New Music Reviews (6/7)

Each week, Music Director Don Yates (joined this week by DJ Alex) shares brief insights on new and upcoming releases for KEXP's rotation. These reviews help our DJs decide on what they want to play. See what we added this week below (and on our Charts page), including new releases from Japanese Breakfast, Mustafa, Islands, and more.

Japanese Breakfast – Jubilee (Dead Oceans)
The third and finest Japanese Breakfast album to date from Brooklyn-based artist Michelle Zauner is an excellent set of expansive indie-pop with a diverse, brightly colored sound featuring synths, guitars, piano, horns, lush string arrangements and buoyant melodies. While her first two albums focused on grief after the loss of her mother to cancer, this one’s more about rediscovering joy and embracing life. — DY

Mustafa – When Smoke Rises (Regent Park)
The debut album from this Toronto artist (and founding member of the hip hop collective Halal Gang) is a powerful set of atmospheric folk-pop combining spare guitars, piano and synths with his warm, gentle vocals and poignant, deeply personal lyrics of friends’ lives cut short and dealing with the resulting feelings of loss and grief. Special guests include Sampha and James Blake. — DY

Islands – Islomania (Royal Mountain)
The eighth album (and first in five years) from this LA-via-Montreal band led by Nick Thorburn is an impressive set of hook-filled electro-pop, featuring a buoyant, groove-driven sound with sunny melodies along with lyrics of finding joy and pleasure despite life’s darkness and strife. — DY

Spiral XP – Drop Me In EP (Peaceful Tapes)
The debut EP from this Seattle-based project spearheaded by Versing drummer Max Keyes is a promising five-song set of shoegazerish indie-rock with fuzzy, effects-laden guitars, half-obscured vocals, often-downcast lyrics and an abundance of memorable song hooks. — DY

UV-TV – Always Something (PaperCup Music)
This Queens, NY-via-Gainesville, FL band’s third album is a strong set of hook-filled post-punk combining jangly guitars, driving rhythms and buoyant song hooks with Rose Vastola’s brightly melodic vocals. — DY

Raquel Rodriguez – Sweet Side (self-released)
The second full-length album from this Los Angeles Mexican-American singer is a stellar set of 90s-steeped R&B, soul, and disco-pop gems that balances sparkling midtempo cuts with some vibrant uptempo grooves, the latter often reminiscent of Jessie Ware. Regardless of the tempo, Raquel's voice and personable lyrics shine bright throughout on what's bound to be one of the sleeper R&B albums of the year. — AR

(Various) – Modern Love (BBE)
This new tribute album to David Bowie focuses on his connection to soul, R&B, funk and jazz through covers performed by a variety of artists with roots in R&B, jazz and other styles, ranging from Jeff Parker, L’Rain and Helado Negro to Khruangbin, Meshell Ndegeocello and We Are KING. — DY

Dobet Gnahoré – Couleur (Cumbancha)
This Ivory Coast artist’s sixth album finds her moving away from her previous introspective, acoustic-oriented style in favor of a bolder, more brightly colored modern Afropop sound with percolating rhythms, buoyant melodies and lyrics revolving around empowerment for women and hope for a better future. — DY

Rostam – Changephobia (Matsor Projects)
The second solo album from this LA-based producer/musician (and founding member of Vampire Weekend) is a well-crafted, intricately textured blend of bouncy electro-pop, jazz-tinged indie-pop, dreamy psych-pop, skittering prog-pop and more. — DY

Jaubi – Nafs at Peace (Astigmatic)
This Pakistani improvisational quartet’s official debut album is an adventurous blend of North Indian classical with hip hop and modal/spiritual jazz, combining traditional instrumentation with guitars, synths and drums. — DY

Mereba – AZEB EP (Interscope)
This Atlanta/LA-based artist’s latest EP is a strong seven-song EP of folk-tinged R&B and hip hop combining an atmospheric, often-spare sound with her supple vocals and lyrics of love and identity. — DY

Okuté – Okuté (Chulo)
This Cuban collective’s debut album is a fine set of rumba and related styles, combining a variety of traditional instrumentation with electric guitars, bright trumpets, organ and more. — DY

New Candys – Vyvyd (Little Cloud)
This Italian band’s fourth album is a solid set of shoegazer psych-rock with fuzzy guitars, atmospheric synths, heavy rhythms, detached vocals and hypnotic song hooks. — DY

Hailu Mergia & The Walias Band – Tezeta (Awesome Tapes From Africa)
Reissue of a rare 1975 album from Ethiopian musical legend Hailu Mergia, recorded with the Walias Band at the Hilton in Addis Ababa, where Mergia and the Walias Band regularly accompanied a variety of influential Ethiopian musicians. The album features their evocative interpretations of Ethiopian standards along with more contemporary songs, powered by Mergia’s brightly melodic organ. — DY

Anchorsong – Mirage (Tru Thoughts Recordings)
The 4th album from this Tokyo-born, London-based electronic producer (aka Masaki Yoshida) is a gorgeous set of warm and transportive electronic grooves that finds him infusing a wide array of global flavors and a fluttery jazz streak into his expansive beats and glistening rhythms. — AR

James – All the Colours of You (Caroline International)
This veteran British band’s 16th album is a solid set of anthemic indie-pop combining guitars, keyboards, horns and soaring melodies with politically charged lyrics aimed at racism and climate change along with more personal songs of loss and love. — DY

Mndsgn – Rare Pleasure (Stones Throw)
The sixth solo studio album from this LA-based artist (aka Ringgo Ancheta) is a breezy, atmospheric blend of soundtrack music, R&B, jazz and psych-pop. — DY

Hildegard – Hildegard (Section1)
The debut album from this Montreal duo comprised of singer-songwriter Helena Deland and multi-instrumentalist/producer Ouri is an adventurous set of experimental pop. — DY

Kareem Ali – Quantum Blackness (CosmoFlux Recordings)
The latest full-length album from prolific Phoenix-based electronic producer Kareem Ali is another strong set of immersive electronic grooves that showcases his unique, homespun, cerebral fusion of house, jazz, hip-hop, juke/footwork, techno, and ambient styles. Quantum Blackness finds Kareem also gently adding his own voice into the mix with more frequency, supplying uplifting lyrics on standout tracks "Don't Give Up" and "They Can't Stop Us." — AR

The Growth Eternal – Kensho ! EP (Leaving)
The latest EP from this Tulsa, OK artist (aka Byron Crenshaw) is a brief but mesmerizing six-song EP of experimental pop inflected with jazz, psych-pop, electronic music and more, combining bass guitar and occasional loops with vocodered vocals. — DY

Oshoo – You’re Not Alone EP (self-released)
The debut EP from this LA-based artist (aka Olivia Xu) is a solid 4-song set of atmospheric R&B with an often-spare sound combining her dusky vocals with hypnotic melodies. — DY

Sam Gellaitry – IV (FFRR)
Following the release of his brilliant Escapism EP trilogy and a debut full-length album that fully showcased his mastery of future club beats, young prodigious Scottish electronic musician Sam Gellaitry delivers his aptly-titled 4th EP and it finds him adding his own vocals into the mix for a visionary synth-pop sound that blends his production wizardry with a magnetic pop sensibility. Closing track "Assumptions" is an absolutely irresistible jam. — AR

Baltra – Ambition EP (Local Action)
The latest EP from NYC-via-Philly electronic producer Michael Baltra is another strong set of magnetic underground electronic rhythms and intoxicating grooves that masterfully balances fuzzy house, crisp techno, rugged breaks, and nostalgic electro flavors, while also dipping into cheeky downtempo territory on the distinctive cut "Like A Butterfly". — AR