"I have struggled for a long time, both being public and not public about my mental health issues or my mental illness"... "I have been there, written 'the note', had the plan, the stockpile of meds, how to disperse my property among my family. I was ready to go"... "some days i'm certain i won't ever be ok and some days are a little bit lighter, but ALL days i have to connect with someone"... "suicide has been an at-many-times daily part of my psychic reality, even still. It follows me around"... Those are the voices of pop and rock stars in the wake of the deaths of ANTHONY BOURDAIN and KATE SPADE. It's been a horrible few days in a not-so-great year. It's good that people are talking, that they feel free to talk. It's a discussion we've long needed to have, that we'll always need to have. HAYLEY WILLIAMS is ready to have it. DARRYL MCDANIELS, too. We can be thankful for that. It's helpful for all of us, whatever our health, to hear. It's important, it's crucial, to listen. Music, like all arts, affords creators a unique chance to express their sadness, their anxieties, their fears, their pain, in everything they do. It also affords them the chance to hide all of that in their work. We can't ever know what a composer or musician is feeling just from listening to a song. We can only know how it makes us feel. We listen to ourselves at the same time we're listening to others. Do depression and other mental illnesses make for better art? Or are great artists simply better at documenting darkness than everybody else is? Or, perhaps, do we hear in songs what we need to hear in songs? I do know this: Sadness can make for great art. And so can happiness. I'm rambling today, sorry. Talk hard. But also talk soft. And listen. Always... And please don't tell people when to be sad. Or when not to be sad... The NATIONAL SUICIDE PREVENTION LIFELINE can be reached 24 hours a day at 800-273-8255... At the APOLLO (!), U2 sends one out to Anthony Bourdain... SIRIUSXM settles out of court with SOUNDEXCHANGE for $150 million... The 1975 puts its money where its pride is... SUPERORGANISM is a little goofy and a lot awesome and this is another great live session... Wow, JORJA SMITH's band. Live at the TINY DESK... We know what KANYE thinks of WYOMING. But what does Wyoming think of him?... RIP NEAL BOYD.