How was everyone's Thanksgiving? Are you still nibbling cold turkey leftovers? Did you survive Black Friday and all the retail craziness? I certainly hope so. This edition of Weekly Tune-Up ushers in December, my favorite month of the year. I'm a huge fan of Christmas and am looking forward to giving you the last four tune-ups of the year. I'll let you marinate on that for a minute. In the meantime I have 15 new tunes to hopefully add to your week's festivities.
I was super stoked to see Wild Nothing announce a new album this past week, Life of Pause, and they dropped two new songs off the record, which is due out February 19th. So it proved an easy choice to kick off this week's tune-up with one of them — "TV Queen." London duo HONNE are gearing up to issue a new EP in January and they just shared "Gone Are The Days." It's another smooth electro-pop ode in the same vein as previous material, which is a good thing. Nova Scotia's Nap Eyes are back with a laid back indie-rock track called "Mixer" off forthcoming Thought Rock Fish Scale (out February 5). This is an album I'm very much looking forward to hearing.
This week's sleeper tune is brought to you by emerging Toronto outfit Blajk, on the rise and likely one that you'll be hearing much more from in the near future. Their excellent new tune, "Lost," is a darker pop track that showcases frontman Jordan Radics’ smooth tonal quality and well-written lyrical turns. The falsetto backing vocals that kick in with the hook are a nice touch. I'll be enjoying this tune after the sun sets.
1. Wild Nothing, "TV Queen"
2. Santigold Feat. ILOVEMAKONNEN, "Who Be Lovin' Me"
3. HONNE, "Gone Are The Days"
4. Diiv, "Mire" (Grant's Song)
5. Nap Eyes, "Mixer"
6. Blajk, "Lost"
7. Talib Kweli Feat. Brother Ali & Planet Asia, "Understand"
8. Beach House, "The Traveller"
9. Dr. Dog, "Badvertise"
10. St. Beauty, "Going Nowhere"
11. Rome Fortune, "Dance"
12. Baio, "Born in a Marathon" (Moonlight Matters Remix)
13. Merchandise & Dum Dum Girls, "Echo"
14. Audiotreats Feat. Mia, "With You"
15. Chet Faker & Marcus Marr, "Birthday Card"
https://embed.spotify.com/?uri=spotify:user:leilanipolk:playlist:0BDEHvTkXK0upryj9o7mLN
This article appears in Nov 26 – Dec 2, 2015.