L-R: Don Toliver, Porches, and Jay Electronica.
Dia Dipasupil, Max Hirschberger, Christopher Polk/Getty
Jay Electronica, A Written Testimony
Trust Jay Electonica to drop his long-awaited album amid a global pandemic. A record few truly believed would ever see the light of day, A Written Testimony is Electronica's debut album and features multiple appearances from Jay-Z plus contributions by James Blake, Travis Scott, Khruangbin, and The-Dream. Jay Electronica’s only previous official release was 2007 mixtape Act I: Eternal Sunshine (The Pledge). — David Renshaw
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Four Tet, Sixteen Oceans
Sixteen Oceans is not as gee’d up as the Ellie Goulding-featuring lead single “Baby” would suggest. That’s a great thing — this lengthy, meditative record feels like a perfect foil to the week that brought us widespread COVID-19 panic, supermarket fights over toilet paper, an increasingly bleak Democratic primary, Sarah Palin on The Masked Singer, widespread cancellation of both people and events, life-altering regulations on socializing, schools closing, and the soundtrack to the film Trolls World Tour. After having listened to Sixteen Oceans a few times, I can almost guarantee that at least part of my weekend will consist of me deleting Twitter from my phone and finding somewhere to listen to this alone. Dive in! — Shaad D'Souza
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music | Bandcamp
Big Yawn, No!
No!, the debut album from Melbourne four-piece Big Yawn, radiates an exciting, mischievous aura; in my head, it fits into a canon of heady, expansive music that I only ever really want to listen to at night time or in the early hours of the morning, when seconds feel like days and minutes feel like years. Consisting of dubby, dissociated techno that’s augmented by live drums, No! has an incredibly broad scope, occasionally playing like the score of some long-lost nineties thriller; from “Attaboi,” the album’s headrush of an opener, No! finds time to make a detour through gloomy ambient jazz (on “Tasmanian Friend”) and experiment in paranoid, polyrhythmic minimalism (“Thomas”). At the same time, it’s compact and hooky, moving with the alarming efficiency of a great pop record. It’s a delightfully disarming first record. — SD
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music | Bandcamp
Justin Timberlake, SZA, HAIM, George Clinton, more, Trolls World Tour (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
This album mostly blows — sorry to anyone expecting profound, boundary-pushing art from the soundtrack to the sequel to a film designed to sell creepy dolls — but if you’re in the mood for an hour-long dissertation on the lengths rich, famous, and ultra-talented people will go to expand their already large fortunes, it’s pretty interesting! On the song “Trolls Wanna Have Good Times” — a Trolls-themed cover of “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” — Justin Timberlake, one of the all-time greatest pop stars, sings about “living underground” both as a metaphor and as literal imagery (because Trolls live underground.) On “Trolls 2 Many Hits Mashup,” Kendrick and Timberlake are joined by James Corden and Icona Pop (they’re still around!) to quickly run through “Gangnam Style”(!), “Party Rock Anthem,” and “Wannabe,” among other things. It’s only a minute long, and yet feels like an eternity. There are some highlights — I like the SZA/Timberlake collab “The Other Side,” and Anderson .Paak is weirdly at home in troll world — but mostly, this record is just a great opportunity to listen to some of the most talented people in the world debase themselves for Hasbro money. — SD
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Code Orange, Underneath
Code Orange did a lot between the release of 2017's Grammy-nominated Forever and now, including collaborations with JPEGMAFIA and Injury Reserve as well as writing the intro music for a WWE wrestler. Today they share Underneath, their juggernaut of a new album. Mixing industrial sounds with post-hardcore and the goopy depths of nu-metal, Code Orange sound like no other metal band around right now. Underneath is their shot at the stars. — DR
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Porches, Ricky Music
Aaron Maine’s follow-up to 2018’s The House is both warmer and weirder than its predecessor. A hybrid, in a way, of that record’s icy, glazed-over production and the straightforward songwriting of 2013’s all-timer Slow Dance in the Cosmos, Ricky Music is wistful and romantic, a lovely departure from the anxious edge of The House. Last year, Maine said that “Porches can be a country song, a dance song, a punk song, a pop song or anything in between,” and Ricky Music feels like a vivid manifestation of that idea: stepping through warm-hearted balladry (“Patience,”) frantic indie (“PFB,”) and chaotic house (“Madonna”) in under 30 minutes, it’s a record that perfects aesthetic confusion. “I’m kinda pretty, kinda busted too,” Maine sings on “Hair”; with its perfect imperfections and occasionally jaw-dropping moments of emotional clarity, you could say the same about Ricky Music, too. — SD
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music | Bandcamp
Don Toliver, Heaven Or Hell
Don Toliver delivers his debut album today. Signed to Travis Scott's Cactus Jack label, Toliver goes hard over beats from WondaGurl and Mike Dean as well as recruiting guest spots from Quavo, Offset, Sheck Wes, and label boss Travis Scott. Naturally, Heaven Or Hell includes Toliver's breakout hit "No Idea," a viral success on TikTok. — DR
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Blanck Mass, Calm With Horses
Anyone who has spent time with Blanck Mass's music knows how well the British artist's propulsive electronic productions would lend themselves to the big screen. Calm With Horses is his first movie score, an understated but powerful backdrop to director Nick Rowland's tale of the feared enforcer for a drug-dealing family in rural Ireland and his efforts to change his ways. — DR
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Shabaka and the Ancestors, We Are Sent Here By History
As a member of both Sons of Kemet and Comet Is Coming, saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings is a cornerstone of the booming U.K. jazz scene. His new album We Are Sent Here By History, recorded with his South African group the Ancestors, is a deep dive into the psyche of the 35-year-old, touching on everything from modern masculinity to politicalactivism, while never ceding its relentless pace. — DR
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Porridge Radio, Every Bad
Porridge Radio started life as a DIY project for Brighton-based Dana Margolin and her brusied but ambitious indie rock songs. Now acting as a fully functioning band, Porridge Radio return with their second album. Every Bad is filled with scrappy production and melodic flourishes that mark the band out as unlikely contenders to break out of their lo-fi beginnings and head towards crossover territory. — DR
Stream: Spotify | Apple Music
Dogleg, Melee
Every video or photograph of them that I’ve seen on social media features cartwheels, backflips, and stagedives, showing an infectious energy that leads fans to not just like Dogleg, but to love and cherish them. The music video for "Fox," an invigorating sub-three-minute blast released last year, showcases the of fervor that Dogleg elicit when they perform: adrenaline coarses through the audience before the song even starts; pink, green, and blue hair flies around the pit; and someone’s crowdsurfing before the vocals even come in. The video ends with the crowd chanting, “Dogleg! Dogleg!” — Danielle Chelosky, Dogleg's New Tricks
