Music Thread 2017

So looking through the forums I noticed that we're already in February and there's no new music thread for 2017 yet. Since the last couple have been pretty key in introducing me to a lot of great music, I figured I'd start this one so people can share whatever they've been listening to.

As always: PLEASE don't embed youtube videos. Linking is fine and encouraged though.

Since I'm usually terrible at listening to stuff when it comes out, I've spent most of the start of 2017 listening to stuff that came out in 2016. Most recently I've fallen into a Math-Pop hole listening to Signals and Orchards. I generally have trouble getting into a lot of Math stuff as it always feels just a little too mechanical to me, so it's nice to hear bands like these two pairing that kind of rhythm and technique with vocal melodies that are easier to latch onto.

I've been listening to Run The Jewels 3 (which came out late last year) on repeat and the new Spoon track. The former is the absolute shit and you should probably listen to it. It's not as fucking dirty as RTJ2 and not as strange as RTJ1, but it's distinct from either nonetheless. It's more of a hype album.

Spoon once again seems to be taking their music in a slightly new, interesting direction while still retaining what made them appealing and good in the first place, which in my opinion is the sign of a truly great band.

@dinosaurcanada: with a post like that, I am definitely going to have to give RTJ2 a listen...

If you want some poppy math rock I would recommend Tricot.

As for 2017 music thus far, new Migos is pretty good, there's a new Kehlani album but I've not listened to it yet outside of like 2 songs, and then there's this new Jhené Aiko song which is pretty great.

Hey new year new music Thread ! Random Thought. New Gorillas song kinda Garbage ? New Gorillaz Song

Thing i look Forward to in 2017 ; New Sigur Ros Album, New Elbow Album, New The National Album

Things that might come out this year new Björk album and maybe a new MGMT one ?

Anyway a lot off things to look forward to in 2017.

Guess I'll step in with your Regularly Scheduled K-Pop Update:

• AOA's first full album, Angel's Knock, came out on Jan 1, along with a double-MV of Excuse Me and Bing Bing.
• Honey Bee, a hot collabo from Luna ( f(x) ), Hani (EXID), and Solar (Mamamoo), is fantastic and deserves more attention than it's getting IMO.
• With 4minute no more, Hyuna has been helping CLC produce their latest music - the influence is obvious in a song like Hobgoblin, but CLC really make the style work for them.
• If you're after something a bit more laid-back, Yesung (Super Junior) & Seulgi (Red Velvet) put out a cute duet, Darling U.
• Seohyun (of Girl's Generation) put out an album, which is well worth listening to. Here's the title track, Don't Say No.
• Red Velvet's fourth mini-album, Rookie, just released. I'm not super into the title track, given how strong RV singles have been, but there's some great music on the full thing.
• The actual Best Jam so far this year is Mysterious from HelloVenus. If you only listen to one of these songs, make it this one. And maybe Honey Bee, too.

If you haven't given K-pop a shot before, I'd highly recommend it - there's a wealth of great stuff out there and it's not all just straight bubblegum pop or ballads. I think it's a much more widely-known thing in Western countries now than it was a few years ago, but if you've missed the train there's plenty of room on here for everybody. If you have been listening but only to singles (as I did for years), maybe try out some albums this year. It's crazy how much good stuff I was missing out on. Spotify in particular has become way better for K-pop over the last couple of years, and they keep adding more back-catalogues to their service almost every time I check.

Syd's Fin is really good. Looking forward to SZA's new album tomorrow and I don't know what to expect from Big Sean. Haven't really been feeling the songs released so far, hopefully the album turns out alright.

Mouth Moods is another mashup album from Neil Cicierega that's clearly mainly comedic but that doesn't stop some of these tracks from actually being pretty great. T.I.M.E. puts the vocals of Y.M.C.A over Time from the Inception soundtrack. Wallspin does something similar for Wonderwall and You Spin Me Right Round, as does The End with In The End and What a Fool Believes (my personal favourite).

For someone that I initially thought would just be known for one or two viral internet jokes (Brodyquest and Puppet Pals) Neil creates some good tracks, including original tracks under the name Lemon Demon, such as Touch-Tone Telephone.

I also recently discovered Polysics (Japanese Devo), and some of their tracks, such as I My Me Mine and Electric Surfin' Go Go have grown on me. Not for everyone though.

I'm going to try to actually listen to some albums beginning to end for once. For as much as I like certain artists, the fact that I sometimes only really listen to a haphazard smattering of their tracks is probably doing them a disservice. The only albums that I have really listened all the way through that come to my mind now are OK Computer and Plastic Beach.

Missio's Middle Fingers is my new personal anthem.

@adequatelyprepared: I love Polysics, awesome stuff. Their live shows are full of energy, would have loved to seen them live before their original keyboardist, Kayo left.

@y2ken That Honey Bee collabo came out of nowhere for me and I love it. I also am not feeling RV's title track, but I'm digging Body Talk. I haven't checked out that CLC song yet because i kept hearing the 4minute comparisons and the wound is still too fresh for me, I'm not ready!! :p

Anybody here listening to NIN? What do you say on The latest EP?

I have been listening to Dr.Dog's new album "Abandoned Mansion" ans have been enjoying it. it is mellow session music, definitely slower paced than some of their other stuff. technically they released it at the end of 2016 (which makes 2 albums in 1 year with the release of "Psychedelic Swamp" earlier in the year) but it was only available through their Bandcamp page until last week they released it on all platforms.

other than that Mastodon just released a new single from their upcoming album "Emperor of Sand" and its pretty good so far. their last album was a bit of a let down compared to their previous work so im looking forward to seeing how this one shapes up.

Anyone know of any good rap/hip-hop? i would like to listen to something post 1992.

I'm hoping the Aphex Twin Cheetah EP was a taster for a new album this year. I liked it more than most -- it was much more stripped down and funky than most of his work.

I'm desperate for a new Janelle Monae album, too; also, something from Arca. They're the only things I know I want this year.

The new Mastodon track is decent. Curious if the album will indeed be more Crack the Skye-esque. That's exciting.

@mattimus_prime: Rap/hip-hop suggestions:

Can't go wrong with Run the Jewels.

I'm a big fan of the track Wesley's Theory on Kendrick Lamar's album To Pimp a Butterfly. Weird and groovy. Great album.

"Enemies All Around Me" by Ghostface Killah. The albums it's from is very different and super progressive in some ways.

Deltron 3030 is great. Mastermind is a cool track, big fan.

"At the Helm" by Hieroglyphics

"Witness" by Roots Manuva.

"Purple Kush" and "Moving at the Speed of Life" by Living Legends (more positive and upbeat vibes).

Aesop is cool.

Outkast's Stankonia has some banging tunes, as do ATliens and Aquemini.

The Avalanches aren't strictly hip-hop, but deffo a sub-genre of it at least. Their last album is bonkers.

AIM is a cool French hip-hop/electronic artist. I love his track "Demonique."

Until I get a job, music is not going to be a priority for me this year. Considering the headache this year is (and will continue to be), that sucks. Thankfully, some bands I like still throw losers like me a bone now and then: like The Menzingers!

http://www.stereogum.com/1922907/stream-the-menzingers-after-the-party/music/album-stream/

The Menzingers are a band for aging jaded punkers. Lots of whiskey soaked ballads about nostalgia and regret. If Jeff Rosenstock's similar content is a little too blunt, rough around the edges, or grim, The Menzingers got you. They have a much more poetic approach to social struggle.

In music that exists that I haven't gotten yet:

YMCK - Family Swing : This is a Japanese chiptune pop outfit. At first glance, you'd think a band like that would get old fast, but YMCK finds a way to add a little twist to every album they release (the count is at about 7 or 8 now!).

later this year...

Grandaddy (think Radiohead meets Bad Astronaut) reunites for an album in March.

Jens Lekmen (one of the most clever and charming songwriters out there) has something out soon. He spent 2015 releasing a song a week for a full year. In 2016 he scrapped an album, regretting that he has become too much of his own "Jens Lekmen character"; so I'm expecting a lot of neat new ideas in this upcoming album.

Elbow has a new album right around the corner (if not already).

SPOON - HOT THOUGHTS (March 17)

My boy, Kenichi Asai & The Interchange Kills - METEO (March 8)

[brag]I was here for this show - https://youtu.be/OVccBBhnL7U(headphones warning). I was probably just to the left of whoever shot this.

Saw them again in 2010 (3rd to last show with Kayo). I tried to buy the hoodie off Hayashi's back, but settled for their latest CD instead. Happy to have heard "Beat Flash" in person at least once, because I don't think they're ever coming back. [/brag]

A few I'd recommend (in addition to @brunothethird's recommendations above.

• Chance The Rapper - Acid Rap (not on Spotify but on Soundcloud - its fantastic).
• Madvillain - Madvillainy
• The Roots - Undun
• Common - Be
• Lupe Fiasco - Food & Liquor

Should get you going nicely.

I really like both the new Mastodon songs.

I was a bit unsure about Show Yourself at first but I think it's rad. It comes right after Sultan's Curse at the start the album and the transition is great. Lots of momentum in it. Can't wait to hear what comes next.

@paulmako: I love Show Yourself. It's very much in the vein of Leviathan, guitar tone-wise, but with the vocal polish they finally figured out on Once More 'Round the Sun. Simpler than I'm used to from them, but catchy as hell. Hopefully some tracks have that proggy goodness they've been missing for a while.

Some good Jazz and Electronic releases I've heard so far;

B12 - An Eternal Flame: Outside of Time Tourist I haven't listened to much of B12, and apparently they have several EP's out this year. This is good ambient techno.

Chip Wickman - La Sombra

Escape Hatch - Roots of Unity

@hadoken101 if you're in to math rock you may dig Maps and Atlases

I've been listening to the new Japandroids, the new Neil Cicierega, and McCafferty

Also getting super stoked for my Radiohead show in April! Finally getting to see them from GA instead of the nosebleeds

My thoughts exactly. At first Show Yourself seemed a little bland but as I listen to it more I've been appreciating it for being a fun straight forward strong to groove to. Still think Sultan's Curse is much better but I also think Sultan's Curse might be one of their best songs ever so that says a lot. Super excited to hear more off the album, really like the more proggy instruments with the more modern Mastodon cleaner vocals.

Other new stuff for 2017 I've dug is:

John Garcia - The Coyote Who Spoke in Tongues: In general a totally solid album, but man the acoustic covers of Green Machine, El Rodeo, Gardenia, and Space Cadet are wonderful. Gardenia in particular is just a totally different song but still fits the whole desert feel to it.

War Baby - Coma Kid EP: One of my favourite (semi) local bands. Modern Grunge/Noise/whatever from Vancouver. I adored their 2015 album Death Sweats and this EP just gives more of what I love. Driving bass lines, crazy distorted guitar, hard hitting drums and a great mix of cleanish vocals and screams (like the punk/grunge kind, not the metal kind really). Seriously check them and their kind of insane videos out.

The new White Reaper single Judy French is pretty killer. I never liked any of their previous stuff that much, but this got me excited for their new album out in April.

hope it will be something worthy )

@sloppydetective: oh dang I didn't know they had a new song out!

Just started listening to the new Ryan Adams album. I'm a a pretty big fan of his. So far so good with the new stuff, but he's getting a little formulaic.

Tinariwen - Elwan My favorite album so far, though there hasn't been much else I have really enjoyed except the records I posted previously.

@the_grindilow: Dude. "One Time" is such a goddamn great song.

Have The Roots ever released a bad album?

It seems like I am listening to RTJ3 every other day on my way home from work. Definitely different from their past albums, but still fantastic.

I kind of hated Radiohead's new album when it came out last year, but I gave it another chance last week and it's been growing on me.

Finally, I've been digging Omar Rodriguez-Lopez's Aranas En La Sombra. Omar has always been an artist I've appreciated, but have never been able to fully enjoy. He went on a stint the last few months of release a new album every 2 weeks or something crazy like that. Aranas is the one I've tried of his newer releases and it's stuck with me pretty hard.

No, they haven't. I think "And then you shoot your cousin" is one of the most underrated albums in the last few years. "The Dark (Trinity)" kills me everytime I listen to it.

Since I'm terrible at keeping up with new music, I've been going thru all the stuff I missed last year which, aside from that Tribe album, is literally everything.

• Coloring Book by Chance the Rapper - I didn't love Acid Rap that much so I was kinda surprised to hear not only was this album getting a ton of love, he won a couple of Grammys for it. After listening to the album, it is no one surprising.
• RTJ3 by Run The Jewels - I've seen Run the Jewels mentioned a lot recently. Heard one song around the time they first started out. Didn't leave much of an impression sadly. This shit right here? Fiiiiiiiiiire.
• Doom 2016 OST by Mick Gordon - I never did get around to playing Doom, but if I had, I suspect the music would have secretly been my favorite part.
• Forever by Code Orange - Admittedly, I don't listen to much metal (or metalcore or however the fuck you describe half this music), but every now and then, someone I trust very much will recommend an album in the genre and it's usually awesome. This is no different.

I have mostly been listening to old songs:

Asleep - the smiths

Blackbird - the Beatles

top of the world - carpenters.

I've been listening to run the jewels 2+3 on heavy rotation as well as a bunch of Danny brown's album old and do what though wilt from ab-soul.

@luieel:The Smiths are so good. Top 3 favorite bands for sure. I Know It's Over is probably my favorite song of them. or is it There's a light... hmm.. maybe Bigmouth or Paint a Vulgar Picture? :D

At the end of the year, i like to read up on what the best music was of that year and go back to listen to them. Found some cool stuff like

• Mitski - Your Best American Girl
• Weyes Blood - Do You Need My Love
• The Avalanches - Because I'm Me
• Cass McCombs - Bum Bum Bum
• Kehlani - Undercover
• Danny Brown - Ain't It Funny
• Kero Kero Bonito - Trampoline
• Hamilton Leithauser + Rostam - A 1000 Times

The new Radiohead album is awesome as well.

There's been a few songs that have come out from Mount Eerie (Phil Elverum)'s upcoming album, A Crow Looked At Me. All of them are very explicitly about Phil's wife getting cancer shortly after having their child and then last year, dying. It's all extremely hard to swallow but powerful stuff from a musician who's been a big part of my life for well over a decade. It feels fucked up and exploitative to say I'm excited for the album, but I am.

• "Ravens" (Youtube link)
• "Real Death"

Jungle Fire - Jambu Some real catchy Latin Funk. Straightforward, but great

Sherwood & Pinch - Man Vs Sofa Nice mishmash of Dub/Dubstep/UK Garage.

I love the new song 'Bones' by Lea Porcelain. Has the vocal lilt of Morrissey with the deepness of an Ian McCulloch, but filtered through the ethereal, pompy production style of late-eighties U2. The music itself is huge-sounding -- it has the presence of a massive stadium without people in it -- it's very effective. Has the kind of energy I'd expect from TV on the Radio, but more dreamlike. Lazy comparisons aside, it's a nice eighties throwback (the good kind) with a wall of sound around it.

I realize that this reveals how far behind I am with some of this stuff but I had no clue that Franz Ferdinand and Sparks did a collab in 2015.

Johnny Delusional and Call Girl are both tracks I enjoy, but really the whole album (FFS) is quite good if you're a fan of either band. It's kind of incredible how well they play off of each other. It's also nice to see Franz Ferdinand still output at a reasonable level. There's a lot of bands that were big during the initial pop rock indie revival thing of the early 2000s/late 90s who fell off pretty hard. The Strokes and The Vines both come to mind.

Also, remember Mick Gordon? You might know him as the man that did the Doom soundtrack. Turns out he's doing Prey as well, and Bethesda officially released a track called 'Everything Is Going To Be Okay' which of all things is a relaxing synthwave beat. And I just found out that he'll be part of Routine, another sci-fi horror game, which is finally coming out in March.

Waiting for that new Steven Wilson.

@adequatelyprepared: That FFS Album is great !

Also if you like Some "heavier" stuff OathBreaker released a new album that being getting a lot off positive praise. To bad a lot off there riffs and intro seem to be taken from other Artists.

So there was some atmospheric crooning and then BLACK FUCKING METAL! (or maybe it's leaning more towards the hardcore side, I dunno, there's an argument about it in the Youtube comments and it doesn't matter) I was on a different tab when the song really kicked in, that was a nice surprise.

EDIT: That may be a little too tortured for my tastes and I've listened to Jane Doe my fair share of times.

FFS is really good (I'm a colossal Sparks fan). 'Little Guy from the Suburbs' is a great tune.

I'm excited right now because Janelle Monae said she is indeed going to release music this year. Hyped. ArchAndroid is one of the best pop albums of all time.

No news on what Arca is up to yet. If you haven't heard him, his albums Xen and Mutant are brilliant and the equivalent of prog in the electronic genre. Recommended track to get you into him: "Wound."

@dinosaurcanada: if you ever have the chance go see rtj live so fucking good

@brunothethird: his new album is out soon I think he's put out a few songs from it

@sagesebas: No way! thank you! *Intense Googling*

Still listening to the new Thundercat album Drunk, which is very good. I love the range of it and how it's willing to be silly. It even has a catchy mellow club banger with Wiz Khalifa I like which is pretty cool to be that all over the map on one album. It has Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald featured, what's not to like? I recommend anyone into R&B, Funk, and Hip-Hop check it out.

Pretty excited for the Mac Demarco album to drop. Not sure what else is coming out soon.

Ghostland Observatory- Any Album

Rebelution- Falling into Place

Juno What?!- Shameless

Umphrey's McGee- Zonkey

Big Gigantic- Brighter Future

St. Paul & The Broken Bones- Half the City

Twiddle- Plump Chapter 1

Stop Light Observations- Radiation

Stick Figure- Set in Stone

Unified Highway- Unified Highway

Mac Demarco- Any Album

As for the Radiohead discussion, I probably have grown to like A Moon Shaped Pool less over time. I would rather listen to the bootleg ass version of True Love Waits and I like some of the other songs for sure but I just don't know it stacks up against their other stuff for me. I don't want to listen to it as often I would say.

Listen to J Dilla (his work with Slum Village is classic too). All the Tribe albums I would recommend (and JDilla production there). MF Doom. Madvillain. De La Soul's The Stakes is High is an underrated classic. Death Grips is worth looking into if you can like dark music (certainly very unique). I also think Spaceghostpurrp is worth looking into (I think he's very underrated). The whole Top Dawg Entertainment label, which includes Kendrick Lamar, Schoolboy Q, Ab Soul, Jay Rock has put out some really strong albums in the last few years. Acid Rap as mentioned before is definitely a recent classic. I love Malibu by Anderson .Paak and his NxWorries project from this last year a lot if you like some Soul/R&B with your Hip-Hop. Kanye's College Dropout and Late Registration are easy recommendations. Mos Def's Black on Both Sides and The Ecstatic. The group Little Brother is very underrated (and producer 9th Wonder). Outkast. Hieroglyphics are really good. If you missed Lethal Injection by Ice Cube from 93 listen to that one (real classic). The Infamous by Mobb Deep from 95 is a gem.

Those are ones that come to mind quickly but if you're interested check out those recommendations. I could go on. Those are all pretty classic IMO.

My favorite band I would say. Hard to choose a favorite between Heaven Know's I'm Miserable Now, Headmaster Ritual, Ask, and Panic.

As maybe you can tell I like "Loser Rock" but Asleep is even too much of a bummer for me to listen to that often.

It has been a good year for metal so far, so I'm looking forward what 2017 has to offer.

• Mors Principium Est - Embers of a Dying World
• Aeternam - Ruins of Empires
• Gloson - Grimen
• Firewind - Immortals
• Ex Deo - The Immortal Wars
• Benighted - Necrobreed
• Kreator - Gods of Violence
• Pain of Salvation - In The Passing Light Of Day
• The Great Old Ones - EOD : A Tale of Dark Legacy
• Xandria -Theater of Dimensions

And some none metal stuff as well.

• Blackfield - Blackfield V
• The Mute Gods -Tardigrades Will Inherit The Earth