Dear listeners,
As someone who doesn’t love music festivals and has an outsize distaste for wind, it seems very unlikely that I will ever attend Coachella. If my teenage heroes No Doubt reuniting — and bringing out the pop star I most wish existed when I was a teenager, Olivia Rodrigo — did not convince me to make the pilgrimage to Indio, Calif., then it feels safe to say nothing can.
So I heartily welcome the rise of the Coachella livestream, which allowed me to experience the festival from the comfort of my couch, and also gave me the reassurance that there will be video of just about anything important that I missed, whether that is a buzzed-about set from the rising pop star Chappell Roan or the head-scratching moment when J Balvin brought out a surprise guest, Will Smith, to perform “Men in Black” among a bunch of dancing aliens. (OK, maybe if they had announced that ahead of time, I would have found a way to get to Coachella, out of morbid curiosity.)
Today’s playlist, highlights from the past few weeks of our Friday new music roundups, is also a bit of armchair musical journey for you, flitting from Puerto Rico to South Africa to … the moon. And it features a couple of those aforementioned Coachella performers, Rodrigo and Roan, whose music you can enjoy without getting a single grain of desert sand blown into your face. Thank me later.
Drivin’ on the right-side road,
Lindsay
Listen along while you read.
1. Chappell Roan: “Good Luck, Babe!”
Chappell Roan’s voice drips with sarcasm on the verses of this synth-pop tune, as she sends an ex off with a shrugging, “It’s fine, it’s cool.” As the song builds, though, the details of the relationship come into focus and Roan allows herself to admit she is neither fine nor cool with how things ended. Still, she knows she deserves better; as she puts it in her impassioned and theatrical voice, “I just wanna love someone who calls me baby.”
2. Margo Guryan: “Moon Ride”
This one’s not technically a new song — it was recorded in 1956 — but it is newly released, and very much worth checking out. Margo Guryan was a singer-songwriter best known for “Take a Picture,” her breezy and charming 1968 album, which has become a cult favorite over the past few decades. A forthcoming boxed set will showcase other corners of Guryan’s singular career, including early forays into jazz-inspired songwriting. The singer Chris Connor released a version of the coolly absurd, Guryan-penned “Moon Ride” in 1958, but now Guryan’s own recording is available to hear. Though “Moon Ride” has a certain retro-futuristic kitsch about it, Guryan’s phrasing and winking tone sound strikingly modern.
3. Jordan Hamilton: “Roses”
And now let’s blast back to the present, to hear a new track from another idiosyncratic songwriter who harnesses jazz influences into a unique sound. Jordan Hamilton blends R&B and hip-hop cadences with nimble cello playing on this track from his upcoming album, “Project Freedom.” “Roses” begins with a jaunty, plucked sequence over which Hamilton’s staccato vocals hopscotch. Then, when he picks his bow back up halfway through, the song morphs into a lush, fluid dreamscape.
4. Tyla: “Safer”
Last year, the young musician Tyla had a breakout global hit with the slinky “Water,” which earned her a Grammy and made her the first South African solo artist in more than half a century to crack the Billboard Hot 100. “Safer,” from her recently released self-titled debut album, is another sleek hybrid of American pop influences and her native country’s amapiano style.
5. Young Miko: “Princess Peach”
Here’s another fun track from a young phenom’s debut album: the chatty and lilting “Princess Peach,” from the rising Puerto Rican star Young Miko’s recently released “Att.” Miko depicts a roller-coaster ride of a relationship with grinning cheekiness: “Con ese peach, mami, ¿quién se enojada contigo?” (“With that peach, mami, who’s mad at you?”)
6. Olivia Rodrigo: “So American”
Olivia Rodrigo’s new expanded edition of last year’s “Guts” — appropriately titled “Guts (Spilled)” — is full of pop-punk gems, but I’m partial to this nervy little rocker about a cross-cultural romance: “He laughs at all my jokes and he says I’m so American.” The song is full of Rodrigo’s characteristic dizzying intensity, but here it’s employed in the service of ecstatic joy rather than her usual themes of heartbreak or cringe. It’s a total sugar rush — quite possibly the sweetest song she’s ever written.
The Amplifier Playlist
“6 New Songs You Should Hear Now” track list
Track 1: Chappell Roan, “Good Luck, Babe!”
Track 2: Margo Guryan, “Moon Ride”
Track 3: Jordan Hamilton, “Roses”
Track 4: Tyla, “Safer”
Track 5: Young Miko, “Princess Peach”
Track 6: Olivia Rodrigo, “So American”
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