THE ROUNDUP: Pop-culture highlights from across the region

Snakeskin ‘We Live in Sand’ The Lebanese duo — Julia Sabra and Fadi Tabbal — just dropped their excellent third album, written in October 2024, as Israel’s war on Gaza was expanding to include attacks on Beirut. Understandably, then, there’s an atmosphere of grief, anger and frustration throughout, but as with so much of the music Sabra and Tabbal make — together or separately — there is hope here too. “How to love in our insignificance?” Sabra sings in “Blindsided.” It is the record’s main theme.