I just wrapped a new podcast with up & coming artist Rachel Grae. The NY based artist is inching towards one million TikTok followers and a half of million Spotify Monthly listeners. With Rachel, a 30 second TikTok  clip went viral and launched her to the next level, but she continued delivering after the viral moment and that’s what counts. It’s about the slow and steady, not the fast and easy, especially in the creative industry. In this episode we talked about how she got here and touched upon a few pop surprises.

Do you have something interesting to tell? I want to to hear about it. Maybe we can talk it through on my podcast.

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3njrqdfJpY&t=1423s

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3goY7kuZEfzsd2gum5KP8q?si=ccf0de9e7e09426d

Watch out for Cece Vee Self and the alt pop/synth track Doubt. The new track which is about battling overthinking and self doubt. The track is a follow up to the confessional EP Past Midnight.

I often experience self-doubt and I overthink a lot, both in my artistic career and in my personal life. This can look like overthinking decisions, worrying about the future, dealing with imposter syndrome, or lying awake at night, replaying conversations in my head,” Cece reveals.

Previous tracks topped the charts of JOOX’s New Pop Hits playlist (2020), and could be heard on US series like Good Trouble. Upon the release of her EP in January 2022, she was also featured on the cover of the Spotify editorial playlist, SAlt.

Blake impresses with the indie pop track Skeptical. Originally from New Zealand, she has spent the last several years in the UK immersing herself in the songwriting scene. The music video for the track has garnered support from MTV Upload which put the video in high rotation across Australia and New Zealand.

“The song pertains to the notion of experiencing false starts in relationships and enduring many instances of ‘all talk no action’. The overall theme of the song is being skeptical to love and learning to not always take things at face value. That the proof of a person’s intentions lies in their actions,” says Blake.

Check out the track debut track Talking Over Tea by the duo LXIX. You’ll like if you’re in the mood for a mid tempo infectious pop track.

The Nashville duo notes: Talking over Tea is about living for yourself and not focusing on the drama that surrounds you or partaking in it. Friend groups and common interest groups, like the music community/industry can become very draining if you lean in to the drama side of things or if you spend time associating with people who like to gossip. The song talks about taking strides, “making moves” and it makes you feel good and on the other side of that, it talks about being jealous and letting that feeling drive your actions, grasping for attention, asking for recognition and talking badly about other people, saying that that is not the route to take and will not be rewarding.

Class is in session with Lupe Fiasco. The rapper landed a new gig as a professor at Boston’s MIT. Teaching what? You got it, rap.

I been holding this for a while,” Fiasco tweeted. “I’ll put together something more sophisticated later that really captures the nuance and gravity but for now I’ll just say it straight and raw: I’m going to teach Rap at MIT.”

Fiasco said “Syllabus isn’t built yet but I’m thinking its fruit to be had in looking at neuromorphic computation through the lens of Rap as a lossless data compression model with a dash of energy efficiency via refining Landauer’s principle applied to cytoarchitectonics. And some rapping…”

Lupe Fiasco will drop a new record “DRILL MUSIC IN ZION” on June 24th.