Pictured L-R: 8485, Berwyn (Frank Fieber), Erika De Casier (Gloria Moreno)
Each week, The FADER staff rounds up the songs we can't get enough of. Here they are, in no particular order.
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“Rubber Bands” — Berwyn
British songwriter Berwyn has an uncanny knack of bypassing cliche and familiarity to deliver melodic addresses that feel deeply personal and heartfelt. “Rubber Bands” practically bounces, with bubbly percussion and Berwyn’s spoken word verses making an ideal pairing. Listen as he rolls his rs around the line “like a rubber band I just ran, it was done” and realize Berwyn is an artist in control of his own destiny. —DR
“Interblaktic” — Muzi
The lead single from the South African artist’s upcoming album is a pounding, electro-house bop that channels Muzi’s musical alter ego, Zulu Skywalker. A bouncy ode to culture and freedom, the track plays like an Afrofuturist world unto itself. —SE
"Busy" — Erika de Casier
Look, we get that we've designated practically every single from Erika de Casier's forthcoming debut record as a song you need in your life, but you really do need "Busy" in your life. With its spindly, Four Tet-esque production (courtesy of de Casier and Natal Zaks) and bossed-up mentality, it's easily her most dynamic track to date. Consider the deal sealed on Sensational living up to its name. — SM
“Xcxoplex — A. G. Cook and Charli XCX
A. G. Cook and Charli XCX’s latest essential collab is everything you love and have come to expect from the duo in that it sounds both like the machinations of a washing machine and something that hit Number One in Holland in 1994. Taken from Cook’s upcoming Apple vs 7G remix album, due May 28, “XCXoplex is a high energy flash of euphoric moments both past and still to come. —DR
“Every Chance I Get” - DJ Khaled with Lil Baby and Lil Durk
Rap’s reigning “Lils” have every ounce of the chemistry found on previous collabs “Finesse Out The Gang Way” and “3 Headed Goat,” the song that set Durk on his major comeback. The synths on Tay Keith’s beat have a horror movie mood but twinkle with the glimmer of the stars on a Rolls-Royce ceiling. That kind of combination can only result in a conqueror’s theme song. —JD
"seer" — 8485
After making her debut as a hyperpop artist, 8485 began to grow past the subgenre on her great recent EP plague town. “Seer,” an electronic ballad more indebted to Annie than 100 gecs, is wide-eyed devotion at its most cathartic. —JD
“Spaceship” — Youngn Lipz
Within this compact, elegant piece of modern R&B from Sydney’s Youngn Lipz is an absolutely jaw-dropping hook, the kind of chorus melody that only reveals itself two days later, when you can’t get it out of your head. —SD
“Chance” — Juls feat. Tay Iwar and Projexx
Cross-diaspora linkups almost always sound good, and the song’s slow, percussive groove creates the perfect vibe for Nigeria’s Tay Iwar and Jamaican rising artist Projexx to wax poetic about budding romance. If there was ever a song that sounded like a rum-fuelled slow wine on a beach, it’s this one. —SE
“Leafy Outlook” — M Field
If the thought of more quarantine-induced music has you driven to your wit’s end, I don’t blame you. But on his second solo offering, Cape Town analog pop artist Matthew Field packs in enough levity to float above the typical shuttered-in fare, as he observes a world blooming around him with discombobulated awe. —SM
“Smaller” — Angel Olsen
The short, slight, and bittersweet “Smaller” plays like a neat epilogue to the heartbroken grandeur of Angel Olsen’s All Mirrors era. “Too bad I wasted all your time with my small mind,” she sings, the hint of a smirk beginning to appear, “I’ll be smaller for you next time.” Seems unlikely. —SD
