Still searching for that Father’s Day present? You can’t go wrong with music — and I’m sure it’s no coincidence that there are a bazillion great new albums coming out next week. OK, maybe not an actual bazillion — but enough that I could easily have put 20 titles in this post. Thankfully, in the interest of not taking up your whole damn day, I whittled it down to a six-pack. Which is something else Dad might appreciate, come to think. Anyway:
Foals
Life Is Yours
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Foals take a fresh, thrilling new direction on with their upcoming album Life Is Yours, the followup to the triumphant, two-part Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost. Life Is Yours feels like a natural evolution for Foals, its disco-tinged guitars, tight syncopated rhythms and punchy, insistent hooks echoing their roots as purveyors of rambunctious house party chaos. Thematically, it’s escapist, transportive and in rapture at life’s endless possibilities. It’s a record that’s perfectly in tune with the prevailing atmosphere of this moment in time — a life-affirming celebration as the world is reunited. Yannis Philippakis says, “I feel that with Everything Not Saved… we touched upon all of the facets of our sound up until that point. This time we wanted to find a new way to express ourselves. We wanted to refocus and do something that shared a DNA throughout the songs: a physicality, a danceability, and with energy and joyousness. It’s definitely the poppiest record we’ve ever made.”
Nova Twins
Supernova
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Genre-bending heavy alt-rock duo Nova Twins (singer-guitarist Amy Love and bassist Georgia South) are about toe release their highly anticipated sophomore album. Supernova is a piece of work that’s fearlessly itself — once again playing with genre and rich in different moods, textures, and layers, all the while retaining that purity and simplicity of the essential elements: South, Love, bass, guitars, drums, and a whole lot of energy. Ultimately, it captures the tension and release that we’ve all been through lately, while imagining what’s to come. Speaking on the album, Amy and Georgia said, “Supernova is the beginning of a new era. As we delved into the unknown, making this album became our medicine through a turbulent time. It’s a reflection of where we were and how far we have come, encased in a fantasy world that we imagined. Supernova is made out of dreams, triumphs and colourful nightmares. When you get to the other side, you will always come out a winner.”
Bartees Strange
Farm To Table
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Farm to Table is the second album from Washington D.C. resident Bartees Leon Cox Jr. Where his 2020 debut Live Forever introduced the experiences and places that shaped Bartees, Farm To Table zeros in on the people — specifically his family — and those closest to him on his journey so far. With his career firmly on the ascent, Farm To Table examines Bartees’ constantly shapeshifting relationship with life post-Live Forever. It also speaks to a deeper lore that says, don’t forget where you came from, and this album is why. Always remembering where he came from, across 10 songs Bartees is celebrating the past, moving towards the future, and fully appreciating the present.”
TV Priest
My Other People
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Without a brutal evaluation of their own becoming, TV Priest might have never made their second album. Heralded as the next big thing in post-punk, they were established as a bolshy, sharp-witted outfit, the kind that starts movements with their political ire. There was of course truth in that, but it was a suit that quickly felt heavy on its wearer’s shoulders, leaving little room for true vulnerability. “A lot of it did feel like I was being really careful and a bit at arm’s length,” says vocalist Charlie Drinkwater. “I think maybe I was not fully aware of the role I was taking. I had to take a step back and realize that what we were presenting was quite far away from the opinion of myself that I had. Now, I just want to be honest.”
Hank Williams Jr.
Rich White Honky Blues
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Larger than life, capable of summoning all his rowdy friends with crashing downbeats and a blaring guitar riff, Hank Williams Jr. has been one of country music’s truest outlaws for over half a century. But more than the swaggering singles, roughneck fantasy videos or relentless sense of blue-collar boogie, at his core, the 72-year-old legend is a bluesman. Pure, unqualified and unadulterated, the only son of Hank Williams has the same down low lonesome in his veins as the man Rufus “Tee-Tot” Payne taught to play guitar as a small child growing up in Greenville, Alabama. With Rich White Honky Blues, the second-generation Country Music Hall of Famer makes good on his legacy with a turpentine and rough wood take on the hill country blues that informed his father’s raw-boned style of putting his pain out there. Grammy-winning Producer of the Year (and Black Keys singer-guitarist) Dan Auerbach recorded the set live over three days, with a dozen songs reprising classics from Robert Johnson, Lightnin’ Hopkins, R.L. Burnside, Muddy Waters, Big Joe Turner and a few from Bocephus himself. “The blues is where it all comes from,” concedes Williams. “It’s the start of everything musical in my family; everything starts with Tee-Tot and flows from there. I’ve always flirted with this stripped-back blues — all the way back to the ‘80s. But I finally made an album that’s just that, and I like it.”
Frank Zappa
Zappa/Erie
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “The latest audio treasure to be excavated from Frank Zappa’s vast and legendary vault, Zappa/Erie brings together an exciting trio of shows that the Maestro performed in Erie, Pa. and the surrounding area between 1974-76. The new six-disc box contains more than seven hours of unreleased, electrifying live performances from Zappa and three different lineups of incredible musicians from this peak period. Of the 71 tracks, only 10 minutes have been released before, on Zappa’s classic 1974 live album Roxy & Elsewhere, outside of the amateur recordings that have been passed around on the bootleg/tape trading circuit. The three complete shows included on Zappa/Erie are presented in chronological order and trace Zappa’s history with the Pennsylvanian lakeside suburb. The set kicks off with a concert at Edinboro State College, a local university outside of Erie, on May 8, 1974, and is followed by Zappa’s first proper concert in Erie at the Gannon Auditorium at the private, Catholic, Gannon University on Nov. 12, 1974; and concludes with what would be his last Erie show, held at the Erie County Fieldhouse on Nov. 12, 1976. In addition to the full shows, several performances from South Bend, Ind., Toledo, Ohio and Montreal during from the same time period, are included as bonus tracks.”
