Indie pop
Every Arcade Fire Song Ranked from Worst to Best
Rank and File finds us sorting through an exhaustive, comprehensive body of work or collection of pop-culture artifacts. This time, we celebrate Arcade Fire’s entire catalogue by revisiting all 85 of their anthems. This article originally ran in 2017 and has been updated as of May 6th, 2022 to mark the release of WE. From the very first notes of their debut album — those gleaming wind-chime like synths, the chugging guitar, the regal piano — Arcade Fire became one of those remarkably few life-changing, era-defining bands in indie rock history. Their songs soared, creaked, ached, and roared, breathing vibrant, triumphant life and passion. For over two decades, the New Orleans-by-way-of-Montreal band have continued to push and challenge themselves, drawing from their own confrontation with p...
Billie Eilish Surprises girl in red with a Norwegian Grammy at Coachella
Norwegian indie pop star girl in red was nominated for seven awards at Norway’s prestigious Spelleman Awards, but a North American tour kept her from the ceremony. Instead, fellow pop wunderkind Billie Eilish met up with the artist while at Coachella to present her with the Spelleman Album of the Year award. In a video that aired during the ceremony, Eilish sits in girl in red’s tour bus at weekend two of Coachella, waiting patiently for her friend to come aboard. “I am about to surprise girl in red with the Spellemann Album Of The Year award,” she explains, before the artist, born Marie Ulven, enters the bus. “What the actual fuck?” Ulven exclaims. “That’s a Norwegian Grammy, you know?” Ulven asks incredulously. “I am aware,” Eilish says. The American singer then directs her Norwegian fri...
Lykke Li Unveils New Song “Highway to Your Heart”: Stream
Lykke Li is back with “Highway to Your Heart,” the second single from her upcoming audiovisual album EYEYE. Check out the song and its accompanying music video below. Tender but devastating, “Highway to Your Heart” allows Li to mourn a lost love with slow, simmering keys and reverberating harmonies. “Night falls, it rains, I wake up alone,” she chants. At this point, loneliness is a routine: “Get high but it won’t last/ I’m still alone.” The single comes with an equally dramatic video directed by Theo Lindquist, which sees the artist engulfed in a mix of flames and rain following a car accident. While Li previously shared a teaser of EYEYE’s visual component, “Highway to Your Heart” offers listeners the first complete video from the album, which features several clips directed by...
Purity Ring Announce New EP Graves, Share Title Track: Stream
Purity Ring have announced their new EP, Graves, out June 3rd via the band’s own label The Fellowship. As a preview, the duo have shared the title track after it was premiered at a virtual listening party earlier this week. Not much else is available in the way of details, but vocalist and songwriter Megan James revealed in a statement that “graves” was nearly a decade in the making. “This song has been haunting us for eight straight years so we’re very glad to let it be heard,” she said. “We hope it brings you as much joy as it has now brought us. Thank you for listening and please enjoy the beautiful music video about human cells.” Featuring the catchy melodies for which Purity Ring has become known, “graves” builds toward a dark chorus contrasting with James’ sweet vocals. “We’ll w...
MUNA Perform “Anything But Me” on Ellen: Watch
MUNA made their daytime television debut on Monday, April 18th, when they stopped by The Ellen Degeneres Show to perform their recent single “Anything But Me.” Watch the lighthearted performance below. Clad in coordinated, purple-and-black outfits, Katie Gavin, Naomi McPherson, and Josette Maskin brought their signature synth pop flamboyance to the talk show, a fittingly upbeat atmosphere for the strong-willed breakup storyline of “Anything But Me.” “You’re gonna say that I’m on a high horse/ I think that my horse is regular-sized/ Did you ever think maybe you’re on a pony/ Going in circles on a carousel ride?” Gavin sings, while McPherson and Maskin sway beside them. Advertisement Related Video The tongue-in-cheek banger is the latest jovial single from MUNA, whose Phoebe Bridgers co...
Song of the Week: Phoebe Bridgers Returns With “Sidelines”
Song of the Week breaks down and talks about the song we just can’t get out of our head each week. Find these songs and more on our Spotify Top Songs playlist. For our favorite new songs from emerging artists, check out our Spotify New Sounds playlist. This week, Phoebe Bridgers more than delivers on her first solo release of 2022. For an artist whose discography is packed with piercingly sad lyrics, there is perhaps no line as nihilistic in Phoebe Bridgers‘ catalogue as the closer to her latest, “Sidelines”: “I used to think you could hear the ocean in a seashell/ What a childish thing.” Written for the upcoming Hulu adaptation of Sally Rooney’s Conversations with Friends, “Sidelines” is another slow, sad yee-haw from the indie singer-songwriter, the type for whi...
Jordana Shares New Single “To the Ground”: Stream
Jordana has dropped the new single “To the Ground” as the latest preview from her upcoming album, Face the Wall. The admirably uplifting tune is described in a statement by the 21-year old indie-pop singer-songwriter as “about being alone and starting from square one, not knowing how and where to start, a venture into adulthood. With the path to growing up, it’s wanting to not ask for any help on any growth to feel accomplished and self-brought-up, emotionally and physically. The only help being asked for in this song is to be stripped completely and figuratively thrown to the ground to get back up.” Though she leads into the chorus by singing, “It’s not that I need your help or anything/ But if you’d like to start me off that would be pretty cool,” Jordana keeps much of the responsibility...
How Artist of the Month Wet Leg’s Authentic Joy Led to Massive Buzz
Artist of the Month is an accolade given to a rising artist or band on the cusp of stardom. In April 2022, we give the nod to one of the buzziest bands around, Wet Leg. Getting Wet Leg on the phone for an interview is impressively challenging. In the run-up to last week’s release of their self-titled debut, the Isle of Wight duo of Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers were, in their own press rep’s words, “scheduled within an inch of their lives.” Between countless interviews, their second tour of the United States, and performing on nearly every late-night show there is, the buzziest band around is hard to lock in for a 30-minute chat. All the attention has been a wild ride for Wet Leg, but an understandably exacting one. As Teasdale notes, it’s hard to appreciate the landmarks when they co...
Arlo Parks Announces 2022 North American Tour
After opening for artists like Billie Eilish, Florence + The Machine, Harry Styles, and Clairo, Arlo Parks will set out on a headlining 2022 North American tour of her own this fall. The 18-date run kicks off on September 6th in Philadelphia and will make stops in cities like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, New Orleans, and Washington, DC before wrapping on October 12th in Atlanta. Find the full itinerary below. Fans can register here for the official presale, which begins on Tuesday, April 5th at 10:00 a.m. local time. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Friday, April 8th via Ticketmaster. Advertisement Related Video Our former Artist of the Month has a handful of remaining dates left on her tour with Clairo, after which she will play Coachella. In June, she will appear at a ...
Superorganism Drop New Song “It’s Raining” Featuring Stephen Malkmus: Stream
Superorganism are back with another look at their forthcoming album, World Wide Pop. This time around, they’ve shared “It’s Raining,” which features Pavement singer Stephen Malkmus and UK rapper Dylan Cartlidge. “It’s Raining” is a swaggering hip-hop track, with a slinky, bass-heavy beat, a mess of synthesizers, and a glitchy Scott Walker sample coalescing at full force. The single comes with an animated music video, directed by AEVA with illustrations by Risa Kazama, where an anthropomorphic raindrop slides along with the grooving passengers of a bullet train. Check it out below. Superorganism discussed the origins of “It’s Raining” in a statement. “We’ve been enormous fans of Stephen Malkmus forever, and we loved the idea of combining Malkmus and Scott Walker into a strange almost b...
Beach Bunny Announce New Album Emotional Creature, Share “Fire Escape”: Stream
Beach Bunny have announced their sophomore album, Emotional Creature, out July 22nd on Mom+Pop Music. As a preview, the Lili Trifilio-fronted quartet have shared the new single “Fire Escape.” Emotional Creature was primarily written by Trifilio after the band came off a whirlwind tour behind their excellent debut record, Honeymoon. While retreating into sci-fi stories, she was inspired to come up with “Y2K-esque pop sounds.” Beach Bunny recorded the album at Chicago’s Shirk Studios with producer Sean O’Keefe, who is known for working with Fall Out Boy and Motion City Soundtrack. “We are always changing, growing, and adapting — it’s a deeply ingrained part of the human experience,” said Trifilio in a statement. “We strive to be stronger, trust we’ll grow smarter, and spend most of our lives...
Lykke Li Announces New Audiovisual Album EYEYE, Shares 2022 Tour Dates
Lykke Li has announced her next album, EYEYE, out May 20th. She’s also shared 2022 tour dates in support of the record. Pronounced “EYE,” the entire album was recorded in the Swedish singer’s Los Angeles bedroom with production by her frequent collaborator Björn Yttling, who last worked with the musician on 2014’s I Never Learn. The vocals were recorded on a handheld $70 drum mic, with the album mixed to tape by Shawn Everett. EYEYE will also be an entire audiovisual experience for fans, with seven looping visuals adding to the story Li is telling on the LP. Directed by Theo Lindquist and shot on 16-millimeter film by cinematographer Edu Grau (A Single Man, Passing), the one-minute clips are fragments of a larger story. Advertisement Related Video “I wanted the record to have the inti...
