The Chicago rapper Lil Durk returns this week with Almost Healed, a sometimes searing, sometimes tender examination of his life after years of loss and survival. On this week’s episode of New Music Friday, we dig into the music, talk about the pain that informs it and how Lil Durk has entered a new period of growth as an artist. …
Four Things I Learned at Shaky Knees 2023
In May, I got to cover the Shaky Knees Music Festival in Atlanta, Georgia, one of the biggest indie-inclined fests in the Southeast. The festival was celebrating its tenth anniversary, bringing in headliners like The Killers, Muse, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Flaming Lips; Shaky Knees’ first-ever headliner, The Lumineers, also returned. And, for the first time in the festival’s …
On “Howlin’,” Jacksonville’s Halfway Hounds Unleash a Primal Yowl
The calamitous hindrances of musicians owning their own recording studios remain unheeded, even though the barbarous words are carved on the massive headstones that populate the graveyard of CD-ROM boxed sets and DAT tapes. On the flip, the freewheeling merits of that same boon/curse gave us the Halfway Hounds. The product of not one, but two, accomplished musicians who are …
New Music Friday | The best releases out on May 19
The rapper Aminé and producer and DJ KAYTRANADA drop their highly anticipated joint project KAYTRAMINÉ this week, a free-wheeling, feel-good party album just in time for summer. We give a listen to several tracks from across the project to open this week’s show, marvel at the lyricism (“Y’all talkin’ like we’re equals when we know you’re Sméagols”) and talk about …
On “Hazy,” Gainesville Garage Rockers bed bug guru Share a Dreamy Pummel of Fuzz
Any song with fuzz bass guitar is invariably better than a song without fuzz bass. Let’s get that cosmic truth front and center. The new single from Gainesville-by-way-of-Jax garage rockers bed bug guru features some guttural fuzz bass—heard prominently in the song’s apparent bridge—yet “Hazy” offers up more than just sadistic 30Hz frequency. A dreamy pummel of lock-and-hammer electric guitars, …
On “Backseat,” Jacksonville Singer-Songwriter Sun Child Untangles their Radiant Charms
Somewhere between the prescriptive freedom-with-an-asterisk atmosphere of indie and the predictable wash-and-wear weather of Adult Album Alternative exists the music of Sun Child. Led by beaches native Brooke Garwood (Girl Pluto), the debut EP Everything features six cuts that lean predominately on acoustic guitar and piano arrangements with a production that is polished to a mellow, decorous sheen. “Backseat” is …
On ‘Cedar Island Songs,’ Florida songwriter Laney Tripp Floats in a Vast, Sparkling Sea of Experimental Folk
As a music descriptor, the term “wet” has been common parlance since the early 1960’s. Largely associated with reverb, it’s been used as a kind of shorthand to capture everything from the distant echo of the vocals on classic country tunes to the pedal effects of the single-string guitar leads pioneered by the King of Surf Rock: Dick Dale. If …
New Music Friday: The best releases out on May 12
The singer Rahill is best-known to some for her work in the Brooklyn garage-rock group Habibi. But this week she drops her debut solo album, a collection of genre-hopping songs that are as danceable as they are idiosyncratic. On this week’s show we give a listen to Flowers At Your Feet and talk about the ways Rahill crafts deeply honest …
Playlist | Best New Music of May
Featuring a few dozen new tunes from local, regional, national and international artists, our Fresh Squeeze playlist includes the best new music emanating from Northeast Florida and beyond. Handpicked by our team of contributors, there are no rules or genre restrictions; just songs we thought were worth a share. Our latest Fresh Squeeze includes the surprise Thundercat + Tame Impala track …
Five Essential Mdou Moctar Tracks
Currently on a tour of North America, Tuareg musician Mdou Moctar will visit the Bier Hall inside Intuition Ale Works on Tuesday, May 2 as part of our JME Presents Music Discovery Series. If you’re unfamiliar with Moctar (pronounced em-dew mock-tar)’s work, the singer, songwriter, actor and activist is best known as something of a guitar hero. Moctar taught himself …
