New Music Friday on the eve of Labour Day Weekend is a weird one. Some years, it’s a ghost town as the music industry waits until we’re all back to work in September before dropping new singles and albums. Or depending marketing cycles, it can be rather busy. This year, there’s quite a bit that deserves our attention, especially if you like the name “Beth.”
Singles
1. Steve Mahabir, Summertime (AMG/UNI, Big Canoe Music)
Steve is an interesting dude from Toronto who I think has great potential. This is the second single from his upcoming sophomore album, Peace Love War & Hate, that is due sometime this fall. Perfect timing, too. Who won’t want to hear a song about the bittersweet end of summer? File this next to The Motels’ Suddenly Last Summer and Don Henley’s/AFI’s Boys of Summer. You will ache.
2. Good Neighbours, found u/mee (Polydor)
Good Neighbours is a new (est. 2024) English duo featuring Oli Fox and Scott Verrill. Their first single, Home, did well in the UK for a debut effort, reaching number 26 on the singles charts. This second single will also appear on their debut album, Blue Sky Mentality, which arrives on September 26. For fans of Bleachers, fun., Phoenix, and maybe event MGMT.
3. Fall Out Boy, Start Today (UMe)
Fall Out Boy is almost ready to release a 20th-anniversary edition of their breakthrough album, Under the Cork Tree. It will come as a 3 x LP/2 x CD box set along with a “super-deluxe digital edition.” This is a previously unreleased track–a cover of a song by band called Gorilla Biscuits–that’s being used to promote the reissue.
Albums
1. Bryan Adams, Roll with the Punches (BAD Records)
Bryan’s 17th album reunites him with Mutt Lange as a co-writer along with longtime partner Jim Vallance, and Eliot Kennedy. We’ve know about this record since at lead February when the title track was released as a single. Bryan has already spent a chunk of the summer playing these songs live. If you’re a fan, there’s a special edition featuring acoustic recordings. Watch for a box set, too.
2. The Beaches, No Hard Feelings (AWAL Recordings)
These women are one of my favourite Canadian bands of the last ten years. Their third record, coming two years after Blame My Ex, has already been partially revealed with the release of six advance singles (gotta get that radio airplay and playlist slots, right?) but there are five more songs that we still needed to hear. Today (August 29), the band will follow up their appearances at festivals like Coachella and Osheaga with a full-blown North America tour. Things start in Chicago and will end in Moncton November 15.
3. Jehnny Beth, You Heartbreaker You (Fiction)
Jehnny Beth, the French singer, former frontperson for the British band Savages, actress, and part of the same management company that runs things for the Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age, and St. Vincent, is back with here second solo album–her first since 2020–that sounds in places like a female Trent Reznor. Oh, it rocks–and it can get heavy.
4. The Beths, Straight Line was a Lie (ANTI-/Epitaph)
If you’re into antipodal indie rock, you’ve probably heard of The Beths (singer Elizabeth Stokes is the only “Beth” in the bunch), a group from Auckland who are up to their fourth album. Love the harmonies here. Good for fans of Alvvays and Rilo Kiley.
5. Helloween, Ghosts & Monsters (Reigning Phoenix Music)
Time for some power metal. Helloween (est. Hamburg, Germany, in 1984) is now up to 17 albums. If you’ve got a thing for Iron Maiden and bands in their orbit, and you haven’t discovered Helloween yet, here’s your chance.
6. The Hives, The Hives Forever The Hives (PIAS)
Moving to Sweden, we have the seventh album from the sharp-dressed men in The Hives. This the follow-up to the album The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons in 2023, which ended a hiatus of eleven years. Here’s my description of the album: reliable, solid, and engaging Swedish garage rock. How can you go wrong?
7. Nova Twins, Parasites & Butterflies (Marshall Records)
Another duo from the UK, this time featuring Amy Love and Georgia South, who are based out of London. Now three albums deep into their career of creating bass-heavy punk-style music, you’d never know they first bonded over a mutual love of Destiny’s Child. Nowit’s all about The MC5, Kiss, The Sweet, Led Zeppelin, Jack White, and St. Vincent. More proof that much of the future of rock is in the hands of women.
8. Slow Crush, Thirst (Pure Noise)
Anytime there’s a new shoegaze album, you know I’m going to recommend it. What can I say? It’s a weakness. In this instance, it’s Slow Crush, a four-piece from Leuven in Belgium, who have been around since 2017. They prefer one-word album titles (Aurora in 2018, Hush in 2021, and now Thirst).
9. Wisp, If Not Winter (Music Soup/Interscope)
More shoegaze, this time from Wisp, the nom-de-guerre of San Francisco’s Natalie R. Lu, someone who has masters the alt-rock “little girl voice.” When she started releasing music in 2023, a single called Your Face went viral on TikTok, which propelled it onto Billboard’s Hot Hard Rock Songs. After nearly a dozen singles and an EP, she’s finally issued a debut album. More fuzz, please.
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