Keeping up with new music can be exhausting, even impossible. From the weekly album releases to standalone singles dropping on a daily basis, the amount of music is so vast it’s easy for something to slip through the cracks. Even following along with the Uproxx recommendations on a daily basis can be a lot to ask, so every Monday we’re offering up this rundown of the best new music this week.
This week saw Baby Keem deliver on his promise with his debut album and Kacey Musgraves channel her heartbreak into another superlative release. Yeah, it was a great week for new music. Check out the highlights below.
For more music recommendations, check out our Listen To This section, as well as our Indie Mixtape and Pop Life newsletters.
Kacey Musgraves — “Simple Times”
While Golden Hour was an album driven by love, Star-Crossed is more about loss, a change that mirrors Musgraves’ life following her divorce. On “Simple Times,” the loss is that of childhood, as the song sees her reminiscing about her younger years (the titular simple times). She also shared a video for the track (a clip from the Star-Crossed film), in which she is joined by You‘s Victoria Pedretti, Princess Nokia, and Drag Race‘s Symone.
SZA — “The Anonymous Ones”
The uber-successful musical Dear Evan Hansen is making its way to the big screen with a movie adaptation, and they got some big names to assist with the soundtrack, providing covers of the musical’s songs. SZA took on “The Anonymous Ones,” filtering it through her pop/R&B lens.
Baby Keem — “Issues”
Baby Keem may have at one point been best known as Kendrick Lamar’s cousin, but with his debut album The Melodic Blue, he’s proving that he’s his own person. Indeed, save for a handful of features (including a couple from Lamar), Keem goes about it mostly solo on his album, like on “Issues,” an emotional cut he debuted on The Tonight Show.
Ed Sheeran — “Shivers”
After taking some time off, Ed Sheeran is continuing his mathematician-approved saga of albums with =. He’s promoted the effort with some singles thus far, and his latest his “Shivers,” which continues on the pop path forged by the album’s lead single, “Bad Habits.” The track also comes with a surreal video staring awkward and kooky encounters between Sheeran and actress AnnaSophia Robb.
Chlöe — “Have Mercy”
Chloe Bailey has generated a lot of attention for herself since announcing her intentions to go solo. Finally, she made good on all the hype last week with her debut solo single, “Have Mercy.” The tune borrows from R&B and pop, and Bailey says the later genre is the direction her new album will take.
Big Thief — “Certainty”
Adrianne Lenker and Buck Meek dropped some great solo projects in recent times, but now they’re back to focusing their efforts on Big Thief. The band has shared some singles this year, and they did so again last week with “Certainty,” a lovely folk tune the group wrote during a multi-day power outage.
Syd — “Right Track” Feat. Smino
It’s been a few years since Syd dropped a new solo project, and while nothing on the follow-up front is set in stone yet, there’s at least a new single, “Right Track.” Uproxx’s Wongo Okon describes the song as “a change in tempo from the singer’s often breezy and chilled-out songs” and notes that on it, the artists “beg for trust and commitment from their partner while promising that they’ll reach the next level together if things stay on the ‘right track.'”
Rico Nasty — “Switch Places”
Rico Nasty is at the point where it’s a big deal when she releases something, meaning there’s some sort of fanfare about a new project from her. So, fans were caught off-guard last week when she went ahead and dropped a group of new songs on SoundCloud. The collection highlights Rico’s genre-spanning sensibilities, as Uproxx’s Aaron Williams outlines: “There’s the puffy sugar trap of ‘Show Me Your Love,’ the JetsonMade-produced banger ‘How Ya Feel,’ the stripped-down ‘Switch Places,’ the spacey ‘Cotton Candy,’ and the surprisingly vulnerable ‘Grow Up.'”
J Balvin — “Perra” Feat. Tokischa
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrhrE7VojWI
J Balvin’s fans have been eating well, as last week brought the release of Jose, his fourth annual album since 2018. Among the highlights is the final pre-album single, “Perra,” a rhythmic tune with Tokischa that’s a fitting send-off to summer as we leave the warm months behind.
Lisa — “Lalisa”
Lisa is forging her own legacy outside of Blackpink, which she kicked off last week with her debut solo album, Lalisa. She shared a video for the project’s title track, and describing the visual as “ultra-maximalist,” Uproxx’s Rachel Brodsky notes, “this is pretty much everything you’d want a pop music video to be: costume changes galore, bonkers dance routines, super-slick sets, etc.”
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. .
