Today is New Music Friday, which means there’s loads of new songs in the world.
Here are the 10 single best songs released today I loved.
See the New Music section for all the of tracks and albums featured this week.
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1.
Ojerime, Mura Masa
Keep it Lo
South London R&B artist Ojerime impresses on a Mura Masa beat, with a sample from Memphis rapper Project Pat embedded in. ‘Keep It Lo’ is a low-key smooth ride.
2.
Sharpson, Wax White
Much About Me
Dublin producer’s new EP, Dublin Mannerisms, on Choki Biki Records, uses the distinct Dublin twang as a drops in these breaks and dance tracks, inspired by how ’90s producers did the same with reggae and dub tracks.
Much of those samples are drawn from extras from an EP he worked on with his close confidants, rap duo Wax White, and there’s a breakbeat, UK garage and jungle slant to the productions on the tracks.
‘Much About Me’ is track two, “a tribute to my friend and collaborator who’s been suffering from homelessness. Even though it’s light lyrically, its theme is about being judged and the stigma surrounding homelessness and addiction.”
“When I started DJing Drum & Bass about 12 years ago, I would get frustrated when I would play my own tracks and nobody would know they were mine. For ages I couldn’t figure out how to get people to realise that it was MY music. I always envied how Hip-Hop acts had their own individual accent and subject matter, so it was apparent that it was their music. I started to collaborate with Irish Hip-Hop acts such as Dusty Residents, 5th Element and Mango to make DNB tunes with Dublin accents rapping over them. Then, when I played these tracks in the clubs, people would hear the local accents and come up to me and ask who it was. I finally gave my tracks an identity.
Much like how the UK producers in the 90’s with dub-reggae drops, I started getting the Wax White boys to supply me with some vocal samples. When I was recording them for their own tracks, I would ask them to say something random into the microphone between takes which we called ‘Little Dublin Mannerisms’. This is how I got the samples for ‘4 Ur Ma’, ‘Rock Up Knock Up’, Who’s In The Garden’, ‘Locked’ and ‘Tesco Lager’. I like the idea of giving club music a Dublin accent.”
-Sharpson
3.
Bibio
Potion
Whether a Bibio album is filled with ambient passages, or funk-electro, or wobbly indie-folk songwriting, it’s always worth a listen.
Stephen Wilkinson is a fan of contrast between releases, and ‘Potion’ is more of the funk and electro buzz of his work, on his 10th studio album BIB10, which is out 21st October 2022.
Just don’t expect a live gig, he doesn’t do them.
Hear also: ‘Off Goes The Light’
4.
Kormac, Loah
Carry Weight
The Irish producer Kormac is back with new album called Equivalent Exchange on November 11th, on his own imprint Always the Sound.
Like recent live shows, the long player has a guest element with Jafaris, and MayKay featuring, along with an orchestral score played by the Irish Chamber Orchestra, and artwork by Maser.
‘Carry Weight’ is the first lead-in single featuring the singular timbre of Loah, and the track swirls around her voice, with plucked harp samples, orchestral flourishes and drums adding up to a Bonobo-esque song.
The album will also be released with a collection of Spatial Audio mixes, 3 short form animated videos.
A launch night with the Irish Chamber Orchestra happens in Dublin’s The Button Factory on release night, November 11th.
5.
Dry Cleaning
No Decent Shoes For Rain
Only a week to go before Dry Cleaning drop their second album Stumpwork, and if you can’t wait another week to hear it in full, their latest track ‘No Decent Shoes For Rain’ mentions pancakes more than once, and meanders in an album fashion.
“It’s so good to meet you / but not here / not here obviously,” is a lyric highlight.
See also: ‘Don’t Press Me’
6.
Rayko
Tell Me Why
The Madrid-based DJ and producer of nu-disco and cosmic dancefloor edits, comes through with this bass-lingering mid-set number, with a vocal that sounds a bit like Janet Jackson.
7.
Rozi Plain
Prove Your Good
The ever-talented Rozi Plain continues to expand a core folk sound with the latest pre-release track from the forthcoming album Prize out 13th January 2023 on Memphis Industries. It’s a tune that has some psych-indie flavour, in a dream-like fashion.
“Prove Your Good is thinking about the often silent fight within us. Trying to come good, trying to not be bad. Feeling judged and judging ourselves. The small re-writing we can do of bits of our own history. The painful shift of changing favourites. Rearranging the leader board. Knowing things must be simpler but going after the tricky stuff anyway”.
Rozi featured on Anna-Mieke’s recent single.
Some gigs upcoming for Rozi Plain:
Thu 19th Jan 23 – London, Rough Trade East Instore
Sat 28th Jan 23 – Chester, St. Marys
Tue 31st Jan 23 – York, The Crescent
Wed 1st Feb 23 – Hull, Adelphi
Thu 2nd Feb 23 – Cardiff, Clwb Ifor Bach
Fri 3rd Feb 23 – Falmouth, The Cornish Bank
Sat 4th Feb 23 – Totnes, St. Marys
Tue 28th Feb 23 – Manchester, YES Pink Room
Wed 1st Mar 23 – Dublin, Workmans Club
Thu 2nd Mar 23 – Bangor, NI, The Court House
Fri 3rd Mar 23 – Waterford, Phil Grimes
Sat 4th Mar 23 – Ballydehob, Levis Corner House
Tue 7th Mar 23 – Leeds, Brudenell Social Club
Thu 9th Mar 23 – Newcastle, Star & Shadow
Fri 10th Mar 23 – Cambridge, Portland Arms
Sat 11th Mar 23 – Margate, Olby’s
Sun 12th Mar 23 – Brighton, Hope & Ruin
Tue 14th Mar 23 – London, Studio 9294
8.
Holland Andrews, Nils Frahm
Rules
Holland Andrews is an American vocalist, composer, and performance artist who has enlisted Nils Frahm for the moody lead track of a new EP called Doubtless out October 28th.
9.
Aoife Wolf
The Wetlands
Murky spiky indie-rock from the Belfast-based Offaly artist Aoife Wolf, fresh from playing Ireland Music Week.
Aoife’s song ‘The Woman Who Shot Andy Warhol’ featured here in May.
10.
Fozsa
Nauseous (with Shane Richardson, Adam LC)
The return of Irish producer Luke O’Brien aka Fozsa who returns with a two-tracker with the lead song ‘Nauseous’ featuring a twisted Shane Richardson vocal (of Ugolino) and singer Adam LC.
“The collaboration on ‘nauseous’ cropped up when Shane sent me a few verses he had written and recorded on his phone a couple of years ago. I imported the file directly into a beat I was working on and pitched the voice note to reflect the warped disillusionment and alienation portrayed in the lyrics. I wanted the production to describe this emotion spatially with dripping textures, wonky synths and modulating reverbs to create this lack of spatial stability.”
O’ Brien is currently studying Architecture and wants his music to reflect a spatial sort of escapism.
“I want the new music to feel inhabitable; for the textural elements in the music to feel like fragments attached to memories of a specific place or condition. These sound fragments can sometimes feel like transportive triggers to a kind of immersive nostalgia, which becomes exciting to curate as a producer.”
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