Every week the Stereogum staff chooses the five best new songs of the week. The eligibility period begins and ends Thursdays right before midnight. You can hear this week’s picks below and on Stereogum’s Favorite New Music Spotify playlist, which is updated weekly. (An expanded playlist of our new music picks is available to subscribers on Spotify and Apple Music, updated throughout the week.)
mercury - "Roar Of The Heliac Goat"
Maddie Kerr, the Nashville musician who records as Mercury, is one of many artists mining the fertile ground between roots-rock and grunge, even working with the in-demand producer Alex Farrar. On the brilliantly titled "Roar Of The Heliac Goat," she pushes the sound in a glacial slowcore direction that suggests the influence of Jason Molina continues to be pervasive. But from Kerr's songbird vocals to Farrar's pristine production, there's an inherent prettiness to this music. It glitters like a starry sky, heavy with emotion but providing catharsis with each gnarly riff and moonbeam melody. —Chris
Father John Misty - "The X-panded Universe"
"The chair-bound oracle Dr. Valence can’t believe that this girl is the perfect weapon he was sent here to retrieve" — that's quite a line. But it's not just how Josh Tillman weaves his writerly tapestry of insanity as interdimensional vision. It's also how he drawls it out with honeyed panache, hitting a clean falsetto on the second syllable of the word "believe." Tillman has been doing this for a long time, reflecting his layered poetic ideas through the lens of his louche, literary Laurel Canyon lounge lizard persona.
On this six-minute reverie, Tillman gets in at least one goosebump moment — "In the expanded universe, in the crossover event, God is only as good as the villains he invents" — before the slow-motion crescendo where he conjures hosts of voices and trumpets to let us know that everyone gets saved on a bad, bad day. After all these years, Father John Misty remains a one of one. Nobody else gets down like that. —Tom
Phoebe Bridgers - "On Video"
Alex G was one of many friends who helped Phoebe Bridgers with her spectacular third album Lost Weekend, and his influence is especially prevalent on her new Primetime song "On Video." What starts off as a cryptic, acoustic sprawl explodes into a distorted whirlwind, mesmerically swinging between quiet and loud. Much like Lost Weekend, it's a song that completely absorbs its listener into its dark, eerie little world. —Danielle
Emma Ogier - "Hands Tied"
"Hands Tied" is a vintage car. Emma Ogier serves up some raggedy, greasy knuckled garage rock about a forever love, making it sound lived in but no less important. The drums begin muted until a veil falls away. They are loud and stomping, and their necessity becomes undeniable. Ogier has a sticky, flowing delivery. Her lyrics pack a dozen intimate moments that expand into a millennium. It’s rusty but functioning and clear like a love thats gonna last despite its worn exterior. The vessel doesnt have to be complicated and modern to match the feeling of forever. —Margaret
Tinashe - "Brainrot"
It's a risk to title songs after internet slang, like "Brainrot" and "Crash Out." It can come across as an artist — especially one who's been in the industry for decades — attempting to keep up with the moment and trying to parody the absurd, which already feels like a parody of itself. But on Tinashe's Popstar, those two tracks might be the best ones. She achieves a genuine snapshot of these ridiculous times, twisting the online-addicted generation into a buzzing, fascinating piece of art. "Brainrot" flutters with dopamine-drunk bliss, her voice swooning as she sings the sticky hook: "Brainrot, I'm nothing but numb/ Brainrot, so sick of fake love." It's a glamorous, addictive blip about desensitization and a growing inability to feel fulfilled, yet for a brief moment the song fills the void. —Danielle
