Brenda Lee's "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree" has topped the charts for the first time, de-throning Yuletide-queen Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" from its yearly spot atop Billboard's Hot 100.
Warm and inviting without every sounding too saccharine, "SeaStar" is a refreshing glimpse of summer sky, clouded by just the right amount of lyrical longing to balance the light with shade.
Earlier this week, Vancouver-based Indie darlings Peach Pit dropped their new track "Magpie" in advance of its eagerly anticipated, similarly titled parent album. Magpie's October 25th release will be the band's most recent since 2022's From 2 to 3, with this titular single being their first musical offering since that album's "Vicky." "Magpie" sees Peach Pit - who have previously characterized their music as "chewed bubblegum pop" - coloring their trademark aesthetics with layers of rich harmonic fuzz. No pun intended.
"Josh Tillman and the Accidental Dose" is at it's core a classic-sounding chunk of tuneful, piano-and-guitar-driven melodicism, underscored by a colorful and ever-present orchestral accompaniment. The phrase "Beatlesque" immediately spills out to describe this particular union of elements, though "Accidental Dose" owes much, if not more, to later additions in that particular musical idiom the Fab Four helped to define. Tillman's soulful vocal is more Joe Cocker than McCartney, and song's almost playful arrangement recalls something that could be found on Nilsson Schmilsson as much as it does, say, "I Am The Walrus."
"I Like It I Like It" is a soulful, almost sinister little helping of R&B, built on a roiling, slinky beat and a positively seductive bassline and topped with luscious, chime-like keys, plus the occasional clarion-call synth. Both singers join in reverb-drenched harmony throughout, splitting the song's two primary verses between them before ending once more in perfect tandem.
... OB's exultations are put forward with an delicacy found in the most effervescent indie pop. The end result feels at once relaxed and celebratory: a perfect portmanteau of Afrobeat jubilation and Indie contemplation.
Canadian DIY darlings Men I Trust made a name for themselves in the indie scene with their unique blend of dreamy, groove-laden pop. Oftentimes in the band's press it seems that former characteristic of their music eclipses the latter in recognition, but "Tailwhip" is proof positive that their sense for for crafting an infectious rhythm is just as keen as their knack for generating the spacious atmospheres those rhythms occupy.
"Claw Foot" ... is a tightly constructed and eminently catchy exemplar of Royel Otis' sterling approach to alt-pop/rock. The song's bass-heavy rhythmic figure and chimey guitars are immediately evocative of genre paragons like Joy Division and The Cure, while it's breakneck pace and chanted chorus keep things sounding fresh and the energy high.
Though frontman Robert Smith might protest easy categorization, The Cure are without a doubt one of the seminal gothic rock bands of all time. Pop-twinged and radio friendly hits like "Friday I'm in Love" or "Just Like Heaven" exist alongside the kind of haunting, angst-filled odes like "One Hundred Years" or "Lullaby" that helped define the goth rock phenomenon. "Alone," the legendary band's first new release in well over a decade and the lead single from their upcoming album Songs of a Lost World, sees the band return to that latter sort of peak brooding form after a considerable hiatus.
Receiving particular acclaim following the release of 2021's album Ignorance, The Weather Station has spent the intervening years refining a particular blend of indie, folk, and jazz, through to their newly released record Humanhood. "Mirror," the album's third track and most recent single, epitomizes that style, just as its accompanying video realizes it into a wider spectrum of the senses.
... "Animaru" contains multitudes, being on the one hand as unpredictable and wild as its namesake would imply, and on another a carefully sonic opus.
..."Unraveling," feels like a both a culmination and an evolution of all these past iterations of Muse, merging the synthwave ventures of their later years with the guitar-driven heaviness of their earlier repertoire.