The 1975 Chamber-Pop Confessions and 8 other new songs

Matty Healy, the proudly enigmatic singer-songwriter of the 1975s, leads his band into chamber pop with “Part of the Band”, the first song from an album to be released in October, “Being Funny in a Foreign Language”. He sings about “grinding teeth and heroin fits”, about a “chic barista catch-all vaccinist” and about literary-minded homosexual liaisons – “I was Rimbaud and he was Paul Verlaine”. He also asks, “Am I ironically awake?” The production ranges from a breathless string ensemble to hand-picked folk-rock to a chorus of saxophones, all mingling towards the end. It’s pandemic confusion, questioning and boredom, with melodies to spare. JON PARELES

A simple daily admission — “I know you’re back, I saw your sister at the pharmacy” — kicks off the latest single from Canadian dream-pop band Alvvays; as soon as vocalist Molly Rankin sings this line, the song suddenly turns into a fantasy of soulful melody and screaming guitars. Hints of My Bloody Valentine and Japanese Breakfast hang in the hazy atmosphere, but Rankin’s bittersweet delivery gives “Pharmacist,” the opening track from upcoming album “Blue Rev,” a distinct emotional undertow, like a moving dream that ends a little too soon. LINDSAY ZOLADZ

Julien Baker, “Guthrie”

“Guthrie” is a quietly heartbreaking postscript to Julien Baker’s 2021 album “Little Oblivions” from a collection, “B-Sides,” due out later this month. Like “Little Oblivions,” the song confronts what it’s like to be addicted: “Whatever I get, I always need a little more,” she sings. But whereas Baker doubled down in a rock band on “Little Oblivions,” in “Guthrie,” she’s solo, picking out a soothing waltz on her guitar as she rips through her own flaws. The song is a crisis of conscience and faith, with a voice humbled by self-knowledge. “I wanted so badly to be good,” she offers, “but there’s no such thing.” Talk

“A year without separation could have broken us, baby,” King Princess sings in “Change the Locks,” a song about how pandemic closeness — and friction — could destroy a relationship. It’s three-chord folk-rock that explodes into hard rock when King Princess (Brooklyn songwriter Mikaela Strauss) realizes how bad things have gone. She wants to hold on; she knows she can’t. Talk

English R&B lags American innovations by years, if not decades. Vocal trio Flo are catching up with what American bands like Destiny’s Child accomplished in the 1990s: evoking masculine assumptions while mastering recording techniques and harnessing vocals, instruments and machinery to hone their message of self-determination. . The way Flo juggles individual vocals and two- and three-part harmonies, flirtation and fury, is reminiscent of Destiny’s Child, but unerringly: “Why you gotta be so immature,” they sing, adding “Tell me how can I understand/If you don’t communicate? Even before a crying baby sample slips into the mix, it’s easy to tell who’s wrong. Talk

Ghetto Kumbé, ‘Pila Pila (Trooko Remix)’

Ghetto Kumbé is a group from Bogotá that fortifies Afro-Colombian percussion and socially responsible lyrics with electronics; he released a powerful self-titled debut album in 2020 and opened for Radiohead. The group has handed over tracks from their album to various producers for “Ghetto Kumbé Clubbing Remixes,” an album slated for November. “Pila Pila”, a muscular tribute to the power of drums, reworked by Honduran Grammy-winning producer Trooko (who worked on “Residente” and “The Hamilton Mixtape”). He sped it up even more, bumping the meter from 6/4 to 4/4, moving his incantatory lead vocal to the start of the song and bringing in a hopping salsa bassline, electronic hoots, jazzy piano and boxes. with nervous rhythms, constantly rushes ahead. Talk

Killer Mike featuring Young Thug, ‘Run’

A verse from a still-imprisoned Young Thug only adds urgency to “Run,” Killer Mike’s first new track as a solo artist since his vital 2012 album “RAP Music.” Across four successful albums with Run the Jewels, it’s become commonplace to hear Mike rapping over El-P’s kinetic, collage-like beats, but it’s refreshing here to hear him reconnect with veteran No ID. , whose discrete production allows Killer Mike to operate in a smoother flow. “The race for freedom is not won,” he raps on the chorus, providing welcome counter-programming to your standard Independence Day jingoism. ZOLADZ

Jazz is perhaps one of the only spaces where the term “internet star” still means something. Domi & JD Beck form Exhibit A, a duo of virtuoso post-jazz Zoomers who seem straight out of a cartoon, and whose wow factor is adapted to the small screen: a blonde keyboardist rips solos while a small drummer tap on hyper- contained and hyperbeats. References to jazz history are channeled into the aesthetic of a fast-paced TV jingle. Domi and Beck have found a champion in Anderson .Paak, and their debut album, “Not Tight”, is co-released by his new label and Blue Note Records. Evoking lounge, ’70s fusion, trip-hop and breakbeat, this LP delivers the uninterrupted dopamine drip of a doom-scroll, and it’s heavy with headlining features: Thundercat, Snoop Dogg and Mac DeMarco rise all. “Take a Chance” is their moment with Paak, and if its serious, rapped-up devotional pledges don’t quite match the song’s feel-good vibes and geometric-sounding pop hook that Domi and Beck sing, you’re in dire straits. . to resent them. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO

Tyshawn Sorey Trio, ‘Enchantment’

Multi-instrumentalist, composer, professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and MacArthur “genius” fellow Tyshawn Sorey is likely to be found writing experimental works for a sequel or serving as composer in residence with an opera company, or evoking new systems for group improvisation. It’s been a long time since he was considered “just” a jazz drummer. Thus, for Sorey, recording an album of standards with a piano trio is considered a curve ball. Of course, he has a great penchant for curves. Sorey recently joined pianist Aaron Diehl, one of jazz’s leading traditionalists, and versatile bassist Matt Brewer to record “Mesmerism,” an album of jazz classics and lesser-known pieces from the canon. Horace Silver’s “Enchantment” is usually played as a tensely paced samba, but the trio adapt it, Diehl putting the lush precision of its harmonies to work over a loose, drawling beat from Sorey. RUSSONELLO