Hey, hi, and hello, everyone. Anthony Fantano here, the Internet's busiest music nerd. I hope you're doing well. It's time for a weekly track roundup. My thoughts, my feelings, my opinions, even, on a bunch of tracks that have dropped over the past week or so. Just basically letting you guys know what I think.

Worst Tracks of the Week.

Okay. Starting off with a new John Bellion track. Yep, basically, arrested development in pop music, once again, if you're really into that thing with bands like AJR, I could see you being into this track "Kid Again". I, however, am not. And yeah, it just seems really a basic and infantile, but that's just me.

All right, next off of this new track from BIA featuring Lil Yachty, "Pissed Off". I'm not too crazy about it. It doesn't sound pissed off enough. Yeah, unfortunately, especially when Yachty comes on. He needs to sound more pissed. Or there should have been a feature from somebody who was actually going to sound pissed on the song. It just seems like there was a concept there It was an idea, but not a lot of follow-through.

The tracks I was meh on are as follows.

This new one from The Weeknd and Playboi Carti is pretty mid and adventurous and not surprising at all. I mean, I do think vibe-wise and instrumentally, they do a decent job of creating some common ground over which they both fit. But I think Abel really had to dumb down his writing style and go back to an older version of himself to create something that would have made sense for Carti. Carti is just switching up his flow a million times in terms of his delivery, anyway. The flow itself is okay, and it seems like while the vibes are there, they forgot to write a memorable song. But yeah, that's all. Pretty uninteresting track all around.

New one from Young Thug with Nigo, "Dope Boy". And yeah, there's not really a whole lot to say about this. I mean, it does sound like one of Thugger's better features in a minute, but he has been in federal trial for quite a while now, so we're probably digging through the vaults on this one, and it just sounds unfinished. It feels like it could have been built out in a more of a song or maybe had another feature on it or something. There's just not really a whole lot to it. It's gone with the breeze once it's done.

Moving on from there, Tee Grizzly and Jay Cole, unfortunately, is not really the fireworks crossover that I was hoping for. However, there's not really a lot of topical or stylistic common ground between the both of them, so I guess I didn't really know what to expect.

We also have Stevie Nicks coming through here with her first new original track in quite a while, although it is giving some Netflix original music vibes, especially on the very loud big rocking chorus. Takes a minute to get started as well. I just think it's okay. It's all right. It's fine. It's passable.

We also have a new crossover between Maxo Kream and Tyler, the Creator, where I just don't really think they bring the best out in each other. It just sounds like very basic flexing from Tyler. Maxo does have some clever bits of wordplay here and there, but there's no real standout chorus, plus an instrumental that just sounds like a Neptunes rip off, but worse. It's just average, in my opinion.

We also have a new one from Linkin Park, which I think is a pretty decent step up from their last single. Yeah, it's rocking. It's got the Mike Shinoda raps. Emily Armstrong pretty much scratches that Chester Bennington raspy scream register itch. It's got a cool little jump the fuck up course at the very end. It's nothing super new or crazy Linkin Park, honestly. It feels like they're just really rehashing an old formula or two, but they're doing it decently well with a new singer that right now is on thin ice in a way. So I think it passed or surpassed a lot of very low expectations, and we could probably leave it there.

We also have pop queen Ms. Kylie Minogue, is apparently dropping a sequel to her Tension record, and there are a couple of tracks out from it. This one over here in particular, though, is "Lights, Camera, Action". It's got a decent chorus. It's just passable, near emotionless dance pop, though, without a lot of a personality to it. I'll say that.

We also have one over here from JADE, "Midnight Cowboy". If you're looking for some dark, murky dance pop that has a bit of a ballroom flair to it.

Also, this new one from Death's Dynamic Shroud, the experimental and electronic music collective, is back with a new single. You never really know what you're going to get. In this particular instance, it's like an art rock-y, art-poppy number with a lot of keys on it that sounds like a Muse demo. Interestingly enough, I'm not crazy about it, but it's for sure different and surprising that Death's Dynamic Shroud did this. I could say that much, even if it's not necessarily the direction I'm crazy about.

We also have The Cure with "Alone", brand new single. There are some aspects to the song that I feel like are great, especially the vocals. There are some aspects that I think are not so great, like the mix and the very grinding, trebbly, horrendous bass tone. But with that being said, I still think it's a pretty thoughtful meta track about the Cure and the state of the Cure and the creative trajectory, current day of the band, of the project, of Robert Smith. It's very lengthy, it's very downtrodden, and it's a very moody first single from this forthcoming album. I feel like it's mostly there. I just hope that future singles mix-wise and aesthetics-wise just sound a little bit better. Everything else just seems to be in working order. Again, especially the vocals, surprisingly so. Vocally, it does not sound like Smith has missed a beat at all. But there are some other aspects that I feel like are not going over quite as well. We'll see how things develop as we hear more from the record.

All right, we also have Amyl and the Sniffers, who have dropped another single, like their "Chewing Gum" one, that's a bit of a slow burner. I was hoping for a really rowdy lead up to this new album of theirs. But even this new one over here, "Big Dreams", really seems to be the band reeling it in a little bit and trying to make tracks that are a bit more slow burners, maybe more thoughtful. And I just feel like, I don't know, it's just not hitting for me quite as much. Maybe this is going to be the band's mood piece as far as the next album that they're dropping in their catalog over here. I guess we'll see. But fingers crossed that the heat turns up a bit more as we get nearer to the record release.

Best tracks of the week, they are as follows.

Bam.

Starting with Willow, who has put up a Deluxe Edition version with some extra tracks of her latest LP, Empathogen. This one over here features Kamasi Washington and is total freaking fire. It's more of that really impassioned piano rock that made the highlights on that record so good. But with Kamasi in the mix, it's even greater. "Wanted" is the title of the track.

Next, we have Sugar Pit, who is, I think, really answering the call with this popularity, this demand that we're seeing for music that is LCD Soundsystem-inspired. If you're into the Dare and you're really liking what the dare has been doing lately, I think you may get something out of hearing it done in a punkier, more raw, more lofi high fashion with Sugar Pit on this new track over here, "Magic", which is quite kooky. I'll say it's got those post-punk dance groups to it, the talk singing, but it feels very raw and very zany in a way that is specific to Sugar Pit if you've been listening to his various tracks and singles up until this point.

Also digging on this new one from Rosalia featuring Ralphie Choo. It's multifaceted, it's multigenre, and it's got some killer vocals from Rosalia to boot. Really liking the meld of ideas and influences on this one. It's a chaotic track, but still a very fun track.

We also have quickly, quickly, who's coming through with a Nick Drake cover. It's almost like if you could hear "From the Morning", but done in a way where it would appeal to the lo-fi study beat crowd, which maybe sounds weird, but aesthetically, it's a vibe that works for this song. It's a vibe that works. Give it a listen. It's actually a very pretty rendition, even if it's not taking a whole ton of very overt liberties with the track.

We also have Laura Marling, "Child of Mine", new single from her. Very beautiful ode to motherhood on this track. It's touching, it's moving, it's just gorgeous, it's poetic, it's wonderful. Laura continues to smash it in the lead up to her new full-length LP.

We also I have a Kembe X and Ab-Soul, "Introverted Extroverted". A track that sounds like it would have been a pretty thoughtful banger in the early 2010s. As far as like trap music, it's got like some hookiness, some head nodding beats and flows, and some standout and cheeky wordplay here and there. I'm really liking this one a lot, even if it does feel like a bit of a throwback. I feel like something like this hitting again could be fantastic. I'll say that.

All right, we have Blood Incantation who has seen fit to get us pumped for this forthcoming album of theirs. It's like the first three tracks from it. I want to point specifically to the song "The Stargate [Tablet 3]", which is an amazing climax. But listen to all three of the tracks from their forthcoming album, one of which actually features Tangerine Dream, which is crazy. But if you think about Blood Incantation, how much they're usually inspired by and into sci-fi stuff and synth stuff and so on and so forth, much more than most death metal bands that is. It's not that surprising of a connection to happen, and it actually goes over very well. So check out this track. It's an amazing, proggy, thrilling death metal epic. And again, they've only put out the first half of the record so far, so it'll be interesting to hear with the rest of it sounds like very soon because I believe the album is dropping Friday.

We also have cumgirl8, who has dropped a track, "ahhhh!hhhh! (i don't wanna go)", which is this off the wall, goth rock-inspired, a little post-punk number with some insane vocal passages and some great guitar work, too. I'm feeling like this is going to be one of the weirdest but most exciting albums of the year once it actually comes out. The Eighth Coming, believe it or not, is the title of their upcoming album. So shout out to them.

Shout out to Chat Pile, who is sounding very Melvins-esque, but more animalistic and wild on this new one "Funny Man" that I am absolutely loving. They are three for three with their new singles, if I'm remembering the number of tracks correctly.

And shout out to Chase Icon, who has come through with a very hilarious and cheeky dance track with some great group vocals on it and some very, very funny tongue and cheek lyrics on it as well. A great groovy production, too.

And finally, shout out to Beach Bunny, who is hitting us with "Clueless", which is a bit of a thoughtful contemplative little emo and pop rock-type anthem, all about aging and the world changing around you and coming to terms with that. And yeah, that's essentially it. Beach Bunny. "Clueless".

That has been the Weekly Track Roundup. Hopefully, again, you got some good recommendations out of this video. Thank you guys very much for watching. You're the best.

Anthony Fantano. Weekly Tracks. Forever.