Rosalía has surprised her fans during these hard times with the release of “Dolerme” or “Hurt Me,” a heartbreaking ballad.
“Dolerme,” showcases Rosalía’s graceful search for balance between her traditional flamenco roots with a modern, pop-infused vibe. A simple acoustic guitar backs the track as she sings “Yo ya no sé for qué no quire dolerme/Acelero pa’ ver si consigo esterllarme/Quiero que lo vea’, no piense’ en detenerme/Asì demuestra’ que has podío’ olvidarme (I don’t know why it doesn’t want to hurt me/ I accelerate to see if I can crash/ I want you to see it and don’t think about stopping me/ So you show that you’ve been able to forget me.”
This definitely a new direction for the Spanish singer, but Rosaliá has proven her range, navigating from flamenco to reggaetón without losing her essence.
The album artwork features a drawing of a sad-faced woman lying on a bed next to a knife and a cat. It exudes a heartbreaking quality that accompanies the song’s tone, and has a certain Picasso Sleeper Near the Shutters aesthetic in blue.
She also included a note to her fans providing them with an update and a message of solidarity to help them through quarantine. Here’s the English translation:
“Many of us are in quarantine and not leaving our homes. I was in quarantine and I lost a bit of time because I decided that I was not going to think about it too much and that instead I was going to put my energy and my heart into doing something for others in my own way. I know what I do as an artist may seem expendable, for some it will be, but for me to be able to make music is good for my mental health. This song is called “Dolerme” and I hope it makes you feel a little better than I did when I made it. Please take care of yourself and take care of everyone you have around, with all my love.”
In January, Rosaliá released her single “Juro que,” which she performed at the 2020 Grammys. She also took home the award that night for Best Latin Rock, Urban or Alternative album for her 2018 album EL MAL QUERER.
Happy Friday! The music world has blessed us with new music from our favorite artists once again. What’s a better way to kick start the weekend then new music? As COVID-19 continues to spread across the nation keeping us at home in self-quarantine, it’s the little things like a new single or new album that continue to lift our spirits during these dark times. Today NAV, Gunna, and Travis Scott have teamed up on a new single, and we have new albums from Dua Lipa, Comethazine, PARTYNEXTDOOR, and Jessie Reyez.
Turks (featuring Travis Scott)- NAV & Gunna
NAV, Gunna, and Travis Scott proved they were the perfect trifecta back in 2018 with track “YOSEMITE,” off LaFlame’s Astroworld. The trio is back today with their new single “Turks,” which had been previewed three times over the past couple of months, but had no official release date. Nav and Gunna decided to drop the Wheezy produced track after they appeared on Instagram live together. The three outline what their successes have brought them over a bouncy beat with melodic flow. It’s unclear yet whether the single will appear on a bigger project such as NAV’s third studio album, but for now we’re grateful to be enjoying the new track.
Future Nostalgia- Dua Lipa
Dua Lipa’s long awaited sophomore album Future Nostalgia, is a dazzling disco and funk-influenced pop masterpiece. Drawing inspiration from 80s and 90s pop-icons like Madonna, Oliva Newton-John, and Mariah Carey, Dua gives us an album with back-to-back dance tracks that are reminiscent of both the future and past, living up to it’s title. Dua Lipa is the pop icon we didn’t know we needed.
Pandemic-Comethazine
Image via Comethazine’s Instagram.
The album’s title is fitting considering the time we’re living in, but Comethazine actually picked the name prior to all the ongoing chaos. After watching the Netflix documentary Pandemic, the rapper felt inspired to write an album based on the end of the world. “I was on tour in Europe in February and started watching the documentary Pandemic in the hotel,” he explained. “It got me thinking about the end of the world and shit. The music I made for this album has that energy and fit perfectly.” Pandemic is a quick listen, with tracks spanning around two minutes. Each track is filled with lots of energy and low key clever bars, that showcase Comethazine at his most fast-paced ever.
PARTYMOBILE- PARTYNEXTDOOR
After years of teasers and multiple pushbacks PARTYNEXTDOOR has finally released his finally anticipated album PARTYMOBILE. This is his first release since his 2017 EP Seven Days.PARTYMOBILE spans 15 tracks, including “Believe It” featuring Rihanna, and the previously released songs “Split Decisions,” “The News,” “Loyal” featuring Drake, and the “Loyal (Remix) with Bad Bunny. “This album was inspired by the experience you get when riding in your car and you’re listening to music by yourself,” he said in a press release. “It is the soundtrack of those late night drives.” It’s an album where PARTYNEXTDOOR showcases his vulnerability, and emphasizes his voice and thoughts on modern love.
BEFORE LOVE CAME TO KILL US- Jessie Reyez
Jessie Reyez’s debut album Before Love Came To Kill Us is finally here, and she’s holding nothing back. She immediately grabs our attention within the first few seconds singing “I should’ve F*cked your friends/It would have been the best revenge.” The album spans 14 tracks and includes features from Eminem and 6lack. The singer digs deep into her emotional core in this LP speaking on everything from heartbreak, to independence, to spearheading her own career and human nature, and even immigration on the track “Imported.”
The Weeknd has finally dropped his highly anticipated album, After Hours, keeping fans up after hours. Pun intended. As the coronavirus forces us all into a period of quarantine, self isolation, and uncertainty, the Weeknd offers a light in what feels like a dark time.
The LP spans 14 tracks and is completely featureless. Abel Tesfaye invites us to take a deeper look into his dark and somewhat paranoid universe, that is of course filled with distortion and drugs. There are also hints throughout of a much more mature and self reflective Abel, which may be due to the fact that he turned 30 last month.
Abel has clearly departed from his Starboy days, as the album is filled with moody records with retro and electronic inspired beats. The album starts off with gentle quieter songs that are synth-heavy. The album’s mood is set with tracks like the haunting “Alone Again,” and “Too Late,” which are filled with ominous keyboards and sinister sub-bass. We then shift into the aching “Hardest to Love,” followed by the slow ballad “Scared to Live,” before transitioning into the autobiographical “Snow Child.”
“Snow Child” and “Faith” are clearly standout tracks on the LP as they perfectly showcase what Abel has always been best at: creating a distorted reality with his muffled vocals. These two tracks along with “Escape From LA,” will leave his House of Balloon era fans very satisfied. The songs feature production from his day-one producer Illangelo, bringing back his 2010 tones.
On “Snow Child,” he makes reference to 2011’s “The Morning,” and 2015’s “Tell Your Friends,” where he used the line “Cali is the mission,” and now flips it to, “Cali was the mission now a n—- leaving.”
Now we’re 25 minutes into the album, and here comes the dance bangers we’ve all been waiting for. “Blinding Lights” and “Heartless” are probably the biggest hits of his career thus far. “In Your Eyes” and “Save your Tears” are filled with infectious 80s synth pop sounds, while “After Hours” house beats will find you dancing around your kitchen alone. Or maybe thats just me.
On “Repeat After Me (Interlude),” Kevin Parker helps Abel mellow things out again. On the Parker produced track, Abel sings delicately and sounds sweet over the layer of synth chords throughout. If you listen closely you can even here a Tame-Impala-like electronic squiggle or two.
The fun ends and the ominous atmosphere returns with the final track “Until I Bleed Out,” and what we presume to be an unhappy ending.
After Hours is clearly Abel’s best work. During this difficult time I’m sure we’ve all been leaning on music to get us through more than ever. The Weeknd offers us a perfect and brief escape from reality with After Hours.
Fiona Apple has been telling her fans that a new album is on the way for months now. Last Fall she teased a 2020 release date, in January she said she’d be ready “in a few months,” and earlier this month fans rejoiced when she finally announced she’d completed the long awaited LP.
Apple opened up in an interview with The New Yorker on Monday (March 16), about her fifth studio album, Fetch the Bolt Cutters. In the expansive profile she reveals that the album’s title came from a line she heard from Gillian Anderson‘s character in the British crime drama, The Fall. Her character, a lead detective, calls for the bolt cutters to unlock the door to a room where a young girl has been tortured. “Really, what it’s about is not being afraid to speak,” she told writer Emily Nussbaum.
The album was recorded at her home studio in Venice Beach over the past few years, with the 13 tracks being described as “raw and unslick” and “percussion heavy.”
The article teases songs like “The Drumset is Gone,” “Ladies,” “On I Go,” and “Newspaper,” which features vocals from her sister Amber on a lyric that goes like “It’s a shame, because you and I didn’t get a witness, we’re the only ones who know!” The title track features harmonizing vocals from supermodel Cara Delevingne.
The track “For Her,” was written shortly after Brett Kavanaugh‘s Supreme Court nomination hearings and features the line, “Good Mornin’!, Good Mornin’! You raped me in the same bed your daughter was born in.”
Apple also recalls her experience quitting cocaine after “one excruciating night” several years ago at Quentin Tarantino‘s house with the director and her then boyfriend Paul Thomas Anderson. “Every addict should just get locked in a private movie theatre with QT and PTA on coke,” she jokes, “and they’ll never want to do it again.”
The album still has no official release date, but we hope we get to enjoy it some time soon. Her 1999 album When the Pawn Hits... will be reissued on vinyl, replacing its original Paul Thomas Anderson-shot cover art. Read the entire New Yorker article here.
Don Toliver has proven himself to be one of the most promising and fastest rising Hip-Hop stars today. His much anticipated debut album Heaven or Hell, finally arrived and we couldn’t be anymore excited.
Heaven or Hell serves as the follow up to his 2018 mixtape Donny Womack. Since his 2018 mixtape, the Houston Rapper has gained more mainstream attention due to co-signs from Eminem, The Weeknd, and Travis Scott, who signed Toliver to Cactus Jack Records in August 2018.
Heaven or Hell spans 12 tracks and includes features from Sheck Wes, Offset, Quavo, and Kaash Paige, and boast productions credits from Mike Dean, WondaGurl, and Frank Dukes. The LP includes titles such as “After Party,” “Cardigan,” “Can’t Feel My Lungs,” and previously released “Had Enough” and “No Idea.”
Throughout the LP Toliver takes listeners on a journey of retrofuturistic R&B and psychedelic Cactus Jack Trap. One of the album’s standout tracks is “Euphoria,” which features Travis Scott and Kaash Paige. The melodic hip-hop track will take you on a euphoric trip, that lives up to it’s title.
Toliver will be supporting the Weeknd on his After Hours North American Tour, alongside Sabrina Claudio.
On Monday (March 9) Eminem shared the new music video for “Godzilla,” the latest visual from his new album Music to Be Murdered By. The video is directed by Lyrical Lemonade’s Cole Bennett, and is dedicated to the late rapper Juice WRLD, who is featured on the song’s hook.
The video begins with Eminem in a Costco-like warehouse store, where he begins rapping, “I can swallow a bottle of alcohol and I’ll feel like Godzilla.” We then see the rapper beginning to chug a bottle of Godzilla, with his face on the bottle. The drunk rapper then begins to wander around the store clearly hallucinating, and runs into an array of characters some of which are played by himself, before he vomits up a pile of lego chunks.
The rapper then lands on top of a mountain of his entire discography, and raps to the shoppers in the store. He later runs through a parking lot where he is accidentally punched in the face and knocked out by Mike Tyson.
At the hospital, we see his longtime collaborator Dr.Dre playing up to his title in a white lab coat and blue scrubs alongside Eminem who is also playing a doctor. Eminem then spits his last verse before Bennett signs us off with a special tribute to the 21-year-old rapper Juice WRLD.
A black and white video of Juice laughing plays, accompanied by a voiceover from the rapper. “I hope everybody havin’ a good day. I hope everybody accomplished something significant. Even if you didn’t accomplish anything significant, don’t be discouraged. Just aim to accomplish something significant tomorrow and the next day and so on. If anybody is going through anything, I hope and pray you get through it. And just know you do have the strength to get through whatever the f— you going through, no matter what it is.”
Music to be Murder by was released in January, with “Godzilla” being its standout track. Both from Chicago, Bennett and Juice WRLD were close friends. Bennett is best known for his work directing videos for not only Juice WRLD, but Vic Mensa, Chance the Rapper, Famous Dex, Lil Pump, Smokepurpp, Lil Xan, Blueface, Ski Mask the Slump God, Jack Harlow, and more. His most notable video on his Youtube channel is Juice WRLD’s “Lucid Dreams,” which has surpassed 400 million views.
