Anyone who can convincingly equate song creation with curation will have won my heart before we're done saying hello. Kudos to ALIM KHERAJ, who makes that case while searching for the common thread that links SELENA GOMEZ, who has only a handful of songwriting credits; BEYONCÉ, who tends to collaborate with an army of writers/producers/influences; and BLOOD ORANGE's DEV HYNES, who is an "all tracks written by" kinda guy. They're all in the business of using their craft and vision to pull together various threads of interest, influence and inspiration. Kheraj wonders why Gomez, whose 2015 album REVIVAL is "steeped in emotion, vulnerability and her meticulously specific identity," tends to be seen as less authentic than the other two. But you probably can guess the answer to that... Kheraj's piece also alerted me to this cool new podcast from pop songwriter ROSS GOLAN, who not coincidentally has a credit on that Gomez album... More on the endless, and endlessly entertaining, debate over whether music fans can tell a hi-res audio file from your average mp3: "Most people don't know the difference," says LAURA BALLANCE of MERGE RECORDS (and SUPERCHUNK). "A lot of people accidentally buy FLAC files and they're like what the hell?!" The BEGGARS GROUP's BRI AAB deals with a different customer base: "If I send out something that isn't a FLAC or a WAV, I catch s*** for it immediately. People aren't just listening on their laptops anymore." More indie label execs talking about file quality, streaming, vinyl and cassettes here... SPOTIFY buys, shutters MIGHTYTV... CHANCE THE RAPPER is hiring an intern... The great alto saxophonist ARTHUR BLYTHE has died. Along with JAMES BLOOD ULMER and the WORLD SAXOPHONE QUARTET, both of whom he played with, he was my somewhat unconventional introduction to jazz. I treasure the sides he cut for COLUMBIA RECORDS, which at the time I had no idea were considered avant-garde; I just thought he was soundtracking the coolest party ever. I thought that's what NEW YORK would always sound like. RIP.