Deadshirt

Deadshirt Is Listening… Bringing you a rundown of our staff and guest contributors’ favorite new tracks released in the past week after they’ve had the weekend to blast them in their cars, in a club, alone in their rooms, etc.

Jake Arant is miming along to…

“Gardenia”
Iggy Pop and Josh Homme
Post Pop Depression
Alternative Rock

Iggy Pop’s upcoming Post Pop Depression is the kind of record I would have theorized in a drunken stupor and then dismissed as an impossible dream. It’s been painted as a sequel to Iggy’s beloved 1977 solo album Lust for Life with the addition of Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme as both a musician and songwriter. My love for everything Josh Homme is no secret to anybody, and I’ve responded to this news with no tact or filter. This is, in short, a big fuckin’ deal.

Ahead of the album’s March 18th release, they’ve released “Gardenia,” which is a fascinating cocktail of harmony and dissonance. Iggy Pop’s voice has aged in very interesting way, and what I appreciate about a lot of his recent work is that he doesn’t make an effort to hide it. His smoky growl clambers over Homme’s bright-yet-chunky guitar harmonies, not at all worried about whether he’s exactly on key or not. It reminds me an awful lot of Pop’s 2009 Preliminaires record, a dark poetry piece that’s a far cry from his howling proto-punk roots. “Gardenia” shines during the choruses especially, where Pop’s gravel is underlined by Homme’s velvety Jack Bruce-esque falsetto.

One of my favorite things about Iggy Pop is how heavily his music and style is flavored by those he collaborates with, and like James Williamson and David Bowie before him, Josh Homme seems to be helping bring out a new shade of Iggy, and that is very exciting.

Joe Stando is losing his mind to…

“Maybe, Sweet One, You Won’t Have Nightmares Tonight”
Father John Misty
Folk, rock, eldritch horror

I like Father John Misty alright, enough that when I saw that he’d released a new single on SoundCloud, I checked it out. The song itself, a scrapped Colbert skit called “Maybe, Sweet One, You Won’t Have Nightmares Tonight,” is what made me love Father John Misty. It’s a song that really has to be heard to be believed/understood. A faux lullaby, it moves from cute to scary to funny back to scary and back to funny as it traces and mashes up all kinds of nightmare and stress dream imagery. FJM’s commitment to the bit is total, and while it would’ve been fun to see as a sketch, I think it’s almost better as an audio-only gag, as you can more fully appreciate the variety of jokes and messed-up imagery. The subtle introduction of screaming and bass recalls “twist” horror movie scores or the Nightmare on Elm Street nursery rhyme, and the sheer number of images described, from teeth falling out to hats made of human hair, deftly go from creepy individual moments to an absurd, laughable aggregate. It cracked me the hell up.

Dominic Griffin is winding it up to…

“Lightning (Featuring Juicy J)”
Tinashe
Joyride
R&B

There’s been an ongoing debate about modern R&B music and the divide between what is traditional and what is electronic, what is hip-hop, what is dubstep with the occasional cooing voice. Tinashe’s music bridges more modern dance-oriented stylings with that old school, soulful sense of yearning. She’s not a belter. She doesn’t tear the house down with glass-shattering melisma, but she’s got a breathy kind of charisma that’s absolutely intoxicating. “Lightning,” her new heater produced by Mike Will Made It, rocks the boat in that perfect sweet spot tempo. It feels like Quiet Storm radio on drugs, coiling around your spine with that tingling sensation of wanting. It’s sensuous without being puerile. She still understands how to imply a powerful amount of sexuality without resorting to crass lyricism. Juxtaposing her charming vocal presence with a lowkey verse from Juicy J just confirms something I’ve long thought, that Tinashe’s voice is the closest thing to a lapdance on modern radio.

That’s what we’ve been listening to this week – what’s got your ear this week? Tweet your recommendations @DeadshirtDotNet or drop us a line on our Facebook page.