The Boo Radleys – Wish I Was Skinny

I forgot how much I loved this song.

Despite the title, the lyrics are actually about all sorts of insecurities that we find ourselves plagued with. The song happily dances upon the surface of existential loathing, a buoyant celebration of being weird and alone and, on rare occasion, freaking out and having some unbridled fun.

I’d never seen the video before today, so I’m thankful I thought to look it up. The band members star as put-upon losers who let loose a bit of anarchy in the driving, instrumental second half of the tune. It’s basically what I saw in my head every time the song played, a cathartic release of tension and inhibitions. After all these years, it’s still a burst of joy.

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The Boo Radleys may be remembered in Britpop history for their 1995 breakthrough Wake Up!, but I’ve always had a much softer spot for the previous album, Giant Steps. Wish I Was Skinny is a bit of a red herring, since the rest of the album is a turbulent, dizzying race through a dense series of wild sound worlds.

It’s an incredibly ambitious psychedelic pop album, veering from washed out shoegaze to broken jazz explosions, infused with an uncanny pop sensibility that makes even the noisiest parts endearing. It was ballsy to name an album after the John Coltrane masterpiece, but if anyone in the world of 90s British rock deserved to use it, it was this band.

If you become nauseous at the mere mention of Oasis, don’t worry. These guys have more in common with Mercury Rev or My Bloody Valentine than those lamentable torch-bearers for British pop overseas.

Miley Cyrus + The Flaming Lips Actually Made An Album

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So it turns out that all the BFF-ing Flaming Lips leader Wayne Coyne did with Miley Cyrus over the past year was actually in service of art. It’s called Miley Cyrus and her Dead Petz.

I just woke up and have nothing more to say about this, other than: it sounds like Miley Cyrus backed by The Flaming Lips. Or rather, it sounds like a particularly fizzy Flaming Lips album with Cyrus on vocals. I’m only a few tracks in and it’s… not bad at all. Enjoy?

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Thundercat’s New Samurai Video For ‘Them Changes’

Thundercat dons some samurai armor in this exquisitely weird clip for the instant classic funk tune Them Changes.

Enjoy!

This song is on the brief but brilliant The Beyond / Where The Giants Roam, a mini-album that manages to nearly render the man’s prior music obsolete. In a mere 16 minutes he manages to fuse his latent Isley Brothers and Parliament influences into the sharpest iteration of his unique space funk sound yet. The above song is the most pure pop moment of Thundercat’s career but the remainder of the set veers into more progressive, fluidly jazzy territory.

Thundercat

You can pick up the album Since I like making things convenient, I’ve got the full mini-album streaming below, courtesy of Spotify.

Live Band Covers Flying Lotus’ Never Catch Me (and it’s incredible)

You need to hear this fantastic live band cover of Flying Lotus‘ brilliant collaboration with Kendrick Lamar, the incredible Never Catch Me.

The band is absolutely on point; every player nails his or her part, from the pair of alto saxophonists to the trio of backup singers. Special mention should go to the drummer and keyboardist for really adding that swing. While the rapper is no Kendrick (and no one else is), he pours his heart into the rapid-fire delivery of the song, nailing the cadence and approaching the breathless energy of the original.

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Thanks to a tweet earlier today, the whole world gets to enjoy this sublime take on an instant classic song from last year’s incredible You’re Dead. I feel like I haven’t heard a cover version this good in years. These guys show a ton of potential, and I’ll be following their moves in the future.

Vince Staples – Señorita [killer music video]

Thanks to my music friends, I was tipped off to Vince Staples just before this album dropped. One of them stated that it was better than To Pimp A Butterfly, the funky hip-hop masterpiece from Kendrick Lamar that’s quickly become one of my favorite albums in years.

That’s a ballsy statement. I clicked play.

The video is one of the most subtly powerful images I’ve witnessed all year. It’s a visual treatise on the way that myriad subcultures and “others” are only seen by suburban white America through screens, the tangible life and death struggle rendered impotent or entertainment by the separation of glass. An indelible final shot delivers the death blow; I won’t spoil the surprise. You’ll know if you watch it.

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Kendrick Lamar’s arresting new video: Alright

Watch this right now. Just do it. You don’t need to thank me.

If you want to see an artist at the peak of his powers absolutely nailing the zeitgeist, click play.

Kendrick Lamar dropped To Pimp A Butterfly just a couple months ago, and it’s already one of my favorite albums of all time.

The brazen mixture of politically, socially, and psychologically aware lyrics with an incredibly nuanced and evolved delivery; the dark and deeply funky production, shot through with an entire jazz band’s worth of all-star live players; the live-wire theatricality of the entire endeavor… all of these parts coalesce as Lamar’s ambition and talent meet in in the stratosphere.

It’s both incredibly audacious and earnest to a fault. The album feels embarrassingly personal at times, the rapper spilling his demons in a drunken crying jag. At the same time, everything’s wrapped in a sense of universal struggle, the intrinsic knowledge that we’re all in this together. There’s no wonder that it’s proven as divisive as it is beloved.

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A$AP Rocky – L$D

How many rappers drop bars about dropping acid?

This may not be the best tune on A$AP Rocky‘s new album, but it exemplifies the tripped out charm of the whole spacey affair. The video feels like a lighthearted take on Gaspar Noe’s swirling labyrinth of a death trip, Enter The Void, all pulsing lights and liquid camerawork. Check it.

L$D, funny enough, is one of the more conventional tracks on the album. It acts as soft, neon-glow connective tissue, sliding effortlessly into the kaleidoscopic heart of the hallucinatory album. In that way, the name suits it perfectly.

The full album, At.Long.Last.A$AP, is a full-bore journey through psychedelic underworlds both street-level and subliminal. It’s one of the most cohesive yet dreamy hip-hop full lengths I’ve heard in a while, and surprised the hell out of me. After only kind of enjoying his major label debut a couple years ago, this one feels like a revelation.

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If dropping acid really gave Rocky his own revelation, allowing for an expanded sense of his own art, I’ll admit to being a little jealous. It’s been over a decade since I’ve had a deeply psychedelic experience and I feel like my inner life is about due for another little journey. I’m thankful for the reminder.