In 2026, the brooch sits comfortably in the category of accessories no one under the age of seventy actively thinks about. The only remaining enthusiasts seem to be those impeccably dressed, old-world grandmothers you photograph on the street like a rare species, and Daniel Roseberry. Elsa Schiaparelli, of course, had a weakness for that sort of thing. Those surreal little Schiap buttons collectors lose their minds over were designed by Alberto Giacometti, who once gifted her a brooch called ‘The Sphynx’. Guess what Roseberry’s Fall 2026 collection was named after. “This chimera — half-person, half-animal — speaks to the sort of contradictory thing inside of you, inside of me, inside of the brand as well,” the creative told WWD.
Daniel Roseberry has a knack for temporal tourism. His collections constantly drag us back decades, sometimes centuries, through clothing alone. This time, even the venue wasn’t allowed to stay in the present. The maison’s invitation, topped off with a gold ring in the shape of an actual finger, led straight to Carrousel du Louvre. The ultimate spot if you wanted to relive Parisian runways of the ’90s and early ’00s, podium and all.
What would Schiaparelli be without contrast, illusion, and a healthy obsession with the natural world? Luckily, we’ll never have to find out. Picture trompe-l’oeil denim that looks exactly like fur, knitted panels cut like puzzle pieces hovering on the body thanks to tulle, and jersey manipulated enough to create depth. One look toward the end glittered entirely too much, turns out it was made from crushed CDs and cassette tapes. Accessories returned with a sense of order. Elsa’s iconic keyhole popped up on blazer labels, bags, and jewelry, keeping at least one foot in reality. The shoes, however, were having none of it. Roseberry took ‘kitten heels’ a little too literal, crowning pumps with full-on cat and dog faces. As realistic as they looked, no animals were harmed. Resin, on the other hand, had some rough days at the atelier.
Death Cab for Cutie have announced a new album, I Built You a Tower, and shared its lead single, ‘Riptides’. The follow-up to 2022’s Asphalt Meadows is set to land on June 5 via ANTI- Records. Check out director Jason Lester‘s video for the driving, jittery new single below, and scroll down for the album cover and tracklist.
According to Ben Gibbard, ‘Riptides’ “is about the challenge of dealing with personal struggles as the world around us experiences tragedy and loss on an unfathomable scale. And how when these two elements intertwine themselves in our psyches, it feels utterly paralyzing.”
The new LP was produced and engineered by John Congleton from three weeks’ worth of sessions split between Animal Rites in Los Angeles and the band members’ homes in Seattle, Portland, Bellingham, and Los Angeles. “The anniversary tours exorcised any nostalgia in our systems,” guitarist and keyboardist Dave Depper commented. “We felt part of this powerful force greater than all of us and went into the studio with a sense of, how can we capture that feeling and put it into something new?”
Bassist Nick Harmer added: “The whole experience of this record got us back to the earliest versions of this band: If the musicians in the room like what we’re working on, that’s enough. We reconnected with the confidence that comes with that.”
“There’s this need to find a place in ourselves to put loss and grief,” Ben Gibbard explained, referring to the titular tower. “A place that can hold it so we can move on with our lives. But there are these moments where the trauma breaks out of that shell we created for it.”
Death Cab are also going on tour in support of their new album, beginning in Minneapolis on July 10 and wrapping up in Paso Robles on August 7.
I Built You a Tower Cover Artwork:
I Built You a Tower Tracklist:
1. Full of Stars
2. Punching The Flowers
3. Pep Talk
4. I Built You A Tower (a)
5. Envy The Birds
6. Stone Over Water
7. How Heavenly a State
8. Trap Door
9. Riptides
10. The Flavor of Metal
11. I Built You A Tower (b)
Yinka Ilori will present a new exhibition at Cristea Roberts Gallery this summer. Yinka Ilori: Joy Through Resistance opens on 5 June and runs until 11 July 2026, marking the artist’s first solo gallery exhibition in London, his home city. The show brings together new and recent works across painting, print, sculpture, immersive film and sound, offering an insight into themes that shape Ilori’s colourful visual language.
Born in North London to Nigerian parents, Ilori’s work draws on Nigerian storytelling traditions and parables, which he translates into contemporary design and public art. His projects, known for transforming urban spaces through bold colours and patterns, encourage participation and connection within communities. Previous presentations of his work include exhibitions at the Design Museum, the Royal Academy of Arts and the Saatchi Gallery, alongside public commissions across the UK and internationally.
The exhibition takes inspiration from Ilori’s own experiences and the resilience of the diaspora. Through layered imagery that combines the Nigerian yellow trumpet flower with the British daffodil and decorative lace motifs, the artist reflects on how cultural memory can transform hardship into a form of communal strength. A sculptural sound installation featuring handmade congas, a custom shekere and a drumkit, each wrapped in lace, anchors the exhibition’s central tension: the resonant pulse of percussion held within the fragility of textile. Presenting these ideas through a mix of media, the exhibition invites viewers to consider joy as a form of resistance.
The exhibition will be on view 5 June – 11 July 2026 at Cristea Roberts Gallery (43 Pall Mall, London SW1Y 5JG).
Your Star will continue to shine, 2024 Screenprint. Paper and Image: 75.0 x 75 cm. Edition of 30. From: Paradise for All
Anjimile Chithambo, who writes and performs music under his first name, was raised by Malawian immigrant parents in the suburbs of Dallas, Texas. He moved to Boston to attend Northeastern University before relocating to Durham, North Carolina, where his management company, as well as the producer of his new album, You’re Free to Go, are based. After working with Shawn Everett on 2023’s starkly dramatic, grief-stricken The King, his 4AD debut following 2020’s critically acclaimed Giver Taker, Anjimile linked up with Brad Cook (Bon Iver, Waxahatchee, Hurray for the Riff Raff) to help craft the airier, relaxed, and quietly cathartic songs that emerged from a period of renewed freedom. “It comes in waves/ Memory and empathy/ It stays and waits with me,” he sings on ‘Waits for Me’, patiently letting them ripple across and crash into his music, often retreating into a question instead of resolving. Whether for something as abstract as freedom and embodiment or palpably simple like kissing a partner, you want the desire to wash over you, and Anjimile makes it sound easy.
We caught up with Anjimile for the latest edition of our Artist Spotlight series to talk about settling into his songwriting, working with Brad Cook, collaborating with Iron & Wine, and more.
What is your relationship to the new songs like as we’re nearing the album’s release?
I was talking to my partner, who I wrote a lot of the songs on the album about, last night, and I was like, “Rust & Wire’ is coming out tomorrow.” That song was written in the summer, and it just brings us both back to when we fell in love, summer heat, warmth, and sunshine. Something about a spring album is really doing it for me.
I’m curious how that warmth is reflective of your process as much as the themes of the album. Do you feel like you’re easing into your songwriting more with each release, or is it more about where you were in your life when you were making it?
I definitely feel like I’m at a point in my artistic career where I feel confident about my songwriting. But also, I’m really interested in expanding it and doing things I’ve never done before. Even structurally, I have a goal of writing a song with a refrain instead of a chorus, or having a song that has literally only two chords in it. I would love to write a two-chord banger. These songs are about my feelings about very specific situations that have occurred in the last three years, but those specific situations engender such big feelings, and those feelings ripple across my life, my relationships, my conversations. These big emotional moments don’t exist in a vacuum, and I feel like that’s what’s cool about songs, is that you can put that big emotional experience in a little bit of a vacuum. Just be like, “Here is pure emotion. Here you go.”
I also don’t consider myself much of a narrative songwriter. I’m not like, “I was at the beach on Tuesday.” I don’t want people to know where I was at or with whom. [laughs] I don’t need the government to know my whereabouts constantly just because I sing about them. But I like to get down to the feeling. Maybe meeting my partner who inspired a lot of the songs on this album has helped me lean into the emotionality of just who I am as a person, which has let me feel more confident about expressing that sonically.
You’ve said that songwriting, for you, feels like “a prayer, a plea, or a question.” ‘Exquisite Skeleton’, for example, is a song that turns into a plea halfway through. I wonder if you feel like a song needs to approximate one of those things in order to feel complete.
It’s definitely an unconscious process. However, I do find, and I have found that there are a lot of questions in my songs. Ending songs with a question, or just having that be the bridge, or having it be an important component, it’s something that I tend to do, for sure. I have so many questions for my higher power and for the universe that I know I’m not necessarily gonna be getting the answers to. And also, I have questions for the subjects of these songs that I’m not necessarily gonna be getting the answers to. But something just feels right about using songwriting as a conduit, an opportunity to present these spiritual or existential questions.
When revisiting your previous record, the line “In my stillness, I am safety” felt like a prayer that stretches out to the nakedness and the stillness of the new record. Despite the musical shifts between the two albums, do you feel like there’s a thread there?
I haven’t thought about that at all. [laughs] But it does resonate extremely. In the aftermath of making my second album, The King, I was pretty emotionally spent, post-tour, post-everything. Songs are painful and meaningful to me, and I love them, but I didn’t expect the emotional weight of singing these songs every night to accumulate, literally, on my body. After the tour, I was like, “I need a break. I need to not think about this music, or maybe my music career at all, and just restabilize.” The distance between recording The King and this new album, I had some breathing room, and that’s what I needed to clear my mind and get back to putting pen to paper, feeling like I would even want to make another record. Making an album and then releasing it, it’s an awesome, exciting, wonderful, beautiful, mysterious, crazy process. And it’s also a lot.
I had this space to breathe, and it was in that space that I was able to meet the producer of the album, Brad. Honestly, I think Brad had a lot more to do with this album’s existence than I give him credit for. Obviously, he was a producer and he was there recording it every step of the way. But he inspired my songwriting as well by just showing me cool music and encouraging me. I would send him songs, and he would be like, “Hey, this is awesome.” He became a sounding board for my process in a supportive and non-judgmental way. It was just purely for the love of art. When it was time to record this album, me and Brad had linked up, we were buddies. I’m trusting Brad, I’ve written a song with him that’s on this album. By the time we’re recording, I’ve fallen in love with this new partner. I’ve written all these songs about her, I’ve ended a previous relationship, there’s just a lot of life changes happening. But I think my relationship with Brad and that trust provided a sense of stability that helped me approach this recording process with a clear heart and mind.
What are some things that made you feel comfortable and kind of spiritually aligned in the studio, that maybe surprised you, even though you and Brad had become friends by that point?
I already knew that he was just a chiller. He’s just easy to spend time with. He’s a kind individual with a great sense of humor. He smokes so much weed, more weed than I’ve ever seen anybody smoke in my life. He has such an incredible, silly, and sharp mind. I already knew that he had great feng shui. He’s got salt lamps all over his house; this guy’s got fantastic lighting. So nice, so smooth. He’s got delicious candles. He introduced me to a candle called Pasta Water. I’m not kidding: delicious, incredible, artisanal. He’s a man of the senses. But getting into this studio and seeing how simultaneously focused, completely locked in, and also objectively ridiculous he is as a person – it’s really hard to describe. Brad has an indescribable je ne sais quoi that exudes through every pore into the studio.
I’ll tell you one moment on the record where I can visualize that. When you say the words “Fucks sake” on ‘Exquisite Skeleton’, I feel like that’s an example of him allowing that ridiculousness and humour to permeate an otherwise dark song.
When I wrote that, I wasn’t trying to be funny, but I was like, “That’s funny.” And Brad got that too. We were listening to the playback, and he’s like, “I can’t believe you started this song with the lyrics, ‘I don’t want to be a son of a bitch,’ that’s hilarious.” And I was like, “It’s funny, because it’s true.” I think that’s also why it works.
Having had that breathing room, when did you feel like you were re-entering the flow of a new album as you were writing new songs?
A lot of it just had to do with the fact that I’m signed to a label. Commercially speaking, it’s in my best interest to release an album at least every three years, ideally less. But that’s just been my goal. So when I saw that I was coming up on that mark, I was like, “Okay, what have we got?” Whenever I write, I’m like, “Three years from now, this is gonna be probably an album.” But it was only through meeting with Brad, and with my managers, showing them all of the songs that I had accumulated over the past couple of years, that it became clear that there was a collection of songs that worked together. It’s a weird process to put all your songs in a playlist and then be like, “Yup, yup, no, no, yup, no, sucks, good.” [laughs] But that was more or less the process. It’s hard to describe, because I feel like thematically these songs fit a certain narrative. But I feel like music, in the same way that the songs kind of write themselves, I feel like the album kind of has a will of its own, almost. The songs are magnetically attracted to each other in a way.
Do you remember what kind of music Brad Cook introduced you to?
Yeah, Brad introduced me to Cameron Winter. Heavy Metal came out right after we finished recording, and he was like, “Dude, check this out.” He introduced me to this band called Good Morning. I think they’re from New Zealand. I don’t know if there’s anybody whose music tastes I just unequivocally trust as much as Brad. He showed me this record called Peanut by the artist Otto Benson. I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s indie, but there’s electro, and there’s also some Midwest emo going on. Brad introduced me to Cate LeBon, the record Reward.
How were you affected when Sam Beam entered the studio, given how Iron & Wine has inspired your songwriting?
That was surreal. Brad is just buddies with him, he knows him. Sam Beam lives 25 minutes away from us, and it quickly went from, “Oh man, I love Iron & Wine,” to Brad being like, “We’ll get him in the studio,” to Sam Beam just being there. I guess Brad had sent him some tunes, because I would not expect Sam Beam to know what my music is. Just to have him be like, “Brad showed me the songs, and they’re beautiful,” I was like, “Is this a joke? Am I alive or dead?” It was awesome. And then, he has just the most beautiful voice. It was a pleasure, and honestly a huge, unforgettable learning experience just to watch him sing. I was like, “This man’s voice is completely unreal.”
Do you have a favorite of the three collaborations? It’s really striking to hear his voice on ‘Ready or Not’, especially, given the weight of that song.
I think it probably is ‘Ready or Not’. He just went in there, and he was auditioning crazy harmonies that I would never even think to try. Again, I was like, “Is this a dream? Is this reality?” In addition to the beautiful harmonies, for the last 20 seconds of the track, it’s him breathing rhythmically, and when he laid that shit down, I was like, “It’s so good!” It’s just intuitively perfect. And then you listen to it and it’s cerebrally perfect.
One production detail that ties into the vocals is the modular synth on ‘Waits for Me’, which stood out to me because your voice isn’t really heavily effected elsewhere.
The inspiration of that tone came from the demo, which I just made in my room. I ran the vocals through an amp plugin on Ableton and just thought it sounded cool. But Matt McCaughan, who did a bunch of drums on this record, came in with a modular synth, and that distortion created the most sonically thick and satisfying version of that little lick. And you’re right, there’s not a ton of effected vocals at all, certainly not a ton of distorted-sounding stuff in my work on this record. I imagine that point in the song is a little victory lap, and I feel like that modular synth supports that feeling.
What other parts on the record stand out as victory laps to you?
Definitely the ending of ‘Like You Really Mean It’. Nate Stoker, who played guitar, he rips the last chorus with this tapping riff that’s just totally insane. I don’t know if victory lap is the right word to describe it, but towards the end of the record, there’s a song called ‘Afarin’, which is kind of a sad love song. The outro builds with drums entering in the last 20 seconds of the song. I’m hesitant to say victory lap because that song is sad, it’s yearning. But something about the drums in the outro just felt perfect, and maybe that feeling of perfection is victory to me. The perfect way to expand on and honor this emotional moment in the song.
Are you more of a perfectionist when it comes to endings? Do you usually put a lot of stock in the ending of a song?
Not really. [laughs] I wouldn’t say that I’m a perfectionist, but as a songwriter, I do ascribe to the school of thought where my song should have an end, instead of just it being assumed that it will fade out. A fade-out is beautiful and awesome, but I think it’s important to end a song sometimes. I think sometimes a song needs to be over. For my songs that have endings, which I feel like is most of them, I like for there to be a definitive end.
One song where that feels especially pronounced, maybe because it’s a short song, is ‘Point of View’, which has one of my favorite vocal moments on the record, the repetition of “But you know.” How does the memory of singing these songs in the studio sit in your mind?
‘Point of View’, from an emotional standpoint, I wouldn’t say was fun to sing. But from a technical standpoint, it was fun to sing because the mood for that song feels unique to me. A bit of controlled hysteria, or like something’s about to fall over. There was definitely a joy and an ease to recording and singing these songs on the album, but it can also be challenging to get out of your head enough to sing the song, the way that it is, without worrying about anybody around you or who’s gonna listen to it – or who isn’t, or who it’s about, or who it’s not about. In that sense, it was simultaneously so easy and so hard. But one of the standout singing moments for me was ‘Ready or Not’. Me and Brad wrote it together, and the melody came about super spontaneously, and the lyrics came about pretty quickly, a stream of consciousness. I remember feeling a sense of catharsis, the freedom of saying something true and having it feel right. For a lot of these songs, Brad was auditioning backing vocals behind me while singing, being like, “How about this? This could be sick.” So I felt supported. I wasn’t singing alone; I wasn’t experiencing some of these tough emotional moments alone.
Something that comes up on this record a couple of times is the relationship between time and songs. On ‘Like You Really Mean It’, you sing about how “time became a song that carries on without me,” and on ‘Ready or Not’, you sing “I wait too long/ I make no time for my song.” I’d love for you to talk about that feeling of songs existing outside of you, and I’m also curious what making time for songs looks like for you at the moment.
I’ll answer the second one first and say that making time for songs for me is not just a physical thing of, like, “I need to sit down, put my body here next to a guitar” – that definitely needs to happen, but I also need to be somewhat emotionally clear in order to express whatever needs to come out. If I don’t know how I feel, then I can’t write a song. If the feeling is I don’t know how I feel, then that’s a feeling. That counts. That’s a song. But if I feel like I have to live with a certain degree of emotional awareness and practice that in order to write music at all.
In terms of songs existing outside of time – love that. The producer for The King, Shawn Everett, once described music to me as decorations of time. I just think that’s so beautiful. Songs have a runtime, but at the same time, music exists around you, and you can feel it moving inside you. Literally, when there’s bass, when you’re at a live show; metaphorically, when that chorus hits and you start crying. For a phenomenon that doesn’t technically have a body, music is a pretty physical experience. For a phenomenon that exists in the air, in sound waves, and exists somewhere in our nebulous concept of time, it has the power to grip you, just like anybody’s hand. Bob Marley said when it hits you, you feel no pain. And I don’t know about that, for me personally, in terms of the feel-no-pain part, but it definitely hits. It’s just cool that music can exist around you, you can be completely surrounded by it, and have that surroundingness feels like a completely timeless moment. When you’re at an amazing show, and everybody’s sweaty, and the sound is everywhere, it’s this magic moment in time that is forever captured and you’ll never experience again.
You talked about The King‘s songs being painful to sing. Do you think a part of older songs becoming timeless has to do with them not hurting as much? You’re carrying them, but is there a point where they feel separate from you in that way?
I wouldn’t say that the hurt goes away. I’d say the point at which it feels like the songs exist without me is release day. That’s when the songs aren’t mine anymore. It’s not that the emotions in these songs don’t still resonate with me, but once you give your art away, it’s something that everybody can put their heart into. I value my life experiences and I care about them, and I’m grateful they’ve inspired this music, but I don’t need anybody who listens to this music to know anything about me for it to resonate with them, and honestly, I’d prefer that they didn’t.
I’ve played a song I wrote for an ex years and years and years ago, and it doesn’t have the same meaning. It’s like looking at an old photograph of an ex: there’s love and experience here, but not this now-ness. It’s the graciousness of the past, not necessarily diluting the feelings, but letting me look at it from farther away and see: I was hurt, and she was hurt, and we were hurt, and this isn’t about me. The passage of time helps me zoom out from these songs. The meaning of these songs evolves over time, which has been the weirdest experience about writing and performing them over the years.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
At the turn of the millennium, fashion was no longer confined to the runway. The early 2000s marked a moment when popular culture, media, and celebrity visibility began shaping the way people dressed on a global scale. Music videos, red carpets, reality television, and emerging internet platforms created a shared visual landscape where trends moved quickly and images traveled even faster.
In this environment, clothing became more than personal style. It became a form of cultural participation. What people wore was increasingly influenced by what they saw on screens.
The Rise of a Media-Driven Style
One of the defining characteristics of early 2000s clothing was its deep connection to mass media. Cable television and music channels such as MTV and VH1 played a major role in shaping youth culture. Music videos were not just about sound; they were visual statements where clothing helped define entire identities.
Pop stars, hip-hop artists, and R&B performers appeared in carefully styled outfits that were instantly recognizable. Oversized logos, statement accessories, low-rise denim, and bold graphics became visual signatures of the era.
Because these images were broadcast repeatedly across television and magazines, the styles quickly moved beyond celebrity circles and into everyday wardrobes. Fashion was no longer distant or exclusive. It felt immediate and accessible.
Celebrity Culture and the Everyday Look
The early 2000s were also the golden age of celebrity visibility. Paparazzi photography, tabloid culture, and entertainment news programs brought the private lives of public figures into constant view.
Unlike the carefully curated glamour of traditional red carpets, paparazzi images showed celebrities in casual situations: leaving restaurants, walking through airports, shopping in city streets. These moments blurred the line between fashion performance and daily life.
As a result, casual clothing gained cultural importance. Tracksuits, hoodies, denim, and simple tees appeared repeatedly in celebrity photographs, transforming everyday garments into recognizable trends.
People were not only inspired by formal fashion moments. They were copying what celebrities wore on ordinary days.
The Influence of Music Subcultures
Music scenes played a significant role in shaping the visual identity of early 2000s fashion. Hip-hop culture, in particular, had a strong influence on silhouettes and styling choices. Baggy denim, statement sneakers, and branded streetwear became part of a broader cultural movement tied to music and urban identity.
At the same time, pop artists introduced a different kind of visual energy. Bright colors, playful accessories, and experimental styling pushed fashion into more expressive territory.
Rock and alternative scenes added their own aesthetic elements — darker palettes, layered looks, and distressed fabrics.
The result was a fashion landscape shaped by multiple musical influences rather than a single dominant trend.
The Early Internet and Visual Circulation
Another key factor behind the spread of early 2000s fashion was the rise of the internet. Although social media as we know it today did not yet exist, online forums, fan websites, and early digital photography played a role in circulating images.
Fashion magazines were still influential, but digital spaces began accelerating the speed at which trends traveled. Fans shared photographs of celebrity outfits, runway collections, and street style moments online.
These early forms of digital culture created a new kind of visual archive. People could revisit outfits, discuss trends, and reinterpret styles within their own communities.
Even before platforms like Instagram or TikTok, fashion was already becoming a global visual conversation.
Fashion as Cultural Performance
Looking back, y2k fashion reveals how closely clothing was tied to performance and visibility. Outfits were often designed with cameras in mind. Whether on stage, in music videos, or captured by paparazzi lenses, fashion was part of a broader spectacle.
This visual emphasis encouraged experimentation. Logos became larger. Accessories more dramatic. Fabrics shinier. Clothing needed to stand out not just in person, but also on screen.
The result was a period where fashion felt energetic, sometimes excessive, but always expressive.
A Legacy That Still Resonates
Today, the influence of 2000s fashion can be seen in contemporary design and youth culture. The renewed interest in Y2K aesthetics reflects more than simple nostalgia. It reveals how strongly the era shaped the visual language of modern fashion.
Many elements that defined the time — graphic prints, statement denim, athletic-inspired silhouettes — continue to reappear in modern collections and street style.
The difference is that today’s interpretations are often filtered through a contemporary lens, combining the boldness of the original era with more refined styling.
Fashion as Cultural Memory
Ultimately, the significance of early 2000s fashion lies in how clearly it reflects the cultural environment that produced it. It was a time when media visibility expanded rapidly, celebrity culture intensified, and the internet began reshaping the way images circulated.
Clothing became part of this transformation. It captured the mood of a generation learning to navigate a world where identity, media, and image were increasingly intertwined.
What people wore during that period was not just about trends. It was a reflection of how culture itself was changing.
And in that sense, the style of the early 2000s remains more than a nostalgic curiosity. It stands as a cultural record of a moment when fashion and media began dressing the world together.
In the world of AAA video games, the role of the “music designer” has become a critical bridge between artistic composition and technical implementation. Part-enginner and part-musician, Udit Srivathsan is a music designer and audio engineer sitting at this unique niche. His audio work spans some of the most anticipated titles in the gaming industry, including Marvel’s Wolverine and Ghost of Yōtei, which just won a Music Editing award at the 73rd Motion Pictures Sound Editors Awards, which was announced March 2026. Srivathsan was part of the Music Editing team that won the Golden Reel Award with Sony Interactive Entertainment for winning the Outstanding Achievement in Music Editing for Game Music.
Udit is currently serving as a Music Designer at Sony Interactive Entertainment America, and his career offers a look into the complex systems that allow video game music to react dynamically to player choices. His approach, which he describes as a combination of “creativity with logical problem solving,” involves taking recorded material and designing the systems that determine how it transitions during gameplay.
“It’s like scoring a movie, but it can go in so many directions,” Udit said in a recent interview.
Engineering the Sound of Superheroes
Udit’s portfolio includes high-profile contributions to several major franchises. On Marvel’s Wolverine, he initially served on the engineering team, where he was responsible for preparing composer stems for recording sessions. This involved analyzing the score to determine how to record ensembles in a way that maximized flexibility for music editors later in production.
Just as his work on Ghost of Yōtei recently garnered a 2026 MPSE Golden Reel Award for Outstanding Achievement in Music Editing, it’s a testament to the increasing recognition of music design as a specialized craft within the industry.
“Being brought on to work on Ghost of Yōtei with a team of experienced veterans was an honor and I’m thankful for their trust in me! I learned so much along the way from people like Andrew Buresh, Sonia Coronado and Ted Kocher and I look forward to continuing to work together on many more projects in the future.”
Meanwhile, while working on titles like Saros, Udit collaborated with the PlayStation music team in the UK, working with music by composer Sam Slater. Udit was tasked with creating “mashups” of existing themes for specific boss fights, ensuring the music remained tonally consistent while cutting through the game’s dense sound design. “This was definitely a challenge,” he said, “making the cues stand out enough yet work amidst the super crunchy and satisfying sound design already in the game.”
Mastery of Immersive Formats
Beyond gaming, Srivathsan has established himself as a specialist in immersive audio formats, particularly Dolby Atmos. He served as the Upmix Engineer for the Counter-Strike 2 Masterminds II Music Kit box, taking stereo mixes from composers such as Austin Wintory and Ben Bromfield and expanding them into a spatial environment.
His engineering credits also extend to legendary experimental acts; he served as the Lead Recording Engineer for Dr. Dark (2025) by The Residents. This technical versatility is rooted in his training at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he studied both music composition and audio engineering.
Bridging Film and Games in The Studio
Udit’s background in film post-production—including dialogue editing for the feature film Second Chance (2024) and assistant engineering on the horror-thriller Ick (2024)—has informed his perspective on interactive media. He maintains that the disciplines are more similar than they appear, noting that both require an understanding of narrative context and the ability to anticipate changes in a scene.
“In a movie, there’s a story, cutscenes, dialogue, and sound design—all of which can change,” Udit explains. “Understanding when a scene is ready to score or edit and how to anticipate any changes is something that working with films has given me insight into.”
Udit’s Artistic Exploration
While much of his work involves technical implementation for major studios, Udit continues to pursue independent artistic projects. Alongside co-composer Cullen Luper, he wrote and produced “Unbound,” an hour-long narrative immersive album. The project featured a live performance with a multichannel speaker system, utilizing twelve speakers to surround the audience, further pushing the boundaries of spatial storytelling.
As the industry moves toward more sophisticated audio systems, Udit’s hybrid role as an engineer and music designer highlights a growing trend in entertainment: the blurring of lines between the person who writes the music and the person who builds the system that delivers it.
With upcoming projects including Kena: Scars of Kosmora and continued work on Sony’s premier titles, keep an eye on Srivathsan’s musical work on his website, uditsrivathsanmusic.com.
The 2026 Academy Awards took place last night (March 16). In the music categories, Ludwig Göransson won Best Original Score for Sinners, beating out Jerskin Fendrix’s Bugonia, Alexandre Desplat’s Frankenstein, Max Richter’s Hamnet, and Jonny Greenwood’s One Battle After Another. Marking his fifth nomination and third Oscar win, the award was presented by the reunited cast of Bridesmaids at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre.
Best Song went to HUNTR/X’s KPop Demon Hunters hit ‘Golden’, which won over Diane Warren’s ‘Dear Me’ from Diane Warren: Relentless, Raphael Saadiq and Ludwig Göransson’s ‘I Lied To You’ from Sinners, Nicholas Pike’s ‘Sweet Dreams of Joy’ from Viva Verdi!, and Nick Cave and Bryce Dessner’s ‘Train Dreams’ from Train Dreams. The songwriting team accepted the award from Lionel Richie. “Growing up, people made fun of me for liking K-pop,” Ejae said in her speech. “Now everyone is singing our song, and in all of the Korean lyrics. I’m so proud. I realize this award is not about success; it’s about resilience.”
During the ceremony, Sinners star Miles Caton and Raphael Saadiq performed their Best Original Song-nominated ‘I Lied to You’ alongside blues legend Buddy Guy (who makes a cameo in the film), Brittany Howard of Alabama Shakes, Shaboozey, and more. Later on, Ejae, Audrey Nuna, and Rei Ami took the stage to perform ‘Golden’. In previous years, all nominated songs would be performed throughout the show, but the Academy announced earlier this year they were going to “move away” from live performances for the ceremony.
The full performance of “Golden” from ‘KPOP DEMON HUNTERS’ at the Oscars.
It’s the summer of 1992, and Japanese Giants editor Ed Godziszewski is being led toward the rafters of Toho Studios’s Stage 9 in Tokyo. The friend escorting him previously explained they could visit Koichi Kawakita’s special effects set for Godzilla vs. Mothra, but probably wouldn’t see much—maybe a few shots of Mothra and a new creature called Battra flying around. “Okay by me,” Godziszewski said at the time. “I’m happy to see anything.”
But as was discovered upon entering the sound stage—and as was reinforced tenfold from the rafters—something had surely been lost in communication. Godziszewski’s new vantage point offers a first-class view of a miniature set depicting Yokohama’s Minato Mirai district. “Everything was constructed on a platform about two feet high. They had the InterContinental Hotel and the Cosmo Clock 21 Ferris wheel, but only the bottom half of the Landmark Tower was standing; the rest was a pile of rubble. For the ocean, they’d custom-built a tank two or three inches deep. There was a curved backdrop with two-dimensional building cutouts to create a sense of distance.” And Mothra and Battra, hardly fluttering above the horizon, are locked in battle with Godzilla.
Godziszewski has watched Kawakita’s team rehearse the shot and its various components. Part of the day was spent on assistant director Makoto Kamiya coordinating Godzilla’s movements with stuntman Kenpachiro Satsuma: holding out a fist and shouting to the man inside the monster costume, “Look here! This is where Mothra will be coming!” The Mothra puppet has been rigged to a crane and undergone semicircular practice swoops. A subsequent dry run put them together, with Kamiya yelling “Dat-dat-dat-dat!” to simulate explosions that’ll be caused when Mothra fires animated beams at Godzilla. (Battra, meantime, lies prone on the ground, stunned by injuries captured in an earlier shot.)
Image courtesy of Ed Godziszewski
At last, Godzilla is coated with squibs. The actual take is coming. Perched in the rafters, Godziszewski aims his camcorder; he’s been shooting video throughout the day and is eager to capture the moment that’s taken hours to prepare. He hears Kawakita holler from below, “Ready!”
Then comes a heart-stopping click.
“The battery died.” The dismay lingers in Godziszewski’s voice as he tells the story decades later. “I was sad not to get the actual take on video. But it was still cool to watch the scene unfolding. To see Mothra curving in and to watch giant explosions burst on Godzilla as he staggers back.”
Being on set was also something of a personal fulfillment for the historian. By this point, Godziszewski had been to Japan several times and even paid a few visits to Toho. But never before had he observed the making of a Godzilla movie in real time. Nor did he truly know what went into a shot on these films whose images have dazzled him since childhood. Norman England’s Behind the Kaiju Curtain: A Journey Onto Japan’s Biggest Film Sets was decades into the future; there was, at the time, no English-language resource documenting the daily goings-on inside Stage 9. But now he was watching Godzilla tangle with one of his most famous opponents—after being told there was probably ‘not much to see.’ “I was, as you can imagine, shocked and delighted!”
Image courtesy of Ed Godziszewski
Godziszewski’s journey to the set began in spring 1992. “I’d recently joined a company that was headquartered in Japan, and my wife and I were overseas on my first business trip. Since we were there for a couple of weeks, we dropped in on Kawakita and learned about the movie they were getting ready to shoot.” As it happened, this particular visit took place mere weeks after international headlines declared that a Godzilla suit used on the previous year’s Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah had been plundered from the Toho lot. “In fact, we got there the day after they found it and brought it back to the studio. Kawakita turned us over to Kamiya for a tour, and I still remember him complaining, ‘We really wanted to make a new suit and were happy when somebody stole the old one. And then they had to find the damn thing!’”
In the end, though, the staff got their wish: the theft had led to an okay to build a new costume. “When Kamiya showed us around, they were just starting to cast new fins and body parts. Before the trip ended, we got an invitation. ‘If you have time later this year, why don’t you come back?’ And so, I took a week’s vacation that summer and returned with my friend Bill Gudmundson—specifically to watch them filming.”
Godziszewski knew little about Godzilla vs. Mothra ahead of time—just that it featured the eponymous monsters and something called Battra. He likewise had no insight into what’d transpire in the Yokohama battle he wandered into. Once Mothra’s charge at Godzilla was complete, Kawakita’s team lensed inserts of the winged monster coursing through the air. From here, another couple of hours went into setting up a scene wherein Mothra lands before Battra and the two monsters start communicating. “My Japanese friend who came with us described it as Mothra cheering up Battra,” Godziszewski recalls with a chuckle.
Preparation was nearly done when the staff broke for dinner around six. The visitors sat near Toho’s legendary Big Pool, “eating a little something we’d brought with us. Just when everyone was getting ready to go back inside, Kawakita sat down and asked if we were enjoying ourselves. That made me feel good; he didn’t think of us as annoying interlopers.” The day had likewise been punctuated by fun moments that included a meet-up with Satsuma and discovering monster props that weren’t in use. Mothra’s caterpillar form—along with a Godzilla puppet used for close-ups—was found in a storage area separated from the set by a partition. “And at one point, my friend showed us a huge blue tarp covering something near the Big Pool. Mind you, he’s not a staff member, but he just lifted the tarp, and there was the larva Battra! It was attached to a motorized wheeled platform used to carry it through water for swimming scenes.”
Mothra ‘cheering up’ Battra required numerous lights “going on and off” beneath the creature puppets and finally wrapped around ten p.m. “They were going to shoot something else, but we didn’t want to miss the last train. We thanked Kawakita for having us, and then he said—and maybe he was just joking—‘Come again!’” Godziszewski remembers exchanging glances with Gudmundson on their way back to the hotel before agreeing to take up Kawakita on his “very loose invitation.” And so, following a day of exploring the real Yokohama—seeing the location that was currently being razed in Stage 9—the two were en route back to Toho.
“My Japanese friend wasn’t able to come with us this time, so it was up to us to find our way and get in. I’d taken pretty good notes on how to get to Toho, and when we reached the front gate, I tried—through my terrible, broken Japanese—to tell the guard, ‘We’re Kawakita’s guests.’ It looked like he got on the phone and actually called him on the set. We stood there, wondering if we’d be told to leave.” Eventually, however, the gate opened, and they were ushered in.
Image courtesy of Ed Godziszewski
“We walked into Stage 9 just after they’d set up a shot of Battra carrying the Ferris wheel toward Godzilla.” Although the scene called for Battra to use the wheel as a battering instrument, the shot in question consisted of him just flying at his opponent with the infrastructure in his claws; the close-up of Godzilla being bludgeoned would be lensed another time. Godziszewski and Gudmundson remained on the studio floor and off to the side, doing their best “not to be in anyone’s way,” as the shot was finished. The Ferris wheel was then detached, fractured, and rigged to Godzilla’s body. When Kawakita called for action again, Battra flew past while Godzilla simultaneously hurled himself onto a building, making it appear as though he’d been knocked off his feet.
At times, the Toho staff treated their guests to a surprise. “After the scene of Godzilla falling over was done,” Godziszewski recalls, “Bill and I watched them help Satsuma out of the suit, which was left on the floor with all the debris still attached. One of the staffers walked up to the broken Ferris wheel, grabbed two of the miniature carriage cars, and—making a gesture to be quiet—gave them to us. So we got to leave with souvenirs from the set!” Another kind moment came from the man who Godziszewski learned years later was the son of modelmaker Keizo Murase. “He waved us over to show us the smaller flying props for Mothra and Battra and let us hold them. We couldn’t speak much Japanese, and he couldn’t speak any English, but we still managed to communicate. I wish this had been the age of digital cameras, because I would’ve taken a thousand pictures. Back then, you had a roll of film. Thirty-six sacred pictures was what you got.”
The rest of the day featured more exciting action—including a high-angle vista of Mothra and Battra crossing paths while Godzilla thrashed beneath the Cosmo Clock 21’s ruins—but the high point remained the first thing Godziszewski saw on Day One of his visit: Godzilla stomping toward a grounded Battra and strafing him with his atomic breath. For this scene, explosives were wired beneath the Battra puppet, and every staffer in Stage 9 clambered onto the set’s platform. Godziszewski realized at this point he had a chance to join them—to get closer to the camera and the monsters during an actual take. “I wasn’t going to be presumptuous and assume I could do anything. But for this particular shot, nobody was on the floor. Bill and I looked at each other. ‘What do you think? They won’t even notice us.’ Quietly, we jumped onto the set and stood behind everyone as they got ready.”
Image courtesy of Ed Godziszewski
Once more, there was a rehearsal. Satsuma, clad in the Godzilla suit, lumbered toward Battra, and the crew used controls to open the costume’s mouth, where an animated ray would be added later. “Battra was still hooked up to wires, and they jolted him upward as though he were being hit by Godzilla’s breath. And then, the real take…. We knew it was happening, because they started up fans that blew smoke and fog across the set.” Satsuma went through his motions again; the mouth swung open.
Then came the explosion.
“It was a sound like I never expected,” says Godziszewski. “I was expecting the equivalent of firecrackers, but this was like M-80s! An enormous, loud sound! Really shocked the hell out of me and took away my hearing for a moment. The explosion itself lifted Battra off the floor a bit; they probably didn’t need to use wires. But it was so impressive to watch. Even now, seeing the scene all these years later, it looks every bit as great as it did in person. I still think to myself: ‘I was right there! Right by the camera!’”
Image courtesy of Ed Godziszewski
Ed Godziszewski’s two days on Godzilla vs. Mothra came after years of studying Japanese texts and behind-the-scenes photographs. And the experience taught him just how much there was to special effects that no verbiage or picture could adequately convey. “Most photos show maybe a handful of guys on set, but in reality, there are thirty-plus staffers constantly doing something. I’d say at least two hours pass between shots, and during that time, everyone has a job and is busy setting up and fixing things.”
Being an onlooker also allowed him to study the props and their intricacies. How, for instance, Mothra and Battra underwent battery tests to verify their luminescent eyes would turn on for a scene. How someone activated the batteries with switches located behind Battra’s neck and in the center of Mothra’s chest. Regarding Mothra, Godziszewski notes that the prop’s six legs—seemingly immobile through much of the movie—were capable of movement, as they awkwardly wriggled during a test he saw. “My guess is they didn’t really show this on camera because the movement was so unnatural.”
One of the carriage cars from the Ferris wheel prop. Image courtesy of Ed Godziszewski
Another lesson learned was the truly dangerous nature of the set. “There’s a labyrinth of big, thick electric cables strewn everywhere—around transformers and canisters of compressed air and methane gas. The staff also lights these kerosene-soaked rags inside empty film cans and sets them in the background to make it look like the city’s burning. There’s always something flammable or on fire near these cables that, again, must have a good charge going through them. And everyone’s working in the midst of this! I found myself thinking, ‘I can’t believe nobody’s been blown up!’”
He also got a surprise concerning air quality inside the stage. “For effects scenes, they often use fog machines, because fog and smoke makes the air denser and gives the images more scale. The machines use paraffin, which makes the set smell like burning candles. And when they broke for dinner that first day, I walked out of the studio, blew my nose, and when I looked at my tissue, the whole thing was black! ‘Holy shit, we’ve been breathing that in?!’” From this came another degree of awe for the Toho effects team. “I’m just imagining these guys…. They’re all smoking to begin with, and then they’re sucking in smoke and paraffin and burning rags…all day…every damn day…. I’m surprised any of them live past fifty.”
Wondering what all the Ditto transformation moves in Pokémon Pokopia are and how to unlock them? It wouldn’t feel like a proper Ditto adventure without its iconic ability, and in Pokémon Pokopia, Ditto transformations let you copy other Pokémon and use their moves to do everything from watering plants to smashing rocks.
Every transformation move in Pokémon Pokopia gives Ditto a new way to interact with the world, letting you water dry patches with Squirtle’s Water Gun, chop through logs and grass with Scyther’s Cut, or glide across cliffs with Dragonite’s Glide. You unlock each transformation by finding the Pokémon that has the move, and many of these abilities can later be upgraded to make them even more useful. Here are all Ditto transformation moves in Pokémon Pokopia and how to unlock each one.
Pokémon Pokopia: All Ditto Transformations and How to Unlock Them
There are 14 Ditto transformation moves to unlock in Pokémon Pokopia, and most of them are unlocked through the Pokémon you encounter across the island. Every transformation gives you a new tool, letting you reshape terrain, gather resources, and explore areas that were previously out of reach.
You’ll unlock these moves by meeting specific Pokémon, completing their requests, or progressing through different regions of the island as you play through the story. Here are all Ditto transformation moves in Pokémon Pokopia and how to unlock them:
Water Gun
Water Gun is the very first transformation you learn in Pokémon Pokopia. Early in the game, you will come across a dehydrated Squirtle in the Withered Wasteland, and helping it teaches Ditto how to spray water in front of it. This move restores dry terrain, turning barren land back into healthy soil. It can also water crops, flowers, and trees, which makes it one of the most useful abilities in the early part of the game. Later, once cooking becomes available, eating Soup increases the range of Water Gun so you can water a larger area at once.
Leafage
You can unlock Leafage by meeting Bulbasaur in the Withered Wasteland shortly after learning Water Gun. This ability lets Ditto grow tall grass from the ground using Bulbasaur’s vines. Leafage is mainly used to create grassy habitats for Pokémon and bring plant life back to empty areas. After eating Salad, the move becomes more flexible, allowing you to grow duckweed on water and moss on hard surfaces like rock or stone.
Cut
To unlock Cut, you’ll need to find Scyther in the Withered Wasteland. After interacting with it, Ditto gains blade-like arms that can slice through grass, trees, and piles of wood. Cut is essential for gathering wood logs, which can later be turned into lumber for crafting and building. You’ll use this move often while clearing areas or collecting resources. Eating Bread upgrades the ability so you can cut objects from a distance and slice through metal grates.
Rock Smash
Rock Smash becomes available after meeting Hitmonchan in the Withered Wasteland. This transformation lets Ditto punch through terrain using powerful fists. The basic version works on softer materials like grass, sand, dirt, and hay blocks. Tougher materials require a temporary power boost. After learning to cook, eating Hamburger Steak strengthens Rock Smash, allowing you to break stronger materials such as granite, crystal, steel, and stone.
Rototiller
You can learn Rototiller from Drilbur in the Withered Wasteland, who can be found behind the stone wall near the Pokémon Center. Rototiller prepares soil for farming by tilling the ground so you can plant vegetables and flowers. It is also useful for decorating habitats, as it lets you move plants like flowers without damaging them.
Jump
To unlock Jump, you’ll need to find Magikarp near the Lighthouse in the Withered Wasteland. Despite its reputation, Magikarp teaches one of the most useful movement abilities in the game. Pressing R allows Ditto to jump onto higher blocks, making it much easier to move around the island. Even though it doesn’t involve a full transformation, Jump greatly improves exploration and movement.
Surf
You can unlock Surf by completing the Swimming Time request in the Bleak Beach area and then speaking with Lapras. Once learned, Surf allows Ditto to transform into a Lapras-like form and glide across water safely. Without it, falling into water often results in drowning. This ability opens up new areas of the map and makes exploration across the island much easier.
Camouflage
Camouflage is unlocked after completing Zorua’s request in Bleak Beach. With this ability, Ditto can transform into nearby objects. While it doesn’t have many practical uses for progression, it can be fun for hide-and-seek games or multiplayer sessions.
Suck Up Liquids
To gain the ability to suck up liquids, you’ll need to find Paldean Wooper in Bleak Beach. By holding Y, Ditto can absorb liquids from bodies of water such as rivers, seas, mud pools, or hot springs.
Strength
Strength becomes available in the Rocky Ridges region after Machoke appears in the area. To make this happen, you’ll first need to create a Grassy Training Field habitat. Once Machoke arrives, it teaches Ditto how to push heavy objects such as large boulders and blocks. This ability makes it easier to reshape terrain and solve environmental puzzles.
Rollout
You can unlock Rollout by meeting Graveler in Rocky Ridges. Using this transformation turns Ditto into a rolling Graveler-like ball that moves quickly across the terrain. As you roll, blocks and objects in your path are destroyed. This makes Rollout useful for clearing large areas quickly, although it can also accidentally destroy structures or decorations if you aren’t careful.
Glide
Glide becomes available after meeting Dragonite in the Sparkling Skylands. To use the move, jump first and then press R again to activate the glide. Ditto transforms into a Dragonite-like form and slowly drifts through the air. Glide makes exploration much easier, especially when traveling across cliffs or large gaps.
Waterfall
Waterfall is an upgrade to Surf that you can unlock by completing a quest for Gyarados in the Sparkling Skylands. While using Surf, pressing A allows Ditto to travel upward along waterfalls, opening access to areas that were previously unreachable.
Magnet Rise
Magnet Rise is the final transformation ability and becomes available in the post-game after helping Magnemite. This move allows Ditto to float freely through the air and move both upward and downward. While floating, you can still place blocks, collect materials, and continue building. Magnet Rise is especially useful for late-game exploration and construction since it gives you full control over vertical movement.
And that’s about every Ditto transformation move in Pokémon Pokopia and how you can unlock each one. For more gaming news and guides, be sure to check out our gaming page!
Everything’s more fun with friends, and Pokémon Pokopia gives you plenty of ways to share the adventure. Like most multiplayer games, Pokopia lets you team up to explore, build, and share your worlds. You can drop by a friend’s island to see their Pokémon and habitats, team up on a Cloud Island to create something new, or roam freely in Palette Town, where you can meet other players, trade, and take part in shared activities. If that wasn’t enough, hanging out with friends lets you discover Pokémon that don’t appear on your own island, swap tips, or simply enjoy exploring each other’s creations. With so much to do side by side, here’s how you can play Pokémon Pokopia with friends.
Pokémon Pokopia: How to play with friends
To play Pokémon Pokopia with friends, you first need to reach Environment Level 2 in Withered Wasteland. Additionally, if you want to play online, you’ll also need an active Nintendo Switch Online subscription. When you’re ready to jump in, head over to any Pokémon Center PC and pick the Link Play icon with the Ditto emblem. From there, you’ll see all the multiplayer options, including GameShare, which is only available in Palette Town.
There are three main ways to play Pokémon Pokopia with friends: you can visit or host friends in-game, collaborate on a Cloud Island, or explore and interact with others in Palette Town.
To invite or visit a friend, select Invite Others to Visit to host or Visit a Friend to join someone else. Choose Local or Online, confirm your settings, and press the Plus button. Hosting generates a Link Code that you can share with friends, while visiting requires entering your friend’s code. Once connected, you can explore their island, check out Pokémon and habitats, and interact based on the selected mode.
Cloud Islands in Pokémon Pokopia let up to four players build and explore together, even if the host is offline. To create or join a Cloud Island, select Link Play at a PC. You can generate a random island or use a Magic Number to start a specific world, similar to a Minecraft seed. Any habitats or recipes you discover in a Cloud Island are yours to keep, but Pokémon you encounter will not register in your main game.
If you want to get the most out of Pokémon Pokopia’s multiplayer, head to Palette Town. After repairing the bridge from Withered Wasteland, you and your friends can enter through the Pokémon Center or cross the bridge together. In Palette Town, all Moves and items are available unless Spectator Mode is on. You can terraform, craft, complete group challenges, and build and play together in real time with your friends.
