New Music Releases
Jorja Smith Releases New Single “Addicted”: Stream
Jorja Smith is back with an irresistible new track called “Addicted”. The song comes with a music video filmed entirely in isolation, which you can watch ahead. Following last year’s “Come Over” with Popcaan, “By Any Means” of Roc Nation’s Reprise compilation, and The Eddy contribution “Kiss Me in the Morning”, “Addicted” marks Smith’s first single of 2021. Musing in the atmosphere of a hazy beat punctuated with live guitars, the song is as alluring as a siren. Which is fitting, since the lyrics call for a lover to recognize how good they have it and “be addicted to me.” In a press statement explaining the track, Smith noted it’s about “focusing on wanting the full attention of someone who’s not giving enough (or any) when they should be.” “Addicted” comes with a self-directed video (...
The Breeders and Tkay Maidza Share Covers from 4AD’s 40th Anniversary Compilation: Stream
UK independent record label 4AD turned 40 years old in 2020. In belated celebration, the label has announced a new covers compilation called Bills & Aches & Blues, out on streaming services April 2nd. As a preview, the first five songs from the release are streaming below. Today’s cache of tracks include The Breeders covering His Name is Alive’s “Dirt Eaters”, Tkay Maidza’s version of Pixies’ “Where Is My Mind?”, and U.S. Girls’s rendition of The Dirty Party’s “Junkyard”. You’ll also hear Aldous Harding covering Deerhunter and Maria Somerville playing an Air Miami song. Other artists featured on the compilation include Big Thief, Bradford Cox, tUnE-yArDs, Future Islands, Helado Negro, SOHN, and many more. Check out the full tracklist below. The first 12 months o...
TEKE::TEKE Unleash New Song “Yoru Ni”: Stream
Montreal’s TEKE::TEKE have unleashed the new song “Yoru Ni” from their upcoming debut album Shirushi. The surf-psych seven-piece originally formed as a tribute band to Japanese guitar icon Takeshi Terauchi. But from that singular purpose, TEKE::TEKE have developed an expansively off-kilter identity, layering on the beauty of Japanese folk and the ferocity of UK punk into the perfect soundtrack for dropping acid at the beach. “Yoru Ni” means “At night,” and as guitarist Serge Nakauchi-Pelletier said in a statement, the song had a spookily nocturnal inspiration. He explained, “‘Yoru Ni’ (which translates from Japanese to ‘At night’) was literally written in the middle of the night. I woke up suddenly and had this melody in my head, as if it had come to me from another world. It really felt l...
CHIKA Covers Billie Eilish’s “my future”, Reimagines “U SHOULD”: Stream
All this week, the Spotify Singles series is highlighting the nominees for the 2021 Best New Artist Grammy. But the contribution from CHIKA comes as a double celebration, as today happens to be the Alabama MC’s 24th birthday. As a gift for your ears, she’s delivered a new rendition of her single “U SHOULD” as well as a cover of Billie Eiilish’s “my future”. Plenty of artists have put their own spin on Eilish’s single from last summer, including Artist of the Month Arlo Parks and Miley Cyrus. CHIKA takes it into a new realm, however, taking ownership of the luscious, jazzy ode to self worth with a whole new verse of her own. “Ain’t no stopping shooting stars/ They got their own mind, and that’s the gold mine,” she raps. “The whole grind is nuts, so hold mine/ I promise you I’m set for go ti...
Matt Berry Announces Psych Rock Album The Blue Elephant, Shares “Aboard”: Stream
When he’s not playing a Staten Island-based vampire in What We Do in the Shadows, the English actor Matt Berry makes freaky psych-rock music. He’s released upwards of ten albums over the last 25 years, and now he’s announcing that his latest will be titled The Blue Elephant. The full album is out in May, but today he’s giving fans a taste with a new song called “Aboard”. Like his previous six records, most of which have arrived in the last ten years, The Blue Elephant will be released via the legendary London label Acid Jazz. The imprint is famous for putting out music that’s super out-there, and Berry’s ear for tantalizing psychedelia fits snugly into their renowned catalog. His 2020 record Phantom Birds was a detour into classic folk, but a press release promises that...
Unearthed Song “Slapback” Is Believed to Be Unreleased Dio-Era Black Sabbath Track: Stream
A purportedly unreleased Ronnie James Dio-era Black Sabbath song titled “Slapback” has been uploaded to YouTube. The track was sourced from what appears to be a cassette recording of Black Sabbath’s 1979 “Bel Air” rehearsals for their seminal 1980 album Heaven and Hell. It was uploaded by the estate of longtime Sabbath keyboardist, the late Geoff Nicholls. Nicholls’ stepson and executor of his estate Gary Rees offered some background on the unearthed recording in the video description: “This latest upload from the Geoff Nicholls estate I believe is called ‘Slapback’ from the scrawling on the cassette and the chorus. This is from the same cassette as the ‘Heaven & Hell’ upload on this channel. It doesn’t sound like a typical SABBATH song, if it is them, but it does sound like Ronnie Jam...
Hiss Golden Messenger Announces New Album Quietly Blowing It, Shares “If It Comes in the Morning”: Stream
Hiss Golden Messenger’s M.C Taylor will find out this weekend if his last LP, 2019’s Terms of Surrender, takes home the Best Americana Album at this year’s Grammy Awards. Even with that anticipation looming, the ever-prolific Americana artist has already set his sights on his next effort, as he’s today announced Quietly Blowing It. As a preview of the June 25th release, Taylor has shared “If It Comes in the Morning”. Arriving via Merge, Quietly Blowing It was written during the spring and summer of the tumultuous 2020. Even before that year “rolled up on us like an existential mugger,” as Taylor himself puts it, he was feeling burnt out. He’d canceled an Australian tour in 2019, and left the road ready for “the time and space to mourn something, though I wasn’t sure what.” When h...
Gary Numan Reveals the Origins of New Single “I Am Screaming”: Stream
Our new music feature Origins seeks in depth details about new songs from the artists who create them. Today, new wave legend Gary Numan wants you to hear that “I Am Screaming”. Intruder, Gary Numan’s upcoming 18th studio album, picks up the narrative of 2017’s Savage (Songs from a Broken World) from a different point of view. While that previous LP depicted a barren future wrecked by global warming, the new wave icon’s latest effort takes on the perspective of Mother Earth herself. “If Earth could speak, and feel things the way we do, what would it say? How would it feel?” Numan explained when announcing the album. Although the entirety of Intruder seeks to answer those questions, perhaps no track does so more directly than the new single “I Am Screaming”. What begins as a mournful bubbli...
Matt and Kim Cover Lesley Gore’s “You Don’t Own Me”: Stream
There’s perhaps no more classic anthem for International Women’s Day than the late Lesley Gore’s “You Don’t Own Me”. So to celebrate today’s festivities, Matt and Kim have flipped their name to Kim and Matt for a cover of the 1963 hit. Out via FADER, the duo’s cover of “You Don’t Own Me” sees drummer Kim Schifino providing lead vocals (natch). The home recording updates the song’s instantly recognizable R&B balladry with electronic drums and fuzzy synths. It captures all the norm-defying independence of the original for a modern audience that feels like it’s finally beginning to change those norms. “This song has always resonated with me lyrically, ever since I was a kid,” Kim said in a statement. “My dad raised me to not take shit from anyone and live the life I want to live. It break...
Skullcrusher Announces New Storm in Summer EP, Shares Title Track: Stream
Helen Ballentine has announced the next project under her Skullcrusher banner. The Storm in Summer EP drops April 9th via Secretly Canadian, and has released the title track as an early preview. The five-track follow-up to her 2020 Skullcrusher EP finds Ballentine reeling from the spotlight after experiencing some unexpected success. As she explained in a statement, “I wrote ‘Storm in Summer’ after releasing the first Skullcrusher EP. Over that summer I thought a lot about what it means to really put myself out there and share something personal. I felt so vulnerable and overwhelmed by the fact that these songs I had written in private were exposed and likely being misinterpreted or disliked. I think the song really tries to communicate these anxieties in a cathartic way whi...
Brittany Howard Covers Jackie Wilson’s “(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher”: Stream
One of the biggest voices of this century is following one of the biggest voices of the last, as Brittany Howard has shared a new cover of “(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher” by Jackie Wilson. Released in 1967, “Higher and Higher” is not for the faint-hearted or pitch-challenged. “Mr Excitement” Wilson had a four-octave range, and on this, his signature song, he kept his voice moving. That’s no problem for Howard, whose picture you can find in the dictionary under “Powerhouse.” If anything, the rendition by the leader of Alabama Shakes has a little extra ferocity. Howard’s “Higher and Higher” skips over the original’s hand drums and prominent bass riff, preferring a drum kit and guitar-forward sound. She also uses a heavenly choir to a put a little extra height on those “Highe...
Eminem Fires Back at Attempts to Cancel Him in “Tone Deaf” Lyric Video: Watch
Eminem has been a target of cancel culture before the phrase was even part of the lexicon. His lyrics have long been violent, homophobic, misogynistic, and sexist (with more than a dash or rapey-ness), with most of his shocking locutions attributed to “alter egos” Slim Shady and Eminem, while Marshall Mathers stood separate as a sincere wordsmith. Now, it’s Gen Z’s turn to try and put an end to one of the most controversial hip-hop icons, and Em is having none of it. As Hot New Hip-Hop reported, Gen Z TikTok recently set their sights on Eminem for his past lyrics, particularly a line in his Rihanna collaboration “Love the Way You Lie” where he spits, “If she ever tries to fucking leave again/ I’mma tie her to the bed and set this house on fire.” (Which is kinda like trying to cancel D...
