Today is Record Store Day 2026: the die-hard attempt to hold on to the experience of patronizing an independent record store, then placing a vinyl disc on a turntable and taking the time to listen, possibly undistracted, to the mechanical vibrations of a needle spiraling through plastic microgrooves. What was normal in the analog era is a limited-edition luxury now; times change and distractions have multiplied.
This is also the second weekend of Coachella: the 21st-century desert festival that starts the year’s outdoor calendar with two weekends of (nearly) the same lineup, live in California and streamed worldwide, launching tours and kick-starting promotional cycles. Its first weekend stoked the new single from the international K-pop-style group Katseye, “Pinky Up.” It also offered Karol G performing an unreleased new song, “Después de Ti,” written with Greg Gonzalez of Cigarettes After Sex; brusque electronic remakes of Nine Inch Nails songs from Trent Reznor’s partnership with Boys Noize, Nine Inch Noize, and the live debut of Tomora, the collaboration the Norwegian songwriter Aurora with the Chemical Brothers’ Tom Rowlands, along with an assortment of predictable and random guest cameos.
Meanwhile, musicians were productive well beyond the festival grounds. Here are some notable brand-new songs and a glance back to 1986. (Listen on Spotify or Apple Music.)
What’s New
Lana Del Rey, ‘First Light’
Lana Del Rey seizes her commission for a James Bond theme — though it’s just for a video game, “007 First Light” — to enjoy some full-tilt orchestral bombast. Written with David Arnold, who scored “Casino Royale” and “Tomorrow Never Dies,” it echoes bits of John Barry’s Bond themes and enjoys big crescendos and retro reverb guitar. Del Rey brings an innocent tone to slyly meta lyrics about where the song is placed: “All the fates just watch you / dying just to know whether you’ll play your life like a game.” It concludes with an invitation: “Will you play?”
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Anitta and Marina Sena, ‘Mandinga’
The Brazilian songwriter Anitta has built an international audience through determined crossovers: collaborating widely, singing in Spanish and English as well as Portuguese, dabbling in styles from reggaeton to EDM. But her new album, “Equilibrivm,” is grounded in Brazilian music and culture. It features Brazilian rhythms and pays homage to vintage songs and styles; its lyrics are laced with references to the Afro-Brazilian pantheon of orixás. “Mandinga” (“Witchcraft”) samples an Afro-samba from the 1960s written by Baden Powell and Vinicius de Moraes, “Canto de Ossanha,” about being spellbound by the orixá Ossanha. Anitta and one of the other collaborating songwriters, Marina Sena, turn it around, singing about “not falling for anyone’s witchcraft” — but admitting to considerable temptation.
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Massive Attack and Tom Waits, ‘Boots on the Ground’
Tom Waits’s first new song in 15 years and Massive Attack’s first release since 2020 is a grim, profane montage of militarism. Clattery percussion, tolling piano and mournful brasses back up Waits’s gruff singsong. He contrasts obedient soldiers — “We trim your hedges, we fight your wars” — with the privileged and powerful who deploy them: “A coal to a diamond, a vote into law / They campaign up all the blood they can draw.” The video clip uses bleak photos by finaleye and adds disturbing statistics about ICE, the 2021 insurrection and homeless veterans.
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Rosalía, ‘Focu ’Ranni’
“Focu ’Ranni” (Sicilian for “Fire Is Burning”) was included on copies of the physical releases of Rosalía’s 2025 album, “Lux,” but not online. Now — in a kind of reverse Record Store Day gambit — it’s officially available on streaming services. Backed by an orchestral arrangement laced with hyperpop vocal squiggles and distant church bells, Rosalía turns away from an approaching marriage: “I will not be your other half,” she sings, tremulous with regret and determination.
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Tori Amos, ‘Gasoline Girls’
Tori Amos has announced that her album due May 1, “In Times of Dragons,” is a full-length narrative: “a metaphorical story about the fight for Democracy over Tyranny, reflecting the current abhorrent nonaccidental burning down of democracy in real time.” Its characters include the “Gasoline Girls,” a lesbian biker gang helping the lead character escape “that lizard scum” — her wealthy husband. Its verses ride a percussive syncopated piano riff; its choruses rev up with electric guitar and a gang of backup vocals as the women “Snap the throttle / Feel the torque pull.” Brief and transitional, the song is clearly part of the larger opus.
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My New Band Believe, ‘In the Blink of an Eye’
The virtuosic, stylistically omnivorous British band Black Midi has splintered into solo projects, and the guitarist Cameron Picton has started the awkwardly named group My New Band Believe. Like Black Midi, the band flaunts intricacy, dexterity and a particularly British streak of pessimism. Speedy acoustic picking propels “In the Blink of an Eye,” as Picton sings gently, almost fondly, about surveillance, nightmares and estrangement: “If you’re gonna kick me babe / At least let me pick the place,” he suggests. It’s not exactly comforting when he sings, “Don’t cry, don’t scream / It’s just a bad dream.”
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Lovana, ‘Jiro’
Two singers from Madagascar are backed by French musicians in Lovana, a group that brings 21st-century electronics to the island’s traditions; “lovana” means “heritage.” The title track of its new album, “Jiro,” uses a six-beat rhythm derived from spirit-possession ceremonies called tromba; an electric guitar turns the call-and-response into a multistage ascent.
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What’s New in Instrumental Music
Boards of Canada, ‘Tape 05’
The elusive Scottish electronic duo Boards of Canada, whose last album was “Tomorrow’s Harvest” in 2013, has re-emerged with the “Tape 05,” a hazy, subtly layered track that begins as a threnody, with a deep drone and distant, wavery tones. It takes an almost optimistic turn halfway through, before drifting back toward staticky entropy.
Listen on YouTube
What Was Big 40 Years Ago
Prince and the Revolution, ‘Kiss’ The Bangles, ‘Manic Monday’
Prince, who died 10 years ago on April 21, was his own secret chart competition on April 18, 1986. “Kiss,” a quintessential piece of falsetto funk flirtation, was No. 1. It’s a blanket come-on that waives a lot of requirements. His lover doesn’t have to be beautiful, rich, cool, experienced or any particular astrological sign; she doesn’t even have to undress him. The beat is ultra-terse, with little flurries of rhythm guitar that signal an expert touch. That same week, the No. 2 song was the Bangles performing “Manic Monday,” a song credited to Christopher but also written by Prince. The lyrics describe reluctantly waking up to the workweek, while the sound comes from an entirely different era, revisiting late-1960s Baroque-pop psychedelia. The Bangles’ vocal harmonies hint at what the Mamas and the Papas might have done with the chorus. The two songs only begin to suggest Prince’s versatility and scope.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
Jon Pareles, a culture correspondent for The Times, served as chief pop music critic for 37 years. He studied music, played in rock, jazz and classical groups and was a college-radio disc jockey. He was previously an editor at Rolling Stone and The Village Voice.
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