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Eight best new songs this week (31st Jan): Pins, Missy Elliott, Arcade Fire

31 January, 2017 — by Christopher Ratcliff0

We’re back! Yes after quietly taking a few weeks off to mentally prepare myself for the coming year and all the expected horror it will surely bring with it (I believe Elbow’s new album is out next week), I’m finally ready to return to my number one priority* in life: bringing you all the very best new songs of the week, along with some jokes that are wilfully obscure at best.

This week… PINS, Arcade Fire, Thundercat, Missy Elliott, Aristophanes, Bonobo, Anohni and Matt Martians.

*I wrote this sentence forgetting that the main reason for my recent absence is because I became a father. It’s fine. She can’t read. And by the time she can, she certainly won’t go anywhere near anything her grumpy dad wrote. Unless I start heavily referencing The Octonauts, but I fear that may be self-defeating.  

Thundercat – Show You the Way (featuring Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald)

Bad-ass bassist and purveyor of the squelchiest brand of future-funk seduces an entire audience using two of the most impressive wing-men anyone could ever hope for… Kenny (Danger Zone, Footloose) Loggins and Michael (that hair, that voice) McDonald.

If you wish to learn more about the world of laid-back yacht rock (of which McDonald and Loggins are the velvet kings), here’s what you’re letting yourself in for…

"Apologies. You may now be pregnant"
“Apologies if you looked at me for too long. You may now be pregnant”

Bonobo – No Reason (featuring Nick Murphy)

Bonobo’s new album Migration is a gorgeous, downbeat piece of electronic melancholia, and its lead single ‘No Reason’ featuring the man formerly known as Chet Faker is just as heartbreaking. The following video would be impressive enough even without the knowledge that the entire thing was created practically with forced perspective and clever lighting. Plus you get to awkwardly brush your head up against someone’s gutch.

Matt Martians – Dent Jusay (featuring Syd & Steve Lacy)

The Internet’s Matt Martians has a solo album called The Drum Chord Theory out right now, and ‘Dent Jusay’ is a smooth-as-Loggins taster featuring his other friends from The Internet, Syd and Steve Lacy. Who are your friends from the internet? A 14 year-old concert promoter from Idaho and your mum pretending to be a grown man from Rotherham who’s really into your Adventure Time slash-fic. Yeah sames.

Arcade Fire – I Give You Power (featuring Mavis Staples)

Legendary RnB singer and civil rights activist Mavis Staples (who once turned down a proposal from Bob Dylan) appears on Arcade Fire’s first single since the (wrongly) lukewarmly received Reflektor. Arcade Fire would gladly accept a Dylan proposal, although the fact they’ve been stringing along Donovan for a few years may make things super-awks.

PINS – Aggrophobe (featuring Iggy Pop)

Awesome UK punk quartet Pins (sorry PINS) return with a new single, Aggrophobe, taken from their forthcoming EP named Bad Thing, which is due out March 24. I was going to make a joke about being scared of fighting, but as I was saying it in my head I realised it was in the voice of Ardal O’ Hanlon and that I’d stolen it from Father Ted.

Aristophanes – 人為機器 (Humans Become Machines)

Aristophanes is the Taipei-based rapper who appeared on Grimes’ Art Angels track ‘Scream’. Grimes also produced this gloriously twisted piece of moody bubblegum rap. You can tell.

Anohni – Paradise

Anohni will release a companion EP to last year’s phenomenal Hopelessness, called Paradise on March 17. Ah, remember when that album came out, and we all read the title and thought, “well we don’t know for sure that Brexit and Trump will definitely happen.” Ah, halcyon days indeed. How’s it going in your bunker? Yeah I ran out of toilet paper too.

Missy Elliott – I’m Better (featuring Lamb)

Missy’s back. Thank fuck. It’s the slowest comeback ever, but WHEN her new album FINALLY comes out, it will be totally worth it. Especially if Missy keeps writing lyrics like, “he’s watching my body like he watches Scandal.” I guess that means ‘through a complicated system of VPNs and torrent sites’? Oh wait no, it’s on UKTV.

That’s your lot. See you next week. Unless every musician in the world forgets to release a record over the next seven days.

It’s possible, There’s a lot going on.

Here’s the continuously updated Spotify playlist containing all the best tracks from January and February 2017.

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