Music Releases 05-24-24
Clancy marks Twenty One Pilots’ first studio album in three years and follows their RIAA Gold certified LP, Scaled And Icy. With details of the release teased to fans earlier this month via cryptic mailings and covert artswaps on streaming services, “Overcompensate” welcomes listeners back to the band’s immersive world of ‘Trench.’ Layers of synths build over a racing breakbeat in the song - a skilled passage of alternative dynamics, flexing in time, and ready to explode. Having amassed over 33 billion streams worldwide and over 3 million tickets sold across global headline tours, the Columbus, OH based duo of Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun have established themselves as one of the most successful bands of the 21st century and redefined the sound of a generation. Co-produced by Joseph and Paul Meany, Clancy marks the final chapter in an ambitious multi-album narrative first introduced in the band's 2015 multi-Platinum breakthrough, Blurryface. Furthermore, Clancy’s forthcoming release on May 17th coincides with the 9th anniversary of Blurryface, which was released exactly nine years prior to the day. Twenty One Pilots extended the ambitious concept laid out in Blurryface with their 2018 Platinum-certified album TRENCH. Featuring the multi-Platinum and Platinum singles “Chlorine,” “My Blood” and the GRAMMY® Award-nominated “Jumpsuit,” the album graced spots on “Best of” year-end lists by Billboard, KERRANG!, Alternative Press, and Rock Sound—who placed it at #1.
Produced by Chris Coady and written by DIIV (pronounced Dive), Frog in Boiling Water, the band’s fourth full-length LP is a collection of snapshots that explores the brutal realities of end-stage capitalism and overwhelming technological advance. Across 10 dark and dazzling tracks, DIIV documents the collapse from various angles with unusual sensitivity and depth of purpose while expanding their grand, hypnotic shoegaze, to create a transportive, sensual work of hope, beauty and renewal.
Timeless. Explosive. Romantic. Inspiring. How else to characterize Blue Electric Light, Lenny Kravitz’s 12th studio album? Kravitz’s mastery of deep-soul rock ‘n roll is a long-established fact. As a relentless creative force—musician, writer, producer, actor, author, designer—he continues to be a global dynamic presence throughout music, art and culture. Blue Electric Light is an impassioned suite of songs, that broadens this distinction and is the latest contribution of a man whose music—not to mention his singular style—continues to inspire millions the world over. On the album, Kravitz's talents as a writer, producer and multi-instrumentalist resonate as he wrote and played most of the instruments himself, with longtime guitarist Craig Ross. Lenny Kravitz has won four GRAMMY® Awards and sold 40 million worldwide. He was recently recognized by the CFDA with their “Fashion Icon Award” and was also selected as a 2023 Hollywood Walk of Fame inductee.
An arsenal of global smash hits from Grammy-winning hard rock titans Creed. This fourteen track collection spans the band's multi-Platinum studio albums My Own Prison, Human Clay and Weathered, including the singles “Higher,” “With Arms Wide Open,” “One Last Breath,” “My Sacrifice,” and more. The 2-LP set features an etched Side-D.
Inspired by a lifetime of listening to jazz + woodshedding, Andrew Bird on his new album Sunday Morning Put-On presents his take on the Great American Songbook. Andrew Bird Trio features Ted Poor (drums) & Alan Hampton (bass), and transcends nostalgia, pushing his limits as an improviser. Replacing saxophones with violin solos, and showcasing Andrew's signature vocal prowess, the Trio reimagines jazz standards completely live in southern California’s legendary Valentine Studios.
John Rossiter (Young Jesus) had quit music to study permaculture and to work in landscapes and gardens. His last album, Shepherd Head, was too much time spent on the computer. Working with soil and plants gave him some life back. He said, “You know, when gardening, the right decision to make for the landscape is usually the one that is already happening. It just takes time to read what that is."
So, John left the orchard to meet Shahzad Ismaily (Feist, Lou Reed, Arooj Aftab) for lunch. They instantly bonded, talking about improvisation, rhythm, the heart. On a lark, Shahzad invited John to New York.
Songs started to form, songs about shame and grief, love and redemption. They came fast, a song a day for two weeks. It was different from past albums, which felt like years of hammering out lyrics and ideas. This one came in the wake of a long illness, where tunes came in a rush, as if they were physical, as if the body couldn’t heal without them. An almost involuntary outpouring, overrunning his usual self-consciousness.
Rossiter had to sit and transcribe without judgment: let the ideas grow on their own. Shahzad was in LA one day when John sat down at the piano and played them for him. They decided to record them at Shahzad's Figure 8 Studios in Brooklyn – these songs would blossom into Young Jesus’ forthcoming album, The Fool.
Inner landscaping requires presence and bravery. It can get pretty dark and strange the deeper you walk into that jungle. And it’s from the absolute pits of that inner landscape that the truest music rises from.
At the end of the last session, Rossiter and Alex Lappin sat down and drew tarot cards. John drew The Fool.
66 is the 17th solo album from Paul Weller, marking his 66th journey around the sun, released on Polydor Records on 24 May. Artwork by Sir Peter Blake. Indie Exclusive Limited Edition 180g Blue vinyl. Includes a 12pg full size booklet and large foldout poster.
The relatively short life of San Francisco’s Aluminum has so far yielded a single (Spinning Backwards, 2020) and an EP (Windowpane, 2022), but their debut LP, Fully Beat, overflows with tenured confidence and a singular style that deftly comprises shoegaze, big beat, and jangle pop. With influences ranging from Orbital, to Wipers, to The Avalanches and Sly and the Family Stone, theirs is a multifaceted take on established forms, fed through fuzz and led by honeyed, male-female vocal harmonies from Bay Area post-punk veterans Marc Leyda (of Wild Moth) and Ryann Gonsalves (of Torrey). “Smile” begins with deceptive sparseness, adding neon swirls of stacked tremolo over a mesmerizing lyrical refrain, and hinting at the dynamism to come with understated grace and grit. “Always Here, Never There” is Fully Beat’s first pure hit of melodic pop: its liquid bass groove winds beneath a melancholy-sweet synth hook and Leyda’s plaintive vocals,
while drummer Chris Natividad’s deep, pillowy snare and propulsive style maintain a driving pace. Lead single, “Behind My Mouth”, shifts gears into a big beat shuffle and howl of overdriven guitars, which relent to Gonsalves’ rolling bassline and playful, snarky vocal. Composed across several weeks of experimentation, it is a prime iteration of Aluminum’s meticulous world of sound, which nevertheless carries an air of wry nonchalance. Asking, “Do you ever see behind my mouth?”, Gonsalves notes that the song “comes from a place of wanting to be understood authentically, and to communicate intentionally.” This approach speaks to the album’s broader theme of exhaustion amid the demands of the modern grind: working unfulfilling jobs to pay exorbitant rent, feeling society break at
the seams, and trying to maintain a meaningful personal life with the remaining scraps of morale. The response, then, must be to find joy. These songs were crafted over a half-dozen months in basements and practice spaces, creating an abundance of authentic passion and catharsis that’s as nostalgic and comforting as a cherished, tattered band t-shirt. The closer, “Upside Down”, is a full-throttle blare of joyous release – “a straight-up love song,” according to Leyda. The deliberate choice to end it with a gradual fade, rather than a dramatic climax, smartly suggests the ambivalence of acceptance – perhaps fitting, when considering the immensity of the album’s subject matter. It also hints that there is much more to be said, and as such a rich and compelling debut, Fully Beat shows that Aluminum are only getting started.
LP1 Color in Color - Opaque Red in Clear • LP2 Black in Clear
A star-studded collab between Fania All Stars and guests such as Jorge Santana, Billy Cobham, Manu Dibango and Jan Hammer that was recorded live and in the studio. Live tracks were taken from the historic “Live At Yankee Stadium” and the Puerto Rican Roberto Clemente Stadium show. Featuring “El Raton”, “Soul Makossa” and other tracks that demonstrate the All S tars ability to fuse Jazz, Rock, Soul and Salsa as only they could do.
NewJeans - NewJeans `How Sweet' Standard ver. - K-Pop CD
After a successful run of the EP `Get Up' which landed at #1 on the Billboard 200 and 5 entries on the Billboard Hot 100, global K-Pop girl group NewJeans are back with a new single titled `How Sweet,' available in 6 versions: MINJI, HANNI, DANIELLE, HAERIN, HYEIN & NEWJEANS. Contents include: CD, CD Envelope, Outbox, Interview Book (44 pgs), Photo Book (76 pgs), Mini Poster, Sticker Pack (5), 5 Photo Cards, Post Card & Bookmark. US/EU Retail Excl.: Group Postcard. Dimensions: 312 x 312 x 25 mm.
Travis Denning will release his debut, full-length album on May 24th and it will include 15 songs available on CD. Travis, a native of Warner Robins, Georgia, singer/songwriter and Mercury Nashville recording artist, first made waves with the release of his Top 40 debut single “David Ashley Parker From Powder Springs” which has been certified Gold by the RIAA. He celebrated his first #1 and Platinum certified single with the “shadowy” (Rolling Stone) “After A Few” from Denning’s debut EP “Beer’s Better Cold”. This new album includes “Southern Rock” which features HARDY, as well as a song with Country artist Josh Ross, titled, “The Sound of a Beer Getting Cracked.” Denning will be on the road this Spring and Summer on the HARDY Quit!! tour and doing fairs and festivals