Photos by Nourished By Time; SAILORR; Lauren Vargas
Each week, The FADER staff rounds up the songs we can’t get enough of. Here they are, in no particular order. Listen on our Spotify and Apple Music playlists, or hear them all below.
Standing on the Corner, “Baby”
On their first single release since 2020, N.Y.C. collective Standing on the Corner haven’t missed a step, and their gait will still keep you guessing. “Baby” leans toward the more approachable stations on the group’s stylistic radio, a fuzzed-out psychedelic soul song combining a Cindy Lee-flavored approach to history with their astral jazz expansiveness. Gio Escobar stretches out every syllable of his flirty entreaties, delivering them like a cartoon snake dressed in a freshly starched zoot suit. It’s game beamed directly from the year 3000. —Jordan Darville
tana, “New Cash”
It feels like Eternal Atake was released only months ago but the new generation of rapper/producers are already tapping Lil Uzi Vert’s album for inspiration. “new cash,” the latest song from tana, an 18-year-old artist who made the rare leap from SoundCloud’s underground to commercial success, uses the same symphonic, drill-inspired melodies Uzi tapped on EA. It’s the perfect backdrop for tana to take stock of the endless pleasures at the tips of his diamond-encrusted fingers. His flexes are delivered with style and creatively enough to prevent the song from being nostalgia bait or just another boring accounting of luxury. This is Ric Flair music, and tana’s dressed to enter the ring. —JD
Elaine Howley, “Hold Me In A New Way”
The A-side of the Irish ambient pop musician’s new 7” is the hushed sound of a desperate reach across a perilous chasm, a plea for not just for connection but revival. It’s a collision of the sensual and the funereal: An electronic taps out an excited rhythm to open the song before the morose, Peter Hook-ish bassline comes in. “Hold me in a new way / Hold me in the shape of love / I’ve been feeling far away,” she repeats, her voice pushing through layers of dewy synths like a premature bloom in spring frost. — JD
SAILORR, “Itadakimasu”
In her FADER GEN F profile, the rising R&B star SAILORR teased that her debut album feels “like a hot ass summer in Florida with your homegirls, smoking cigarettes on the side of the road.” On “Itadakimasu,” the cutest song on the record, it seems it’s also for getting nasty in a sushi restaurant. Over a twinkling beat, she purrs about sipping sake and eating A5 wagyu with her boo thang, before inviting him to another course: “come bless this meow ‘fore you,” —Steffanee Wang
PinkPantheress, “Noises”
Every song on PinkPantheress’s new record Fancy That is a hit, but I’m permanently stuck on “Noises,” a mid-album explosive that hinges on a genius sample of Nardo Wick’s “Who Wants Smoke?” It’s a club banger about literally hearing things that are or aren’t there but Pink uses it to translate an air of untouchability. “What the fuck is that?” the song goes, as she fears there’s someone creeping up behind, but when she whips her head around she confirms it’s just her alone at the top. —SW
Kacy Hill, “Please Don’t Cry”
The country bug has come around to bite everyone including indie pop songwriter Kacy Hill. Her new song “Please Don’t Cry” sounds like watching sunsets at a creek, with its wisps of pedal steel and twangy guitar, as she mourns a past loss while trying to move on. —SW
Nourished By Time, “Max Potential”
Taken from his upcoming album, The Passionate Ones, “Max Potential” is a love song delivered from a place of retreat. Marcus Brown is scared of the future, a place filled with demons both real and internal. He finds comfort in the arms of a former lover, someone whose presence is filtered into the grungy and soulful track through Cocteau Twins-style harmonic warbles. “If I’m going to go insane, least I’m loved by you” he sings, backing off the ledge and onto firmer territory. —David Renshaw
Racing Mount Pleasant, “Racing Mount Pleasant”
It takes a degree of confidence to release a self-titled song but Ann Arbor housemates Racing Mount Pleasant, who share a label with Mk.Gee and recently opened for Cameron Winter, have arrived with spades of it. The seven-piece band call to mind Bon Iver at his most earthy and robust on a track that takes detours through hollered gang vocals and sax-laden jazz interludes, never straying from something that feels less than essential. —DR
John Cale feat. Tony Allen, “Long Way Out of Pain”
“When you were out on safari, did you kill anything?” John Cale asks at the start of “Long Way Out of Pain,” from his new loosies album, MiXology (Volume 1). “Did the mighty stay fallen? Were the rhinos running the plains?” His chorused vocals tower above warped synths and steady bass, but his voice is matched in strength by lively drumming from late afrobeat legend Tony Allen. Across six minutes, the duo’s engaged interplay feels synchronous and easy, but the music is still intense — two elite artists challenging each other with the utmost respect. —Raphael Helfand
Anycia, “No Scrub”
The second single from rising Atlanta rapstar Anycia’s forthcoming mixtape, Grady Baby, is a throwback trap banger whose beat samples heavily from Lex Luger’s instrumental for Waka Flocka Flame’s 2010 classic “S.E.X.” Over Luger’s iconic 808s and synth brass section, Anycia disses fake rappers and wannabe lovers alike, taking TLC’s shade to a whole new level. —RH
The Vernon Spring feat. Iko Niche, “Mustafa”
Sam Beste has produced for Amy Winehouse and MF DOOM, but his massive solo catalog has largely flown under the radar. His new LP Under a Familiar Sun — an understated, perfectly paced 12-song suite — might just be the one that breaks through. On early-album cut “Mustafa,” a bone-warming keyboard riff rides calmly through the sea of crackling static that surrounds it. “Step by step, step by step,” guest artist Iko Niche sings wistfully, barely audible above the fray. —RH
