Music: Miley Cyrus: Plastic Hearts

The best new song to have come from pop star Miley Cyrus isn’t on her new studio album, Plastic Hearts, but the singer’s cover of Hole’s “Doll Parts”—performed on The Howard Stern Show last week, is reason enough to give Cyrus’ seventh record a spin … or three. The 28-year-old’s raspy vocals and f*ck-you attitude are back on rock-tinged gems like “WTF Do I Know,” and the record features a handful of guest greats, including pop cohort Dua Lipa on “Prisoner” and ’80s icon Billy Idol on the synthy, disco-powered “Night Crawling.” Turn it up, and let a dance party ensue. –Leslie Ventura

Book: Greenlights by Matthew Mcconaughey

Step into the cowboy boots of Academy Award-winning actor, bon vivant and native Texan Matthew McConaughey. With characteristic pluck, he tells his heroic life story, sprinkled with poems, bumper stickers, life advice and more. (The “greenlights” of the book’s title refers to McConaughey’s inspiring approach to living.) Spring for the audiobook, read by the author, with all the emotion, force and intonation you’d expect from an actor of his caliber. Texas Monthly says the narration “might just be the performance of his lifetime.” Greenlights.com. –C. Moon Reed

TV: Song Exploder

Hrishikesh Hirway’s acclaimed podcast allowing—or sometimes, seemingly forcing—popular singers and musicians to take apart their songs and articulate their creative process became a spectacular Netflix series two months ago. The four emotional episodes feature Alicia Keys, R.E.M., Ty Dolla $ign and Lin-Manuel Miranda breaking down some of their most significant tracks, and you don’t have to be a writer or composer to get caught up in the artistic intimacy. Watching an embarrassed Michael Stipe listen to his original vocal demo for “Losing My Religion” might be a religious experience. Volume 2 arrives December 15 featuring Nine Inch Nails, Dua Lipa, Natalia Lafourcade and The Killers. Netflix. –Brock Radke

Podcast: Optimal Living Daily

The amount of content on the internet is overwhelming—vlogs, blogs and podcasts compete for our increasingly fractured attention. What if someone curated the best of the web and then read it to you in 10-minute segments, giving you a daily dose of inspiration and motivation? That’s exactly what Justin Malik of Optimal Living Daily does. He culls the best blogs on topics like personal development, minimalism, finance, health and business and reads them to you (with author permission). Consider the six topical podcasts under the Optimal Living umbrella the antidote to the infinite scroll—you might even walk away with a little more wisdom. Apple Podcasts. –Genevie Durano

Music: Grandaddy: The Sophtware Slump ..... on a Wooden Piano

Remember those haunting, old-timey Radiohead piano covers from the saloon scenes in Westworld Season 1? If you dug those, or better yet, if you sit in the shaded portion of the Venn diagram between that sonic treatment and classic indie rock, this one’s for you. Not that The Sophtware Slump ..... on a Wooden Piano is some covers project. It’s Grandaddy singer-songwriter Jason Lytle re-recording all of 2000’s beloved The Sophtware Slump in the most pandemic way possible: with most everything but the piano and his voice wiped away, as if he’s playing in an empty theater after the rest of humanity has vanished. The approach sounds entirely natural for the LP’s balladish songs (“He’s Simple, He’s Dumb, He’s the Pilot,” “Jed’s Other Poem (Beautiful Ground)”) but it’s perhaps more interesting hearing rocked-out material like “Hewlett’s Daughter,” “Chartsengrafs” and especially “The Crystal Lake” in this fashion, with the spotlight on Lytle’s delicately powerful vocals

and enduring melodies. –Spencer Patterson