A publication for working artists who are also running real companies.

Mission

Founders & Frequencies covers the cohort of working artists who are also running real companies, and working founders who are also releasing serious creative work. We are interested in the overlap. We do not cover artists who use the founder identity as a marketing prop, and we do not cover founders who use a creative project as a marketing surface for their company. The distinction matters, and we judge it on the work.

The publication runs as a quarterly issue with rolling web pieces in between. Long-form reviews, conversations, listening diaries, and scene reports — the format reflects the cohort, which is patient, small, and getting bigger. We do not run a release calendar. We are interested in records and practices that reward sustained attention.

What we cover

• Album Reviews — long-form reviews of records made by founder-artists. We sit with a record for at least two weeks before we file.
• Conversations & Q&A — interview-format pieces, transcribed and lightly edited. The Q&A track is the publication's spine.
• Listening Diaries — softer profile pieces and our own rolling listening diary.
• Scene Reports — pieces about regional clusters where the founder-artist cohort has begun to share a tone (the launch issue covers Chiang Mai).
• Essays — long-form cultural essays on the texture of parallel-practice working life.
• Listicles — reported, never aggregated. Each entry reflects at least one direct listen.
• Series — including the publication's standing interview series, From the Studio to the Stack.

Editorial independence

Founders & Frequencies is an independent music quarterly. Editorial decisions — what to cover, in what framing, with what cuts — are made by the named contributors.

We do not run sponsored content, we do not accept fees for placement, and we do not let an advertiser determine coverage. Where a contributor has a personal or professional connection to a subject, that connection is disclosed at the top of the piece.

Masthead

• Vera Sokolov — Music Critic. Album reviews, listening-diary profiles, listicle reporting.
• Linus Embry — Culture Essayist. Long-form essays, the Q&A track, cultural analysis.
• Editorial Team — Reporting & Series. Standing byline for collaborative reporting, scene reports, and series intros.

History

Founders & Frequencies was conceived as a publication in late 2025 and launched in 2026. The publication intends to be slow, patient, and durable. Issue 02 is forthcoming and will broaden the lens.

Funding

The publication is reader-funded. Subscription revenue covers contributor honoraria, fact-checking, hosting, and the occasional fixed cost of reporting. The publication does not run banner advertising, does not run sponsored content, and does not accept fees for placement. If we add a sponsored-newsletter slot in the future, it will be unmistakably marked as such.

Ethics

Our long-form ethics document lives at /editorial-guidelines. Briefly: we disclose conflicts, we grant anonymity sparingly, we fact-check before publication, we correct errors publicly on the corrections page, and we do not let an AI tool draft criticism. Contributors using AI for research, transcription, or copy editing must disclose that use where it is material to the piece.

Get involved

• Contact & pitch — addresses for editorial, tips, press, and corrections.
• Press kit — logo lockups, palette, official tagline, masthead bios.
• FAQ — fifteen questions we get often, answered.
• Newsletter — one letter per quarterly issue.

The standing footer line

Every page on the site carries the following line in the footer:

Founders & Frequencies · An independent music quarterly.