10 New Albums to Stream Today
Photos by Chris Phelps, Jeff Bierk & Samuel Gehrke Music Lists New Albums
I don’t know about you, but I’m greeting March with a sigh of hesitant relief. Relief, because certified-worst-month February is finally over, and hesitancy, because will this rain ever end? Will we ever contain the coronavirus? Will Joe Biden actually get the Democratic nomination?! Stressful questions linger, but at least there’s plenty of brand new music to distract us from all the uncertainty. This week, the haul includes a rework of Anna Calvi’s 2018 album Hunter, a high-energy Caroline Rose record, some folk songs that go down easy courtesy of Aoife O’Donovan, Mandy Moore’s triumphant return to music and so much more. Enough with my yapping—see below for all the noteworthy records out today, March 6.
1. Anna Calvi: Hunted
In January, British musician Anna Calvi revealed that she would be completely reworking her 2018 album Hunter, bringing out a rawer, more pared-down sound. The reworked album, out today, is called Hunted, and features Courtney Barnett, Joe Talbot of IDLES, Julia Holter and Charlotte Gainsbourg. Having already shared the latest rendition of “Don’t Beat the Girl out of My Boy” featuring Barnett, Calvi most recently shared the reworked version of “Eden” featuring Gainsbourg. —Natalia Keogan
2. Aoife O’Donovan: Bull Frogs Croon (And Other Songs)
Folk singer/songwriter Aoife O’Donovan, who in 2018 joined forces with Sara Watkins and Sarah Jarosz to form fortified roots supergroup I’m With Her, is back with a captivating new release on Yep Roc Records. Her first new studio recordings in four years, Bull Frogs Croon features a string quartet and three new compositions inspired by the work of poet Peter Sears. Bull Frogs Croon also features fresh takes on the Irish traditional song “Lakes of Pontchartrain” and Hazel Dickens’ “Pretty Bird.” —Ellen Johnson
3. Brandy Clark: Your Life is a Record
Six-time Grammy nominee and industry-wide trusted country songwriter Brandy Clark is back with an album of her own stories. Clark has collaborated on songs for Kacey Musgraves, Miranda Lambert, Little Big Town and more throughout her career, but it’s rare to hear her solo work. Your Life is a Record is Clark’s third solo LP in all, following 2016’s Big Day in a Small Town and 2013’s 12 Stories, one of our favorite country albums of the decade. Jay Joyce produced the album, which is out now on Warner Records. —Ellen Johnson
4. Caroline Rose: Superstar
With her all-red wardrobe and wild dance moves, you may feel an urge to assign Caroline Rose the description “quirky.” Resist it. The Austin, Texas-based indie pop artist isn’t an oddity—she’s a hungry artist on a quest for constant evolution. Beginning in the Americana scene back in 2014 with her debut album I Will Not Be Afraid, Rose later abandoned her country pursuits for a chance at making something much more unique: satirical, endlessly catchy synth-pop. That was the crux of her 2018 record LONER. Now, she’s back with something new: an underdog’s odyssey set to music. Lead single “Feel The Way I Want” is a lose-yourself dance track, but “Freak Like Me” is a classy piano ballad. What can’t this girl do? —Ellen Johnson
5. Disq: Collector
Madison power-pop five-piece Disq have spent the past couple of years stealing hearts. The young band’s impressive debut single for Saddle Creek back in 2018, plus a strong showing at last year’s SXSW festival, made them a band to watch, but their debut album, Collector, crowns them with staying power. Painting with various shades of pop, punk and indie, Disq delivers guitar flare and emotional sincerity. With a retro sheen, guitars crumple, chime and squawk while lead singer Isaac deBroux-Slone brings his own vocal versatility. As a rock band of young millennials, there’s an understandable amount of existential dread and self-doubt, but their playful charm softens the blow. When songs like “Fun Song 4” and “I Wanna Die” are on the same album, you know you’re in for a good time. —Lizzie Manno
6. Jonathan Wilson: Dixie Blur
North Carolina-born, Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer Jonathan Wilson—whose work you, as a Paste reader, are all but certainly familiar with whether you recognize his name or not—shares his fourth album Dixie Blur today via BMG. Wilson knows his way ‘round a tune, as his resumé reflects. As a producer, he’s worked with the likes of Father John Misty, Conor Oberst, Laura Marling, Dawes and Karen Elson. Wilson recorded Dixie Blur in Nashville in order to reconnect to his Southern roots, working with producer Pat Sansone of Wilco and recording everything live in-studio with a stacked supporting cast, a stark contrast to his previous albums, on which he handled most of the instrumentation himself. —Scott Russell
7. Mandy Moore: Silver Landings
No longer a major-label plant being cultivated for teen pop stardom, or, as she discussed in a recent New York Times interview, under the watch of her emotionally abusive ex-husband and creative partner Ryan Adams, Moore is back making the music she wants to make. And that music, as it turns out, sounds a lot like a early/mid-2000s pop trend: folk pop. Moore’s new album Silver Landings is a steady blend of coppery Americana (thanks in no small part to Moore’s current husband and folk/rock veteran Taylor Goldsmith, the Dawes frontman who co-wrote and performs on the record with Moore) and soupy pop. It’s not at all the showy, watery fanfare of C’mon C’mon, but it still glistens with the poppy sheen that defined other folk-leaning pop singers from the early 2000s, like Colbie Caillat and KT Tunstall. Two decades ago, songs like “Tryin’ My Best” (an Alanis Morissette-like rocker), the gauzy “When I Wasn’t Watching” and the gentler “Stories Reminding Myself of Me,” all Silver Landings highlights, could’ve easily been radio favorites. —Ellen Johnson
8. Overcoats: The Fight
Hana Elion and JJ Mitchell of Overcoats have always made songs with a decidedly sororal harmony; theirs is music of empowerment through thick and thin. But where the folksy electro of 2017’s YOUNG proved to be deft art-pop, The Fight looks to be the moment where the New York born and bred duo unfurls into a full-blown pop sensation. With the help of producers Justin Raisen (Angel Olsen, Kim Gordon) and Yves Rothman (Miya Folick, Freya Ridings), Overcoats have crafted singles like the layered, decadent and choral “The Fool” and the absolutely explosive, guitar-heavy “Keep The Faith.” “We realized the thing to do is not to wait for life to get easier, but to start fighting harder,” the pair said in a release, and I’ll be damned if this maxim isn’t bursting through all of Overcoats’ new material. —Adrian Spinelli
9. Stephen Malkmus: Traditional Techniques
Stephen Malkmus has always been one shaggy poet. From his Pavement days to his free-for-all rocking and rolling with The Jicks to whatever the hell that 2019 electronic album was (It was called Groove Denied and no, there was not, in fact, any consistent “groove” to be found), he remains an inquisitive writer and songsmith. But, as many Pavement fans will agree, Malkmus is at his best when he’s rambling, spouting sneakily smart sentences that verge on incoherent. It looks like we’ll be getting more of that beautiful nonsense on his new album Traditional Techniques, his third album in three years after Groove Denied and 2018’s Sparkle Hard, a rather endearing Jicks project and one of the best rock releases from that year. Marketing materials are touting this new album as a brush with folk music. In reality, it seems to be just another chapter in Malkmus’ success story: a waltz of words, timed to enjoyable—occasionally masterful—guitar music. —Ellen Johnson
10. U.S. Girls: Heavy Light
“Overtime,” the lead single from U.S. Girls’ eighth album, Heavy Light, is an immediate thrill-ride. Singer Meg Remy begins her breathy delivery in a track that’s pure excitement as she and company roar back for the first time since the group’s 2018’s breakthrough album, In A Poem Unlimited. After hustling for more than a decade, U.S. Girls are now finally a hotly-anticipated musical force, with Remy leading a potent stable of horns, strings, multifaceted percussion and unpredictable vocal arrangements that keep us on the edges of our seats. And perhaps even more importantly, a new U.S. Girls album means that one of the best live bands on the planet will be back on tour for your pleasure. —Adrian Spinelli