All right. Hi and hello, everyone. Anthony Fantano here, internet's busiest music nerd. I hope you are doing well. It's time for our weekly track roundup, where I give you guys my thoughts, my feelings, my strongly held beliefs on a bunch of tracks that have dropped over the past week or so.

All right, Worst Tracks of the Week.

They are as follows We have a few.

One of them being the Spin Doctors. They're back. The Docs. Us, spinners, the spinners being hardcore Spin Doctors fans, are excited to have the Docs back, but I'm not crazy about this track. The lyrics are so bad. Oh, my God. What happened to walking around with a pocket full of kryptonite? What happened to be in funky scuddi-ba-dip? This is just really bad butt rock. I don't know. This is just bad bar rock. I don't quite get it. Who made this cover art? This is just bad concept art. It doesn't even feel like genuine actual cover art. It's like a bad Shel Silverstein drawing, anyway. Yeah, terrible track. Unfortunate that things have fallen this far for the doctors.

Moving on from there. NLE Choppa, teaming up with Imagine Dragons. "Dare You" is the title of the song. That goes about as well as you could possibly imagine, which is not well at all.

All right. Finally, Central Cee teams up with another great British rapper, that would be Mr. 21 Savage, on this new track over here, "GBP". And yeah, of course, it's mid. Central Cee continues to gain momentum and popularity despite just being so underwhelming and average in every way that you could possibly imagine. It's just whatever.

All right, moving on from there.

The tracks that I thought were just okay.

They are as follows.

One, Mr. Tim Hecker has a new, I want to say, like, soundtrack extras project on the way titled Shards. Tim Hecker, wonderful ambient and drone and instrumental music artist, has for years also contributed works to any number of soundtracks tracks. And apparently this upcoming album is just like tracks that have come from those projects, those works, but maybe didn't quite make it, were left over from those sessions, those efforts. This track over here, "Sunset Key Melt". It has a lot of atmosphere to it. Maybe too much for my taste to the point where anything musically going on is a little too washed out. However, given that the intent behind it may have been to accompany something else, maybe it's not supposed to be doing too much to steal your attention to the forefront per se. It is very moody, it is very spacey. There are definitely some pretty bits of this track, and it is worth checking out due to the fact that it is crafted by one of the best ambient music artists of all time.

All right, moving on from there, we have Sharon Van Etten, and the band she has recently attached herself to formally in name of this forthcoming album, The Attachment Theory. "Trouble" is the name of the track. And yeah, it's just like a spacey, moody rock song. It feels like if you could take a 90s radio rock track but make it more repetitive and spacier; it's just okay. It doesn't really leave a strong impression on me, honestly.

Moving on from there, though, we also have none other than Oklou and Bladee teaming up on this track, "Take Me By The Hand". It sounds vaguely like some futuristic internet pop, but there's not really a strong chorus, in my opinion, that comes out of it. Both performances from each artist on the track vocally to my ears are pretty underwhelming. It's definitely not as bold as some of Bladee's latest project stuff, that's for sure.

All right. And Logic. Bobby Logic has suddenly dropped a new EP, Aquarius EP. A handful of tracks on this thing. One in particular is "French Dispatch". And once again, he is on his, I'm working on myself I'm not drinking as much as I was at one point. I'm chilling with my family grind. That's what he raps about these days. That is his thing. And that's pretty much what he has engrossed in on this track over a somewhat punchy jazz rap beat. It is okay. It's fine. It's all right. It's not mind-blowing. It's passable.

We also have a passable track from none other than Jungle. "Keep Me Satisfied" is the name of the cut. It sounds almost like a funk soul disco blend from the 70s that somebody else would sample for another album or something like that. It's got that vintage dance sheen to it like many jungle singles typically do. I don't know. There's not really much to say about it beyond that, in my opinion. Maybe it's not so much my cup of tea these days.

All right, we have Imperial Triumphant. With their forthcoming album, Gold Star, they have a track out featuring Tomas of Meshuggah, and "Lexington Delirium" is the name of the track. It is some harsh, insane, just pummeling prog metal that is just beyond imagination, but also beyond in some points to a fault, really. I mean, the bass sounds like it's tuning up for another song entirely half the time. The ending is mind-blowing, though, so I guess you take the good with the bad. I'm going to leave it there. I'm pretty excited for this project, though, as Imperial Triumphant tends to be one of the more out-there and challenging metal bands on the scene today, point blank period.

We have a new one over here as well from John Glacier featuring Sampha, "Ocean Steppin". If you're looking for some low-key rapping over some moody UK two-step grooves with a very light Sampha feature on the back-end, then give this track a spin. I wouldn't say it's mind-blowing or really demanding my attention or anything, but it's a vibe for sure. It's definitely a vibe.

All right.

Best tracks of the week.

They are as follows. Here we go.

We have this crazy new crossover of a track with Girl Talk, T-Pain and Yaeji. "Believe in Ya". Yeah, it's a dancy banger with some wild loops. T-Pain is going full autotune, sounding insane. And Yaeji's verse on the track is genuinely really cute. Totally unforeseen crossover again, but it somehow works despite each artist here coming from a very different direction with their own sound and their own music.

All right, moving on from there. Shout out to an artist that I'm just finding out based off of this track over here. I'm really looking forward to their fourth coming album. Saya Gray, "Shell of a Man" is the name of this track. It's almost like this blend of art pop and country at the same time. It's very odd, solid, with some beautiful but simultaneously somewhat unsettling vocals. There's something about it that feels so rustic and so nostalgic, but simultaneously, there's something very weird and experimental and off-putting about it, too, that I really I'm definitely looking forward to hearing more great tracks in the lead up to this album, that's for sure.

All right, moving on from there. Perfume Genius is also giving us a new song, a new record, in fact. "It's a Mirror" is the title of the song, and one of the greatest songwriters and voices out there on the indie circuit is hitting it in a way where it's a little folksy. It's guitar-driven. There are elements of it that feel a little Neil Young, REM-esque as well, especially on the vocals. For Mike Hadreas, whose music is typically very wondrous and produced in such a way to where it just feels very grandiose, larger than life, is sounding fantastic in this much more stripped down and intimate state on this new track, which has me very much looking forward to this new album. Again, it's a beautiful track, beautiful cut, great guitar-driven cut with some interesting guitar work on it. I think Mike's voice works great against the acoustic guitar, against that acoustic six string. Nice change of pace. Going back to basics a little bit on this one. I like it.

All right, we have the one, the only, Lucy Dacus. "Ankles" and "Limerance", two new tracks from her, her upcoming album, both of which tell very different stories. Very different stories. One of which – the most interesting of the two, in my opinion – where she's afraid to tell this person that she wants to break up with them, and she doesn't want to break their heart. She's going back and forth between what's better, the lie or the truth. They both hurt in some way. The other track has almost like an old a world Victorian feel to it, to the pianos and everything. It's very much a dainty theatrical ballad with some beautiful poetry to it. There's a lot of range between these two tracks and they're both beautiful songs. I'm really looking forward to seeing what other bases Lucy covers on this forthcoming album, considering how varied these two cuts are and how good they both are.

We have Horsegirl, who is just going full, raw, meditative, almost like kraut-rocky indie rock. On the tracks and singles to their forthcoming album. "The Switchover" is the latest of them, and is also hypnotic, is also groovy. I also love the way their vocals meld together in a relaxed and very entrancing way. But shout out to Horsegirl. Really killing it on these new cuts.

Also, Gates of Hell, if you're looking for some death core that's actually creative and wild and experimental and out there with a nutty performance, absolutely nutty performance on this track. I love specifically this one spot where the band, before the breakdown, slows down to the breakdown. The riffs and the drums are synced up, but tempo-wise, they all in unison slow down a little bit. They have a gradually slowing tempo, and then the breakdown hits, and it's absolutely crazy. It's absolutely nuts. It's a blistering track that is totally relentless, totally badass, and really looking forward to this album, Death Comes to All. I mean, that's a fact if I ever heard one.

Also, shout out to Baths, who I think has really nailed it on this new single over here titled "Eden". It's a great combination of beat music and psychedelic pop and art pop. The vocals are going crazy. The percussive noises that are worked into the instrumental are very organic and odd and almost have an ASMR of quality on the ears. It's very interesting little home production from an artist who has been doing their thing for years and years and years and years and years at this point. You can really hear the skill that goes into the details of this instrumental. Baths is a veteran of the game at this point. You can most definitely tell from all the details and just all the layers and all of the special little packages and bits and nooks and crannies of this song.

All right.

Anthony Fantano, Weekly Tracks, Forever.