Songs You Need In Your Life: April 2024

Patrick Flegel released the newest Cindy Lee project Diamond Jubilee late last month on the Realistik Studios’ Geocities site for purchase via PayPal. The full album from the Women singer and guitarist’s pop project appeared on YouTube a day later. At 32 tracks and more than two hours, it’s a monolith of music, and perhaps Flegel’s most ambitious work yet. The record opens with its title track, an idyllic jam centering a hypnotic guitar groove, slightly off-beat percussion, and a solo lead vocal that somehow sounds like a full children’s choir. Like most Cindy Lee songs, it exists in a daydream space, blurring the lines between imagination and reality. — Raphael Helfand

The genesis of Moran’s new album Moves in the Field began with the Brooklyn composer’s introduction to the Disklavier, a piano capable of recording performance and playing it back in real-time. That instrument became the album’s star and marked Moran’s transition from orchestral electronic experiments to minimal classical. The album’s title track thrums with the excited energy of discovery, Moran’s keys fluttering like fresh snowfall with melodies folding into each other endlessly. Unlike most music built on loops, “Moves in the Field” achieves that intense, singular feeling of an artist collaborating with themself. — Jordan Darville

Few working rappers make music as simultaneously gritty and luxurious as Roc Marciano. The New York rapper/producer and underground cult favorite shines yet again on his new project Marciology, 14 tracks of mafioso rap for the MoMA. “Gold Crossbow” sees Marciano’s flow gliding like a freshly purchased Maybach as he deftly stacks rhymes on top of each other without ever overstuffing his bars. — Jordan Darville