Everyone’s favourite global pop star ™ CMAT announces her second album with the catchy, carefree strut of ‘Have Fun!’, a sage-burning, fiddle-toting summer smash that’s as much about green parakeets fluttering around London as it is about firmly shutting the door on an era-defining relationship. CMAT on ‘Have Fun!’: “This is a song about ring necked parakeets that are wild in London, but it is also a song about getting over a breakup and moving on from an emotional stalemate even when you don’t, or can’t, forgive the other person’s actions. I suppose it is a song about how things in life are never satisfying, and don’t make sense, but they exist anyway and we have to make the best of it. And have fun!” ‘Have Fun!’ is the second single from her just announced second album, Crazymad, For Me. The 12-track album – out via AWAL Recordings on October 13 – is a “an abstract break-up album – about what happens when you are still angry about something that happened 10 years ago”. It’s also a concept record of sorts – involving time travel, Belle Epoque Paris and a woman who may or may not be CMAT in the future. The ‘Have Fun!’ video – an ambitious summary of the album’s central concept – was shot in Paris and Dublin by Collective Film. CMAT on the ‘Have Fun!’ video: “I did two days in gay Paree with a wonderful motley crew of amazing locals who transported me back to la belle epoque so convincingly I was ready to storm the Bastille by the time it was done. The video for ‘Have Fun!’ Sort of encompasses the whole big wide overarching “theory” behind the album, actually. I hope you love it!!” ‘Have Fun!’ was co-produced by Matias Téllez and Rob Milton, and mixed by Matias at his studio in Bergen, Norway.
Last year, the Nashville snot-rockers Be Your Own Pet reunited for the first time in over a decade, and they spent this past March darting around SXSW with all the pent-up energy of an upstart band. And that was all in service to a good cause: Be Your Own Pet’s first new album in 15 years. The just-announced Mommy lands in August, and it reunites the band’s founding members Jemina Pearl Abegg, Jonas Stein, and Nathan Vasquez on record, alongside longtime drummer John Eatherly. “For better or worse, we all were slapped in the face that it wasn’t as easy on our own,” Stein said of BYOP’s time away. “We were all moderately successful, but nobody found that Be Your Own Pet chemistry.” They already teased the album with single ‘Hand Grenade‘ back in March, and now they’re sharing another new song, ‘Worship The Whip,’ a giddily amped-up one with a sadomasochistic bent. “‘Worship The Whip’ is about the right wing authoritarian personality,” Pearl said. “Aggressive and domineering to people who don’t think like them, while at heart being a submissive to the authority figures who use and abuse them.” Watch a video for the track below. [via Stereogum]
Delilah Holliday has released a brand new track, ‘Silent Streets’. It’s taken from her forthcoming EP Invaluable Vol. 1, which is set to arrive July 7 via One Little Independent Records. “People were too scared to go out. And the streets were kind of silent still,” she says. “Nobody was really interacting. And I just thought that was a really abstract, interesting concept to put in the song and sort of make it dancey, of being too scared to mingle, but it’s a clubby track. I like the juxtaposition. This whole project really is about juxtaposition and mixing things together that don’t really go because that’s how started. It’s the spark that inspired all the other songs. Genre blending and putting pieces together that don’t quite fit.” This informed the creepy accompanying music video for the track: “For the ‘Silent Streets’ music video, me and Swarmm wanted to create an apocalyptic metaverse inspired by London, reimagined if the pandemic lasted for 20 years and how that would effect the natural phenomena around us. Which the song also touches on. We achieved this by 3D Scanning my body and inserting into the environment Swarmm created. The whole aesthetic of the video is inspired by the dawn of artificial intelligence.” [via DIY]
Taylor Swift has shared a new official video for the new version of ‘Karma’ featuring Ice Spice. Swift recently dropped a new deluxe version of her 10th album Midnights, titled Midnights (Til Dawn Edition), featuring the Ice Spice remix of ‘Karma’ among other tracks. That same night, the rapper joined Swift to close out the first of multiple nights at East Rutherford’s MetLife Stadium for her ‘Eras’ tour. In the official video for ‘Karma’, which dropped after the performance and was directed by Swift, she appears in a host of different locations including on a yellow brick road, trapped in an hourglass and inside a lightbulb. Once Ice Spice joins the party, the pair row a boat across the sea. [via NME]
Dorian Electra has disclosed their new single ‘Sodom & Gomorrah’. Watch the video, directed by Electra and Weston Allen, below. It follows on from Electra’s recent release, the ‘Freak Mode’ single, in April. Speaking about the song, Electra has said, “Sodom & Gomorrah is the biblical story of two cities that were so sinful that God destroyed them. The word Sodomy – derived from this story – has often been used to oppress queer people, so I wanted to reclaim it in a bratty, slutty, sexy song. Musically, I was inspired by the pop I grew up on (Britney Spears, Missy Elliot), but with a modern twist, and heavy guitars.” Electra has recently embarked on a viral marketing campaign that involved spreading posters featuring the phrase ‘I <3 SODOMY’. [via DIY]
The name on everyone’s lips, BIG WETT, returns with another banger in ‘GSPOT’ accompanied by the new video. The track is taken from her debut 6-track EP P*$$Y set for release September 22 via Play It Again Sam. Sirens, fat bass, skittering hi-hats, a deep, booming vocal driving it forward, ‘GSPOT’ is another electronic-laden track with BIG WETT’S unmistakably catchy, filthy and fun lyrics. “This track has it all. If you didn’t know where your G-spot was before, you do now,” proclaims the artist. Taking the global dance music scene by storm, her songs are tinged with undertones of queer pride, femme power and sexual empowerment, making her one of the moment’s most intriguing new artists with an overwhelming stage presence and personality to match.
K.ZIA is an artist engrossed in culture. Brussels-born, now Berlin & Dakar-based, the singer-songwriter is experienced in the modern world and its intricacies, and you can hear that in her sound. Amalgamating elements of R&B, soul, pop, Afrobeats and more, the songstress holds the unique collection of stylistic characteristics together with her endearingly soulful vocals. Moving to the German capital back in 2017, she began pursuing a career in music ad released her debut EP the following year. January 2022 saw her release her impressive debut album, Genesis. A year a half or so later, K.ZIA has returned with her latest body of work, this time in the shape of vibrant EP Kintsugi Heart. The EP portrays a journey through difficult times, with the artist open about her struggles with depression across the tape. Eclectic, groove-laden instrumentals provide a serene and sultry backdrop for K.ZIA to immerse listeners in her stunning vocals and personal, thoughtful lyrics. Speaking on the EP, the singer comments, “After struggling with depression for the first time in 2020, I embarked on a journey of self-discovery and spiritual reconnection. I traveled, practiced sports, and wrote extensively to understand my life’s purpose and spiritual state. Through these experiences, I was able to heal myself and create a potion that I hope will help others heal too. “Kintsugi Heart” – from the Japanese pottery practice Kintsugi where they mend broken pieces with golden glue is a metaphor for embracing our flaws and imperfections and emerging from difficult times more beautiful with our scars. This EP is the acknowledgement of a time of deep sadness, accepting it, expressing it and healing from it. It is a journey through love, struggle, darkness, introspection, growth and light. It is the final burial of my depression and the Panacea to hopefully prevent another.” [via Wonderland]
Pop veteran NJOMZA plays Doctor in her new music video for production led, R&B earworm, ‘Love Again’, the lead track from recently released EP, STAGES. The creator of ‘The Love Again Method’, Dr. NJOMZA works with a group of volunteers to be part of her groundbreaking new treatment to return the spark in their relationships – Phase 1: therapy, phase 2: a questionable physical treatment, and phase 3: reintegration; which appears to go wrong as the couples pair up with the wrong partners. Directed by Mac Grant, NJOMZA stars in this fun, comical short film. A collection of late-night R&B, atmospheric dance sonics and synth-pop sensibilities backing NJOMZA’s sultry vocal, STAGES sees the singer-songwriter at her most authentic, having created a signature style formed from an impressive melting pot of influences. [via Broadway World]
Madison Beer isn’t silent anymore! After a million years (not really, but it feels like it) we’re finally getting a new Madison Beer album! ‘Home To Another One’ is the latest release from her upcoming new project. In this alien-themed video, Madison craftily blends both vintage and futuristic vibes to create a mystical, magical intergalactic fantasy. A posh take on classic tv shows of decades past, Madison plays a housewife who knows she isn’t the only one in her lover’s life. Beautifully crooning the woeful phrase, “Call me baby, I know you go home to another one,” it’s clear that although this isn’t a healthy love it’s impossible to let go. [via The Honey POP]
