A guide to cities, bars, experiences, and places to stay chosen for how they sound. “I started Tracks & Tales to answer a simple question: Where does music actually sound right? Not where it’s loudest. Not where it’s trendiest. But where sound is treated with care — rooms designed to listen, systems tuned with intention, and music given the time it deserves. Think of it as the Michelin Guide to Listening — if such a thing existed. I travel, listen, return, and write. The rest is the map you can now explore.” Every month, The Listening Club gathers around the world. Join here. — Rafi Mercer, Founder of Tracks & Tales
It does not unfold like Bath or Edinburgh. It does not market itself endlessly through nostalgia or architecture or reinvention campaigns. Wolverhampton has always carried itself more directly than that.
It does not unfold like Bath or Edinburgh. It does not market itself endlessly through nostalgia or architecture or reinvention campaigns. Wolverhampton has always carried itself more directly than that.
Long before playlists became portable and music travelled invisibly through the air, this was a city of ships, crossings and departures. The Atlantic begins to make itself felt here.
Long before playlists became portable and music travelled invisibly through the air, this was a city of ships, crossings and departures. The Atlantic begins to make itself felt here.
Baltimore is a city that carries its history openly. You feel it in the brick rowhouses climbing long streets toward the horizon.
Baltimore is a city that carries its history openly. You feel it in the brick rowhouses climbing long streets toward the horizon.
There are cities built around memory, and cities built around the future. Santa Clara somehow exists between the two.
There are cities built around memory, and cities built around the future. Santa Clara somehow exists between the two.
Vancouver listens differently. Between mountains and ocean, the city has developed a music culture that is quiet, considered, and quietly serious — from the jazz rooms of downtown to Lala,...
Vancouver listens differently. Between mountains and ocean, the city has developed a music culture that is quiet, considered, and quietly serious — from the jazz rooms of downtown to Lala,...
Discover Honolulu through listening culture, from ocean-side vinyl bars and jazz lounges to warm island nights shaped by rhythm, atmosphere and slow listening.
Discover Honolulu through listening culture, from ocean-side vinyl bars and jazz lounges to warm island nights shaped by rhythm, atmosphere and slow listening.
Discover Atlanta through listening culture, from deep southern basslines and vinyl bars to jazz lounges, hi-fi spaces and late-night rooms shaped by rhythm and community.
Discover Atlanta through listening culture, from deep southern basslines and vinyl bars to jazz lounges, hi-fi spaces and late-night rooms shaped by rhythm and community.
Discover Philadelphia through listening culture, from soul records and jazz history to vinyl bars, late-night DJs and neighbourhood spaces where music still matters.
Discover Philadelphia through listening culture, from soul records and jazz history to vinyl bars, late-night DJs and neighbourhood spaces where music still matters.
Every month, The Listening Club gathers around the world. Join here.
There are albums that announce themselves immediately. Big openings. Big statements. Records that want you to understand their importance within the first thirty seconds. Return to Forever does the opposite.
Released in 1992, after the death of Miles Davis, Doo-Bop remains one of the most divisive records in his catalogue. Some dismissed it immediately. Others treated it like an unfinished experiment.
There was a period of life where you rarely knew exactly where you were heading, but you felt more alive because of it. Leftism still sounds like that world — motorway lights, basslines, exhaustion, and the strange freedom of losing the ...
Dare To Wonder sounds like South London after the city finally relaxes. Warm jazz rap, evening light, open windows, and music made by people who still care about atmosphere.
Some albums ask for your attention immediately. Others slowly improve the atmosphere around your life until one day you realise you've been living inside them for years. In A Space Outta Sound is one of those records.
By 2018, John Prine had already lived several lifetimes inside one voice. The Tree of Forgiveness arrived after illness, age, and decades of quiet devotion to the truth — and it sounds exactly like that. A record that asks you to slow do...
In 1987, CHANEL created its first watch for women: the PREMIÈRE, inspired by the codes of the House. Its octagonal case evokes the stopper of the N°5 perfume bottle. The original bracelet, interlaced with leather—like the chain of the iconic quilted bag—has been reinterpreted in chain, ceramic or velvet-finish ribbon versions. A timeless, feminine timepiece to slip on your wrist day and night.
By Rafi Mercer
Miles Davis didn't just make music — he showed us how to move differently through the world. We hold that thinking very close everyday.
By Rafi Mercer
Not the loudest records, nor the fastest risers, but the albums readers returned to with intent this May — a chart shaped by curiosity, slow listening, and the quiet pull of lasting sound.
