Repo already mentioned two of the four big pop/rock releases this week — the other two are the new Modest Mouse LP, An Eraser And A Maze, which (based on the three preview tracks) sounds like Isaac Brock and the gang have put a fair amount of effort into it but aren't trying to change their formula all that much (which is probably good); and as Cheddar mentioned just now, the new Evanescence album, Sanctuary, which isn't bad either, at least if you like goth-metal. After all, they're probably the best goth-metal act operating today, not that I would really know... 🤔
In addition to those, there's supposedly a new one from (The) Dwarves called Jenkem, though I haven't seen it anywhere but on their own website, and another entry in the "Year Of..." series from Fucked Up entitled Grass Can Move Stones Part 2: Year of the Monkey. FU has certainly come a long way stylistically over the years, but they're still reasonably thrashy, despite each track being about 25 minutes long. And it's true, grass can move stones, it just takes a while.
In the "TV and movie stars who make records" department, there's new smoky-lounge material from Jeff Goldblum & The Mildred Snitzer Orchestra (Still Blooming: Night Blooms), not to be confused with Jeff Goldblum Near Death Experience who are considerably more... experimental (and free to download on Bandcamp, I might add). There's also an overly-dramatic (but somehow still sort-of interesting) blue-eyed soul/pop LP from Damian Lewis called Sweet Chaos. Ooh, hold me back!
Just as an aside, don't confuse Norwegian 70s-influenced indie-popsters Goofy Geese with the less-goofy US-based Geese, as I suspect they might like you to do. Goofy Geese have a new album out called I Don’t Feel Like Speaking Now, which I'm only mentioning because I think I might just like it more than the last Geese album that everyone else really liked a LOT.
Two more that were released earlier in the week but I felt deserve a mention:
Clockwork Animals: Fantastic Future Dream
This is a lo-fi guitar-based male-female duo from Liverpool who do shoegaze psychedelia. It's a 5-song debut EP, and I'm not sold on the vocals, but aside from that, probably worth keeping an eye on. (If you're me, at least.)
The Dreamtoday: We Won't Survive the Comet
I've checked out this band before and wasn't super-impressed (there's no Discogs page!), but they've improved their sound and their songwriting quite a lot since they started. They're a classic-shoegaze outfit from Massachussetts, whose defining aspect seems to be the visual of their one female member, Violet Nowak, who (pardon my obvious sexism here) can't even be called a "tambourine girl" because she doesn't play a tambourine — she mostly sings backup vocals while wearing a white dress, and is also the focal point of their music videos (again, always in the white dress). Don't misunderstand, I'm OK with the white dress; I just wish these guys would find someone who could take over the lead vocals on all their material while wearing it. The guy who sings most of their songs now, Nicky Russo, is... just okay. A better singer could really put this band in the stratosphere, or at least somewhere higher than they are now.
That leaves just two albums: First, this weeks' runner-up, Elsewhere, Always by a new band from Birmingham (UK, not Alabama) called Overpass. This appears to be a fairly high-energy Britrock band who sound like they're straight out of the 90s, reminiscent of first-name bands of that era like Travis, James, Keane, Gene, Ash, and possibly Moose (though "Moose" is more of a nickname, really). Or even Muse, who are like Moose but not spelled phonetically. So why call themselves "Overpass"? I suspect this will be their Achilles' heel. Even "Achilles" would have been a better name, if you ask me. Still, the album sounds like it could have hit potential, but maybe I'm just saying that because I was alive in the 90s and was quite fond of bands like this at the time.
This is the debut LP by Deaf Star, an electrogaze solo act from... I'm not totally certain, actually! The guy's name is Ivan Zoloto, born in Petrozavodsk, Karelia (which is in Russia, about 100km from their border with Finland — not far from where the Russians keep most of their nuclear weapons, at least according to Google Earth). At some point he moved to San Francisco and recorded this album, but since then he's moved to Barcelona, and frankly I don't blame him. Electrogazers aren't really welcome in Russia or San Francisco these days because none of them seem to have much hair, whereas Barcelona is a really nice town, with fantastic cuisine and top-notch soccer teams on both the men's and women's sides. Albummaster is from Spain so I'll let him decide where to put him, but anyway, this album is a real mind-blowing experience — which is pretty impressive for a first try! Most people probably won't like it, and I didn't even want to like it myself, but I can't help but be impressed with what he's doing here. It's noisy, experimental, kinda avant-garde... but still shoegazey at heart. And that's what really matters!
Anyway, next week there's the big new LP from Joan as Police Woman, Real Life Evolution, and a new album from Yes called Aurora. (Apparently Steve Howe is still involved, so they haven't gone completely "generational"... yet. Steve's definitely showing his age a little bit though.)
Two surprise drops today in rock 'n' pop land — there's apparently a new album of children's music by Laura Marling called Laura Sings Raffi, and sure enough all the songs are Raffi covers. So I guess it's more of a "tribute album," actually. She has a nice voice. There, I said it.
There's also a new Osees album called Off Course, their 30th (I think), which is pretty good, I guess... their fans should like it well enough, though the cover art isn't great, and music-wise I don't think it's going to win them a lot of new ones. (Fans, that is.) I could be wrong!🤔
Another one that might be worth a mention, which will be coming out tomorrow (June 6), is the new LP by Daily Worker called Sound Sickness. "Daily Worker" is the nom de plume of Harold "Whit" Williams, who used to play guitar in Cotton Mather, another one of my favorite power-pop bands from the 90s. There's only one preview track at the moment ("Anymore"), and it sounds like his usual Beatlesque bedroom pop, but that's not a bad thing and hopefully more will be available in the next hour or three, at which point I can confirm that it is, in fact, worth a mention. Even though I've just mentioned it already.
As for the previously-mentioned stuff, having now heard both albums in full I stand by my ranking of Deaf Star's Sunset Overdrive over the Overpass album — though some people might think I've passed over the Overpass album just because I like overdrive. It's true that I have an overdrive pedal (though I've been using the fuzzbox more lately), but at least I didn't pass over it during Passover, which was back in early April. I went ahead and added the Overpass album to my fully-annotated 2026 BEA year chart!!!, because it really does sound quite "epic," even though it's mostly just for Coldplay and U2 fans who are used to that sort of thing by now. Also, when I listened to it on Amazon Music a little while ago, the AI in charge of keeping me "engaged" started autoplaying The 1975 when it ended, and I could barely tell the difference with them, either.
Finally, I liked the new Widowspeak album, Roses, more than I thought I would. I've sort of dismissed them in the past because they've consistently tagged themselves as "shoegaze" and "dreampop" when they're really not, they're more like heavily-reverberated Americana, sort of like what Mazzy Star and Cat Power used to do. Also, their guitar player is a little sloppy, which may be intentional, but I personally find it a bit distracting, and occasionally even grating. Nevertheless, it's a good record as it turns out, and I should have mentioned it up above. Another one, actually, is the self-titled debut LP by Bad Stuff, a band from Dallas who used to be members of True Widow, not to be confused with Widowspeak who are (or were), like, almost exactly the same despite being a totally different band who also have the word "widow" in their name. I would describe Bad Stuff as "electrogothabilly," so it's not really in my so-called wheelhouse, but it's good for what it is.
Good luck and happy listening, bruthas and sistas! 😄
I'm taking the Summer off! My kids & I are headed to Canada fairly soon. I'm hoping MJ (and perhaps Tap!) can keep the good ship afloat for the next couple of months.
I was toying with highlighting two Metal releases that r coming out tomorrow - Kemmis by Kemmis and Epoch Inhumane by Nuclear Tomb but neither are blowing me away.
Anyways, as always, feel free to highlight new releases that YOU r geeked about!!! I clearly got nothing! 🌻
I hate to say it (again), but you're not alone — this isn't a good new-albums week at all.
For me, it started with the screwed-up release of Swallowtail by She's Green, a very nice dreampop band from Minneapolis. They pre-announced it as an album called Swallowtail(Amazon link, sorry) with a release date of July 10, but then they put up a 4-track digital EP called Swallowtail earlier this week with the same release date (but all four tracks available), and now there's a separate Swallowtail album with 7 tracks showing on all the streaming services too with three of the EP's four tracks on it, so nobody knows which one to buy or whether or not you're going to end up with all 7 tracks if you buy "Swallowtail" now instead of waiting for July 10. I know it's stupid to care about things like this, but I just don't like to see it, at least not with bands I like. (That said, it's also not as good as their last record.)
As for this week's actual releases, obviously everyone is talking about the new Olivia Rodrigo album, You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love, and the various references to The Cure that are on it, but let's face it, it doesn't really sound like The Cure at all, at least not in any meaningful way. (I don't dislike the preview tracks though, they're fine, but it's still basically girlpop.) And speaking of "sad," and bands who actually do sound sort of like The Cure, there's supposed to be a new Sad Lovers and Giants album called The Weight Of Forgotten Dreams tomorrow but... so far, it's vaporware, I'm not seeing preview tracks on any of the streamers, and it isn't even mentioned on their own website. I'll listen to it if and when it appears, but their last album (2018's Mission Creep) was... um, just okay. And for yet another disappointment, I forgot that Joan As Police Woman's debut album was called Real Life, so sure enough, her new album Real Life Evolution is just another one of those "reimagined" albums that so many people are doing these days. (I blame Taylor Swift for this, of course.) It's also not even close to being an improvement, if you ask me.
There's a new album from Yes (Aurora) that's supposed to be good because it's the first time they've had the same lineup for more than two albums, except that the only personnel change during the Fragile to Tales From Topographic Oceans three-album run involved drummers (i.e., Alan White replaced Bill Bruford). Drummers don't count, right? (I'm kidding...) Anyways, if they're playing that up, that tells me that maybe they're even less excited about this LP than I am.
Then there's the new album from Goose, a funky indie-pop act from Norwalk, CT, entitled Big Modern!. Goose are not to be confused with Goofy Geese, whose new album (as I mentioned earlier) was released last week, and neither are to be confused with the Brooklyn-based Geese, whose last LP is still the #1-ranked album of 2025 here on BEA. Still, I can't help but think Big Modern! might have had a real shot at that #1 slot if it had been released last year instead of this year, just by taking advantage of the brand-confusion.
That leaves just three albums I'm really interested in, and even then, none of them are really "up my alley."
Pussy Riot, CYKA: If I could be a member of any band in the world, it would be this one, and I'm not even female. Or Russian. I don't even like their music! Still, this is considered to be their debut full-length LP, so I'm definitely going to want to hear it, and you should too. (TBH though, it's not unlike their 2022 collabs-compilation, Matriarchy Now — this time, the single, if it can be called that, is called "Candy Dopamine" and the collaborator is Avenged Sevenfold.) Musically, it's electro-girlpunk with riffage, but that's just a minor detail in their case.
Klimt 1918, Àmor: These fellers are an Italian post-metal/shoegaze band, and while I've always liked them, this album sounds like it's going to be their best yet, and the production sound is fantastic. Interestingly, this is one of the few bands I like for whom the Wikipedia description of their musical style is almost completely accurate. It's their 7th album (assuming you don't count Sentimentale and jugend, both released on the same day in 2016, as one). Bellissimo!
MONO, Snowdrop: This is (Japanese) MONO's 13th (give or take) studio album, and their first with Brad Wood as producer, replacing the late Steve Albini (but still recording in Albini's Electrical Audio Studio in Chicago). They're billing it as a kind of tribute to Albini, though you probably wouldn't know that if they didn't tell you. Like most, if not all of MONO's albums, it's pretty much all-instrumental post-rock, with lots of dynamics and crescendoes and a general air of magnificence throughout. Steve would be proud, and rightly so.
I guess I couldn't really name a "pick-of-the-week" without having explained all that rigamarole first. If this thread is about what we're most interested to hear and not what we think is likely to be the best album, musically-speaking, then it has to be CYKA, even though I'm far more interested in it as a political statement than as music. But if we're putting politics aside, which I would completely understand, then it's Àmor, by a nose over Snowdrop, and even that's mostly just because Àmor has vocals (which are pretty decent in this case) and Snowdrop doesn't.
Next week — in fact, the next five weeks — don't look any better than this one did, but hopefully someone will come along and surprise us.
I hate to say it (again), but you're not alone — this isn't a good new-albums week at all.
As for this week's actual releases, obviously everyone is talking about the new Olivia Rodrigo album,You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love, and the various references to The Cure that are on it, but let's face it, it doesn't really sound like The Cure at all, at least not in any meaningful way. (I don't dislike the preview tracks though, they're fine, but it's still basically girlpop.)
I'll highlight the new Jesse Welles album Masks Off, which I still need to add to the site once I rate it. He is the definitive folk voice of our time in my opinion, and he continues to blow me away with the music that he releases regularly in a stripped down, acoustic form on YouTube. I've been listening to Masks Off for most of the day and it is excellent! I'm not sure if I like more than Devil's Den or Middle from last year, but it's up there for sure. Early highlights for me are Red (one of my favorites of his for a while, honestly), Masks Off, and Siddhartha. I'm so glad we have a voice like his for this current generation. _________________ My overall top 100 is far from fleshed out at this point, so here are some charts I am actually proud of:
2025
I'll highlight the new Jesse Welles album Masks Off, which I still need to add to the site once I rate it. He is the definitive folk voice of our time in my opinion, and he continues to blow me away with the music that he releases regularly in a stripped down, acoustic form on YouTube. I've been listening to Masks Off for most of the day and it is excellent! I'm not sure if I like more than Devil's Den or Middle from last year, but it's up there for sure. Early highlights for me are Red (one of my favorites of his for a while, honestly), Masks Off, and Siddhartha. I'm so glad we have a voice like his for this current generation.
Oh yeah, I like him! "The modern-day Woody Guthrie"... He's the guy who did the Join ICE song, too. 👏
If you have a Discogs account, you could probably do him an even bigger favor by consolidating the page with his "Jeh Sea Wells" albums with the page that has all his "Jesse Welles" albums, along with the page with all the albums he did as just "Welles." It's confusing, though arguably it's his own doing, using all those names... BEA doesn't have any of the Jeh Sea Wells stuff in the database either, but I just went ahead and made Jesse a member of "Welles" (that's how Discogs has it currently — it should be an alias, right? Those are basically solo albums).
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