“Are You With That?” - Vince Staples
Vince Staples’ self-titled was his version of Thundercat’s Where the Giants Roam. A slight, mournful, low-stakes album that, nonetheless, had his most emotional moments. “Are You With That?” is as plainspoken as Vince has ever been, with producer Kenny Beats embracing his James Blake, populating the beat with ghostly bleeps and ethereal vocals. “Fill these voids or fill my bank,” Staples mumbles after he drives past a row of graves, knowing the checks are the only things that’ll actually move. - Nathan Stevens
“Brando” - Lucy Dacus
Home Movies by Lucy Dacus is chock full of painful, joyous and tense returns to Dacus’ childhood. “Brando,” towards the end of the album, details an imbalanced relationship Dacus had in her teen years with imagery from oldies like A Streetcar Named Desire and Casablanca. Over a drum machine beat and bouncing guitars, Dacus sings “You called me cerebral / I didn’t know what you’d meant / But now I do / would it have killed you to call me pretty instead / I’m in a second story window / and you’re yelling at me ‘Stella! / I’m laughing cause you think you’re Brando but you never come close.” The dancey “Brando” expands on what Dacus’s 2016 track “I Don’t Want to Be Funny Anymore” started. But in Brando, she takes a bit more charge, calling on her former partner to admit they never knew her like they thought they did. Like the rest of the album it comes from, “Brando” returns to those painful years with a sense of wisdom and agency, and a scathing takedown of high school boyfriends who think they are cool just because they can quote from Casablanca. - Sararosa Davies
“Clube Da Esquina No. 2” - João Paulo Amaral
Covering one of the most beloved (and already covered) songs in the Brazilian canon is ambitious. Blowing it up to over double its original length, stuffing it with spiraling solos and adding a melodramatic, bone shattering climax–-well that’s “it's a bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see it if pays off for 'em.” territory.
Yet! Bandleader João Paulo Amaral pulls it off. The Milton Nascimento and Lô Borges joint that changed South American music (and maybe music in general) forever is not reshaped with reverence, but, instead, used as a launch pad. The stuttering drum patterns, frenetic finger exercises of upright bass and ever cascading guitar work give “Clube Da Eaquina No 2” both a feeling of elegance and the nagging thought that the whole project could catch fire at any moment. But the key is that aforementioned climax. After a long instrumental passage where the guitar appears to be a shapeshifter, Amaral and vocalist Ana Luiza duet as the sound fades. Then Luiza bursts into flight, half shouting, half singing in an eruption of bittersweet emotions, joy fusing with regret. Amaral and Co walked a tight rope with no net–-and then set the rope on fire. And they still came out with grace. - NS
“Charmander” - Aminé
Portland native Aminé has never been one to stick to conventions. In a hip-hop world saturated with dark, booming 808s and hi-hat triplets, he broke out in 2016 with “Caroline”, a cheeky single with sharply-enveloped synth stabs and a music video featuring him and his friends just… hanging out and having fun. Since then, he has continued to deftly hopscotch between genres on the production side, while never faltering in his lyrical wit and airtight flow. This is probably why, when I first saw a tweet linking to TWOPOINTFIVE’s lead single “Charmander” with the caption “AMINE HYPERPOP ERA??”, I wasn’t surprised, but more excited. Turns out my excitement was warranted, because the pitched-up vocal samples and bouncy lead of “Charmander” complement the rapper’s infectious charisma like peanut butter to jelly. Run it back, please. - Bram Rickett
“Creatures” - Viagra Boys
Before the album had even dropped, Viagra Boys crafted two versions of their stunning lead single “Creatures.” The first was a gnarly, but pretty, slice of New Wave, like Squeeze had been birthed during the era of grunge. The second was a live set that slowed the groove down to an icy drone and languished in the sorrow implied by the lyrics, flicking through speed addiction, kleptomania and self-destruction. Welfare Jazz, which “Creatures” announced, was supposed to be the Swedish boys triumph, but horror stuck the final note, as band co-founder Benjamin Vallé passed away suddenly and far to early. Now the song that was once a tribute to the beauty of rock bottom is Vallé’s final message. -NS
“Gemini and Leo” - Helado Negro
Roberto Carlos Lange’s newest, Far In, was an introverted, ambient affair. But he didn’t forget to sprinkle a few bangers throughout. The swooning disco affair of “Gemini and Leo” is one half barnburner, one part goofy grin. When Lange sings about “constellations of our love and magic” he’s setting the stage for a dancefloor illuminated with pure joy. - NS
“Hard Drive” - Cassandra Jenkins
When I first saw Cassandra Jenkins perform the at-the-time unreleased “Hard Drive” in November 2019, long before everything shut down, long before the song would be released in a second pandemic year, it felt like a premonition. The wandering, mainly spoken track by no means predicted the COVID-19 pandemic. But in its meditative lyrics and saxophone, it felt like it was a portent for the quiet resolve and mindfulness it would take to make it through. The title is a refrain throughout the song: A bookkeeper talks about philosophy and chakras and says the mind is like a computer hard drive. In the context of driving lessons in New York City at age 35, Jenkins is on a “hard drive.” Close to the end of the five and a half minute track, the main refrain is broken as Jenkins runs into a friend who helps her release all the bundled up tension of a hard year stored in her body. Over ambling guitar and warm saxophone converging, Cassandra counts with her friend: “1, 2,3…” With “Hard Drive” Cassandra Jenkins nails what it’s like to exist in a pent up, anxious body in the year 2021 (and beyond) — on the verge of catharsis with every breath. - SD
"I Don't Live Here Anymore” - The War on Drugs
While visiting fellow 2010s writer Hunter Moore in Portland, we put on Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA, played pool--and it felt right. As “Glory Days” blared and Hunter scratched the 8-ball, there was a correctness to the non-toxic masculinity. It was dudes being guys being bros.
“I Don’t Live Here Anymore,” despite some morose trappings, hits the exact same pleasure spot. Through Dylan references, an ever spiraling guitar riff and pseudo-gospel shouting, The War on Drugs pushes every ounce of dopamine it can from a deep well of ‘80s jukebox nostalgia. - NS
“Jackie” – Yves Tumor
Yves Tumor makes art rock for an age when our rock stars are consumed by anxiety, swimming in substances, or both. Pop music is saturated with clods who can sketch a two-dimensional broken heart over an acoustic guitar loop. “Jackie” is something greater, a song about the way separation can rot into self-destruction. “We were torn apart right by the sleeve,” Sean Bowie sings, feeling their lover’s absence like phantom pain in a severed limb, their voice dripping with desire and the bodily fluid of your choice.
Everything about Yves Tumor's musical evolution would suggest they would never return to the glam-rock bombast of Heaven To A Tortured Mind, which is exactly why "Jackie" feels even more special. Yves Tumor's partnership with live guitarist Chris Greatti suggests they've found the chemical mixture to become iconic rock stars. Greatti is best known for work with louts like Grimes and YUNGBLUD, but here his guitars murmur and squeal as a chorus of subconscious urges.I’d still hesitate to think Yves Tumor will follow this up with more of the same, but if they choose to, they will not be playing small venues for much longer. “Jackie” is about feeling so starved for attention you starve yourself, a petty and dirty little feeling, magnified to the psychedelic extreme. Stasis has never sounded sexier. - Jack Riedy and Raptor Jesus
“Keen Demag” - ZULI
“Keen Demang” offers a reprieve from ZULI’s other five drum-and-bass assaults packaged in the All Caps EP. Don’t mistake it as the track being easy-going, though: thick, steely drums thwack with relentless speed and fury, and the percussive backbone is reliable to cause as much damage as the violent jungle or the warped grime of a few songs prior. But the song’s iridescent synths, with heat and color reminiscent of riffs from a vaporwave tune, also give it a more vibrant, accessible color than its more brute counterparts. Of course, in ZULI’s fashion as a producer, those synths get broken down into shards in the choppy beat, like specs of glitter swirling around a turbulent storm. - Ryo Miyauchi