In Our Headphones

Sessa - "Vento a Favor" a 2023 single on Mexican Summer São Paulo-based musician Sessa returns with his first new single since last year's enchanting LP Estrela Acesa . The track is co-produced by Brazilian artist Biel Basile and American musician Mikey Coltun, who also plays bass in Mdou Moctar.  "'Vento a Favor' started as a track meant to be on Estrela Acesa," he tells Stereogum . "It was recor...

deary - "Fairground (Saint Etienne Remix)" a 2023 single on Sonic Cathedral. London-based dreampop duo deary couldn't have chosen a better group than long-running UK trio Saint Etienne and composer Augustin Bousfield to remix their debut single, "Fairground." (The mix is formally titled the "Saint Etienne Meet Augustin Bousfield At The Top Of Town Mix.") “It was fun putting the guitars down for on...

Corvair - Right Hook from the 2023 self-released album Bound to Be . Portland duo Corvair describe themselves as “Scorpio weirdo power duo serving up lush guitar pop w/ sharp incisors,” which this fellow Scorpio can certainly appreciate. Made up of Brian Naubert (Ruston Mire, Tube Top, Pop Sickle, The Service Providers) and Heather Larimer (Eux Autres), the romantic, as well as musical, duo are ve...

Feeble Little Horse - Tin Man from the 2023 album Girl with Fish on Saddle Creek. Pittsburgh quartet Feeble Little Horse formed three years ago during the pandemic lull but have exploded since dropping their 2021 debut full-length Hayday . They’re on the verge of releasing its follow-up, Girl With Fish, via Saddle Creek, a perfect home for their slowcore brand of noise pop. Out June 9th, we’ve so...

ĠENN - "A Reprise (That Girl)" a 2023 single on Liminal Collective On today's Song of the Day, Anglo-Maltese quartet ĠENN team up with guest vocalist John Newton (of fellow four-letters-all-caps duo  JOHN ) for this stylistically sinister slice of post-punk.  On their Bandcamp page, vocalist Leona Farrugia speaks to the track's themes: “Naturally I’ve always felt like there’s a pressure to compare...

MAN ON MAN - "Showgirls" from the 2023 album Provincetown on Polyvinyl. “ As we lean into what Man on Man is and will be, two things immediately come up. Energy and community. ’Showgirls’ is all that. ” — Roddy Bottum, Man on Man As co-founder Roddy Bottum puts it, today's Song of the Day embodies the fun-loving duo's ethos. The track is a sneak peek at their sophomore LP Provincetown , out June 1...

Caroline Polachek - "Fly To You (feat. Grimes and Dido)" from the 2023 album Desire, I Want to Turn Into You on Perpetual Novice. New music from  Caroline Polachek is exciting enough, but when it features collaborations with both  Grimes and Dido , it's a mind-blower. In an interview with Vulture , Polachek says he wrote part of the song in Grimes' bedroom at 6 AM — "Just the two of us, in this ve...

Puerta Negra - Caida al Mal from the 2023 album Playa Sola on SYNTHICIDE. Portland-based Puerta Negra have been an immense amount of buzz for only just releasing their debut EP in 2022. They make 80’s-infused EBM that’s somehow both slick and grimy, making for the perfect edge. Berlin label Detriti dropped their debut Costa Humano and their upcoming follow-up Playa Sola is being released through B...

Kurs Valüt - Kurs Valüt from the 2021 album Kurs Valüt on No Emb Blanc. Kurs Valüt is an electronic duo formed in 2017 by Eugene Gordeev in Dnipro to popularize the Minimal Wave in Ukraine. “The very appearance of Kurs Valüt is partly caused by the underdevelopment of the dark underground in Ukraine,” the duo explained in an interview with Post-Punk in 2021. “The moment of the absence of the subcu...

Prospexx - "Punya Siapa" from the 2021 album A Quiet World on Symphony of Distruction. On today's Song of the Day, Singaporean synth-pop duo  PROSPEXX  take us back to the '80s with their darkwave dance tracks. In an interview with Unite Asia, vocalist Vanessa explains that she and her bandmate Hafiz have always been into synthwave. "Both of us are super into 80s music, and the dystopian-esque vib...

RATPAJAMA - "Violence" from the 2023 album The Drunken Lost Tapes on Deepland Records With the release of her latest EP The Drunken Lost Tapes , Ratpajama — the solo darkwave project of Kyara Jereissati (aka Kyro Coma) — seeks to embrace imperfection. (Although today's Song of the Day is a goth-tinged piece of perfection to these ears, with a driving industrial beat that will take you to the Batca...

Zanias - "Burial" from the 2023 album Chrysalis on Fleisch Records. Chrysalis , the third album from  Zanias (aka Alison Lewis), finds the ethereal darkwave artist undergoing a metamorphosis. The songs on this release were written and recorded between her current home of Berlin and her original home of Australia during a period of self-protection, as Lewis processed feelings of burnout, trauma, an...

Of The Heavy Sun - Cosmic Television a 2023 self-released single. Of The Heavy Sun are a psych rock trio from Seattle that has been churning out brooding psychedelic opuses since 2015, with the release of their debut self-titled full-length. They’re due to release their latest record Cosmic Television on June 2nd, after two years of production and “constant setbacks,” according to the band. Our So...

Acid Arab & Wael Alkak - Ya Mahla from the 2023 album ٣ (Trois) on Crammed Discs. French-Algerian collective Acid Arab recently released their appropriately titled third record ٣ (Trois) (٣ is the symbol for the figure three in Arabic and “trois” means "three" in French) in February via Crammed Discs. The collective, composed of Guido Minisky, Hervé Carvalho, Pierrot Casanova, Nicolas Borne an...

Shalom - "Happenstance" from the 2023 album Sublimation on Saddle Creek. Brooklyn-based, South Africa-raised artist  Shalom had been playing bass in bands while in New Brunswick for college, and working on home-recorded solo songs on the side, when she was discovered by producer Ryan Hemsworth. He invited her to contribute to his collaborative project Quarter-Life Crisis, which led to her being si...

HÆLOS - "Last Days" from the 2023 album Where We Bring Our Burdens on INDIGO KIN. London-based trio  HÆLOS returns with the track "Last Days," a song they describe as "about trying to evade the fears that come from traumatic experiences by constantly reminding oneself to remain present." It's the third single to be shared from the band's forthcoming full-length, titled  Where We Bring Our Burdens....

Beach Vacation - "Lay Low" a 2023 single on Z Tapes. Take some time off with the dreamy vibes of Beach Vacation . The latest single from this Seattle-based pop project of songwriter Tabor Rupp will call to mind bands on the Captured Tracks Records roster like Beach Fossils and Wild Nothing. Rupp told the music blog  kid with a vinyl that today's Song of the Day is about “wanting to leave behind ev...

Sendai Era - Calamansi dreams from the 2023 self-released album Kalayaan . Sendai Era are a Seattle-based music duo of emcee Era and producer Sendai Mike. They’ve been making music together since 2013 and released their sophomore full-length Kalayaan in January. “Kalayaan” is the Tagalog word for “Liberation,” which is a feeling the duo tried to capture throughout the album. “This album carries th...

Lo! Peninsula - Super Glue (Cover) from the 2023 self-released album The Resurrection Of The Princess Of Woe And Her Vampire Hound Posse . Lo! Peninsula is a shoegaze/dreampop trio from Imphal, India that first caught the ears of KEXP’s John Richards and his producer Owen Murphy back in 2018 with their debut full-length AKA Lo Peninsula . Murphy interviewed the band that year about making music in...

Drinking Boys and Girls Choir - "City" from the 2023 album Hey, Listen To Me on Damnably The latest release from South Korean trio  Drinking Boys and Girls Choir is a collaborative project with three female artists from their hometown of Daegu. (On this EP, they've also invited special guest Jang Young-eun, guitarist and vocalist of the band igloo .) On today's Song of the Day, they've teamed up w...

FiFi Zhang - "Nobody" from the 2023 EP So Beautiful So Lonely on Gum Studio. What started as a thesis project at the Parsons School of Design has since become a music career for FiFi Zhang . The Shanghai-born/Brooklyn-based artist was inspired by a sound design class to create her own songs, and submitted the track " Butterfly " and its accompanying music video. Since then, she's continued to evol...

Lionmilk - "anxious thing" from the 2023 album Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222 on Leaving Records. With his latest LP Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222 , Lionmilk continues the theme of using music to heal with another collection of soothing soul-jazz sounds to inspire introspection. Los Angeles-based musician/composer/producer Moki Kawaguchi refers to the new album as "music to feel less whack to."...

MCM - Cry Me A River from the 2023 self-released Stolen Moments EP. MCM (aka Mid Century Modern) is a brand new Seattle-based duo featuring long-running emcee, producer, and community organizer King Khazm and singer/songwriter Jesse Kogita. In February, they released their debut EP Stolen Moments . The three-song EP sees the duo reimagine classic jazz standards by building a collage of samples, bo...

URF Tone - Zan Zendegi Azadi (Women Life Freedom) a 2023 self-released single. URF Tone is a duo made up of producer (as well as model, actor, and avid golfer) Nicholas Demps, aka The World Famous N.I.C, and MC Ila Parvaz. Together they seek to pay tribute to the golden era of Hip Hop, with inspirational lyricism and jazzy production. Emerging in 2020, the duo have released a string of singles, wi...

Chyle - DAY (feat. B SELF) from the 2023 album Majestic Constellations on Cosmic Aliens Entertainment On his latest LP, Majestic Constellations , Chyle MC (pronounced Child Emcee) invites listeners on a voyage influenced by classic Parliament-Funkadelic, who he cites as his "muse." Though based in Atlanta, Georgia, Chyle MC has ties to Seattle, working with longtime friend and producer Vitamin D,...