's everything we've covered at The Quietus this month, compiled for the listening pleasure of tQ's subscribers

tQ’s Exclusive Monthly Round-Up Playlist: November and December 2024

Here's everything we've covered at The Quietus in the final two months of 2024, compiled for the listening pleasure of tQ's subscribers

tQ’s Subscriber Playlist: Our Top 50 Tracks of 2024

Here's a special bonus playlist for our subscribers featuring all of the tracks included in our top 50 of the year
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Low Culture Podcast

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The Quietus founders & editors Luke & John discussing an essential album, book, telly series or film each month

Recent Low Culture Podcast

Low Culture Podcast: Ghost Stories Of An Antiquary, by M.R. James

This month John and Luke head all the way back to 1904 to experience the thrills, chills and outright horrors of a modern compendium of ghoulish tales

Low Culture Podcast: La Haine

In this month's subscriber podcast John Doran and Luke Turner revisit Mathieu Kassovitz's 1995 film of racial tensions and police brutality in the French suburbs

Low Culture Podcast: Sonic Youth’s Evol vs Dirty

In this month's pod John Doran and Luke Turner get stuck in to two favourite albums from one of tQ's most-loved and much-missed groups, Sonic Youth

Low Culture Podcast: Derek Jarman’s Blue & Reflections on 2024

It’s the end of the year pod, with John Doran and Luke Turner having a chat about weird sightings in Dungeness, and highlights of this year’s albums

Low Culture Podcast: Event Horizon

"Where we're going we won't need eyes" In this month's podcast, Luke Turner and John Doran fire up the gravity drive to head back to 1997 space horror film, Event Horizon
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Low Culture Essays

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An exclusive monthly long read on a cultural artefact by some of our favourite writers.

Recent Low Culture Essays

Low Culture Essay: Jonn Elledge on The Good Life

In April's essay, Jonn Elledge explains why everything you thought you knew about the popular self-sufficiency sitcom, first broadcast 50 years ago this week, is wrong.

The Low Culture Essay: Jeanette Leech on Elastica’s The Menace

In this month's essay, Jeanette Leech seeks to reclaim the legacy of Elastica's vastly underrated second album from prurient mutterings about drug addiction and the collapse of Britpop, celebrating Mark E. Smith collaborations and the birth of M.I.A.

Low Culture Essay: Ian Winwood on How Dead & Company Made Him Love Jam Bands

This month, Ian Winwood writes about the process of his seduction into the patchouli smoke, hardcore fanbase and endless riffs n'widdles of the jam band scene

Low Culture Essay: Patrick McKemey on the Musical Architecture of SimCity

In this month's subscriber essay, Patrick McKemey eulogises the genre-melding soundtracks to the SimCity universe of games, sonic portals between the London suburbs and digital utopias built in his teenage bedroom

Low Culture Essay: Travis Elborough on Eric Bristow Darts Documentary, Arrows

As festive season darts mania once again takes over the UK with the annual PDC World Darts Championship, Travis Elborough travels back to 1979 and John Samson's documentary about the rise of Eric Bristow
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Organic Intelligence Newsletter

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A monthly newsletter deep dive into the fantastic but neglected music of a time, scene or place.

Recent Organic Intelligence Newsletter

Organic Intelligence XLII: British Bengalis in 90s subculture

In this month’s antidote to the algorithm Puja Nandi celebrates five pioneering artists, from Asian Dub Foundation (pictured) to Osmani Soundz, who enriched the soundtrack of the pre-millennial UK by mixing drum & bass and electronica with the sounds of the Bengali diaspora

Organic Intelligence XLI: Toronto Goth of the 80s & 90s

In our latest antidote to the algorithm, Jonathan Wright visits his younger self in 1980s Canada, when goth was on a rise as steep as his backcombed hair

Organic Intelligence XL: Naples in the Early-Mid 70s

In our fortieth antidote to the algorithm, David McKenna takes us back half a century to Naples, where the influence of a nautical culture and American military radio created a music scene as fertile and chaotic as the city itself

Organic Intelligence XXXIX: Christmas Doo-Wop

In the final antidote to the algorithm of 2024, Daniel Spicer takes tQ's subscribers back to the sweet yet sorrowful sounds of festive doo-wop

Organic Intelligence XXXVIII: The Legacy of Broken Beat

In our latest antidote to the algorithm, Joe Muggs hymns the potent legacy of broken beat and picks five tunes where you can find it today, from D'Monk to Kokoroko and Jorja Smith (pictured below)
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Music Downloads

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Exclusive Quietus-commissioned music from the most exciting artists working today.

Recent Music Downloads

tQ Subscriber Release: Jack McNeill’s Chamber Cairn

Serial collaborator and Propellor Orchestra leader Jack McNeill's long-awaited debut solo album is released today exclusively for tQ subscribers, a record that draws deep on his surroundings in Cumbria, but subverts our expectations of the clarinet as an instrument that hymns the pastoral

tQ Subscriber Release: Brain Pills

Exploring the subtle microcosms in rock music then bending them to his will, Ryan Walker interviews Mike Vest about Brain Pills, his new band with Nick Raybould and Adam Stone whose debut EP is released exclusively to tQ subscribers today – a gathering of tales, tunes and feedback

Jas Shaw & Simon Lord Discuss Their tQ Valentine’s Bonus Subscriber-Exclusive Release

As it's Valentine's Day we're showing how much we love our top Subscriber Plus tier supporters by giving them bonus music – here, former Simian members Jas Shaw and Simon Lord discuss how they combined vocals, long form production and the inspiration of Slavoj Žižek on their twinkling epic

tQ Subscriber Release: 2rana 3crana

After a period of personal tragedy and physical rehabilitation, Gum Takes Tooth’s Jussi Brightmore celebrates life with his new project 2rana 3crana, mixing drag, industrial and Afro-Portuguese dance music. He takes Alastair Shuttleworth through the story behind it, and a special EP exclusively for tQ subscribers

tQ Subscriber Release: Ex-Easter Island Head

Your final tQ subscriber download of the year comes from none other than our albums of the year chart toppers Ex-Easter Island Head, who speak to Patrick Clarke about a prolific year, their love of "good old fashioned showbiz", and the sublime live performance captured for this release
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