New Music Weekend: Iggy Pop, Josh Homme, Gwen Stefani, Damien Jurado, and More!!!

Hey there music lover! You like new stuff? Great! You’ve stumbled into the perfect corner of the internet.  Each week all sorts of audiolicious goodies are unleashed onto the masses and this is where they come to be judged. I’ll tell ya what’s good, what’s bad, and what’s a waste of your precious time. So strap on your headphones and let’s take a ride!

The Big News

You know what? Sometimes  man’s just gotta do what a man’s gotta do. The “big news” is usually reserved for the album with the most press and which figures to sell the most copies or units or downloads or whatever.  And this week,  it would be safe to assume that such a title would go to the new Gwen Stefani record. However, this also happens to be the week that the new Iggy Pop record, Post Pop Depression, shambles it’s way into existence. It is the man’s seventeenth release, first since 2012, and was recorded with fucking Josh Homme.  The record is getting rave reviews of course, I mean, after all Iggy is almost 70 and, well, every album might be his last, so it’s tough to be critical, especially in a year overshadowed by the death of David Bowie, Pop’s friend and collaborator. What am I getting at? Just buy the record, ok?

The Other Big News

This is What the Truth Feels Like is the first Gwen Stefani solo record since 2006’s The Sweet Escape. It’s about a bunch of bullshit like Stefani’s high profile divorce from Gavin Rossdale and, shit, I don’t care. So it’s like Stefani’s version of Blood on the Tracks? Fine, I guess everyone is entitled to make one. Good for her.

Solo Suckers

Indie heartthrob Damien Jurado returns with his dozen plus two release, Visions of Us on the Land. It’s the culmination of a trilogy the Seattle singer-songwriter began on his 2012 release Mariquopa.

The Narrows is the latest release from songwriter Grant-Lee Phillips, who, at one time, fronted one of my all time favorite bands, Grant-Lee Buffalo.

BONUS!!!!
Here’s a little Grant-Lee Buffalo for ya!!

British Bangers
The first from English electronic duo Underworld in six years emerges from the shadows this week. Should be fun. This Spin review, which includes the word “ouroborotic”, claims the record, which is called Barbara, Barbara, We Face a Shining Future and is their ninth release, is “transcendent”, concluding that it is an “inspired record born from the desperation of years-long stagnancy.”

Fellow blokes Primal Scream unveil their eleventh effort this week. It’s got a cool title – Chaosmosis. This site called Live4Ever calls it “the most concise record of their career.”

RIP

This is the part where we say goodbye to those who’ve played their last solo. Rest in peace and rock on brothers and sisters.

R&B singer Tommy Brown was 84.

Irish musician Conor Walsh.

Ben Edmonds, another important rock writer, was 65., and Louis Meyers, one of the founders of South By Southwest, was 60.

Jazz singer Ernestine Anderson.

And pop singer Gogi Grant.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHoXMS5IyuE

And, last but not least, Frank Sinatra Jr.

My Recommendation
If there’s a new Boris album out, I’m gonna recommend it. And if there’s a new Merzbow record out, I’m gonna recommend it. And if Boris and Merzbow record an album together I’m gonna orgasm. Then recommend it.

Next Week
Tune in next week, same new music time, same new music channel, for new stuff from: Zayne Malik of One Direction!!