Hello, I’m Joshua Minsoo Kim. I’m a culture writer whose writing about music and film can be found at Pitchfork, The Wire, NPR, the Chicago Reader, Cinema Scope, and MUBI Notebook. I’m the founder and editor-in-chief of Tone Glow. I’m currently writing a book about music, sound, and silence in avant-garde film for Repeater Books. I’m also a high school science teacher in the Chicagoland area.

Contact: Email | Twitter | Instagram | Letterboxd



Photo by Roberto Rodriguez

Current Album Recommendations (last updated 5/12/24)

  • Chavela Vargas - Chavela Vargas (RCA Victor, 1961)
  • Irma Serrano - Irma Serrano (Columbia, 1964)
  • Hannibal Marvin Peterson - Tribute (Baystate, 1979)
  • Georges Aperghis - Récitations (Harmonia Mundi, 1983)
  • Horace Tapscott Octet - Live (Americana, 1988)
  • Wy (Thierry David & Fred Wallich) - Humaninhuman (Body & Soul, 1991)
  • Drone - The Fat Controller (QDK, 1993)
  • Johnboy - Claim Dedications (Trance, 1994)
  • Ikue Mori, Robert Quine & Marc Ribot - Painted Desert (Avant, 1995)
  • Wataru Kamiryo -  鴉 (Teslakite, 1996)
  • Soixante Étages - De sa bouche de loup (33REVPERMI, 1997)
  • Ambient Hawai'i - Ambient Hawai'i (Sushi, 1997)
  • Lucarda - Album de Figuritas (UltraPop, 1999)
  • The Fly - Fallen Love (Hardcore Pop / Mud Rock, 1999)
  • A Whisper in the Noise - Through the Ides of March (self-released, 2002)
  • Yume Hayashi - What the Summer Rain Knows (Avocado Tapes, 2016)

Click here for previous album recommendations.
Tone Glow is an independent publication that I started as a blog in 2015. In December 2019 it moved to Substack, where it has featured over 100 interviews and countless reviews from dozens of different writers. The website will forever remain free and without ads, determined to provide the best coverage of experimental music, film, and more. All writers are paid out of principle from the money I make as a schoolteacher, as well as with support from donators via Ko-Fi and Patreon.

Tone Glow’s interviews are exclusively presented as longform Q&As, and are born out of a desire to see extensive conversations that provide insight into an artist’s life, practice, and work. My goal is to understand the artist as a person first, and to allow the stories they share to inform an understanding of their art.

Tone Glow also regularly features a “Writers Panel,” which finds multiple writers reviewing the same album. This decision was inspired by the pop music blog The Singles Jukebox, which I write for and edit. This format is used to encourage writers to think and write about music that is typically out of their wheelhouse, and for writers to be comfortable with approaching all arts writing from their unique vantage point.


Recent Album Reviews



Other Writing

 Recent Musician Interviews for Tone Glow



Recent Filmmaker Interviews for Tone Glow



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