Oprahs Bank Account becomes Canadian rappers 208th US Hot 100 hit, beating the record set by the cast of Glee
Canadian rapper Drake now has more US chart hits than any other artist in history, scoring his 208th Billboard Hot 100 entry this week.
The rapper broke the record, previously set by the cast of the TV show Glee, with the track Oprahs Bank Account by Lil Yachty and DaBaby, which he guests on. It reached No 85 off the back of 10.5m streams. He is also at No 3 in the chart with Life Is Good, a track with Future, and at No 46 on Chris Browns song No Guidance.
With a cross-generational, cross-demographic appeal thanks to a blend of rap, pop and R&B, Drake has become the worlds top rapper. Spotify named him the most streamed artist of the last decade, with 28bn global streams.
His first US chart entry was Best I Ever Had, which debuted at No 92 in May 2009, eventually rising to No 2. His 207 chart placements since have been bulked out by frequent guest spots on tracks by artists including Rihanna, Nicki Minaj and Travis Scott, as well as his solo hits. He has scored seven US No 1 singles, while all five of his studio albums and three of his mixtapes have reached No 1 on the US album chart.
Twenty years after her debut album, the singer talks about refusing to be pigeonholed, her fallout with Pharrell, and why she has moved to a remote farm
To find Kelis these days, you dont just have to leave Los Angeles, the city where, until last summer, she had lived and worked for almost all her adult life. You have to go to the opposite of Los Angeles. LA attracts people who believe they exist only if other people are watching them. Kelis wanted to go where no one could see her.
Over in that front corral is where the vegetable garden is, and then Ive got my seedlings here. Im waiting for my greenhouse to be built. We have chickens coming and also baby goats, she says as we sit on her front porch on a cool, cloudy day. She is, she adds, considering a cow situation.
We are about two and a half hours out of LA, deep in wine country. She has given me a quick tour of her beautiful 10-hectare (24-acre) farm. There are no passing cars and the nearest shop is half an hour away. Her farm is bordered by high rocky hills, in case the near isolation did not provide sufficient privacy.
I hate LA. I was only ever there for work. Because its not like New York or London, theres nowhere to go after 10 at night, so suddenly youre getting up early in the mornings and youre juicing and youre hiking and figuring out how much wheatgrass can you actually intake. I hate it, says the New York singer, unconcernedly reviving the music industrys old east coast-west coast rivalry. So I thought, if Im going to be in California, I should be where I can appreciate how beautiful it really is, not stuck in LA and pretending its a city thats fun.
As a musician, Kelis was often called hard to place, which is another way of saying that record companies and radio stations did not know how to sell her. Refusing to be restricted to the R&B and hip-hop boxes into which young black artists are often shoved, Keliss versatile, distinctive voice meant producers as varied as David Guetta, will.i.am and Dave Sitek were keen to work with her. She has made dance music, soul music and even on my favourite of her songs, Like You, from her fourth album, 2006s Kelis Was Here sampled Mozart. But that variety may also have worked against her, because it means she does not have an easy, ready-fit brand. On top of that, she had a run of bewilderingly bad luck with record companies.
The issue of race has been such a big part of my entire career. It was never something that I struggled with personally. But it was other peoples confusions. Macy Gray and I were the first [black women] to be considered alternative. But people were like: But youre black and alternative? What is that? Which already is a stupid-ass question, but it was put in our faces all the time, she says.
The reason Kelis is taking a break from farming today is to talk about the record where all this the career, the confusions and, ultimately, the farm began. It is the 20th anniversary of Kaleidoscope, her enduringly beautiful debut album, and she is about to embark on a world tour to mark it. But looking back does not sit comfortably with an artist who has always prided herself on moving forward, and, truth be told, she would not have even noticed it was the anniversary if her manager hadnt mentioned it.
Yeah, Im struggling a little bit, if Im honest. Its a lot harder than I thought it would be. I feel everyone is expecting me to have these deep thoughts about [the anniversary], and I just dont, she says.
Having established that, she then spends 15 minutes sharing her deep thoughts about the albums anniversary, which take in everything from President Trump to modern parenting.
I grew up hanging out in jazz clubs, falling asleep there with people stepping over me, because thats where my parents were, so they just took me. But you look at parents today and theyre like: Oh my God, its nap time, I cant talk to you! And its all: We cant go there because we have kids! Im like, did we die when we had kids?
And then theres a disconnect: Im hypersensitive to the stuff my parents fought for because they werent sheltering me from the realities. Now its like parents stop everything and shield their kids from everything! Then they become these adults who have no taste and no concept of what was being fought for before because they werent privy to it, she says, exasperated.
She means, I think, among other issues, that it is good to rerelease quality music, because that is often the only way kids come across it these days, as their parents just played Peppa Pig and Frozen albums for them. But even if it is not always entirely clear how her arguments relate to Kaleidoscope, I enjoy the ride.
Kelis was born Kelis Rogers, the daughter of a jazz musician and fashion designer. She has always been interested in music and she is, she says, especially proud of her first album: proud of the femaleness of the album, of the freaking outspokenness of it, the blackness of it, the alternativeness of it. But returning to Kaleidoscope has brought back as many bitter memories as sweet ones. Kelis made it with her then close friend Pharrell and Chad Hugo, AKA the Neptunes, after meeting them through a mutual friend at performing arts school. She was 19 at the time. I thought it was a beautiful and pure, creative safe space, she says. But it ended up not being that at all.
The story of the music industry is one of young artists getting ripped off, again and again, because they are too young to understand the contracts they have signed until it is too late. What is different in Keliss case, she says, is that it was her friends who ripped her off.
I was told we were going to split the whole thing 33/33/33, which we didnt do, she says. Instead, she says, she was blatantly lied to and tricked, pointing specifically to the Neptunes and their management and their lawyers and all that stuff. As a result, she says she made nothing from sales of her first two albums, which were produced by the Neptunes. But she did not notice for a few years, because she was making money from touring, and just the fact that I wasnt poor felt like enough, she says. She sighs: Their argument is: Well, you signed it. Im like: Yeah, I signed what I was told, and I was too young and too stupid to double-check it. (Pharrell and Hugo did not respond to repeated requests for comment.)
And they were your friends so you trusted them, I say.
Yeah, its amazing, she shrugs.
She doesnt sound angry. No, Im just stating the facts, she says. I ask why she isnt angry.
To be honest with you, I think if it were not for my faith, I feel like that would probably be the case. Its very clear to me, especially being on a farm, that whatever you put in the ground, that is whats going to come back to you, she says.
Things eventually came crashing down, she says, when she made her third album, Tasty, and decided to work with a variety of producers, not just the Neptunes, and I could tell they were really offended.
But she has seen Pharrell. A few years back, he was performing at an industry event and she was in the audience. And he did that thing to me that hes notorious for, which is making a nod from the stage [to someone in the audience], so it seems like theres mutual respect, when in reality She throws her head back and laughs. Im like, OK, Im not going to yell back: You stole all my publishing! So you end up nodding back and everyone thinks everythings great. Like, whatever.
Would she work with him again? She looks at me as if I have asked if she would jump into a shark tank: Ummm, at that point theres having faith and there is also just stupidity.
Kelis did not talk about any of this publicly for years. Another secret that she kept until recently is that, according to her, Nas, her first husband, physically abused her. She first mentioned this in an interview in 2018, nine years after she left him while seven months pregnant with their child. (He has strongly denied that he abused her.)
The Kaleidoscope tour starts on 3 March in Europe. It will be at the Albert Hall, Manchester on 16 March and at the Roundhouse, London on 17 March. The reissue of the Kaleidoscope album is out on 21 February.
Billie Eilish and Lizzo are competing for a string of the top prizes, but could the likes of Ariana Grande, Lana Del Rey and Rosala cause upsets?
Noise threatens to drown out the music at the 2020 Grammy awards. A line had been drawn under the tone-deaf leadership of Neil Portnow, who had presided over the ceremony since 2002 between 2013 and 2018, Grammy winners were 91% male, but, after a 2018 ceremony where men swept the board again, Portnow said it was on women to step up and create opportunities for themselves.
A woman, Deborah Dugan, replaced him; a taskforce was appointed, and in December they published their report, calling for greater diversity in the Academy voters. Any hopes that they had moved on, though, were scotched last week by Dugan being suspended for alleged misconduct; Dugan countered by saying she had been sexually harassed, that the Academy had covered up an alleged rape by Portnow, and that the voting was corrupt.
So we go into this years ceremony more jaded than ever, but the irony is that, no matter how poisonous the Academy is and regardless of whether it is rigged or not, we ended up with a much more diverse range of nominees this year. Leading the pack are Lizzo with eight noms and Billie Eilish and Lil Nas X with six each a vibrantly youthful and non-conformist trio. But will the Academy members shake off the past and vote for the future?
Record of the year
Bon Iver Hey, Ma Billie Eilish Bad Guy Ariana Grande 7 Rings HER Hard Place Khalid Talk Lil Nas X ft Billy Ray Cyrus Old Town Road Lizzo Truth Hurts Post Malone & Swae Lee Sunflower
Aside from the merely pleasant HER and Khalid tracks, this is a strong field. While lots of eyes are on Lizzo and Eilish, this could perhaps be Ariana Grandes year. Its her first time with nominations in the big four categories rather than being patronised in the pop awards and, with its My Favourite Things melody, doddering Academy voters might listen to 7 Rings and say: Hey, its one I know! Triumphant earworm Old Town Road is the longest-running No 1 in US history; Bad Guy is a showcase of the kind of fiendish genius usually employed by Hollywood horror movies to construct elaborate ways for teenagers to get killed. But an Academy eager to telegraph its modernity might go for Lizzo: Truth Hurts is a great underdog story, reaching No 1 two years after release, and her charisma is near universally infectious.
Will win: Lizzo Truth Hurts Should win: Billie Eilish Bad Guy
Album of the year
Bon Iver i, i Lana Del Rey Norman Fucking Rockwell! Billie Eilish When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? Ariana Grande Thank U, Next HER I Used to Know Her Lil Nas X 7 Lizzo Cuz I Love You (Deluxe) Vampire Weekend Father of the Bride
This is Grandes best chance of a big win. Thank U, Next is a superbly realised almost-concept album about heartache, grief and moving on that can be witty, even caustic, but never cruel it sealed her as one of the three or four definitive pop stars of our time. Lizzo, HER and Lil Nas X are hampered with too much 6/10 material across their albums; Lana Del Rey was the critical hit of the year and will certainly beat out fellow Pitchfork darlings Bon Iver and Vampire Weekend, but may not cut through to the more august and mainstream Academy members. Eilish was the inescapable pop-cultural breakthrough of the year, and her album has such terrific range and invention. She will, hopefully, squeak this.
Will win: Billie Eilish Should win: Billie Eilish
Song of the year
Lady Gaga Always Remember Us This Way Billie Eilish Bad Guy Tanya Tucker Bring My Flowers Now HER Hard Place Taylor Swift Lover Lana Del Rey Norman Fucking Rockwell Lewis Capaldi Someone You Loved Lizzo Truth Hurts
Piano-driven ballads dominate the songwriting category, including Taylor Swifts only big nomination. Lover is such classic American songcraft, though Lewis Capaldis powerful Someone Like You is the best of these ballads and it would be a British win to remember. Eilish is streets ahead in terms of songwriting innovation and should win for that Duh! alone. But, while Truth Hurts most famous lyric (I just took a DNA test, turns out Im 100% that bitch) may have been plagiarised and its British author later added to the credits, Lizzo has this sewn up. The lyrics are hilarious, and it is a massively successful example of that new school of songwriting where a single melody is repeated over and over until the brainwashed public is involuntarily chanting it and then clawing hopelessly at their faces.
Will win: Lizzo Truth Hurts Should win: Billie Eilish Bad Guy
New artist
Black Pumas Billie Eilish Lil Nas X Lizzo Maggie Rogers Rosala Tank and the Bangas Yola
Nice to see some country-soul curveballs here in the excellent Black Pumas and Yola, though the less said the better about the tune-free Tank and the Bangas at any rate, theyre all making up the numbers. Maggie Rogers didnt really break beyond her fanbase with her underrated debut album, and Im sure the Academy will see Lil Nas X merely as a two-hit wonder. Lizzos debut album came out in 2013, whereas Eilish has only just turned 18 and feels like the rightful owner of this award. But you can bet than every Latinx voter is going to be going for the astoundingly talented Rosala, who won big at the Latin Grammys and could cause an upset here.
Will win: Billie Eilish Should win: Billie Eilish
Pop solo performance
Beyonc Spirit Billie Eilish Bad Guy Ariana Grande 7 Rings Lizzo Truth Hurts Taylor Swift You Need to Calm Down
Just as performances where you cry, shout and climb inside the carcass of a bear win you Oscars, the leading pop award rather behoves you to give it some welly not for nothing has Adele won it three times. Eilish and Grandes variously murmured and chatted performances will appear to the Academy like weirdo arthouse choices here, and even Swift is in a relatively conversational mode. Beyoncs ponderous Spirit was the lame old wildebeest eaten by the younger jackals on the Lion King soundtrack, so this is Lizzos to lose.
Will win: Lizzo Should win: Billie Eilish
Rock performance
Bones UK Pretty Waste Gary Clark Jr This Land Brittany Howard History Repeats Karen O & Danger Mouse Woman Rival Sons Too Bad
Anyone looking for evidence of backroom dealing in the Academy might well make Bones UK their exhibit A: Pretty Waste is the kind of creative vacuum beloved only of nihilistically cocaine-addicted LA music industry execs looking for something to soundtrack rock bottom. The rest is pretty good. Rival Sons riffs and hollering make them the most tangibly rock thing here Karen O essays 60s pop, and Brittany Howards History Repeats is a kind of bluesy funk tune, but with mainstream rock stranded out on a sandbar while rappers and pop stars taunt it on jetskis, they need to blur the genre lines. Gary Clark Jr could edge this with his politically charged This Land, half-rapped over a heavily skanking backing.
Will win: Gary Clark Jr Should win: Rival Sons
Rap performance
J Cole Middle Child DaBaby Suge Dreamville feat JID, Bas, J Cole, Earthgang & Young Nudy Down Bad Nipsey Hussle feat Roddy Ricch & Hit-Boy Racks in the Middle Offset feat Cardi B Clout
Many voters hearts will go with Nipsey Hussle, whose murder last year robbed the world of a skilful, soulful MC who united backpacker hip-hoppers and mainstream rap fans. Racks in the Middle also features Roddy Rich, who has broken through spectacularly over the last year. But the track pales next to two others here: DaBabys Suge is a slowly prowling piece of minimalism that makes Offset sound fussily overworked in comparison; its ridiculous that DaBaby isnt up for best new artist. He is rather damaged goods after a series of run-ins with the law, however. That could hand Middle Child the win, on which J Cole raps as if hes high-stepping across the surface of a lake, his triplet time full of balletic grace.
Will win: J Cole Should win: DaBaby
Country solo performance
Tyler Childers All Yourn Ashley McBryde Girl Goin Nowhere Willie Nelson Ride Me Back Home Blake Shelton Gods Country Tanya Tucker Bring My Flowers Now
If you scoff at country, youll probably always scoff at country, but this spread of songs shows off the admirable breadth of the genre and may pique your interest yet. Willie Nelsons song is a bit something-and-nothing; Tanya Tuckers Bring My Flowers Now is nominated in the song of the year category, and its live-for-today message and simple piano backing will appeal across the Academy, but its rather workmanlike. Ashley McBryde outdoes her in the ballad stakes, but its Tyler Childers and Blake Shelton both strongly channelling the gospel and soul music that not so secretly underpins country who are the strongest here. Childers song would make for a classy first wedding dance, while Sheltons stirring ode to proud Christian labour, while deeply unfashionable, will have you gazing soulfully across a cornfield.
Swift and two other songwriters are accused of taking lyrics from a song by girl group 3LW for her hit Shake It Off
A copyright lawsuit against Taylor Swift is returning to court in the US, after an appeal overturned an earlier dismissal of the case.
Swift and her fellow songwriters Max Martin and Shellback are accused of copying lyrics from the 2001 song Players Gon Play by US girl group 3LW, for Swifts song Shake It Off.
Both songs feature the lyrics the players gonna play and the haters gonna hate. In February 2018, a federal judge said the 3LW songwriters who brought the claim, Sean Hall and Nathan Butler, did not have creative ownership over the phrases, which were deemed to be commonplace. By 2001, American popular culture was heavily steeped in the concepts of players, haters, and player haters, judge Michael Fitzgerald wrote. The concept of actors acting in accordance with their essential nature is not at all creative; it is banal.
But the successful appeal found that Fitzgerald should not have had the sole final judgment on the originality of the song. The decision will now be made by a jury.
Plagiarism claims have been made against numerous high-profile songs recently, with the latest case in the US being Truth Hurts, a song by singer and rapper Lizzo that spent seven weeks at No 1. Brothers Justin and Jeremy Raisen allege that they co-wrote the song and filed a lawsuit against Lizzo; she has countersued, saying the men did not help me write any part of the song. She did add British singer Mina Lionness to the songwriting credits, acknowledging that a viral tweet Lionness wrote was used for the songs opening line.
At an immersive, city-wide multimedia presentation of her new album When I Get Home, the singer-songwriter explains how her childhood home of Houston nourished her creative spirit
Its one thing to think with your spirit, says Solange Knowles. Its another to actually live it through your body. The Solange of today works with feelings, grooves, and frequencies in mind. If A Seat at the Table, her breakthrough third album, was a lyrically dense record about the complexities and struggles of the black American experience, then When I Get Home, her latest release, is the sonic manifestation of that blackness. Staccato rhythms and meditative mantras designed to ground and heal her after time on the road ripple on through the bodies of her listeners. Its an album about settling into familiarity: with yourself, the people around you, and the places one calls home.
At the SHAPE community center in the third ward of Houston last Sunday evening, the record comes to life during a screening of a film, also entitled When I Get Home, that Solange created and directed to accompany the album. Despite the celebrities in attendance, this isnt a premiere. The album arrived days before, with the film launching simultaneously on Apple Music and the recently revived, early-internet social network Black Planet. Instead, it is a celebration of her return to her roots.
After previous projects reflected time spent in the deserts of California and a township in Cape Town, Solanges native Houston serves as the inspiration for her latest and most challenging work. For years, she existed to most people as just the little sister of global superstar Beyonc; her talents needed the right outlet to radiate. Her first taste of the spotlight was as a backup dancer for her sisters group, Destinys Child. By her late teens, she began crafting songs for the group and its members Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams, plus gospel girl group Ramiyah. She even worked on two of her sisters best and most underrated hits, Upgrade U and Get Me Bodied, from Beyoncs second solo album BDay.
With blockbuster producers including Timbaland and The Neptunes, Solo Star, Solanges debut album released in 2002 at the age of 16, now sounds more like the inner workings of her label and management than anything she would make for herself. It was not until Sol-Angel and the Hadley Street Dreams, her second album released nearly six years later, when she began to break through, at least in the indie world. Influenced by 60s and 70s Motown, the album was a far cry from her debut, abandoning what was fashionable to focus on the aesthetics that moved her most a tactic that later fed into the minimalist synths structuring 2012s True EP.
But it was not until A Seat at the Table in 2016 that the rest of the world began to take notice. The album, which makes weighty ruminations on black American female identity feel universal, went gold in the US and led to headline festival performances. Cranes in the Sky, a fan favourite single from the album, won her a Grammy for best R&B performance.
So where is Solange now? Consider a scene toward the end of her film. Tens of dancers, in varying shades and sizes dressed in black, gather around a white circular object in a sparse, desert-like setting three curved, disconnected and multi-tiered structures form a circle, with groups interspersed throughout. This is not just a music video, it is video art, a sculpture of massive proportions, performance art, and more, all for one song. She turns the genre of R&B into a massive, interdisciplinary space to explore, build, and play.
Im thinking about the possibility of maybe some young black girl in 20 years needing to reference a black sculptor whos making work that large, and in landscape like that, and the blessing and privilege [that] I might come up in that search, Solange begins. Of course, I want to make these massive landscapes and express these parts of me … because its beautiful, and I want to make astounding work. But I really want to make work to be discovered 50 years from now.
Time on the road promoting and performing for A Seat at the Table mentally, physically, and emotionally disjointed her. I had so much to give on my last project while also needing to heal and work on myself, she says. [A Seat at the Table] was for everybody. I wanted it to be. And [When I Get] Home is for me.
I think any time you go through something like that, you crave things that remain the same, she says, referring to the gruelling tours for her previous album. I know that at any given time in my life, I can come back here, to Houston, to third ward, and have these anchors. And she did quietly renting a house and writing new music to reflect her journey. The longer I was here, the more these sort of things that might have been mundane to me, visually, started to really enrich me.
Guests from the screening got a closer glimpse of Solanges Houston, her first home. There was Emancipation Park, first formed in 1872 the oldest in Texas, it was once the only public park open to black people in the state. A friendly middle-aged security guard roaming the premises spoke of how the neighbourhood had changed as a result of gentrification. What was once the battleground of an infamous shootout between Houston police and the Black Panthers, has since transformed into a vast, inviting space, featuring everything from a community centre and playground, to pools, athletic courts, and a live concert venue.
In 2016, she made headlines as an advocate and participant in the #BlackBank movement, which encouraged black Americans to move their money into black-owned banks Knowles chose Unity National, the only African American-owned bank in Texas. Inside a nearby branch, a spokeswoman offers cards and pamphlets about its services while red leather chairs, typically reserved for staff and customers, were used as seating for a screening of Knowless film.
And there was the Vita Mutari salon, previously owned by Solanges mother, Tina Knowles Lawson, for 20 years. The singer describes it as a ground for her creativity, and although the family no longer occupy the space, the current owners continue to maintain that creative spirit, with large pieces of art lining the walls and neon coloured bottles of hair products.
Each location (there were nine in total) held meaning for Solange; bits and pieces of this Houston found their way into her work. Blackness will never go away, she says. Its who I am. Its what I know. Ill always be a black woman, and Ill always create work from this black womans body. Ill always be from third ward.
Texans are grounded in their culture. Although the state may often be the source of ridicule by outsiders, there has been and always will be innovation born out of its simultaneous vastness and insularity. Only here could you get a mix of zydeco tunes, rhinestone-covered African American cowboys, block-wide churches, barbecue, purple drank and Nasa. Its this editing this commingling and distillation of seemingly disparate things that defines When I Get Home.
Artists become eligible for selection 25 years after the release of their first record. An international voting committee of more than 1,000 artists, historians and members of the music industry will select five or six of these acts for induction into the Hall of Fame. Fans are also eligible to vote: the top five artists selected by the public will be tallied along with the committees votes.
Radiohead were among 2018s potential inductees, but declined to attend the ceremony. The bands guitarist, Ed OBrien, said at the time: As a British band, its one of those things that its very lovely to be nominated, but we dont quite culturally understand it. Its a very American thing. Us Brits are very bad at celebrating ourselves.
LL Cool J was also nominated for the 2018 list. If the New York rapper is selected for the 2019 group, he will be the seventh hip-hop act to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, following Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, Run-DMC, the Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, NWA and Tupac Shakur.
If Stevie Nicks makes the 2019 class, it will mark her second induction to the Hall of Fame. She is a member of Fleetwood Mac, who were inducted in 1998. She would become the first woman to be inducted more than once. As of 2017, 22 male performers had been inducted twice or more, with Eric Clapton receiving three inductions as a solo artist, with Cream and with the Yardbirds.
The Zombies have been nominated multiple times. In 2017, keyboardist Rod Argent told Billboard that the psychedelic band would be flattered, gratified and absolutely delighted to be inducted. I know there are some people that actually portray themselves as unaffected and dont care and, Oh, well, it would be nice, but, really I dont get it. Its not something that I particularly want. Were not those people at all.
There are likely to be complaints from the US about the Halls perceived snubs artists including Bjrk, Kate Bush, Roberta Flack, Whitney Houston, Depeche Mode, the Monkees and Chic are considered overdue for induction. The ceremony holds great significance in the American music industry, but does not command similar significance in the UK.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame organisation was established by the late Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun in 1983. The museum opened in Cleveland, Ohio in 1986. That year, Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Fats Domino, the Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard and Elvis Presley became the first inductees. Aretha Franklin became the first female inductee in 1987. In 2018, Bon Jovi, the Cars, Dire Straits, the Moody Blues and Nina Simone were selected for induction.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2019 induction ceremony will be held at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, on 29 March.
From Behemoths satanic metal to a triumphant return from Lana Del Rey, here are the tracks you need this month read about our ten favourites, and subscribe to all 50 in our playlists
One of 2017s most sensual and heady albums has dropped in the form of Nonames Room 25. Imagine Erykah Badus cosmic knowledge exchange delivered in Chance the Rappers frank chatter and youre close, but Noname has an unruffled confidence and wry worldview that is all her own. The boom-bap backings may be pretty but they belie a savage edge, as the Chicago rapper goes in on Uncle Toms and beta males (The way I lullaby your brokenness, believe me Im Ripley). Its hard to pick a highlight but Ace is an absolute gem, and not just because it shouts out the UK. Two midwest MCs, Smino and Saba, drop by, with the latter almost stealing the show with a domino rally of a verse, words tipping over in an impressively unbroken stream.
Let us give thanks as LDR goes into the DGAF phase of her career. Not only is her forthcoming album called Norman Fucking Rockwell but the second single to be taken from it is called Venice Bitch and is nearly 10 minutes long. Her schtick has long involved a love-hate relationship with American iconography, and now she seems to be falling on the side of love she longs for that Norman-Rockwell-painting life for her and her partner, with the lovely image on the stoop with the neighbourhood kids / callin out bang bang kiss kiss perhaps the first inkling of their nuclear family. The song earns its length, stretching out into the warm evening in a haze of fuzz guitar and wandering analogue synth tones.
The time signature hopscotch of math-rock powers this truly magnificent song, but where that genre often gets bogged down in technicality and bad jeans, Kiran Leonard elevates it to powerful, elegant heights. The prolific songwriter from Saddleworth Moor is only 23 but operating at a seriously mature level, here dissecting the narcissism of internet culture. You can almost feel the weather systems passing across the song, soft breezes in the verses whipping into choppy squalls for the choruses and, with the tearjerkingly powerful guitar solo, an electrical storm of emotion.
One of the most anticipated metal releases of the year is I Loved You at Your Darkest by Polish satanists Behemoth, which, if Wolves Ov Siberia and previous single God = Dog are anything to go by, will be symphonically heavy. Where God = Dog used pulverising blast beats and had a video that epically inverted Christs crucifixion, Wolves Ov Siberia is more of a rollicking romp. Frontman Nergal roars things like We hail the flame, we hail the ice / Beyond bosom, beyond materia / We reject! We fucking deny! while riffs stride confidently across the battlefield.
Returning with her first completely solo material since 2010 is pops patron saint of heartbreak, with Metronomys Joe Mount co-producing. But while Honey is sung in a trademark melancholy minor key, shes clearly fed up of being in the corner / watching you kiss her, and so on. Instead, Honey drips with sex: At the heart of some kind of flower / Stuck in glitter, strands of saliva / Wont you get me right where the hurt is? Suffice to say, the title doesnt refer to something youd spread on toast, unless thats what youre into. Be sure to check out our long read on Robyn from last week, too.
The best rap of this year has been marked by a willingness to get psychedelic. Travis Scotts Astroworld, A$AP Rockys Testing, Swae Lees Swaecation, Playboi Cartis Die Lit, basically anything involving Young Thug all have their heads in the clouds, possibly elevated there by some substance. Lil Uzi Verts new track is up there with them, hoisted aloft by the remarkable production by Dolan Beats, with a floaty harp melody sampled from anime series Death Parade. Uzis lyrics may cleave to cliches about clothes, jewellery and round bottoms but his flow tumbling forward in a permanent high register is addictive enough to run towards the six-minute mark.
Aviary, the new album from highbrow dream-popper Julia Holter, is nearly 90 minutes long, and sees her head back to the slightly more conceptual, suite-like approach of albums like Tragedy and Loud City Song. But, moth-like, she always circles back to the bright filament of pop. I Shall Love 2 is a big-hearted psych symphony: a trilling, wordless vocal line invites in a whole orchestra, who eventually fill the song to bursting it pops, and dies away instantly.
If you want proof that irony, in the hands of the internet and social media, has modulated into something infinitely complex, just take a look at Jimothy Lacoste. His persona posh nerd rapper and possible fuckboi is extremely silly, and yet created with so much deadpan flair that it totally works. It helps that his songs gently slap: following the likes of Getting Busy!, Drugs and Future Bae, Fashion is his best track yet, an ode to his snazzy dressing (Tucked in shirt, lovely cords) backed by dreamy G-funk. Is he serious? Best not to ponder it too hard.
London songwriter Will Westerman has been knocking around for a couple of years now, leaving swoons and sighs in his wake. The acoustic Mother Song was a breathtakingly sad yet sexy calling card, but, with producer Bullion, he has since added subtle drum machines to create 80s-facing pop balladry. With a doleful voice somewhere between Arthur Russell and Car Seat Headrests Will Toledo, on Albatross the first track from his new EP Westerman sketches out a series of lazy afternoons, with possible romances hovering around the edges.
Along with fellow travellers such as Laurel Halo, Call Super and Minor Science, TJ Hertz, AKA Objekt, has carved out a new space for techno. His music keeps the jaw-slackening (or, depending on what youre on, tightening) power of 4/4 beats, but takes in lessons from dub, jazz and psychedelia. The result is a dizzying, intelligent but rambunctious kind of dance music. In the wake of his most commercial moment to date, Theme from Q, comes Secret Snake, another supremely confident and original track. A swaying dancehall-adjacent beat and some subtly kooky vocal samples power the dub techno of the first half, before it explodes into a burst of giant melody.
Singer will follow Roy Orbison and Whitney Houston in performing posthumously via technology and stagecraft
A hologram of Amy Winehouse is set for a worldwide tour in 2019. A projection of the late singer will perform digitally remastered arrangements of her songs, backed by a live band, singers and what the production company Base Hologram calls theatrical stagecraft.
Winehouses father, Mitch, described the endeavour as a dream. To see her perform again is something special that really cant be put into words, he said. Our daughters music touched the lives of millions of people and it means everything that her legacy will continue in this innovative and groundbreaking way.
Mitch Winehouse said the tour will raise money and awareness for the Amy Winehouse Foundation. The charity educates young people about drug and alcohol misuse, provides support for those at risk and supports the development of disadvantaged young people through music.
A hologram of Billie Holliday performs daily 40-minute shows at the Hologram USA Theater in Los Angeles. A similar tour featuring the likeness of Whitney Houston was scrapped in 2017 after her estate said the technology was not ready. Other tours are planned featuring the metal musician Ronnie James Dio and Frank Zappa.
Abba have said they will use the technology as part of a new virtual experience expected to debut next year. Abbas Benny Andersson said in 2016: Were inspired by the limitless possibilities of what the future holds and are loving being a part of creating something new and dramatic here. A time machine that captures the essence of who we were. And are.
Winehouses last performance was at the Tuborg festival in Belgrade on 18 June 2011. The chaotic set, in which Winehouse slurred lyrics and forgot the names of her band members, led to the cancellation of a European tour. She was found dead at her home in Camden, north London, on 23 July 2011.
A new documentary, Amy Winehouse Back to Black, will be released in November. It includes previously unseen footage of Amy and new interviews with her collaborators Mark Ronson and Salaam Remi.
In a BBC3 documentary, former girlfriend Kitti Jones alleges the R&B star groomed an underage girl as well as her and other young women; Kelly has refused to comment
The R&B singer R Kelly has been accused of sexually abusing a girl since she was 14 years old.
The allegation the latest in a string of allegations of the sexual abuse of young women by Kelly was made, referring to another woman, by former girlfriend Kitti Jones, in a BBC3 documentary, R Kelly: Sex, Girls and Videotapes.
During two years of dating Kelly from 2011 onwards, Jones, 34, says she was groomed by him, and forced to have sex with him and others at least 10 times in a sex dungeon.
She said: I was introduced to one of the girls, that he told me he trained since she was 14, those were his words. I saw that she was dressed like me, that she was saying the things Id say and her mannerisms were like mine. Thats when it clicked in my head that he had been grooming me to become one of his pets. He calls them his pets.
Jones said Kelly made the unnamed woman crawl on the floor towards me and perform oral sex on me, and he said, This is my fucking pet, I trained her. Shes going to teach you how to be with me. It is unclear how old the woman was at the time of this incident.
Kelly or his representatives made no comment to the BBC or the Guardian, but he has previously denied accusations of sexual impropriety or violence against women.
In 2008, Kelly was found not guilty of child pornography charges after he was accused of filming and photographing sexual encounters with a 14-year-old girl. He has reportedly made out of court settlements with various other women, including in 1996 Tiffany Hawkins, who said she had a sexual relationship with him for three years from the age of 15.
Jones has spoken out against Kelly before, in an October 2017 interview with Rolling Stone, in which she described him becoming physically abusive after she confronted him over the alleged child abuse images: He would start kicking me, telling me I was a stupid bitch [and] dont ever get in his business.
In the BBC documentary, Jones says Kelly was very abusive, physically, mentally, verbally. I think he gets some sort of satisfaction within himself, knowing that hes taking control over other people.
In July 2017, Jones, along with three other women, spoke out against Kelly for an investigation by reporter Jim DeRogatis for BuzzFeed News, in which they accused him of brainwashing a series of women into a cult-like setup, where Kelly required them to have sex with him, and controlled what they wore and when they could use the bathroom or their phones.
Kelly denied the claims, saying he would work diligently and forcibly to pursue his accusers and clear his name.
DeRogatis later spoke to Jerhonda Pace, another woman who had a sexual relationship with Kelly. She said: I was slapped and I was choked and I was spit on by Kelly, who also reportedly had her dress up like a schoolgirl and call him daddy.
Elsewhere in the documentary, Kellys ex-manager Rocky Bivens stated that he was at the secret wedding ceremony between the singer and fellow R&B star Aaliyah, who was 15 at the time. Kelly has in the past denied the marriage.
Kelly is one of the most successful R&B singers of all time, having scored six US No 1 albums, with seven more reaching the Top 5; his hits include Bump n Grind, I Believe I Can Fly and Ignition (Remix). His success has waned in recent years, however, and he hasnt had a single in the US Top 20 since 2007.
Taken from Ava DuVernays big-budget Disney fantasy A Wrinkle in Time, the song marks an unexpected return from the reclusive British soul legend
Sade has released her first new music in eight years, with the song Flower of the Universe, taken from the soundtrack to A Wrinkle in Time Ava DuVernays big-budget sci-fi fantasy starring Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon and more.
Backed by pretty acoustic guitar and almost eerie wordless backing vocals, Sade delivers a typically spellbinding vocal line. The sentimental lyric is aimed at a child, described as a flower of the universe: They want to know its true / Theres someone in the world, lovely as you.
The song is paired with a remix by No ID, famous for his production work with Kanye West, Jay-Z and Common, who adds some subtle drum programming.
Sades most recent release was her album Soldier of Love in 2010, which came a decade after her Lovers Rock LP, though her popularity remains high despite the intermittent release schedule. When she toured in 2012, she out-earned Adele to become the sixth-highest earning musician in the world that year. She has sold more than 50m records in her career, which began in 1984 with the phenomenally successful album Diamond Life.
