It has been said that the New York subway system is populated by some of the most interesting characters you’ll ever see, but in the video for Chappelle Roan‘s new single “The Subway,” she takes that concept to fun extremes.
Roan loves her costumes, and in this video, she wears a wig that practically turns her into The Addams Family‘s Cousin It. In fact, there’s a whole subplot with a chase scene between two hairy creatures, as well as an impromptu drag ball, because of course there’s a drag ball in a Chappelle Roan video.
Lyrically, the song is about “the girl that got away,” who Chappelle is reminded of by a stranger’s hair on the subway. The singer continues to be haunted by reminders of her ex throughout the city, until she makes a vow: “I see your shadow / I see it even with the lights off / I made a promise, if in four months this feeling ain’t gone
/ Well, f*ck this city! I’m movin’ to Saskatchewan!”
If you ask me, that’s not far enough from New York City; I hear Portland, Oregon is nice this time of year.
“The Subway” is Chappelle Roan’s second new release of 2025, following the country-fied “The Giver.” The Midwestern Princess promised fans she wasn’t going full country just yet, and here’s your proof. She’s the same heart-on-her-sleeve singer-songwriter she always was, and she has yet to miss this year — although we may have to wait a while for her next album.
Steven and Ian open this week’s episode with Steven reflecting on his experience seeing Oasis in London. Ian counters with his own big concert experience — Waka Flocka at San Diego SeaWorld. From there, they touch on some news that they missed when Steven was overseas, including the death of Ozzy Osbourne, the new Tame Impala single, and the trend of indie artists leaving Spotify. They also do a “yay or nay” on music reunions. In the mailbag, they address Indigo De Souza’s reaction to a recent negative review.
In Recommendation Corner, Ian talks about the shoegaze band Bleary Eyed and Steven stumps for psych-rocker Cory Hanson.
New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 250 here and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can submit questions for Steve and Ian at [email protected], and make sure to follow us on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) for all the latest news. We also recently launched a visualizer for our favorite Indiecast moments. Check those out here.
Mariah The Scientist and Kali Uchis link up to pay homage to an R&B legend and forbidden love with their new single, “Is It A Crime?” While this song doesn’t sample Sade’s classic as some other tracks have this year, with that title, it’s hard not to make the connection — especially with Mariah and Kali covering the same thematic material.
You can’t help but wonder whether there’s some long con to get Sade back into the public consciousness this year. No less than three different artists in three different genres have made projects or songs evoking the 1985 smooth jazz hit “Is It A Crime?” First, Afrobeats artist Rema interpolated a sample of it on his song “Baby,” which bears its signature question as a subtitle. Then, Snoop Dogg released his own cover of “Iz It A Crime?” with Sexyy Red, along with an album of the same name. There’s also a song, “Main Event,” that interpolates a sample of the original from rising Detroit rapper Lelo.
Meanwhile, the new song is the latest single from Mariah’s upcoming album, https://uproxx.com/music/mariah-the-scientist-shares-hearts-sold-separately-release-date/Hearts Sold Separately, which hits DSPs on August 22. She previously released the single “Burning Blue.” Likewise, Kali Uchis has been promoting her own new album, Sincerely, which dropped in May.
You can listen to Mariah The Scientist’s “Is It A Crime?” featuring Kali Uchis above.
Hearts Sold Separately is out 8/22 via Epic. You can find more info here.
Last year, ONE Musicfest celebrated its 15th year with a star-studded lineup including Cardi B, Gunna, and more. The 2025 edition, meanwhile, will serve as a sort of reset, getting back to basics for the Atlanta-based festival, which returns October 25-26 at Piedmont Park.
The headliners for the 2025 One Musicfest will be a who’s-who of Atlanta rap royalty, including Future, Ludacris, and a Dungeon Family reunion in honor of late Organized Noize member Rico Wade. While there’s no word yet on if that reunion will include elusive Outkast member André 3000 — or, for that matter, Future, who once recorded at the Family’s basement studio, The Dungeon as “Meathead” — it should certainly be exciting to see Outkast, Goodie Mob, Big Rube, and the gang all in one place. Other artists who have claimed membership to the group include Janelle Monáe, Killer Mike, and Bubba Sparxxx — artists who haven’t really worked with the Family in years — so there are a lot of possibilities for what that’ll entail.
Other artists on the absolutely stacked lineup include Boosie, Busta Rhymes, Chief Keef, Clipse, Doechii, FLO, Jazmine Sullivan, Kehlani, Leon Thomas, Mary J. Blige, Ray Vaughn, Wale, and more. You can see the full lineup below. Tickets are on sale now, you can find more info here.
PinkPantheress’ star continues to rise, as she made her television debut on Wednesday night, performing a medley of songs from her new mixtape Fancy That on The Tonight Show.
The performance had a touch of retro nostalgia as PinkPantheress danced in a square light box flanked by singers with 1960s updos and cigarette pants (a style that, yes, made its comeback in Y2K, the decade the singer pulls from most prolifically). Starting with “Illegal,” she slipped into some light TikTok-inspired choreography for “Girl Like Me,” then finished up with “Tonight,” stepping down to strut back and forth along the stage with her dancers.
The poised performance was yet more proof that her stardom was definitely earned. In a recent interview, she explained how her perfectionism plays into making her such a polished performer. “One thing OCD does make me personally do is it means if I don’t consider myself a certain standard at what I’m doing, I don’t see the point doing it,” she said. “So, all that to say with performing. I love performing, yes. […] I simply don’t think I’m that good yet. So, until, I’m that good, then I’m always going to be a bit, like, ugh.”
She’s certainly on the right track.
Watch PinkPantheress’ Tonight Show performance of “Illegal/Girl Like Me/Tonight” above.
Metro Boomin has remained frustratingly cagey about the release date for his new project, A Futuristc Summa, but he keeps releasing other details, ensuring that the hype grows by the day.
Today, he revealed some of the features that will appear on the project. After previously asserting it’d feature an “all new cast,” a handful of his usual collaborators appear among the names he shared to social media — although more than a few remain a mystery.
The ones we do know are a mix of well-established trap vets and rising stars, including 2 Chainz, BunnaB, Future, J Money, Lil Baby, Meany of Shop Boyz, Quavo, Rich Kidz, Rocko, Roscoe Dash, T.I., Travis Porter, Waka Flocka Flame, YK Niece, and Young Dro. Meanwhile, there are still six mystery guests, that Metro will presumably share at some later date.
Metro is coming off an extremely productive year — no pun intended — in which he and Future released not just one but two collaborative albums that topped the charts and disrupted the landscape of hip-hop. That doesn’t seem to be stopping him from keeping up his prolific pace; in addition to A Futuristic Summa, his fans have been anticipating a joint project with JID, which Metro says is still forthcoming.
Chance The Rapper has been teasing his second album, Star Line, for the better part of the last three years.
Today, though, he gave fans the news they’ve been waiting for so long: Star Line has a release date. The album’s coming on August 15, making it a little over six years since the release of his controversial “debut” album, The Big Day. Chance announced the album via social media today, with a short video clip:
During the album’s long rollout, he began playing it for fans at an ever-evolving art installation, leading to it mistakenly being called Star Line Gallery by fans for a while. Last year, he corrected them, saying he wouldn’t release it until they stopped telling him to drop “the album.” “I’m not going to drop the album until y’all start calling it Star Line,” he quipped during a live stream.
And while he never gave a solid reason for the delay, it’s probably safe to speculate that it was caused by a combination of performance anxiety and perfectionism from the lukewarm reception for The Big Day, his gig as host for NBC’s The Voice, and his divorce. Through it all, though, he kept releasing high-quality raps and staying connected with fans — dedication which will pay off in just two more weeks.
When Oasis announced their return to the road just over 11 months ago, the least original people on the internet all made the same observation: No chance the Gallagher brothers stay together until next summer. It was semi-jokey conventional wisdom that Liam and Noel — who broke up their band in 2009 after a backstage blowup in Paris that involved at least one plum tossed in anger — were too prone to interpersonal strife to pull off the highest profile rock reunion tour of the 21st century. If they did make it to the tour, haters and pessimists insisted, the shows would be a debacle (at worst) or an overpriced ego trip (at best).
Well, I saw Oasis last week at Wembley Stadium in London with 81,000 other fans. And it was incredible. Incredible! One of my favorite shows of all time. And hands down the greatest stadium show. The comeback is real, and it’s spectacular.
I really believe this. I know it. But as a full-time music critic and occasional, quasi-competent music journalist, I want to verify my own claims. The problem is that I didn’t take very many notes while I was watching the concert. And the notes I did take are mostly useless. (One just says “MEGA” in all caps.) The thing is, it’s hard to take notes when you’re holding drinks in both of your hands, a state of affairs that occurred frequently during the two-hour performance. And it’s doubly difficult when you’re constantly hugging your pal when the band starts playing another song you have loved since you were 16.
So, I’m listening to a bootleg recording as I type this. The audio quality is shockingly good considering it’s an audience tape recorded in a sea of overexcited blokes donning football jerseys and Paul Weller haircuts. But it can’t fully convey what I remember witnessing. The Paul Weller blokes are singing along slightly behind the band, and Joey Waronker’s drums are extra thuddy to a degree that seems unfair to Oasis’ replacement timekeeper. (As a Zac Starkey partisan I’m trying to be fair here.)
The highlight for me comes early in the set. All the songs are highlights, really, even the ones I didn’t particularly love going in. (I take back all the snarky things I ever said about “Roll With It.”) But “Acquiesce,” which they played second, is my No. 1 favorite Oasis track, and it set the tone for the entire concert. They’ve been playing the same setlist every night, and because this is Oasis, the message conveyed by the song selections is not subtle. They begin with “Hello,” because “it’s good to be back,” apparently. (Also, opening with “Columbia,” like they did back in 1996 at Knebworth, would have annihilated everyone in attendance.) Later, “Talk Tonight” and “Stand By Me,” normally presented as love songs, are recontextualized as anthems of reconciliation. The B-side “Fade Away,” already one of their more poignant and barbed songs, has extra-significance as a statement about the passage of time. And playing “Live Forever” and “Rock N Roll Star” back-to-back before the encore made Oasis’ most swaggering anthems sound almost melancholy.
But “Acquiesce” is the song. In the past 16 years, I have seen Liam and Noel play Oasis tunes on their respective solo tours. (I also saw Beady Eye many years ago, though I wouldn’t recognize a Beady Eye song now if it tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Beady Eye music, mate.”) I enjoyed hearing Liam sneer his way through “Slide Away” in a medium-sized club, and I was thrilled to see Noel encore with “Don’t Look Back In Anger” at a small theater gig. But “Acquiesce” is the one they have to play together, with Liam on the verses and Noel on the chorus. It was, in a sense, the tune we were all gathered to hear.
After the cataclysmic guitar riff — which sounds like a violent backstage melee possibly involving produce — Liam comes in hot. His voice, as confirmed by the bootleg, sounds outstanding. (The hoarseness you hear on Familiar To Millions, the live album recorded at the old Wembley a quarter-century ago, has been cleared away.) It’s a million degrees in the stadium, and yet Liam is inexplicably wearing a brownish green jacket zipped up to the neck and a scarf, plus the de rigueur corduroy bucket hat. Actually, given that this is Liam Gallagher, the attire is explicable. Liam wears a winter jacket in July because he’s among the last of the genuinely cool rock guys. His refusal to sweat is his most profound artistic act.
When the chorus arrives, Noel hits it with 16 years of pent-up energy. His voice also is in outstanding shape. More important, he sounds sincere. “Because we need each other / We believe in one another,” he says emphatically. “And I know we’re going to uncover / What’s sleepin’ in our soul.” Noel sings those lines like he is levitating two feet over the stage. And for a split second, the entire audience seems to be levitating, too.
What I detected — what we all detected — was entirely unexpected: Are these guys feeling … sentimental about all this? After spending the better part of this century giving each other the insult-comic treatment in the press, do they … like each other now?
What was sleepin’ in our souls had truly been reawakened. Oasis, holy crap, was really back. And it was, against all odds, better than you could have hoped for.
II. WALKIN’ TO THE SOUND OF MY FAVORITE TUNE
The one other time I saw Oasis was on January 18, 1998. The Be Here Now tour at Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis. Guigsy was still, technically, in the band. (I say “technically” because he appeared to have consumed enough marijuana to render him medically brain dead.) They played 16 songs, four of which were solo Noel songs. And one of those tunes, “Talk Tonight,” was interrupted by a fire alarm. The encore was “Acquiesce,” which climaxed with Liam leaving the stage for the front row, where he heckled Noel as he sang the song’s outro. After the show, we stood outside in subzero wind chill and called up to the window in the band’s green room, where Liam occasionally appeared and flashed two-finger salutes to the crowd.
These were my heroes. On this night, the antics were excellent and the music was just okay. The deafening, mile-high “wall of guitars” sound of the album carried over to the tour, but it was rendered with a decided lack of enthusiasm. Souls were in deep slumber at this time. In the moment, I attributed this to a combination of misery-inducing factors: the disappointing reaction to Be Here Now, the awfulness of traveling to Minnesota in January, general burnout from the nonstop grind of the past several years. But after seeing Oasis at Wembley, I now know the real reason why that gig was underwhelming.
They were playing for Americans and not British people.
In August and September, Oasis will perform in a handful of select cities in America. And based on what I saw last week, I expect those shows to be good. But they won’t be as good as the shows in the U.K. They just won’t. In the U.S., Oasis is a good live act. (And, sometimes, they are a mediocre one.) But in England, they are amazing in concert. Even when they suck in Great Britain, they are still better than they’ll ever be in America.
Oasis has the most decisive home-field advantage I have ever witnessed in music. I didn’t fully appreciate it until I experienced it firsthand — not just at Wembley but all over London, where Oasis band shirts were ubiquitous in every neighborhood and tourist attraction I visited. Surely, excitement over the reunion shows played a part in that. But the central place that Oasis has in British culture — which feels more akin to monarchy than “normal popular rock band” status — really does seem unique. The Tragically Hip, I think, has similar significance in Canada. But I struggle to come up with an American equivalent. Taylor Swift? I don’t know that she’s more popular here than everywhere else in the world. Springsteen? Too much partisan political baggage. Michael Jackson? Too much “baggage” baggage.
I was keenly aware of my otherness at Wembley. A running bit where Liam kept slagging off Arsenal fans went completely over my head, despite multiple attempts by my associate, Australian Dave, to explain it to me. And that was okay. I was just a guest here. An American interloper eavesdropping on a passionate love affair.
I now understand, sort of, the reply guys crowding my mentions every time I talk about Oasis on social media. (Particularly on the less fun and more scold-y one named after the sixth Wilco album.) Many of them are from England, and they all buy into the conspiracy theory (originally forwarded by Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine) about how Britpop was a government plot to increase national pride in the 1990s. Maybe that’s true. (If it is, it’s the greatest triumph for the British government since the liberation of France.) But in the end, it’s irrelevant. The Brits love Oasis, and hating them seems like the way less fun alternative. Just imagine the indignity of being a British Oasis hater. It must be like hating the NFL in America. Their cultural loneliness has radicalized them. Oasis is everywhere there, creating joy and camaraderie, and they can’t participate in it.
If I lived in England, and had this band rammed down my throat for more than 30 years, I might hate Oasis, too. But I don’t live in England. So, while I empathize with the haters, I can’t relate, thank god. For me, being among the ecstatic Oasis lovers was like, finally, arriving at my rock ‘n’ roll home.
III. MY BODY FEELS YOUNG BUT MY MIND IS VERY OLD
A few days before the concert, I met up with my pal Alex (who like me originally hails from the American Midwest) at a 200-year-old pub near my Airbnb. It was his favorite bar in London, which he discovered not long after moving there seven or eight years ago. On his inaugural visit, they were having a piano sing-along night, and they eventually started playing Oasis songs. One after another, he told me. Not just the big ones, but also the B-sides. And not just the B-sides, but also the deep cuts that, in America, only the real heads know. Here in England, however, even the normal everyday drinkers had memorized every word. It wasn’t until they got to “The Girl In The Dirty Shirt” — a song about Noel’s now-ex-wife, from Be Here Now — that they flubbed a lyric or two.
At the show, I saw fans demonstrate their Oasis devotion in various ways. The full spectrum of human emotion was represented. During “Cigarettes And Alcohol,” the GA floor section was transformed into a human wave of bobbing bodies that (almost) resembled a mosh pit. During “Don’t Look Back In Anger,” I saw a burly man behind me sobbing heavily. During “The Masterplan,” an extremely high yob knocked a drink out of my hand like he was rehearsing a lethal karate chop. But the most common expression of communal excitement was the mass sing-along.
It’s one thing to hear a couple dozen people nail Oasis B-sides in a bar. It was quite another to see the throngs at Wembley sing every word to “Half The World Away,” one of the undercard tracks from 1994’s “Whatever” single. I’ve always had a “whatever” kind of attitude about “Half The World Away,” one of the lesser Noel acoustic songs from their imperial mid-’90s period. But after hearing all those Brits nearly drown out Noel at Wembley, I have newfound appreciation and even awe for how ingrained Oasis B-sides are culturally over there.
The importance of this sing-along aspect cannot be overestimated when assessing Oasis’ music. After this concert, I’m now convinced that it’s the cornerstone of their appeal. Noel Gallagher is not a great or even cogent lyricist, and his melodies can sometimes seem a little samey. But when it comes to writing songs that large groups of individuals in various states of inebriation can sing in unison, perfectly, Bob Dylan and Beethoven have nothing on him. He is the absolute genius of that very specific art form. Oasis is constantly compared to the Beatles, the Sex Pistols, and the other iconic British rock bands. But their songs actually have more in common with “Happy Birthday” or nursery rhymes. (In the case of “Some Might Say,” and “my dog’s been itchin’/itchin’ in the kitchen once again,” I’m talking literal nursey rhymes.) In England, for a certain generation, I imagine they are the kind of tunes you don’t remember ever learning, they just seem implanted in your brain from the time you’re born.
I’m not normally a sing-along guy at concerts. And I generally don’t like it when other people do it at shows. This was different. This was transformational, and a key part to the home-field advantage. When Oasis plays “Half The World Away” in America, will the audience care? Or will they hit the bathroom until “Wonderwall” comes on? At Wembley, the performance of the audience elevated the performance of the band. It shrank the expanse of the stadium down to the size of a cozy pub. And it made strangers feel, for about 120 minutes, like lifelong friends.
IV. A DREAMER DREAMS SHE NEVER DIES
When the Oasis shows were announced last summer, my friend Steve Gorman — who toured with Oasis many years ago in another lifetime — called it the last big rock reunion tour. At first, I pushed back. Surely there will be others. But then I thought about it: Who is left to reunite and tour on the level that Oasis can? The few remaining big bands/brands that haven’t cashed in already — Talking Heads, The Smiths, anyone else? — seem unlikely to do so. And time is running out for the last remaining giants, a fact reiterated by the tribute to the late Ozzy Osbourne that flashed on the jumbotron screens during “Live Forever.”
Stadium shows get a bad rap for good reasons — the sound is lousy, the sightlines are worse, the drinks are overpriced, and getting in and out of the parking lot feels like it takes twice as long as the concert. But at their best, they have a sense of scale that is emotionally overwhelming. They create a temporary world that feels vast and utopian, where the only tasks at hand are music and revelry, where you don’t even care that an extremely high yob karate-chopped your drink because you’re also psyched to hear “The Masterplan.” A great stadium show connects you to a hive mind the size of a decently populated Middle American city, and that’s a very powerful feeling.
Oasis is back because Liam and Noel are (relatively) young middle-aged men, and because there are so few other bands in their lane. The world’s stadiums require groups that have 12 to 15 songs that tens of thousands of people know by heart and want to experience one more time as part of a mass-population event. Oasis can do that, and I suspect they will be on the road for a very long time and will make an extreme amount of money in the process.
Of course, it’s possible the spell will break soon and Liam and Noel will go back to hating each other. I would bet on that happening, given the laws of nature and the nature of brotherhood. But at Wembley, Oasis played and they played brilliantly. The audience came and they left satisfied. The band wrapped, as they must, with “Champagne Supernova,” one of our finest stadium-rock anthems. And Liam concluded by balancing a tambourine on his head, a gesture both ridiculous and grand, just like the band he sings for. And on that night, at least, the tambourine did not fall.
EDM performer 2hollis dropped his fourth album, Star, earlier this year, and today, has dropped the video for one of its tracks, “Flash.” The video, directed by Noah Dillon, lives up to the song’s title, strobing its way through one of his performances. The visual also makes reference to his insistence that he’ll be a star with a short vignette about a group of children with painted faces, one of whom removes his facepaint and runs away.
“Flash” follows “Style,” the second single from the album, and “Afraid,” the first. 2hollis will take the album on tour beginning in September; you can see the dates below.
Watch the “Flash” video above.
2hollis Tour Dates
9/19/2025 – San Diego, CA @ SOMA San Diego
9/20/2025 – Las Vegas, NV @ Brooklyn Bowl
9/21/2025 – Phoenix, AZ @ The Van Buren
9/26/2025 – Vancouver, BC @ Vogue Theatre
9/27/2025 – Portland, OR @ Roseland Theater
9/28/2025 – Seattle, WA @ Showbox SoDo
10/1/2025 – Minneapolis, MN @ First Avenue
10/3/2025 – Detroit, MI @ Royal Oak Music Hall
10/4/2025 – Toronto, ON @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre
10/6/2025 – Montreal, QC @ MTELUS
10/7/2025 – Boston, MA @ Roadrunner
10/8/2025 – New York, NY @ Terminal 5
10/9/2025 – New York, NY @ Terminal 5
10/11/2025 – Philadelphia, PA @ Franklin Music Hall
10/12/2025 – Richmond, VA @ The National
10/14/2025 – Silver Spring, MD @ The Fillmore Silver Spring
10/15/2025 – Raleigh, NC @ The Ritz
10/16/2025 – Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern
10/19/2025 – St. Petersburg, FL @ Jannus Live
10/21/2025 – Houston, TX @ 713 Music Hall
10/22/2025 – Dallas, TX @ The Factory in Deep Ellum
10/23/2025 – Austin, TX @ Stubb’s Waller Creek Amphitheater
10/24/2025 – San Antonio, TX @ The Aztec Theatre
Star is out now via Interscope. You can find more info here.
A couple of months ago, Bryson Tiller made his official return with the reveal that his next album, Solace & The Viceswould be a double album. Since then, the Louisville native has been relatively radio silent, aside from news collaborations with Tink and Chris Brown. Today, though, the Trapsoul pioneer revealed the release date for the first half of the project, titled The Vices. It’s due on August 8, and according to its press release, “showcases Tiller’s gritty, high-energy side.” Presumably, this means he’ll do more rapping than singing here.
Tiller elaborated on Instagram, writing, “It’s hard to call one a ‘rap album’ and the other ‘r&b’ because I can’t help but to do both on every song. Just know that this is a TRUE double album and not just 20+ songs that I wanted to share.”
“When I was writing Solace my number one goal was to treat it like therapy and say exactly what was on my mind, finding comfort during my times of sadness,” he continued. “That felt good. With The Vices I decided to get rid of my Vices completely and prove to myself that I didn’t need Weed, Alcohol, and all the other shenanigans to have FUN. I’ve been sober ever since. (Still tryna figure out how to look like I enjoy the club tho lol).”
It’s probably fair to say we’ll receive more updates in the coming days, but for now, all we can do is speculate.
The Vices is due on 8/8 via Trapsoul/RCA Records.
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