Awesome Music

We once saw a guitar that had buttons like an accordion, but this guy built an accordion bellows into the body of an acoustic guitar. There’s a little keypad in the bottom corner, but the guit-cordion on only seems to be able to play one chord in this clip.

We can’t decide if this combination of Francis Scott Key’s Star Spangled Banner and Soundgarden’s Black Hole Sun is completely cursed or if it should be our new national anthem. We’re thinking the latter. Either way, There I Ruined It has produced another classic that deserves to be shared far and wide.

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’ Future Ruins festival is a live celebration of film and TV composers on 11.8.25 at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center. Expect performances from legends like Danny Elfman, John Carpenter, Hildur Guðnadóttir, and more. The one-day, three-stage event has no headliners, just a stacked lineup of visionary artists. Tickets drop 5.21.25.

The guys from the band Undecided Future rock a one-of-a-kind instrument. Built by Olmos Guitarras, the electric guitar is embedded into a low-riding BMX bike. While it’s not ride-and-play friendly, it’s perfect for impromptu solos at red lights, turning every street corner into an unexpected concert stage.

Japanese Zen Buddhist monk Yogetsu Akasaka puts a modern spin on an ancient text. The Heart Sūtra, a core scripture dating back to the 8th century, gets a hypnotic update as Akasaka layers chanting, beatboxing, throat singing, and live looping. The result is a meditative soundscape that fuses tradition with technology. (Thanks, Orion!)

You’ll probably recognize most of the songs in rømain’s 6-minute compilation, but how many of them can you name? We had no idea that the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme was from a 1974 Italian movie, or that Mah Na Mah Na didn’t start out as a Muppets song. There’s also a full Spotify playlist of the 50 songs.

The rising tide doesn’t raise all boats. There are some of us who can’t float. The music video for The Flood features stunning cinematography and a passionate underwater performance by singer-songwriter Ben Caplan. Kudos to filmmaker Eduardo de la Cerda for the creative vision and stellar submerged scenes. Check out the behind-the-scenes video here.

We’ve heard some great covers of Black Sabbath’s War Pigs, but never one like this. Led by the amazing Amharic vocals of Asnake Gebreyes, Ethiopian rock band uKanDanZ’s version of the Black Sabbath classic is something truly special. Lionel Martin’s tenor sax is a highlight of the band’s killer instrumentation.

Anthony Vincent never disappoints, once again showcasing his vocal and impressionist talents with a cover of Coldplay’s Viva La Vida — reimagined in the style of Queen. His Freddie Mercury-inspired vocals are solid, and the arrangement brings to mind Queen classics like Don’t Stop Me Now.

Sampling other songs has been a staple of music production since the 1980s. Tracklib’s compilation doesn’t go back quite that far. Still, it provides an excellent retrospective of the use of samples in the most popular electronic and dance tracks since 1990, kicking things off with Deee-Lite’s Groove in the Heart. For more, check out their hip-hop sample breakdown.

Dig through the ditches and burn through the witches, uh-huh, uh-huh. Rob Zombie meets ROSÉ & Bruno Mars in this insane but insanely good mashup from DJ Cummerbund. The groovy dance track also mixes in samples from the B-52s, Britney Spears, Toni Basil, Rammstein, the Ting Tings, and more.

Dharni and Mamikoyoko are each amazing performers, but when they collaborate, something magical happens. Their multitrack beatbox recordings of trance and dance tracks like Children, Sandstorm, Castles in the Sky, and Better off Alone are so well-executed that if you close your eyes, you might think you were listening to synthesizers, not humans.

OK Go’s 2025 album, And the Adjacent Possible, is filled with wonderful tracks, including Love. The uplifting song and its accompanying music video have everything we’ve come to expect from the band’s creative vision. It’s a beautiful ballet of humans and robots working together to prove that the whole is often greater than the sum of its parts. BTS video here.

During their appearance on triple j’s Like A Version, alt-pop group Magdalena Bay turned in this swell cover version of David Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes. The 1980 track is one of our favorites, and Mica Tenenbaum’s warm vocals and Matthew Lewin’s killer bass and guitar do the song proud. Bonus points for the Keytar.

Did you know it’s possible to play an electric guitar by putting it up to your neck? This reaction video from Music Is Win shows how the vibrations of one’s vocal cords can be transmitted through the strings and into the guitar’s pickup to make music. You don’t even need to know how to use the frets to play a tune.

Musician Matheus Lodewijk demonstrates a modern version of an unusual electronic instrument known as a Trauntonium. The custom-made analog synthesizer is controlled using long metal wires stretched across a pair of metal bars. Changing finger position along each wire controls pitch, while pushing down on the bars adjusts amplitude.