This is our weekly recap of the best new songs released each week because Plato said that music gives soul to the universe and wings to the mind and we care deeply about your physical, mental, and spiritual well-being.
It’s also not a bad way to start the weekend. Here’s a Spotify playlist of the songs (with some substitutions for the ones that aren’t on Spotify yet) if that’s more your speed. Also, here’s our collected Spotify playlist of all the songs of the week we’ve had.
A general warning that many of these songs have explicit lyrics. Here they are, in no particular order.
1. Run the Jewels — Talk to Me
They’re back. Run The Jewels dropped the first track off their upcoming album Run The Jewels 3 and it sounds just as immediate and important as anything that came off the first two (perfect) albums. I didn’t think El-P’s production could get any more sonically intense, but he’s fearless, still pushing to add more noise, bigger sounds … guitars, distortion, snares, cymbals, synths, all coming together, the only thing that makes sense really, as they need a sound to match their fury. — Nate Scott
2. Charli XCX — After the Afterparty, Feat. Lil Yachty
This is 2016’s version of the R. Kelly line, “After the party, it’s the after party,” and I’m 100% here for it. Why? Because it’s Charli XCX and Lil Yachty, who are, honestly, not two people I would’ve pegged to team up. But boy, am I glad they did. This is a total banger. Happy freakin’ weekend, baby. — Charlotte Wilder
3. Lambchop — NIV
Lambchop, then called Posterchild, was first formed in 1986, and after thirty years, the band still managing to make some of the most challenging, interesting, and downright beautiful music of any band out there. NIV, off the new album FLOTUS, is a burbling, weird dance track, but a dance track it is. The sounds are so simple to be almost childish — a Day 1 drum track, a plinked piano, a driving bass line — but the voice, ethereal and robotic, adds depth. You may not know what they’re singing, but you feel it. — Nate Scott
4. Meek Mill — Froze, Feat. Lil Uzi Vert & Nicki Minaj
Given that Kid Cudi recently reignited Meek Mill’s feud with Drake over that whole ghostwriting business, it seems appropriate to include a Meek Mill song this week. But Froze is also really good. And it also features Nicki Minaj, who — I would argue — makes any track she touches turn to gold. — Charlotte Wilder
5. Futurebirds — Only Here For Your Love
Futurebirds are one of the most fascinating bands in America, a group of psych country rockers from Athens, Georgia who have passed up label deals and money and battled to maintain their sound, which isn’t really like anything else being made today. Their new video is for Only Here For Your Love, a pulsing noise-filled ballad, and man, what a video. Like some David Lynch fever dream, the video shows the band members weaving their way through the most bizarre house party you’ve never attended. — Nate Scott
6. 2 Chainz — Day Party
2 Chainz’s new EP features Gucci Mane, Future, Ty Dolla $ign, and more. But I have to say that my favorite song on it is Day Party, featuring no one but 2 Chainz and his gravely, quick verses that are getting me so jazzed up that I want to go kick down a door. — Charlotte Wilder
7. Nitemoves — Tonopath Gothic
This is my favorite track off D.C. electronic artist Nitemoves’ new album, Don’t Ask!, and while I have no idea what “Tonopath Gothic” means, I do know that this song has an immediacy I don’t find much in electronic music anymore, and one of my favorite drum tracks of any song put out this year. This is good music. This is such good music. — Nate Scott
8. Khalid — Hopeless
I love this dude. Khalid has a warbly, rough-around-the-edges voice that still manages to soar over his funky, techno-y beats as though it were molasses. I honestly don’t know how he does it, but I am not going to question it. I’ll just let it ride. — Charlotte Wilder
9. The Skins — Bury Me, feat. D.R.A.M.
When I first saw this song I thought it said The Shins had recorded a song with D.R.A.M., and my brain nearly melted. But no this is The Skins, a quintet of impossibly young Brooklyn musicians — ages range from 17 to 24. They make big pop music, and bringing D.R.A.M. in is going to make any song better. — Nate Scott
10. Good Great Fine OK — Get Away
Great Good Fine OK make pop music with an indie bent, a genre that may have had its heyday a few years ago, but the band is still finding things to say. Get Away seems ripped from a montage, you running through the streets at night, finding that next party to go crazy at. — Nate Scott
(Hey guys, Charlotte here. Just want to say I love the Good Great Fine OK song, too. It probably belongs in a Disney movie. Like, A Goofy Movie. But I’m cool with that.)
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