Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

Guitarist and songwriter Nancy Wilson is one half of the rock band Heart, along with her older sister Ann Wilson. Nancy and Ann have been the face of the band since the mid-70s. Heart’s first album, Dreamboat Annie, was released in 1976 right as the band was making traction opening for big acts like Rod Stewart and The Bee Gees. Soon their songs, like “Magic Man” and “Crazy On You,” started to take off in the States, and Heart quickly became a headlining act...

Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament are two of the Seattle scene’s most foundational musicians from the 80’s and 90’s. Stone and Jeff started playing together in 1984 as members of Green River, which eventually dissolved, leading singer Mark Arm to form Mudhoney.

Later, Jeff played bass and Stone played guitar in Mother Love Bone until their lead singer Andrew Wood died of an overdose just days before their major label debut in March of 1990...

16 years have passed since The Black Crowes released an album of new material. The world has changed a lot since then—and so have the Robinson brothers. Chris and Rich Robinson are, of course, the backbone of the band. They started playing together back in Georgia in 1984 as Mr. Crowe’s Garden before moving to NYC, signing to Def American, and changing their name to The Black Crowes...

Famed drummer for the Police and composer Stewart Copeland has one of the more fascinating bios in modern music. His father was a founding member of the CIA and his mom worked in British Intelligence.

After playing in the successful UK prog rock band Curved Air in the mid 70s, Stewart started a new band called the Police with bassist and lead singer, Sting—and eventually guitarist Andy Summers...

Justin Timberlake is one of the most high achieving pop phenomenons of the past three decades. In 1993 he helped relaunch the Mickey Mouse Club where he sang and danced alongside Rylan Gosling and other now luminaries. Then he broke records and sold over 70 million albums worldwide with *NSYNC...

Brandi Carlile’s knack for uplifting the musicians she loves is exemplary. After her own hard-earned ascent to fame over the course of seven studio albums, Brandi started to turn her sights to producing albums for artists she deeply admires, including Tanya Tucker who she’s been on Broken Record with in the past but also Brandy Clark. Then there’s Joni Mitchell—who, thanks to Brandi’s encouragement—has recently made a glorious return to performing live...

To mark International Day of Happiness and the release of the annual World Happiness Report, Dr Laurie Santos talks to fellow Pushkin podcasters Dr Maya Shankar, Tim Harford and Malcolm Gladwell about the happiness topics that they would like to see raised on this day of global wellbeing awareness.   

The discussion ranges from how to quiet your inner monologue; though the misery of running in a Canadian winter; to the happiness lessons to be learned from a colonoscopy...

Natalia Lafourcade is a force. As you’ll hear when she sings during our conversation today she has a gorgeous voice. But she’s also a deft songwriter who’s able to weave together traditions that feel both modern and old at once.

And she’s also a beautiful interpreter of song—take for instance the phenomenon that was the song “Remember Me” from Pixar’s film Coco...

In recognition of this month's World Happiness Day, we are presenting one of our favorite episodes from last year with Janelle Monàe and her longtime collaborator, Nate Wonder. Janelle's latest album, The Age Of Pleasure, was created in part as a celebration of black love and community. And as Nate Wonder shares in this interview with Justin Richmond, one of his guiding principles when making the album was to make Janelle smile...

At 70 years-old, Kim Gordon—the former bassist and founding member of Sonic Youth—is just now making the most abrasive music of her career. She just dropped her second solo album, The Collective, with producer Justin Raisen, who’s previously worked with artists like Drake, Lil Yachty, and Charli XCX. Kim’s spoken-word-like vocals on The Collective are the perfect accompaniment to Justin’s distorted trap-style beats...