The Pop Pod

This week on The Pop Pod, Sam & Jono dig into exactly that question. We start with Confessions on a Dance Floor, the Madonna masterpiece that turns 21 this year and still sounds like the future, and we talk about what it means that she and producer Stuart Price are finally returning with a sequel, Confessions II, out this summer. From there we get into the records that have carried that torch in the years since: Robyn's Body Talk, Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia, Charli XCX's Brat, and so much more.
What separates a great dance album from an all-time one? Is it the sequencing, the production, the emotional honesty underneath all that euphoria? We get into all of it, with plenty of detours along the way.
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Jessie Ware has spent the last six years quietly building one of the great runs in modern pop. From What's Your Pleasure? to That! Feels Good! and now her sixth album Superbloom, out this week, she's carved out a lane that's entirely her own: disco-inflected, deeply felt, and allergic to cheap shortcuts. Superbloom pushes deeper than its predecessors, trading pure escapism for something more grounded in real love, real relationships, and the fear of losing them, without sacrificing a single beat.
This week on The Pop Pod, I sit down with Jessie to talk through the new album, the creative instincts that have guided her since What's Your Pleasure? changed everything, and the pop songs that have meant the most to her. We get into Chappell Roan, Robyn, Rihanna, and more: the records that defined what a perfect pop moment can be, and what Jessie thinks separates a good song from an unforgettable one.

Danny L Harle is one of pop music's most quietly essential figures. A founding member of the PC Music collective, the British producer and composer has spent over a decade reshaping what pop can sound like — from the euphoric maximalism of his early solo work to becoming the trusted hand behind some of the most acclaimed records of the last few years. He's the executive producer of both of Caroline Polachek's landmark albums, Pang and Desire, I Want to Turn Into You, co-produced Dua Lipa's Radical Optimism (including "Houdini"), and has worked with Charli XCX, Carly Rae Jepsen, PinkPantheress, Clairo, and Shygirl - among many others. His own debut album Harlecore arrived in 2021, and his follow-up Cerulean dropped earlier this year.
This week on The Pop Pod, I sit down with Danny to talk through his collaborations, his new album and what he considers to be a pop classic.

Sam Duboff from Spotify joins The Pop Pod to break down this year's Loud & Clear report, Spotify's annual deep-dive into the economics of streaming. We get into what the numbers actually mean for artists in 2026 .
We talk about the rise of the niche pop star: more than 1,500 artists crossed $1 million in Spotify royalties in 2025, and many of them aren't household names — and may never trend globally. It turns out you don't need a massive hit to build a massive career. We dig into what that means for how pop is fragmenting, and why devoted fanbases are now the most valuable currency in music.
Success is being built through deep catalogue engagement, not viral moments - and that has real implications for how pop artists should be thinking about releases.

Robyn returned with Sexistential, her first album in eight years - nine hard-hitting tracks of pure melody and zero filler, picking up where Body Talk and Honey left off. No messing around. Just Robyn delivering straight-up emotion in the most direct way she knows how.
Then there's RAYE, who exercised no such restraint. This Music May Contain Hope stretches over 70 minutes across 17 songs - orchestrals, narrative, Hans Zimmer, Al Green - an epic that dares you to sit with it.
Sam is joined first by YouTuber HTHAZE to unpack This Music May Contain Hope. Then producer Jono, who caught Robyn live on release night, joins to dig into Sexistential.
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