In Sofia Dobrushin’s ‘Codependency,’ being codependent isn’t a pathological personality flaw but a rallying cry. The Brooklyn-based actor, director, and musical comedian’s ballad is as smart and original as it is catchy, taking the stack of self-help books we have sitting on our nightstands and building something useful out of them; in this case, a song that celebrates our messy, often ridiculous humanity. The video is a technicolor-dipped, ‘80s-inspired dreamland of violet and glitter hearts, informed by John Waters and public access dating show camp. In the video, Dobrushin, who uses she/they pronouns interchangeably, plays herself and hosts a dating show titled “Attached at the Hip” that goes haywire, to say the least. “Codependency/ Stay in bed from 3 to 3/ Bed sores and monogamy/ The only way I want to be,” Dobrushin sings with a natural performer’s vibrato with a melody that plays on loop in your brain like the comforting, incessant reminder of sticky note affirmation on a mirror, backed by Dobrushin’s own close harmonies and light, glistening guitar from Evan Sites. Dobrushin wrote ‘Codependency’ in 2020 during a time when a lot of their friends were moving in with their partners during the pandemic. Dobrushin and their partner Matt Albani, who is also in the video, ultimately decided not to live together. (They do live together now.) “My Cancer-cusp-Leo brain was like, ‘how do I rationalize this? So I bought like three self-help books: Attached, All About Love by bell hooks and Pleasure Activism. I haven’t finished one of those books,” Dobrushin tells NYLON. “I read the one chapter of Attached, where it was like, ‘Codependency is a myth’ and I was like, ‘oh my god what?’ And then I closed it and put it away and now I’m here. I hadn’t heard about codependency in a positive way of, maybe, you’re not crazy and have attachment issues, maybe you’re just not getting your needs met.” Dobrushin produced the song alongside Sites in the winter of 2021 in a recording studio in their room, and shot the video around the same time with a group of their actor and comedy friends, including rising comedy and music stars Jes Tom, Gara, and Softee. While Dobrushin directed the video, their roommate Caroline Knight assistant-directed and edited alongside Dobrushin’s childhood best friend Gaby Sant’Anna, whom Dobrushin grew up filming sketches with. The video’s behind-the-scenes intimacy and conspiratorial silliness is as crucial to it as its aesthetic. The real breakthrough moment, so to speak, of ‘Codependency,’ isn’t the earnest acceptance of the flawed parts of our personalities; it’s the tongue-in-cheek, poking fun of our obsession with self-diagnoses at all. “Only child syndrome is my scapegoat for never taking any accountability,” Dobrushin sings in one line. “My therapist says it’s from my dead dog,” they declare in another, drawing out “eh” in “dead.” “But that’s not how my brain works/ Believe me I’ve tried/ I’ve read Pleasure Activism 45 times,” Dobrushin adds again at a particularly observant moment. As much as we’d like to read a book or follow an Instagram account to figure out why we’re sad, it’s not that simple; we can’t blame our anxieties on being an only child or having a childhood dog die, and ‘Codependency’ pokes fun at the very real school of thought that suggests reading Pleasure Activism makes you more self-actualized, something someone might want to tell the three separate people Dobrushin saw reading the book Jacob Riis beach last week. “When I write comedy songs, it’s really when I’m just feeling a lot of things and music is easier for me to compartmentalize,” Dobrushin says. “It’s fun to have people come up to you and be like, I did not know this was something other people felt.’ You feel like you’re in an echo chamber and then it starts to resonate with people and you remember why you did it.” [via NYLON]

UK vocalist Chrissi has shared new single ‘Lipo’. Blending soulful songwriting with a tendency to over-share, this Essex riser is the all-too-relatable voice you’ve been waiting to hear. Last year’s Back In The Day EP was a sparkling debut, and Chrissi returns with something new as summer hits its peak. ‘Lipo’ is a tongue-in-cheek ode to a failed romance, with Chrissi musing on male expectations, and body positivity. Out now on her own Listen Generously imprint, ‘Lipo’ has a fun exterior, but there’s a serious message underneath. “​I wrote ‘lipo’ because I was upset with a guy who’s sexualised me and then decided he couldn’t be with me because he didn’t want his friends to know what he’s into,” she says. Transforming a negative experience into something more positive, she laughs: “Everyone has to kiss a few frogs I suppose… Made a banger out of it though!” The video comes from Denisha Anderson of Caviar, and features Chrissi (and friends) engaging in a fun dance routine. [via Clash]

With her new album Hold The Girl set for release on September 16 via Dirty Hit, Rina Sawayama is releasing the video for the title track. Directed by Ali Kurr, the video acts as a “metaphor for Rina’s emotional breakthrough in therapy” which inspired her to write the song. “’Hold the Girl’ was the first song I wrote for the record at the end of 2020–I had gone to therapy and had a revelation, so I decided to write this song…that was the start of it,” Rina explains. “I was crying before going into the studio to write about it.” [via DIY]

Former IZ*ONE member and soloist Choi Yena has released the music video for ‘Smartphone’, the title track of her sophomore mini-album of the same name. In the vibrant visual, Choi is a gamer who guides an avatar of herself through a playground filled with whimsical mascots, eventually stopping at a shooting game inspired by the Five Nights at Freddy’s franchise. “Mix and match as you like / Airplane in my hands / No matter where you’re going or what you’re going to do, get connected / This star is too narrow to contain me,” Choi sings. [via NME]

Stella Donnelly’s new album Flood will arrive at the end of this month, and now she’s promoting it with one more advance single following ‘Lungs’ and the title track. The brisk ‘How Was Your Day?’ taps into the talky vocal vibes that are all the rage these days, but in a way that reminds u of Blur’s ‘Parklife’ turned wistful. It’s an approach Donnelly’s been rocking since her 2019 breakthrough Beware Of The Dogs, and it sounds incredible here. Donnelly on the lyrics: “This is my attempt at building a song out of a very specific dynamic between two monogamously involved people. The verses are just excerpts from real conversations, fragments of what two people talk about when they both know they need to have a real talk but neither wants to be the one to bring it up. This song came out of lockdown and seeing a lot of friends break up or get married.” As for the video, by Nick Mckk and Claire Giuffre, Donnelly writes, “This video does a really good job of portraying how annoying I am! We shot it from opposite sides of the world which was a little bit stressful but a lot of fun.” [via Stereogum]

Ahead of their debut album, Truly Trash, due October 28, London-based international punk quartet Ghost Car are sharing their new single and video, ‘Sex’. Ghost Car look to make the most of their diversity by exploring different writing styles, all the while expressing themes of openness and empowerment. Their new album provides Ghost Car with that platform, as they rage against political injustice and attack patriarchal inequality, homophobia, racism, and toxic relationships. The album was originally planned to be released by Burger Records, though the band pulled out of the release as accounts of sexual assault and exploitation of women by associates of the label came to light. Ghost Car say, “This album is our way to express what bothers us, from personal interactions to international politics. We wanted to explore different themes in a simple way so that they could be accessible to everyone.” Of the video, they say: “We asked our good friend Simon Eaves, who is a director and also in the band Pleasure Complex, to direct this. We’ve always loved his style and knew he would send the song into another dimension, literally. The idea originally was to have Maeve as Kuntessa’s character but we all loved Kuntessa’s style as a performer and thought she brought a different kind of energy we really needed. She is that annoying person you’re stuck in a lift with, no awareness of personal space but also doesn’t give a sh*t. The concept is really just all of us slumming it in a lift: Clara, late for an interview, Laura, the psycho boss from hell, Maeve, the nonchalant grocery shopper, and Cece as a depressed mechanic working in the building, and then Scott, the weird, male architect no one asked for. The idea was contextually different than the content of the lyrics; Simon’s idea was to really go into that feeling of headbanging to your favorite pop banger. There’s something really jumpy about the staccato chords we like. Then when we all hit the ground, we all lose it and get that euphoric, full-body feeling. I suppose it’s about feeling really uptight, going to work, then clocking off, going to that gig, hearing music really loud, incredible. The euphoric part when the music goes a bit more extraterrestrial was so fun to shoot; look at our hair! Our make up! Our outfits! The making of it was pretty wild; Simon managed to pull it all together in two weeks, even sourcing a real elevator, real buttons to push, the ‘sex’ lift panel, real posters made by Maria De La O Garrido, etc. The attention to detail was just incredible. So they rebuilt it for the set, and that’s us, in a real elevator, having existential breakdowns.” The grungy pop-punk anthem and lead single ‘Sex’ channels names like Stiff Little Fingers and The Undertones, mixing the band’s ’60s girl-group influences with the explosive rock sound of iconic acts like The Runaways. The band say that the track is, “about having an interaction with someone once and thinking more of it than it actually was. Especially with social media, being able to see that person all the time, thinking you have a connection when really you just snogged them at a party once. It made us so happy to be a band formed by women from different parts of the world but with the same feelings and frustrations!” [via New Noise]

Whether your head is in the clouds or your feet are planted firmly on the ground, you’ll find ‘Balance’ with Aaria Tae’s new track. Mixing 70s soul with Kendrick Lamar-esque flutters, her distinct melodic tone pierces across dark soulful basslines – effortlessly dancing between sonic spectrums. The stunning self-directed video is in her own words a ‘London meets Egypt’ fever-dream, an offering of self-acceptance as she realises she doesn’t need to be boxed into one culture. “At first, I found it hard feeling like I did not belong to just one specific culture but I have now come to see how it is what makes me and my art stand out” – and thanks to visually captivating drops such as this, we are waiting on tenterhook for her next move. [via Wonderland]

Jazzie Young’s melodic charisma could have easily been inherited. The LA-based indie pop artist is the daughter of Jesse Colin Young whose band The Youngbloods and their iconic anthem, ‘Get Together’ was a major influence in the 60s movement. Jazzie herself looks like a page out of a 60s magazine and sounds like the soundtrack of a long drive up in Malibu in a vintage Ford convertible. For her second EP 27 Club, Jazzie showcases her evolution of sound and further experimentation as an artist providing the listener with velvet smooth vocals and music to float away to. She has just released the title track and it’s accompanying video. Jazzie tells Ladygunn of the song: “I love this song because I feel like the lyrics are very real, but there’s a really cheeky, funny attitude layered on top of the song that keeps it lighter and more tongue-in-cheek. The upbeat piano and production definitely help with that too. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the idea of the “Saturn Return,” but it’s basically this concept of completing these heavy cycles in your life and that’s said to happen around the age of 27. And the strange thing for me was it really hit me like a semi-truck as soon as I turned 27 last year. The whole year was just filled with so much learning and digging through trauma and growing. It was like a year of emotional spring cleaning, which is rough, but also so liberating once you’re through it! So about half way through 27, I really just wanted to write about how I was feeling, but in a way that wasn’t too heavy. I wanted honesty and humor, and that’s where ’27 club’ was born. [via Ladygunn]

Aotearoa all-stars Dateline share the final single from their upcoming debut album Dumb For My Age, out on August 27 via Sunreturn, plus a video directed by Olivia McClymont. The talented foursome of songwriter Katie Everingham, Callum Devlin (Hans Pucket) Priya Sami (BUB) and Ruby Walsh (Lips) feature in the new clip, with a cameo from Annabel Kean (Sports Team and recent UTR Assistant editor). Recorded by Callum Passells (also of Hans Pucket), the visuals for ‘Love Hertz’ show the band in a doctor’s waiting room, where Everingham’s pining for the healing touch of an alluring doctor (Geo Bidois) becomes extreme (and extremely relatable). The grungy pop-infused distortion electrifies Everingham’s delicate vocals and attentive lyrics in a suitably fuzzy blur of infatuation… “I think I was just being a bit moody when I wrote this… It’s me kind of complaining while acknowledging that actually life and love is good and I wouldn’t change anything, but I may just go “humph” from time to time,” Katie Everingham explains. Olivia McClymont adds: “‘Love Hertz’ was an extraordinarily fun music video to make… the premise for the Love Hertz is a bit literal! It’s about how far you’ll go to be with your ‘true’ love… even if that love isn’t reciprocated. Sometimes love truly hurts! Perhaps this is a bit of a warning to anyone who might think otherwise? Self-love before all other kinds of people! In the video, Katie figures the only way she can be with the Doctor she’s enamoured with is if she has legitimate reasons to go to the hospital… but is it all worth it in the end? (short answer – no, haha).”” [via Under The Radar]

Tāmaki Makaurau via Pōneke duo Earth Tongue, aka Gussie Larkin (Mermaidens) and Ezra Simons (Soft Bait), have unleashed their first official new tune since 2019’s debut long player Floating Being. Entitled ‘Miraculous Death’ and recorded with Jonathan Pearce (The Beths), Earth Tongue have created a self-directed cinematic masterpiece in miniature for the single, visually channeling the lurid spirit of ’70s European horror and suspense, while pushing the over the top elements of their own heavy-psych / prog-rock sound to delirious heights. Shot by Simons on French 16mm cinema camera and ’80s lenses, star of the clip Larkin explained Earth Tongue’s commitment to conveying the true feel of classic horror in their stunning visuals, made with support from NZ On Air. “When I went to the states a few years ago I visited The Stanley Hotel from The Shining – not the one they shot the film in, the ACTUAL hotel that Stephen King stayed in which inspired the novel,” says Gussie. “That was a cool spooky experience that lingered in my mind for a few years after. I’d been daydreaming about finding a location like that and had even looked into filming at The Chateau Tongariro, although that didn’t work out. I found this house on a shoot location website and it felt like striking gold! It literally ticked every box – the mini hedge maze, the fountains, the winding staircases and OTT dining room. It’s usually a wedding venue but the people who owned the place were very generous with letting us run wild for a day.” [via Under The Radar]

HYRA is throwing it back to the early days of hyperpop with her new single, ‘REM (No Sleep).’ The energetic track draws upon the ever-looming impact of PC Music on today’s cultural landscape and marries elements of its production with that of more mainstream EDM, morphing it into a musical framework that’s as synthetic as it is real. That realness comes through HYRA’s songwriting: “The track is about falling in love with somebody to the point that they’re present in your dreams,” she tells PAPER. “It’s the romanticization of being with someone so adamantly that the ‘person of your dreams’ becomes your reality. REM paints the picture of fast nights infused with energetic and numbing love.” HYRA comes from a long lineage of pop songwriters who combine their emotive side on the lyrics with boisterous electronic production, with Charli XCX and Lady Gaga having been two of her biggest influences. She’s bounced back and forth between all of the US pop capitals — LA, NYC and Miami — and brought with her a full deconstruction of the genre. As a filmmaker herself, HYRA has a keen eye for visuals, waking us up in a futuristic hospital-of-sorts painted in full white. It’s a scenery that normally serves to sterilize — sucking the life out of anything that enters its four walls — but it can’t stop HYRA and her guests from partying the night away before we’re blasted into the real world, color and all. [via PAPER]

Almost two years since the release of the critically acclaimed Conscious Control, KAYE releases her latest EP Neon God. In a new era of freedom from former relationships, societal expectations of women in their thirties, and self-restraint, KAYE has created a masterclass in bridging rock, disco and pop. The EP also arrives with an official video for ‘Respect Me’. On ‘Respect Me,’ she allows her bass skills to shine through on the funk-driven anthem. The official video was directed by KAYE’s sister Liann Kaye. This marks their 15th video together; a testament to the creative identity the two sisters have crafted over the years. In the video, KAYE and her girl band of clones shred and seduce, all with her signature style of kooky choreography.

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Portland’s Jessica Boudreaux — known as the creative force behind indie-punk band Summer Cannibals (Tiny Engines, Kill Rock Stars) — has released her brand new I Think My Heart Loves to Break EP. She also shared the final single from the collection, ‘Loves to Break.’ Backed by rolling bass and infectious electronic elements, the noir-pop track details the cycle of being drawn to someone despite persistent heartbreak. The punk energy that defined Summer Cannibals still resonates in a form of direct intent, as she contemplates surrender, asking: “Wonder if I drop it all, I’ll stop hitting the same old fucking walls.” But in place of the massive distorted guitars, the song’s intensity comes from a careful and considered orchestration of sounds flowing over a steady beat and allowing Boudreaux’s signature vocals to shine.

Last month, Stella Donnelly announced her sophomore album Flood. So far we’ve heard lead single ‘Lungs,’ and today she’s back with the title track. “This song feels like a sad little adventure,” Donnelly said in a statement. “I wrote it in the dark depths of a Melbourne winter lockdown where it had been raining for consecutive weeks. Everyone around me was falling into their own version of depression at different times. It felt like a flood of trauma yet at the same time, we were given an opportunity of time to work through stuff that weʼd been distracting ourselves with for so long prior to the pandemic.” ‘Flood’ also comes with a video directed by Donnelly, Nick McKk, and Grace Goodwin. “This clip is pure ridiculous play, like going to your grandparents’ house where you and your cousins would get up to the most elaborate film projects,” Donnelly said. “We always ran around the house making home movies that tried to re-enact other films and much like this clip here, they always ended in some sort of minor catastrophe. With this video for ʻFloodʼ we have made a very feeble attempt at recreating the legendary OK GO video clip for ʻHere it Goes Againʼ and we failed gloriously.” [via Stereogum]

With her debut album Doomed set for release on September 21, Jesse Jo Stark is sharing new single ‘Modern Love’. “’modern love’ is a song that came in a moment, out in the world watching a new kind of love happen all around me,” she explains. “Something in my guts told me we’ve crept away from the pure love I have always wanted. People making friends as accessories. climbing people like ladders. It made me feel like a stranger in my own body.” [via DIY]

First Aid Kit have returned with their first piece of original music since 2019. The Swedish sister duo share their single ‘Angel,’ along with an accompanying music video. Lyrically, ‘Angel’ seems to document a relationship on the brink of collapse, as First Aid Kit square up their narrator’s anxieties with their love interest’s hostility: “What has that fear ever done for me but hold me back?/ What has jealousy and hate ever done for you but remind you of what you think you lack?” Klara Söderberg sings in the first verse over a fingerpicked guitar. Then, in the bombastic chorus, the sisters stand their ground by listing their demands: “Give me love and give me compassion/ Self-forgiveness and give me some passion/ I love you even though you can’t love me,” they sing in their trademark harmony. Watch the Mats Udd-directed music video for ‘Angel’ above. [via Consequence]

With the first single. ‘Anything But Time’, from their new EP, Beach Baby, Baby, Nick & June float in a glittering fog of trilling synthesizers, gentle beat and drum pulses and vibrating organ sounds. Embedded in dark reverb guitars, the bitter-sweet paired voices of Suzie-Lou Kraft and Nick Wolf lead the way through euphorically orchestrated restraint and meditative ramifications of thought. Where parallels were once drawn to artists like Bon Iver, Damien Rice, and Angus & Julia Stone, now also Beach House, Mazzy Star, and Lana Del Rey, peer through the reverb-veil. “The song was written really fast, very stream-of-consciousness, really really fast. It’s a brief song, with simple sounds, in fact just an old Casio keyboard and a drum machine, with lots of ideas in it. We don’t do too much talking about the lyrics so people can interpret them in their own way. Besides, sometimes even we don’t know one hundred percent what they mean.“ The band shot the accompanying video in an old hotel in Berlin, a late 19th-century tenement house that was once home to silent movie star Asta Nielsen. “We have watched many classics of film history and all time favorites in Pandemic – maybe that’s why the overall concept of the EP has a cinematic touch. With these impressions absorbed, we quickly had a firm idea of what the video should look like. The Hotel Funk in Berlin, as an already stunning location, was adapted even more to our wishes by Lillie Ceben, who was responsible for the set design, and Jeanette Friedrich then captured them and shortened them to two minutes thirty – which was really hard with such beautiful material. I believe that with Maja Bons as the actress, we have found the one person who can make this video fun from head to toe.“

Crawlers have shared a new video for ‘Fuck Me (I Didn’t Know How To Say)’. The recently-dropped track follows the band’s absolute mega-hit ‘Come Over (Again)’. Speaking about the song, Crawler’s Holly says: “‘Fuck Me (I Didn’t Know How To Say)’ is a song that’s very personal to us as a band. The song covers two ideas behind sex. First the trauma and disgust after sexual assault, and then the idea of how at the time of writing it I haven’t felt loved and only used for my body and for sex rather than the love I really wanted at the time.” [via Dork]

Alt-pop iconoclast Layke has released her new single and music video, ‘XOXO,’ the latest offering from her forthcoming EP, Frequency, out July 29. Co-written with multi-platinum Grammy-nominated producer, songwriter, and artist Adrian Gurvitz (Andra Day, The Bodyguard Soundtrack, Stevie Wonder) and Transviolet’s Sarah McTaggart, the dance-club bop celebrates Layke’s journey of finding her voice within the LGBTQIA+ community and is a love letter to those who have embraced and supported her along the way. ‘XOXO’ is accompanied by a neon-clad music video that welcomes viewers into Layke’s vivid, candy-coated world featuring a diverse group of dancers meant to mirror the dazzling celebration of acceptance associated with Pride month. “It’s really an ode to the LGBTQIA+ community. This song makes you wanna move, makes you wanna dance,” Layke shares about the track. “It paints a vivid picture with lyrics like ‘prisms dripping light,’ ‘shining neon bright,’ and ‘we make the sun come out at night.’ It’s a true reflection of how enigmatic and beautiful each part of the community is.” Speaking about the music video, she adds, “It opens with a fierce choreo moment to welcome you into a vivid pastel neon rainbow candy coated world of all things fun. You’ll see familiar faces from my previous video, ‘No One Can Stop Us,’ who each represent a different aspect of the amazingly diverse queer community. We wanted to really highlight the brightness and love of Pride month and encourage everyone to keep that energy and Pride going 24/7 365. This is my dance love letter to the queer community!”

JUNO Award winning indie-rock juggernauts MONOWHALES return with another powerhouse release ‘StuckintheMiddle’. The Toronto based band, made up of vocalist Sally Shaar, guitarist Zach Zanardo and drummer Jordan Circosta, let rip a tiddle wave of catharsis on this explosive track exploring lead singer Sally’s complex relationship with self-identity. Through the unrelenting guitars and thumping drums, Sally screams out her spite, angst, and rage in hopes of growing self-aware enough to set herself free. In a statement about the single, Sally explained “Every day is a constant struggle, pushed and pulled around by my past, present and future. The deep seeded trauma from my upbringing can be so easily triggered it becomes unwelcomed habitual mannerisms, which I despise. Apparent and invisible expectations, instilled within me since the day I was born, are placed on every action I take. Do I choose to be a sweet, good girl, or an unapologetic rebel? It’s suffocating. ‘StuckintheMiddle’ is the caged-up embodiment of this unsteady confusion. At a certain point all this pressure starts to feel like a shaken-up bottle poised to explode. Singing the chorus, I feel like I am standing in the middle of a room screaming “What the fuck do you want from me?”. Accompanying the release is the new music video. The gruelling shoot sees Sally desperately fight against her restrains, set to the sterile setting of a classic 50s kitchen depicting what is expected of a woman in her position. “Those real (and heavy) chains were hooked to my arms for the entire shoot with folks on constantly pulling at them to get my real reaction of what it felt like to be pulled and dragged around. By the end the video, everything around me starts to crumble but I remain helpless no matter where I try to go. I had to pull up the deepest darkest places in my head to show this and by the end of this shoot I was physically and emotionally drained.”

Bay Area trio Rainbow Girls are currently on tour with revered singer-songwriter Ani DiFranco with upcoming California shows in Solana Beach and Los Angeles. In celebration of the appearances, they have released a new single, ‘Compassion to the Nth Degree,’ and an accompanying music video. The track is off a forthcoming full-length album of which few additional details have been revealed. Of the song, the group shares, “If you don’t like protest songs, you’ll love this. In a last-ditch effort to wrench up compassion for those we don’t see eye-to-eye with, we turn to love. This song names a kind of love previously undefined: love for the bigot, love for the thief, love for the destroyer. Infinite compassion. Only light can illuminate the darkness, so this is a sweet little love song for all the sh**heads out there.” Of making the music video, they add, “We made this video in our living room. We moved all our furniture outside, spent days taping aluminum foil to big pieces of plywood and hanging tinsel curtains. We bought gaudy cakes and donuts and covered them in glitter. We commissioned a custom eggplant emoji piñata from a woman in Oregon because we wanted a metaphor so blatant that even Party City couldn’t help us. We hired our dear friend Sam Chase to take a risk, take a test, and make this video with us (he also has a cameo in the video as our Donut Sommelier). We wanted to create a liminal zone lacking substance. A sugar-coated wonderland reflecting the vapid distractions and bulging vanity we were seeing all over social media, despite the very alarming reality of the world falling apart in every conceivable way. The thing is, we set out to make something airbrushed and fluffy and stupid in order to ridicule an internet culture that can be all of those things, and in doing so had the most fun ever filming a video. We got to makeout with glitter lollipops and roll around in cotton candy clouds- what’s not to love?????” [via Grateful Web]

A brilliant songwriting mind with a smooth, provocative voice, jena keating is turning heads with her new song, ‘Nobody Can Have Me’. The London-based Irish artist is an exciting creative who loves to explore genres which she chooses to align with, unafraid to break the mold. While her music could be considered alternative R&B, it also holds space for so many other musical genres such as jazz, rap, and pop. Her creative talents put her in a unique space that puts her a cut above. ‘Nobody Can Have Me’ is a personal song for jena, who describes the song by saying that it “encapsulates the painful detachment from a love not capable of lasting that long but did. It stores a solid truth that nobody ever will ‘have’ wholefully me, but it comes from a source deeply burrowed in fear. It is misfortune, longing, resentments. It holds the process of healing while also grasping the sound of no more.” [via Wordplay Mag]

Jessie Reyez is done putting up with a ‘Fraud’ in her first new solo music since the release of her debut album Before Love Came to Kill Us. Reyez makes her directorial debut in the single’s accompanying video alongside co-director Emma Higgins. The vivid clip features Reyez and a group of women who paint the walls red with blood while dealing with a couple of devilish men. They soon find themselves in a lush setting, where flowers bloom, making their own kind of Garden of Eden, free from the evil. “‘Oh, you’re such a fucking fraud,” she sings, calling out the betrayal. “Your lies they go on and on and on.” She laments the lack of loyalty and the pain of loving somebody who doesn’t love you back. [via Rolling Stone]

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BEX has dropped a brand new single, ‘Tiptoe’, sees the artist’s 2022 debut and features heavy bass plucks, annihilating drums, and witty vocals across a riotous music video. Describing herself as, “a punk-rocker who wants the music to speak again” BEX is a young artist looking to reshape the rock industry through a lens of hard-hitting riffs, feminist lyrics and cutting-edge videos. Amongst this BEX balances out all the things that “suck,” such as: sexism, racism, fast fashion, judgementalism and heartbreak with pleasantly uplifting things like: riffs, self-expression, expressive art, inclusion, equality, feminism and last (and certainly not least) respect. Speaking about the track she says: “Lyrically ‘Tiptoe’ is about males who take advantage of women, ‘just because we perform it doesn’t welcome you off stage’. The chorus reflects on men taking action and the consequences that come from it. Musically the track is just riffs, fat riffs. A simple punk structure with two alternative bass lines that compliment each other. ‘Tiptoe’ is simple but meaty. The song is filled with alot of rage and rebellion against female norms, standing up for myself/ourselves and other females who have been in vulnerable situations. The track is in favour of post modern feminism.” Recorded in the first lockdown, ‘Tiptoe,’ is a track produced by Sam Cramer, and with BEX’s bass tones all created by hand on a custom pedalboard. ‘Tiptoe’ arrives with a vivid official video co-directed by BEX herself and videographer/photographer Olivia Brissett. Matching the soaring and beckoning energy of the track, BEX says of it: “The video is a visual representation of my anger and rage in the song. Also representing female empowerment, and lastly… showing off my handmade outfits and masks.” Honourably gifted across the arts, BEX is not just a musician, as she admits, “I hand painted the artwork on a canvas,” about the single’s artwork. Continuing her love for curating BEX expands on some of the projects she’s working on: “I have been making a zine that I am going to get printed, it’s like a little lyric and expansion book, all handmade. I also self directed the music video and I am currently in the process of editing it! I love making things, I made all the outfits for the music video as well as the masks. Nearly everything is DIY, I love having the ability to portray my personality creatively.”

In 2019, the Australian musician Stella Donnelly released her debut full-length, Beware Of The Dogs. Now she’s back with her sophomore album, Flood, which was written while Donnelly moved between various cities in her home country during lockdown. “I had so many opportunities to write things in strange places,” she said. “I often had no choice about where I was. There’s no denying that not being able to access your family with border closures, it zooms in on those parts of your life you care about.” Now, she’s sharing the playful lead single ‘Lungs,’ which comes along with a video that Donnelly co-directed with Duncan Wright. “Very loosely based on the Banded Stilts of my album cover, the character I play in red is a wobbly adult, doing their best with their new set of legs and responsibilities, trying to make it look easy but very much on unsteady ground,” she said in a statement. “I wanted this video to celebrate the child, firm in their footholds, intimidatingly honest, not to be messed with, they are the strength and power of this video no matter how much I try to assert myself as the boss.” [via Stereogum]

Phoebe Green will release her debut album Lucky Me on August 19. The songwriter has something special, with a string of project illuminating the patient innocence of her lyricism. The pensive title cut is online now, the optimism of the title undercut by word-play that deals with Phoebe Green’s own insecurities. She comments: “‘Lucky Me’ explores the idea of disguising self-destructive behavioural patterns due to a feeling of guilt for living a seemingly easy life. I’m very lucky in so many ways that I almost feel ungrateful for still experiencing such difficulties with my mental state. I frantically search for a trivial, tangible cause of distress so that I don’t have to dig too deep or accept that I might just be a bit mentally fucked, then altogether silence myself when I imagine how others may be perceiving me and my actions. The song represents the common defence mechanism of invalidating and dismissing my emotions before anyone else can.” Phoebe Green continues: “I wanted ‘Lucky Me’ to be the title track of the album as this is very much a running theme throughout; analysing and dissecting my experiences and emotions as opposed to feeling them, as they feel easier to digest that way. The title almost feels sarcastic and snarky depending on which way you look at it, and as I use humour to cope a lot of the time it does seem fitting. But I am actually extremely lucky to still be here so there is some sincerity in there somewhere.” [via Clash]

Down to the name, Number One Popstar makes no attempt to hide what she’s about. A mix of winking satire and loving tribute, the pop project spearheaded by singer and comedian Kate Jean Hollowell is both a quintessential chart-topping indie pop idol and a witty, irreverent send up of the genre. Having been likened to the Andy Kaufman of pop music, Number One Popstar is the sorely needed injection of humor we didn’t know was needed. Looking for relief from all her worries and woes, Number One Popstar is back with her latest single, ‘Dance Away the Pain.’ Full of glossy ’80s synths, the track sees Hollowell use her quirky strain of pop as a form of escapism, delivering a dark yet catchy hook of “My depression makes me go insane/I just wanna dance away the pain.” Not quite as overt as an SNL skit or a Weird Al Yankovic track, Number On Popstar manages to strike the right balance between humor and finely crafted melodies without making the music a joke. The single arrives alongside an equally absurd visual directed by Hollowell herself. Clad in a neck brace, the music video shows Number One Popstar hitting up the early bird special at the local family restaurant (which fittingly also looks like it hasn’t been updated for decades) to stuff her elderly compatriots’ faces and naturally dance away the pain. “I feel like pop music, especially pop music videos, are filled with young cool people, but I want to make music that brings joy to everyone, at any age, specifically 70+,” Hollowell says of the visual, which features a cast made up of real life friends she met at a Zumba class. “My hope is that this song is a celebration of not just dancing, but acknowledging the pain you’re going through.” [via PAPER]

Mysie has released a new video for ‘gin + juice’. It’s a cut from her new EP joyride, out now via Fraser T. Smith‘s label 70Hz, about the first time she met her ex-partner; “that exciting feeling I got before we were together,” she explains. “What I realise between every project is that I’m learning as I go,” she adds, of the EP as a whole. “I forget that’s what life is about, and I’ve learned so much from Joyride. It served as therapy to me.” [via Dork]

Rapidly rising Australian punk rock stars Teen Jesus and the Jean Teasers are thrilled to release their debut EP Pretty Good For A Girl Band via Domestic La La. To celebrate they’ve dropped a video for ‘Girl Sports,’ their blistering new single which was written in honor of the male dentist who said that bassist Jaida Stephenson should stick to “girl sports” after knocking her teeth out skating. Featuring nods to three classic teen films, the ‘Girl Sports’ video is everything you’d come to expect from the four-piece; in your face and won’t back down, but they’ll still have some fun along the way. On the video, Teen Jesus and the Jean Teasers say, “We had so much fun filming the ‘Girl Sports’ video. While the song encapsulates a lot of frustration and anger, we wanted to create a visual element that brought a more light-hearted feel to a song that touches on some pretty frustrating experiences a lot of women and non-males would relate to. We wanted to create a fun take on the idea of ‘girl sports’ by drawing inspiration from sport scenes in Clueless, St Trinian’s and Twilight (we hope we did the iconic pitching moment justice). We wanted the video to be fun as possible because everything we wanted to say, we had already screamed in ‘Girl Sports.’ The video is basically a big middle finger, you can’t touch us moment, to all the men that had and continue to look down on us.”

Los Angeles trio Lost Cat share their second single, ‘Bitch Fight,’ the latest track off their upcoming self-titled debut album, Lost Cat, due May 27 via Lolipop Records. As the rollicking fuzzed-out punk rock track proclaims, “If you don’t like it, you can go to hell!” Speaking on their newest single, band member Kiki wrote: “‘Bitch Fight’ was quietly written in my parent’s garage while they were sleeping…Originally, the lyrics were fist fight but when I brought the song to practice, Lucy thought she heard Bitch Fight and that’s where the name was coined. The song still needed a few more words, so the remainder of the song was again quietly written but this time at Angie’s dad’s house as he slept.”

Los Angeles hard rock outfit Starcrawler have released an official video for their single ‘Roadkill,’ directed by Gilbert Trejo (son of actor Danny Trejo) and featuring a cameo appearance by none other than Steve-O of Jackass infamy. In the video, the band is chased through the streets of LA by a raging pink jalopy with a grudge, driven by Steve-O. Interspersed with a very cool, stylized performance shoot, ‘Roadkill’ is perhaps the best example to date of Starcrawler’s super-swanky drip being fused with hard rock and punk. In talking about the track, vocalist Arrow DeWilde said, “‘Roadkill’ is about anyone that tries to dig their heels in the ground and stand in your way. We’ve all had people try to tear us down, and sometimes you just have to run right through them.” [via Metal Injection]

Award-winning French pop trio Hyphen Hyphen unveil a new single and accompanying music video, ‘Don’t Wait For Me’. ‘Don’t Wait For Me’ was co-written with six-time Grammy winner Glen Ballard (Alanis Morissette) and mixed by Charlie Holmes (Ed Sheeran).“In the midst of chaos, we’ve chosen the light! Here is our new song ‘Don’t Wait For Me.’ We had so much fun writing it with Mr. Glen Ballard, hope you’ll feel the energy. Don’t wait anymore!” says the band. “It was a great privilege to be invited into the creative circle with Hyphen Hyphen,” says Ballard. “Their exuberance and talent was a great inspiration. This band has joy and energy at their core…I’m forever a Hyphenate!”

The singer Carlota Flâneur broke onto the music scene a little less than two years ago with a her tender and colorful pop sound. Her first album uncertainty, will finally be released on September 16. On it, Carlota Flâneur explores all the forms, manners, angles and colors of pop within ten songs that stick in the memory and introduce the world into a fantastastical universe. Now, Carlota releases ‘lungs,’ the first single that the Barcelona artist is sharing from this first LP. It is a fresh and catchy song that hints at the next steps for the young singer. In the video clip for ‘lungs,’ Carlota Flâneur speaks to herself in different worlds full of color, snow and stars, creating a narrative between the apparently real and fictional spaces through a telephone as a common thread.

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