We bring you good tidings! There might be an Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement, and George Santos is being freed from political persecution in an American hoosegow.

In this week’s best-of roundup, we think about Rainer Maria Rilke, the ontology of God, and Italian pop music from the 1970s.

I chose back in June to make sure I remained present and engaged with this inglorious moment by listening exclusively to newly released music. Here is an overview of 2025’s Summer vibes.

You’re a Marxist rap-metal band and you’re doing a cover of Springsteen’s “Ghost of Tom Joad”? WTF is even happening?

The recent controversy over country singer Luke Combs’s surprise hit cover obscures the deeper history of Chapman and her cultural movement in powerful ways.

It is Saturday night, and El Monte’s atmosphere is buzzing with a youthful glow. As the parking lot and the surrounding streets began to fill with vehicles from the American golden age of automotive design with names like Galaxie and Mercury, the space became saturated with cosmic energy.

To borrow from our millennial friends, it is very on brand for the Tropics of Meta crew—composed mainly of Gen X Nirvana-loving kids who eat hot Cheetos and drink cold beer—to drop new books in a global pandemic.

It’s a long time since the vaporous heyday of Cool Britannia, and both the UK and European football look much different than they did in 1996.