12 Greatest Songs of the Week: Charly Bliss, Jessica Pratt, The WAEVE, Hamish Hawk, and Extra

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12 Greatest Songs of the Week: Charly Bliss, Jessica Pratt, The WAEVE, Hamish Hawk, and Extra

Plus Lionlimb, Why Bonnie, Jon Hopkins, Font, La Luz, and a Wrap-up of the Week’s Different Notable New Tracks

Could 03, 2024

By Mark Redfern (with Andy Von Pip)

Welcome to the fifteenth Songs of the Week of 2024. This week Andy Von Pip, Caleb Campbell, Mark Moody, and Scott Dransfield helped me resolve what ought to make the record. We severely thought of over 20 songs this week and narrowed it right down to a Prime 12.

Not too long ago we introduced our new print problem, The ’90s Problem, that includes The Cardigans and Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth on the covers. Purchase it from us straight right here.

Up to now few weeks we posted interviews with Sunday (1994), Sam Evian, Cheekface, Chastity Belt, Elbow, Julia Holter, Trip, Slowdive, and others.

Within the final week we reviewed some albums.

That can assist you kind by the multitude of recent songs launched within the final week, we’ve picked the 12 greatest the final seven days needed to provide, adopted by some honorable mentions. Try the complete record under.

1. Charly Bliss: “Nineteen”

This week, Charly Bliss introduced a brand new album, FOREVER, and shared its first single, “Nineteen,” by way of a music video. FOREVER is due out August 16 by way of Fortunate Quantity. Try the album’s tracklist and canopy paintings right here.

Charly Bliss is Eva Hendricks, Sam Hendricks, Spencer Fox, and Dan Shure. Sam Hendricks co-produced the album with Jake Luppen (Hippo Campus) and Caleb Wright (Samia).

FOREVER follows their 2019 album, Younger Sufficient, and 2019 EP, Supermoon. In 2023 the band launched two new songs—“You Don’t Even Know Me Anymore” and “I Want a New Boyfriend” (which was one in all our Songs of the Week and accompanied by a courting web site)—neither of that are on the brand new album.

Eva Hendricks had this to say about “Nineteen” in a press launch: “I’ll at all times be fascinated by love and relationships that don’t fairly work and produce tsunamis of heartbreak. The additional away I’m from it, the sort of love that bashes you towards the rocks simply as typically because it carries you over waves of manic pleasure, the simpler it’s to see the complete scope of it. Old flame is loopy.”

Younger Sufficient was picked as our Album of the Week.

Try our evaluate of their Supermoon EP. By Mark Redfern

2. Jessica Pratt: “The Final 12 months”

Jessica Pratt launched a brand new album, Right here within the Pitch, as we speak by way of Mexican Summer season. Earlier this week she shared the album’s third single, “The Final 12 months.” It’s the album’s closing monitor.

Beforehand Pratt shared the album’s first single, “Life Is,” by way of a music video. “Life Is” was one in all our Songs of the Week. Then she shared the album’s second single, “World on a String,” by way of a music video (it was additionally one in all our Songs of the Week).

Right here within the Pitch is the follow-up to 2019’s Quiet Indicators. The Los Angeles-based musician as soon as once more recorded at Gary’s Electrical Studio in Brooklyn. She labored with earlier collaborators, multi-instrumentalist/engineer Al Carlson and keyboardist Matt McDermott. Bassist Spencer Zahn and percussionist Mauro Refosco (David Byrne, Atoms for Peace) additionally took half within the periods. Ryley Walker, Peter Mudge (Mac Miller, J.I.D.), and Alex Goldberg all additionally contributed to the album.

“I turned obsessive about figures emblematic of the darkish aspect of the Californian dream whereas making this file,” Pratt mentioned of Right here within the Pitch in a earlier press launch.

Pratt recorded the album over a three-year interval, from 2020 to 2023. Of the five-year hole between albums, she mentioned: “I by no means wished it to take this lengthy. I’m only a actual perfectionist. I used to be simply attempting to get the fitting feeling, and it takes a very long time to do this.”

The earlier press launch in contrast the album’s first single, and opening monitor, “Life Is,” to The Walker Brothers’ Sixties orchestral pop basic “The Solar Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore,” however Pratt warned it’s not precisely consultant of the album as a complete, which is starker.

“In a manner, it’s sort of a false flag,” Pratt admitted. “However I additionally really feel prefer it’s an announcement of intention.”

Learn our interview with Jessica Pratt on Quiet Indicators. By Mark Redfern

3. The WAEVE: “Metropolis Lights”

This week, The WAEVE—aka Rose Elinor Dougall and Blur guitarist Graham Coxon—shared a model new music, “Metropolis Lights.”

“Metropolis Lights” follows the duo’s self-titled debut album, which got here out final yr by way of Transgressive and was one in all our Prime 100 Albums of 2023.

James Ford (Arctic Monkeys, Florence & The Machine, Foals, HAIM) produced The WAEVE, which was recorded in 2022. Dougall and Coxon began buying and selling messages throughout lockdown, round Christmas 2020, and the mission grew from there.

Most of the band’s tracks characteristic Coxon on saxophone, one of many first devices he picked up when he initially turned a musician.

The WAEVE have been interviewed in Problem 71 of our print journal (get it right here).

Dougall was additionally one of many artists on the quilt of our particular twentieth Anniversary print problem, the place you may learn an unique interview along with her.

Dougall launched her final solo album, A New Phantasm, in April 2019 by way of Vermillion (it was our Album of the Week and one in all our Prime 100 Albums of 2019).

Learn our interview with Dougall on A New Phantasm.

Additionally learn our interview with Dougall on her all-time favourite album.

Plus learn our evaluate of A New Phantasm.

Coxon’s final solo album was 2012’s A+E, however he’s stored busy with soundtrack work, together with releasing two albums of songs and rating from the acclaimed TV present The Finish of the F***ing World and his 2021 rating to the comedian e book Superstate. His memoir, Verse, Refrain, Monster!, acquired a U.S. launch final yr by way of Faber Books. Blur additionally launched a brand new album final yr, The Ballad of Darren. By Mark Redfern

4. Hamish Hawk: “Massive Cat Tattoos”

This week, Scottish musician Hamish Hawk introduced a brand new album, A Firmer Hand, and shared its first single, “Massive Cat Tattoos,” by way of a music video. A Firmer Hand is due out on August 16 by way of Fierce Panda. Try the album’s tracklist and canopy paintings, in addition to Hawk’s upcoming tour dates, right here.

Hawk had this to say concerning the new music in a press launch: “‘Massive Cat Tattoos’ is simply one of many nice unsaids that make up the brand new file, and it’s the birthplace of the album’s title: ‘A Firmer Hand.’ Unknowingly I’d been increase an unpleasant arsenal of nice unsaids over the previous few years, and the album turned a spot I may offload them, and hopefully put them to relaxation.

“I attempted to keep away from cleansing issues up on the time of writing, I cornered myself right into a warts-and-all method. However don’t be fooled, ‘Massive Cat Tattoos’ is all speak. Our hero will get a number of barbs in good and early, and lands a few clumsy jabs, however ultimately we’re witness to nothing greater than a petty diatribe. It’s embittered, unbecoming and wholly embarrassing. It does have a sure get-up-and-go, although.”

A Firmer Hand is the follow-up to 2023’s Angel Numbers.

Hawk had this to say concerning the album: “Scripting this album, I opened up my closet, and a skeleton got here out. The factor that hyperlinks all the songs is a way of the unsaid, whether or not out of guilt, disgrace, repression, embarrassment, coyness, no matter it might need been. I noticed: I’m going to say these items, and never all of them are going to make me look good. The album made so many calls for, and I simply gave myself over to it.

“As soon as I’d given myself over to the thought, I believed, I’ve to stay to this. I can’t cover something from it. I can’t clear all of it up for consumption. It felt uncomfortable for me – and that’s precisely the way it ought to really feel. That’s a extremely sturdy place.”

Learn our 2022 interview with Hamish Hawk.

Learn our evaluate of Angel Numbers. By Mark Redfern

5. Lionlimb: “Underwater”

Lionlimb are releasing a brand new album, Limbo, on Could 24 by way of Bayonet. This week they shared its third single, “Underwater,” by way of a music video.

Lionlimb is the New York-based mission of Stewart Bronaugh and it additionally options Joshua Jaeger.

A press launch describes the brand new single in higher element: “On ‘Underwater,’ Bronaugh compares falling in like to plunging additional into deep water, represented by rolling piano and tense strings. Utilizing pictures impressed by nature, he expresses being overtaken by a drive higher than himself, because the psychedelic devices evoke huge landscapes.”

Beforehand Lionlimb shared Limbo’s first single, “Hurricane,” by way of a music video. “Hurricane” was one in all our Songs of the Week. Then they shared its second single, “Dream of You,” which options Angel Olsen, who additionally seems within the video. Bronaugh and Jaeger have additionally each carried out in Olsen’s touring band. “Dream of You” was additionally one in all our Songs of the Week.

Limbo follows 2021’s Spiral Groove. A press launch says the brand new album was “impressed by a palette of ’70s Italian movie soundtracks, ’60s woman group music, and funk and soul ballads.”

“Once I’m engaged on music, it’s like I’m attempting to make my very own world,” Bronaugh says within the press launch. “It’s that feeling of eager to exist some other place. I’m attempting to specific one thing and get out of my head and physique.”

Of the brand new single, he provides: “‘Hurricane’ is about escapism and trying to find THAT feeling that places you in a movement state, away from the nervousness and uncomfortableness of being human. Creativity may also help, after which there are different methods which can be way more dangerous. This music is about saying goodbye to these, however I really feel like I’m at all times trying to find that subsequent factor.” By Mark Redfern

6. Why Bonnie: “Dotted Line”

This week, Why Bonnie (the mission of Blair Howerton) shared a brand new music, “Dotted Line,” by way of a music video. It’s her first single for Hearth Discuss, which have simply introduced that they’ve signed Why Bonnie.

Howerton wrote “Dotted Line” when she was “broke as hell” and underneath “the load of capitalism.”

“I used to be considering of all of the issues we’re instructed are markers of success, and the way at this fee, I’ll most likely by no means have any of them,” she explains in a press launch.

Howerton co-directed the video with Grace Pendleton and the press launch says it’s about “entering into mattress with ‘the person.’”

Why Bonnie launched her debut album, 90 in November, in 2022 by way of Keeled Scales. In 2023 she shared a model new single, “Apple Tree.” Beforehand the mission was offered extra as a band, however now it appears to be extra of a solo enterprise.

Learn our 2022 interview with Why Bonnie. By Mark Redfern

7. Jon Hopkins: “RITUAL (evocation)”

This week, British digital musician Jon Hopkins introduced a brand new album, RITUAL, and shared its lead single, “RITUAL (evocation),” by way of a music video. RITUAL is due out August 30 by way of Domino. Try the album’s tracklist and canopy paintings, in addition to Hopkins’ upcoming tour dates, right here.

RITUAL follows 2021’s Music For Psychedelic Remedy and is a single 41-minute piece unfold over eight chapters.

Hopkins had this to say concerning the album in a press launch: “I don’t know what I’m doing once I’m composing. I don’t know the place it’s coming from, and I don’t know the place it’s going, nor does it appear to matter. I simply know when it’s completed. So all I can actually do is really feel my solution to the tip, then try to retrospectively analyze what could be occurring, and try to determine what its function is. What is obvious is that this one has the construction of a Ritual. I do know what that Ritual is for me, however it will likely be one thing completely different for you. It feels essential to not be prescriptive about what this Ritual really is.

“It looks like a software, perhaps even a machine, for opening portals inside your inside world, for unlocking issues which can be hidden and buried. Issues which can be held in place by the stress in your physique. It doesn’t really feel like ‘an album’ subsequently—extra a course of to undergo, one thing that works on you. On the identical time, it feels prefer it tells a narrative. Perhaps it’s the story of a course of I’m going by, and one which we’re all going by. Perhaps it’s additionally the story of creation, destruction and transcendence. Perhaps it’s the story of the archetypal hero’s journey—the journey of forgetting and remembering.

“Finally although, all I’ve to say about it’s mentioned by the sound.”

Learn our 2019 interview with Hopkins right here. By Mark Redfern

8. Font: “Hey Kekulé”

This week, new Austin five-piece Font introduced their debut album, Unusual Burden, and shared its first single, “Hey Kekulé,” by way of a music video. Unusual Burden is due out July 12 by way of Acrophase Data. Try the album’s tracklist and canopy paintings, in addition to the band’s upcoming tour dates, right here.

Font is Thom Waddill (guitar/synth/vocals), Jack Owens (drums), Anthony Laurence (guitar/synth/sampler), Logan Wagner (percussion/sampler), and Roman Parnell (bass/synth).

Cormac McCarthy’s essay, “The Kekulé Drawback,” a few German chemist, impressed the brand new single. Waddill explains extra within the press launch: “As with the opposite songs on the file, there isn’t a intentional that means to the symbols, references, phrases, and pictures I take advantage of. I’m not attempting to ‘say’ something concerning the unconscious—I’m solely attempting to channel it. And an enormous purpose why I may try this right here was as a result of it was one of many first songs the place the five-part machine of the band actually started to whirr—I had a hand in virtually not one of the music for the music. The beat, the piano half, all of it got here from the band, and since it was a really overseas container, I may merely launch and reply.” By Mark Redfern

9. La Luz: “I’ll Go With You”

La Luz are releasing a brand new album, Information of the Universe, on Could 24 by way of Sub Pop. This week they shared its third single, “I’ll Go With You,” by way of a music video.

The band is led by guitarist, singer, and songwriter Shana Cleveland. She had this to say concerning the new single in a press launch: “This music is closely influenced by Yanti Bersaudara, a gaggle of Indonesian sisters who launched a few of my very favourite music initially launched within the mid ’60s and early ’70s. Lyrically, this music is a retelling of a dream I had one night time once I had gone to mattress with the melody of this music in my head. I had some completely different phrases in thoughts, however this candy little romance dream took over.”

Beforehand La Luz shared the album’s first single, “Unusual World,” by way of a music video. “Unusual World” was one in all our Songs of the Week. Then they shared its second single, “Poppies,” which was additionally one in all our Songs of the Week.

Information of the Universe follows 2021’s La Luz, which was launched on Hardly Artwork, Sub Pop’s sister label, which makes this their debut on Sub Pop correct.

Cleveland was recognized with breast most cancers two years after the start of her son, which led to the postponement of reveals in 2022.

“Seeing the cycle of life, seeing issues develop out of decay, the decay of different dwelling issues—was tremendous comforting to me. I needed to get to a spot the place I felt extra comfy with the thought of demise,” Cleveland mentioned of the brand new album in a earlier press launch.

Information of the Universe incorporates a altering of the guard when it comes to La Luz’s lineup—it’s the primary look for drummer Audrey Johnson and the ultimate ones from longtime members Lena Simon (bass) and Alice Sandahl (keyboards).

La Luz labored with producer Maryam Qudos (Spacemoth) on the album and the collaboration went so nicely that Qudos has joined the band as their new keyboardist.

“There are moments on this album that sound to me just like the final frantic confession earlier than an asteroid destroys the earth,” mentioned Cleveland, summing up Information of the Universe.

Learn our 2021 interview with La Luz. By Mark Redfern

10. illuminati hotties: “Can’t Be Nonetheless”

This week, illuminati hotties (the mission of singer/songwriter Sarah Tudzin) shared a brand new music, “Can’t Be Nonetheless,” and introduced some new fall tour dates. Tony Wolski directed the video.

Tudzin had this to say concerning the music in a press launch: “I discover that one thing I’ve in widespread with most individuals that I speak to recently is the immense worry of and incapacity to be alone with ourselves. Fixed movement, avoidance, restlessness—something to maintain myself from stagnating have at all times been my coping mechanisms when my inside monologue begins to get loud.”

“Can’t Be Nonetheless” follows “Sandwich Sharer,” a brand new music Tudzin shared in 2022, and her 2021 album, Let Me Do One Extra.

Let Me Do One Extra was one in all our Prime 100 Albums of 2021.

Learn our 2021 interview with illuminati hotties. By Mark Redfern

11. Sunday (1994): “Blonde”

Up-and-coming Anglo-American band Sunday (1994) dropped their self-titled debut EP as we speak. Additionally they shared a video for the EP’s new single, “Blonde.” The discharge follows their two hit singles “Drained Boy” and “Stained Glass Window,” which garnered worldwide consideration for the band.

Sunday (1994) craft songs impressed by the on a regular basis magic discovered within the mundanity of contemporary life. Their music could evoke a nostalgic ’90s cinematic movie aesthetic, however their lyrics are laced with an acerbic self-aware wit and a darkish humorousness.

Composed solely inside their one-bedroom condominium by the songwriting duo of Paige Turner and Lee Newell, alongside their drummer recognized merely as “X,” their debut EP is a love letter to the common expertise of affection, separation and all of the related drama, magnificence, and heartbreak that comes with it

The Newest single “Blonde” units the temper with its swaying tempo, chiming guitars, comfortable arpeggios, and emotive, evocative vocals. The band describes the monitor as “a music about reclaiming your self and discovering freedom after heartbreak.”

Learn our latest interview with the band HERE. By Andy Von Pip

12. Mdou Moctar: “Oh France”

Nigerien quartet Mdou Moctar launched a brand new album, Funeral for Justice, as we speak by way of Matador. Earlier this week they shared its third single, “Oh France.” A press launch says the music is “a fiery indictment of French colonialism.”

Beforehand the band shared the album’s title monitor, by way of a music video. Then they shared its second single, “Imouhar,” by way of a music video. It was one in all our Songs of the Week.

Funeral for Justice follows the band’s 2021 album, Afrique Victime.

The band belong to the Tuareg folks and Mdou Moctar shares its title with its lead singer and guitarist.

In a earlier press launch, Moctar mentioned the brand new album is impressed by the troubling political local weather in Niger. “This album is actually completely different for me. Now the issues of terrorist violence are extra severe in Africa. When the U.S. and Europe got here right here, they mentioned they’re going to assist us, however what we see is actually completely different. They by no means assist us to discover a answer.”

Producer and bassist Mikey Coltun mentioned: “Mdou Moctar has been a powerful anti-colonial band ever since I’ve been part of it. France got here in, fucked up the nation, then mentioned ‘you’re free.’ They usually’re not.”

Talking of the band’s development, Coltun added: “Ilana was the gateway album, saying that it is a uncooked rock band. And Afrique Victime was a summation of that imaginative and prescient. With Funeral for Justice, I actually wished this to shine with the political message due to all the things that’s occurring. Because the band acquired tighter and heavier dwell, it made sense to seize this urgency and this aggression—it wasn’t a pressured factor, it was very pure.”

Learn our interview with Mdou Moctar on Afrique Victime. By Mark Redfern