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The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

“Do you see yourself unraveling?”

This question opens Sophie Payten’s second album under the recording moniker Gordi, as she takes a moment to herself in an airplane bathroom while traveling from her home in Australia to work in Europe. From the outside, it might have seemed like Payten had everything going for her, but really she was in a state of flux, having finally completed the exams that would allow her to become a doctor and finding herself transitioning out of a stale relationship and into something more true to her identity. In that instant of isolation, endings and beginnings began to come into focus.

This is the moment of time that launches Gordi’s excellent new record, an album that balances fierce intimacy with expansive ambition. It’s not an album about anything singularly, but encompasses the range of what occurred and who she has become in the three years between releases. She explores sexuality with new-found clarity, gives a lovely tribute to her recently deceased grandmother, and reckons with the idea of identity and the need to share her true self with those closest to her. The resulting piece feels like an honest, personal reckoning, where both the artist and listener can join each other on the journey and emerge as better versions of themselves on the other side.

Recorded with Bon Iver affiliates Chris Messina and Zach Hanson in the secluded town of Canowindra, the album reflects isolation and turns it into focus. Genre lines are blurred to the point where the straight-ahead indie rock of “Sandwiches” fits snuggly beside the cinematic pop of “Unready” and the atmospheric drama of “Volcanic.” Whatever preconceived notions Gordi had built with her early career are largely left in the dust. Just as the album takes on the project of a woman figuring out her own place in the world, Our Two Skins does exactly that with Gordi’s music.

Speaking with Uproxx via Zoom in late May, Payten discussed being a doctor during the pandemic, her relationship with her grandmother that inspired the record, and just what Pride means to her.

How does the world feel in Australia right now?

We’re still pretty deep in isolation. So as of early June, the restrictions are starting to be lifted. Some pubs, clubs, and restaurants are opening for 20 patrons at a time. You can now have up to 20 people in your home. I’ve never had 20 people in my home. I’m not sure that if I wanted to, I even could. People are back in the streets and stuff, and just generally seems less fearful. There’s toilet paper back on the shelves in the supermarket, which there wasn’t for a while. So yeah, it’s definitely not back to normal, but it’s starting to feel out of the depths of all that full-on isolation. Fortunately, in Australia, we just haven’t seen the numbers of infection that other places around the world have. And I guess that’s probably largely due to being an island and being able to shut our borders pretty soon after it all took off.

I know the medical profession was arming itself with everything it could, and there’s been all this talk of these big COVID centers opening and big respiratory facilities, and none of it has happened because the patients have not been coming into hospitals in the numbers that they expected. So, it’s been a largely manageable situation here in Australia. And I think probably much more of a toll than the actual health crisis has just been the social crisis and the economic crisis.

Were you doing medical work with COVID?

I’d quit my job, my medical job, on the 31st of January after working for a year as a doctor. And then I got back from tour in March and I called my old workplace and I was like, “I’m back if you need me, given everything looks like it’s going mental around the world.” And I put my name down with the government body that was organizing all the medical professionals to come and help in these COVID clinics. I had a call back from them and they were like, “You’ll be first on the list of people that will be called when these COVID clinics get set up. And we’ll put you in into one of those.”

There was a two week period where I was like, “Okay, I’m getting ready to go into this and go back to work.” But then the numbers just went off a cliff in Australia and all my friends that are working in hospitals were like, “We have nothing to do, because not even the regular patients are coming in, let alone any COVID patients.” I actually still haven’t set foot back in a hospital.

I feel like it’s the best-case scenario for a doctor, to not be needed?

Yeah, 100%.

The psychological effects of isolation, that’s something so many are experiencing now. I found that the album features this juxtaposition between a need for privacy — be it a moment in an airplane bathroom or whether it’s the remote town that you recorded in, your childhood hometown — and then this need for being heard, for being bold in who you are and what you believe in. It feels like a journey on the album. What have you learned about these two states of being along the way?

Yeah, it is the real contrast of the record and something that I’ve had to do a lot of mental work to come to terms with, because the content of the record was really occurring at a time in my life when I was undergoing a lot of identity change, and entering a new relationship and these questions of sexuality. But I think that almost puts it a bit too simply, I’m not really a category person when it comes to sexuality, I’m much more of a spectrum person. And I think it was this lesson for me in life, you find a person for you and that person can take any shape or form.

And that whole experience was something so private, and imagining doing interviews about it and talking to strangers about those elements of my life, I was like, “No way in hell am I going to do that.” But then, I accidentally wrote an entire album about it and we got to the end of it, and I was like, “There’s no way that I’m going to be able to put this out and not talk about it.” So I needed to come to terms with that.

I think the queer community really lacks content about itself. There are not stacks and stacks of role models that you see on TV and film. This story that I’m telling of falling in love with someone at the age of 25, which gave me all these new questions about my identity, it’s one more little piece in the enormous puzzle that any queer person can look to and be like, “Okay, there’s a frame of reference for my life. So if something like that happens to me, I can at least be like, oh, look, that’s something that I can kind of compare to.” I think it’s the privacy of what happened to me versus that public, shared experience, and I feel like the latter outweighs my right to that privacy, because it’s an important story to tell.

That’s awesome. And I feel like the dichotomy comes across sonically, too, with songs like “Unready” and “Sandwiches,” they feel like these big deserved communal experiences. And then a lot of the songs feel more intimate, like a conversation almost directly between you and the listener. Does that play into the process, how a listener might experience a song, be it through headphones or through a performance?

Definitely. I remember asking Zach Hanson this question, “Do you like records that are record-player records or headphone records?” And I’ve always put records into those two categories. Obviously, there are some that do both. But my first record, I really think of as a headphone record. And coming into this album, I was like, “I want to make a record-player record,” but then the sonic details and stuff are so important to me that I was like, “Oh, maybe I want it to cross over into both of those lands and try and have a bite of each cherry.”

I wanted to make a couple of songs that you can listen to on your own. And I wanted to make a couple of songs that you listen to with others. The songs that you listen to on your own come more naturally to me, I feel like I’ll write those for the rest of the time. But I find that I have to be more careful with my sonic choices when I’m making songs like “Unready” or “Sandwiches,” because it’s not always my natural instincts. My natural instincts are those quieter moments like “Aeroplane Bathroom,” or something. And all of those songs, like “Aeroplane Bathroom,” “Volcanic,” “Radiator,” they all took the least amount of time because it felt very natural.

The reason I was first drawn to the album was “Sandwiches,” just hearing that song and how it addresses your grandmother’s death with such beauty and specificity. But she also serves as the general inspiration for the album, right?

Yeah. She was 95, and I grew up a hundred meters from her. I used to ride my bike down there and we were very, very close. She raised me as much as my parents did and we’d talk on the phone a lot as I got older. I’d been traveling all of 2018, doing these tours and writing a lot of this record, and then I came home in September of 2018. I went home to Canowindra where my parents live, where I grew up, basically because I’d run out of money. And I was waiting to start my medical job a few months later, but I needed something to tide me over, and so I went back to my old job at a rose nursery in Canowindra where you just stand there waiting all day.

Each afternoon I’d drive back, call into my grandmother’s, sit down and have a cup of tea with her, and then go home. And I was home for six weeks, and over the course of that time, she became unwell and it turned out to be the last six weeks of her life. She went into the hospital in Canowindra and it became apparent that she wasn’t going to come out of there or get better, and she passed in early October on the 6th.

It was a Saturday morning and my mom and dad and I drove into the town, into the hospital, and we were there with all of my father’s siblings, all her children, and we were all around the bed and all taking turns to be beside her. And a few hours into the morning, it was midday and my mom and I were like, “Oh, we should go and get some food for everyone because no one’s going to want to leave here and no one’s really eaten.” So we went down to the supermarket and grabbed some basic supplies and we start making sandwiches; it’s in the little kitchenette next to her room. We were just making them and passing them around to everyone. And people were coming out for a little breather and having something to eat.

Then my auntie called out, “She’s just gone.” We put our sandwiches down and went in and sat around the bed and were all grieving, and I read this prayer out that my other auntie had and we just all sat with her for as long as we could. And like that first line of the song, it’s a nice memory of just holding her hand and thinking, “This is the last time I’m going to really get to do this and feel her skin and smell the way she smelled,” and all of those really sensory things that are so immediate, that you lose just like that.

I tried to write this song so many times and I didn’t want it to be this tragic funeral song or something, and I think that’s why I needed a bit of space. So I didn’t really write it for like five months, but it was a celebration of a really long and wonderful life. It was a total tragedy that we lost her because she was so, so loved, but it was the course of a life and it was a beautiful, natural end. And her passing made me want to come back and feel connected to the place and connected to her, so that’s why I decided to make the record back home.

And it meant a lot to you to be able to let her know about your identity before she passed away, too?

Yeah, it did. She was incredibly accepting, probably a lot more accepting than other people of her generation. She was born in 1923 and yet she was able to accept all of those things and said so to me. We had a really lovely phone conversation just before I arrived home where she said, “I love you and nothing’s ever going to change that,” and then that happened. I got home, and she died six weeks later.

I’m so glad it happened because if it hadn’t, there would have been something really missing for me. And in my own life, it was the end of this chapter, which was the record. The start of it was the start of all this stuff, and then the end of it was her passing and her acceptance of it. And it’s all incredibly intimate and personal, but it’s a really beautiful story.

It really is! Thank you for sharing it. In America, June is Pride Month, and it’s fitting that this is coming out here at the end of June. What does that concept of Pride mean to you?

It has changed a whole lot in the last few years. And on the one hand, there’s this really wonderful Australian comedian named Hannah Gadsby who had this show called Nanette, which was this smash hit across the globe. She’s a queer person and grew up in Tasmania in Australia where homosexuality I think was illegal until 1996 or something outrageous. And she talks about Pride and the queer community and the queer flag, the rainbow flag. And she’s like, “I didn’t really identify with the big parade and dancing on a float. The rainbow flag is hideous and I don’t like those colors,” and all this sort of stuff, which I think is, to a degree, something I identify with, because that very, almost traditional form of Pride is something that I haven’t really experienced, but that going into this experience, what I thought Pride was.

I thought it was dancing on a float and I thought it was waving a rainbow flag and a very simplified version of this month or this one festival that happens, but I’ve really learned through this experience that it’s a state of mind and it’s something that you have to, and should, exercise every day. And it was a big part of me coming to terms with everything that had happened in my life, because on the one hand, you have the shame and embarrassment and all those feelings that come to any queer person when they go through this sort of journey in their life, and that’s on one scale.

And then on the other one is your sense of pride in yourself, but also being proud of the person that you’re with and being proud of that relationship and being proud enough that you would put it on display for the world to look, and I think that that’s now what Pride means to me. It’s like being so proud of the relationship that I’m in and of my partner and of myself in being open to that. That’s something that I’m proud of, for other people to look at me and think or feel whatever they want. None of the fear of judgment will outweigh that sense of pride.

Our Two Skins is out now on Jagjaguwar. Get it here.

As Hamilton‘s longest-tenured original cast member – playing the duel role of both Hercules Mulligan and James Madison – Okieriete Onaodowan was there that night in December of 2016 when then Vice President-elect Mike Pence arrived for a show. For Onaodowan, it wasn’t just that Pence was there. Yes, the headlines that night were that a number of people in the crowd booed Pence. But for Onaodowan, he couldn’t stop thinking about the people there who cheered for Pence. As in, why in the world are you at Hamilton in the first place if you’re cheering Mike Pence? When I asked Onaodowan what was going through his mind that night as he performed for this particular crowd, the word he said was “rage.” And he repeated it six times.

This weekend, Hamilton will finally be available for home consumption through Disney+. It’s a recording from 2016, with the original cast members at (as Onaodowan says) at the height of their powers. Filmed mostly in front of a live audience (some shots had to be done earlier that day), this is the first time people will have full access to what was, even still this year before Broadway shut down, one of the most difficult tickets to obtain. Onaodowan still holds out hope that people who see this show can still learn something from it, even though, no, it sure didn’t do anything to change Mike Pence. And Onaodowan explains, in the wake of George Floyd’s death and this national moment, what Hamilton means to him today.

I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you this, but getting tickets to Hamilton was not easy.

[Laughs] No one has ever told me that before.

They should really let the people performing know this stuff.

I never knew.

We went in December of 2016 and you were one of the last original cast members still there. You were getting a lot of applause, like an athlete on a retirement tour.

That’s a great analogy. That’s what it kind of felt like. It was like that, in his final season, and I want to do a backflip somewhere like, “Yep, I’m done. We’re out.”

So obviously a lot of people wanted to see this, and it’s important for people to see this. And they moved up the date. But should something like this had happened earlier? Or does this feel like the right time?

I feel like what we’re experiencing is like eight things converging at once. It’s like, every week, for me, I think the significance of this dropping has changed. For a while it was COVID, and after George Floyd was murdered, the meaning, again, changed why it’s released early as opposed to later. And with where we are right now, I think it’s important for people to get this message: the message of it’s your duty stand up and say, “This is what America should be.”

Not only that, you should work tirelessly to make sure that happens through legislation, through writing, through understanding the laws and making sure laws are passed. That’s basically what Hamilton did. The first number, you see him stand on a box and you see Burr push him out the way. And then he uses his words to break down what he’s saying and break down the crazy madness of what he’s saying and tell the people, “This is not it. This is not what your country should look like. This is not how the people who lead you should sound.”

That sounds eerily reminiscent of what protesters are doing right now, of all shades and colors in response to the murder of George Floyd. That message, I think, is vital for people to come home to after a long day of their Twitter feed and Instagram feed and seeing all this madness and hearing the things that that man in the White House says and does. To put on entertainment and also get some medicine – also get some empowerment and also get a message that says, “It is now we have to do this. You have to speak up.”

You mentioned the man in the White House. Where you still there when Mike Pence came to Hamilton?

Yes, I was.

What were you thinking that whole night? I mean, I can imagine…

Rage. Just rage. Just rage, rage, rage, rage. Because in the beginning of the show, he entered and there were a lot of people cheering as well. There’s a Venn diagram of people who love Hamilton and people who love the man in the White House. It was just hard as an artist to think what I’m doing is promoting this message, in black and brown skin, telling our founding fathers’ story, and yet there were still people in there who are celebrating the arrival of Pence. It’s complicated and it’s hard. It’s really, really hard to know sometimes you may put art out, but it’s not necessarily interpreted the way that it’s intended. It’s actually not stopped me from still putting it out. It was a very tough and difficult show.

It shouldn’t stop you. You said it’s difficult to wrap your mind around it…

It’s hard.

But how did you? Because the entire message of what you’re trying to say is the polar opposite of what this man represents.

You just do it. Exactly. And it’s hard to then perform for people that you saw cheering him, and now are in the front row looking at you. It’s like, “Yeah, dance for me.” But the whole point is you do it. How do you do it? You do it, like anyone who’s done anything that’s hard to any degree. Your purpose, your spirit and your will should take over. And my love and the intention behind creating the art, I will just focus on. I will have those feelings of apprehension and all that stuff, but at the end of the day, I know at my core why I’m doing it. You focus on that, focus on what got you there and what will keep you going.

The people cheering wasn’t really in the press much. Because obviously the President made a big deal about people booing. But I imagine sitting that it might have been difficult to put on a show for those people who stand against everything with what the show means.

It’s complicated. When Hillary came, people booed. People cheered and people also booed. I feel like I was able to see why Targets are on fire in that moment. It’s because people really do have a different definition of what this country needs, and it couldn’t be more representative in that room. But you do it anyway because there is a chance – and it’s the difference between people who hold faith in their heart and hold resentment – is there is a part of me that still hopes it’s like, “Well, we don’t know. All the data says this, but maybe Pence may turn around and do something different at the end.” That was one of the things. I was like, “I just have to focus on that today. I just have to focus on that instead, and hope and hope and hope.”

I want to believe in the humanity of people that might still be in there and think, “Well, maybe he’ll learn a lesson from this.” And it just never seems to happens. I’m very pessimistic about these things. I mean, but this is hindsight. In the moment, that’s what I believed. It was tough, at least we got through it. History has shown us that was correct, it did not change his mind. My job is to perform. That’s it. Just to perform, regardless who’s out there, people out there or not. He was out there and it’s like, “I still have to do the thing.”

Now, have you seen what’s going to be on Disney+? What a weird question to ask you. “Have you seen Hamilton?”

[Laughs] That is weird. We had an opportunity to see the link. But Disney’s, to keep it super tight, we literally had 24 hours, just 24 hours to watch it and I wasn’t able to see all of it. I saw half of the show and, from what I saw, it’s just remarkable, again, to see it. In theater, we can never truly see what we make because when we step out, it’s going to change. Your understudy’s on, so everyone’s performance is different. It was lovely to see, to really see our show. I’ve seen versions of the show, but it was remarkable just to really see what everyone actually saw. And for me, it was just exciting to see the homeys do their thing because we’re normally backstage when someone’s on stage, or we’re onstage when someone’s having a moment. It was great to look and just to see what I’ve been hearing, to be able to look and see them in the moment and not just have to listen backstage or catch a glimpse from the sides. That was special.

Were you given a heads up before that performance? Like, “This is going to be the performance of record, basically, for the rest of eternity”?

Yeah, we shot it over like three days. So, yeah, we had a heads up. There was a lot of prep. There was a lot of talking. At the end of the week, some of the footage you see is, we shot it, and then actually performed that night. Some footage from that night, some footage is from a Monday where we had cameras on stage. It was a whole thing. And we had five days total of shooting, three days of actual performances, and then two days of catching things here and there. So yeah, we were prepped and we were ready and we were told, but it was beautiful because at that point, it was so ingrained in our bodies. It was just kind of perfect. We were cooking with gas. We were comfortable. I feel we gave one of the best shows because it was just right in the pocket.

What does Hamilton mean right now for this moment? Not as much it’s great people are going to see it, but for you, specifically something in it?

I know what you’re saying. For me specifically, it’s the message of Hamilton saying this is not what America should be, and that is what means most to me. That at the core of this character, everything starts because he says, “I don’t think this is the way this country should look,” and the whole show is just following a man who’s determined to change it. I think that is something vital that every protester, every human, any person who watched George Floyd with a knee on his neck, for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, needs to say: “I need to do this, and it can only change if I have the resolve and the will Alexander Hamilton had, and I am dedicated to creating the country that I believe is true and just.” That’s what it means to me.

‘Hamilton’ begins streaming via Disney+ on July 3rd. You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

Late last week, 2K Sports announced that three individuals will grace three different covers of NBA 2K21. We learned the first of these on Tuesday morning, when 2K announced that Portland Trail Blazers star Damian Lillard will be on the cover for copies of the game on current generation consoles.

Lillard also announced the news on his Twitter account, saying that he used to play 2K on his Sega Dreamcast and that making it onto the cover is “a dream come true.”

In a statement to ESPN, Lillard said that, “This is a special moment for me in my NBA career. I’ve been a fan of NBA 2K for years and love how they represent all aspects of basketball culture. I’m an avid 2K player, so I’m honored to join the other NBA greats who have been on the cover. I’m grateful to all my fans and can’t wait for everyone to experience the game later this year.”

Gamers got their first look at 2K21 during a recent Sony PlayStation livestream, when New Orleans Pelicans standout Zion Williamson helped debut a collection of gameplay clips. The remaining two covers for this year’s 2K game are expected to be announced on Wednesday and Thursday of this week, and while there is no word on pricing or the game’s official release date, the trailer with Lillard revealed that preorders for NBA 2K21 will begin on July 2.

Sufjan Stevens has kept busy in recent years, but it hasn’t always been with solo albums. Since his latest album, 2015’s Carrie & Lowell, he collaborated with Bryce Dessner, Nico Muhly, and James McAlister on Planetarium in 2017. Earlier this year, he and his stepfather (the titular Lowell Brams of Carrie & Lowell) made a new age album together, Aporia. Now, though, Stevens is ready to get back to traditional solo fare: Today, he announced The Ascension, his new album that is set for release on September 25.

There are no tastes of the record available yet, but the lead single, “America,” will be released on Friday, July 3, as will a video for the track. The tracklist also included the song run times, and there are some lengthier numbers here. Aside from the 12-minute album-closer “America,” there are six other songs that run for longer than five minutes.

Check out the art and tracklist for The Ascension below.

1. “Make Me An Offer I Cannot Refuse”
2. “Run Away With Me”
3. “Video Game”
4. “Lamentations”
5. “Tell Me You Love Me”
6. “Die Happy”
7. “Ativan”
8. “Ursa Major”
9. “Landslide”
10. “Gilgamesh”
11. “Death Star”
12. “Goodbye To All That”
13. “Sugar”
14. “The Ascension”
15. “America”

The Ascension is out 9/25 via Asthmatic Kitty Records. Pre-order it here.

Most shows have a creative decline after four, maybe five seasons, assuming they even make it that long. But not It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. The FXX comedy, starring Rob McElhenney, Glenn Howerton, Charlie Day, Kaitlin Olson, and Danny DeVito, has been very good to great for 14 seasons, and counting. How is that possible? An ability to adapt over the years helps, like tweaking Dee’s role in The Gang, as does, as McElhenney explained in a recent roundtable interview with the Hollywood Reporter, surrounding yourself with voices that are different (younger, more diverse) than yours.

“In my writers room right now on Sunny, I have people who were not allowed to watch the show when it first aired. That’s the truth! I will go out and find 20-, 21-, 22-year-old people with all different backgrounds, and it’s not from some altruistic or pandering point of view, it’s that it’s going to make the show better, and I don’t want to be a dinosaur,” McElhenney said. “I want them to help guide me and show me what’s not only funny but what’s relevant, what’s changing, how is it changing, and how can we continue to be on the cutting edge.” The Mythic Quest co-creator, who’s lived a fascinating life, also shared an enlightening story about one of his first on-set encounters with DeVito:

“For me, I remember Danny DeVito came on in the second season of [It’s Always Sunny], which was 13 years ago, and he’s a comedic icon and a hero of mine, and [he asked me] at one point on set, ‘How do you want me to say it?’ And I said, ‘Well, just say it whatever way you think is funniest.’ And he said, ‘No, I want you to tell me what’s funny.’ And I remember going, ‘You want me to tell you what’s funny?’ He’s like, ‘Yeah, you’re the young person, and the reason I signed on to this show was because I want to stay fresh and relevant, and if I don’t, then I’m just going to become a dinosaur.’ That was a real learning experience for me.”

Don’t be like Grampa Simpson…

… but do be like Danny DeVito. This is true for most things in life.

(Via the Hollywood Reporter)

This week, several big-name pop musicians shared new music that earned the best new pop label. Selena Gomez remixed Trevor Daniel’s recent hit, Blackpink returned with their first piece of new music in over a year, and Charlie Puth further proved his talent for writing feel-good pop tunes.

Each week, Uproxx rounds up the best new pop music. Listen up.

Selena Gomez, Trevor Daniel — “Past Life”

This week, Selena Gomez served up a remix that was sure to earn Uproxx best new pop stamp of approval. “When I heard the song the first time, I loved the fact that it was kind of like a story about all the things that we tend to hold onto and the patterns that we have,” Gomez said in a statement. “And I’m very, very vocal about my personal experiences making decisions that aren’t necessarily healthy for me.”

Blackpink — “How You Like That”

Last April, Blackpink dropped Kill This Love EP just ahead of their Coachella set and haven’t released any music since — until this week. The K-pop group returned with “How You Like That.” Fans were so excited that they broke the record for the biggest video premiere ever on YouTube, with an impressive 1.65 million people tuning in concurrently.

Charlie Puth — “Girlfriend”

Over the course of his career, Charlie Puth has proved a knack for writing buoyant pop tunes, and his new single “Girlfriend” is no different. In a statement alongside the single’s release, Puth said “Girlfriend” is one of his favorite tracks he’s ever written: “I think this is like one of my favorite songs I’ve ever made, and one that I’ve been sitting on for a really long time and just kind of perfecting the production and the vocal production over the year. I truly love this song more than anything.”

Lauv — “Dishes”

Lauv shared his emotive debut album, How I’m Feeling, just a few months ago. But the singer didn’t let much time pass before shared another EP, including the lighthearted track “Dishes.” Lauv has proved prolific in his time in quarantine, writing and producing the entire EP within just a few months at home.

Jessie Ware — “Soul Control”

Jessie Ware debuted her irresistible album What’s Your Pleasure? this week, and with it arrived the show-stopping tune “Soul Control.” The single opens with clapping beat and rubbery keys before a funky bass guitar takes over. With her breathy vocals, Ware sings of the euphoria of dancefloor attraction.

Arca — “KLK” Feat. Rosalía

Venezuelan producer Arca shared her record Kick I this week. The record is an ode to her experimental type of music and her collaboration with Rosalía is no different. The hypnotic tune expertly layers jarring, samples with contemporary pop sensibilities.

Dominic Fike — “Chicken Tenders”

After garnering a large fan base from his self-released EP and a handful of singles, Dominic Fike is gearing up for his major-label debut album. This week, Fike shared the sultry album lead “Chicken Tenders.” The lush single details a particularly passionate night in his hotel room.

Shay Lia — “All Up To You”

Montreal-based songwriter Shay Lia shared the effervescent number “All Up To You” this week. In a statement, the singer said she wanted the single to bring universal joy: “I wanted to create something positive for people to dance to in these crazy times. I wanted to feel reminded that we’re stronger than we think. I believe in the powers of words and music and I love creating inspirational songs full of warmth and joyful energy for everyone of any age to enjoy.”

Alec Wigdahl — “Lipstick”

Following his breakout hit “Cologne,” Alec Wigdahl returns with the swooning single “Lipstick.” “I love the kind of songs that are incredibly specific to the artist’s life, but when you listen it hits you right in the chest — almost like it’s happening to you,” Wigdahl said in a statement alongside the single’s release. “In my own music I try to be as personal and vulnerable as I possibly can, so that everyone can feel like the song was made for them. I want them to feel like I’m narrating their story at the same time that I’m narrating mine.”

Brevin Kim — “I Need Water”

Boston-based sibling duo Brevin Kim returned this week with the hard-hitting effort “I Need Water” as a preview for their upcoming music. On the experimental single, quick-tempo beat simmers underneath the brothers’ layered lyrical delivery.

Some of the artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Netflix’s commitment to epic-feeling series continues with Cursed, an adaptation of Frank Miller and Tom Wheeler’s bestselling novel, which reimagines the Authurian legend. In this realm, the classically-accepted worlds of Merlin and Arthur get spun on their heads when a young woman, Nimue, is destined to become the Lady of the Lake. The first season includes a war on magic, infused with a coming of age story, and this trailer promises an expansive feast for the eyes on the small screen.

Actually, the trailer looks absolutely stunning with lush forest sets and battle scenes aplenty. Central to all of that is Excalibur, which changes course from the legend to choose a queen. Not only is Nimue the Lady of the Lake in this series, but she collects a few other titles, all of which should thrill viewers. Hopefully, we’ll get lots of winks and nods and convincing swordfighting akin to the Henry Cavill-starring The Witcher.

From the official show synopsis:

Cursed is a re-imagination of the Arthurian legend, told through the eyes of Nimue, a young woman with a mysterious gift who is destined to become the powerful (and tragic) Lady of the Lake. After her mother’s death, she finds an unexpected partner in Arthur, a humble mercenary, in a quest to find Merlin and deliver an ancient sword. Over the course of her journey, Nimue will become a symbol of courage and rebellion against the terrifying Red Paladins, and their complicit King Uther. Cursed is a coming-of-age story whose themes are familiar to our own time: the obliteration of the natural world, religious terror, senseless war, and finding the courage to lead in the face of the impossible.

Netflix’s Cursed will stream on July 17.

It was announced in April that several artists would be selling face masks to benefit coronavirus-related charities. The Weeknd was among those artists, and the “XO” masks have sold well. The Weeknd has personally matched the money raised by the masks, so it has been announced the he has donated half a million dollars to his hometown Scarborough Health Network (SHN), and another half million to MusiCares.

The Weeknd said in a press release, “I was raised in Scarborough and felt it was important to give back to the community that raised me during the hard times of this pandemic.”

SHN’s Dr. Elaine Yeung also said, “Like The Weeknd, many of my fellow frontline workers either come from Scarborough or call this community home. It is amazing to see one of our own on the world stage, giving back during our community’s time of need; generous support like this inspires us to keep going. This gift represents Scarborough’s incredible spirit and collective passion for shaping a brighter, healthier future.”

Meanwhile, The Weeknd’s After Hours was recently named to the longlist for this year’s Polaris Prize, one of Canada’s top honors in music. He also recently unveiled a new set of rescheduled tour dates.

Welcome to another installment of Ask A Music Critic! And thanks to everyone who has sent me questions. Please keep them coming at [email protected].

I’m a crazy person and think that Some Loud Thunder is not only better than Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s debut — hey, remember them? — but one of my favorite albums of the ’00s. That’s for another debate, which I’d likely lose, but I’m wondering what your favorite “career-killer follow-up” albums are. And if there’s a good album title we can use to name this “career-killer better than the debut” effect. — David from Atlanta

How about Congratulations-core?

I refer to my favorite “career-killer follow-up” album, the 2010 LP by MGMT that essentially transformed them from the kings of late-aughts dorm-room indie-pop — it can’t be overstated how popular songs like “Kids” and “Electric Feel” still are — to a weird outsider psych outfit who never regained the mainstream popularity they once had. I’ve long been a bit obsessed with Congratulations, so much so that I wrote my 10th-anniversary appreciation of the record three years early. The following year, when I interviewed MGMT for an article about their (pretty good!) 2018 album Little Dark Age, I kept asking questions about the excessive “true California ’70s” lifestyle they enjoyed during the making of Congratulations. (I later put it in my top 10 favorite albums of the 2010s.)

Congratulations arrived at a moment when the indie wave of the aughts was about to crash against the critical vogue of poptimism and the commercial consolidation around massive pop stars that has defined the corporate and homogenized streaming era. What I love about Congratulations is that MGMT steered into the crash. Instead of chasing more hits, MGMT pursued an idiosyncratic (and to some degree self-destructive) muse that crippled their pop fortunes but in the long run made them a more interesting (though also significantly niche-ier) band.

While I don’t agree with you assessment of Some Loud Thunder — my main memory of that record is reviewing it and thinking my promo stream was malfunctioning and then realizing it was supposed to sound like that — I understand where you’re coming from. Congratulations-core albums need defending, which makes us defenders love them even more than we already do, because minor cultural injustices rile up tremendous passion in the hearts of us music nerds. It’s the same reason I love Soup, the second album by the ’90s jam-grunge band Blind Melon, the one they made after their self-titled debut sold millions on the strength of their one hit, “No Rain.” Like Congratulations, Soup is the act of a band determined to move in the opposite direction from alt-rock radio success, by making something stranger, less accessible, and (I would argue) deeper and more ambitious.

The relative failure of Soup was complicated by the death of Shannon Hoon, which occurred no long after the album was released. Had he lived, perhaps Soup would have done for Blind Melon what, say, The Bends did for Radiohead. Lest we all forget, Radiohead was also a one-hit-wonder for a few years after the success of “Creep” — until The Bends arrived as the stranger, less accessible but ultimately deeper and more ambitious followup that proved to be a great success and set Radiohead on the path to glory. The same could be said of the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique, an album that actually was a failure for a few years after it bombed commercially in the wake of Licensed To Ill, only to be later revived critically as a work of incredible invention and foresight.

But enough about that. We’re here to toast the failures. We love you Congratulations, Soup, and (why not?) Some Loud Thunder. Thanks for bombing in such lovable, endlessly defensible ways.

I know you’re a big fan of Bob Dylan’s new album, and his later work as a whole. I’ve been enjoying his new album a lot, too. His voice is rough and he sounds old, but I think it suits the music he’s making very well. He sounds like a weird, old mystic playing with a band of incredibly talented miscreants in a rundown backwoods bar in the mountains. However, my 65-year-old dad can’t get into it. He can’t get past his voice at all. He’s been a fan of Dylan since the early ’60s and has had a hard time getting into his more recent work because of his voice. He’s said that some of his friends around his age have expressed similar feelings. I’m wondering if this is something that you’ve heard from people in that same age range and/or if you think it’s a trend from people who listened to Dylan when he was in his prime? Are these people just afraid to get old and don’t like that Bob seems very comfortable embracing his age? — Eric from Cleveland

Hey Eric, I think what you’re describing is a fairly common phenomenon. When it comes to Dylan specifically, I think it’s often true that younger fans appreciate his older work more than the boomers who grew up with him. And I think that has a lot to do with when each group came in with Dylan, and how that affects perception.

In my book Twilight Of The Gods – sorry for the shameless plug here, but I swear it’s pertinent — I wrote about how Gen-Xers, millennials, and now zoomers who tune into classic-rockers tend to appreciate different things than the original audiences for those artists. I was writing specifically about lesser-regarded albums in their day that wound up benefitting from revisionism via younger critics. Examples include Paul McCartney’s early post-Beatles solo albums like McCartney and Ram, or Bob Dylan’s Christian-era records.

The reason this happens (I think) is that for younger audiences, they’re taking in the totality of the artist’s work over the course of many decades all at once, which obviously gives them a different perspective. That younger listener can hear The Beatles and “Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey” at the exact same time, which puts that music roughly on the same level. Whereas the older listener who heard that music in real time is shaped by hearing The Beatles at one point in their life, and Ram in another. Not only has the music changed, but (more importantly) the listener has also changed. The Beatles might have had a very significant place in that person’s personal history, which will inevitably influence how they hear the later work. Meanwhile, the younger listener doesn’t experience the music like that. That person might go through a heavy McCartney binge in one week, and take in 50 years of music in a matter of days. The music changes, but that younger listener basically stays the same.

I think that might explain why your dad doesn’t like Rough And Rowdy Ways. He’s been listening to Dylan for most of his life. When he first heard Dylan, the music would have probably been much fresher and exciting for him, because he was younger. Whereas now, he’s heard so much Dylan in his life (and at some many different points in his life) that he can’t help but compare then to now. And then often has a kind of home-field advantage as you get older, because it’s what you know and have appreciated the longest. You have an idea in your head of what Dylan should sound like, and any deviation from that seems wrong.

Or … he might just hate the sound of old Bob’s voice!

Over the last ten years, I (27, male) have engaged in a musical debate with my mother (61) which has reached alarming levels of cognitive distance. The debate is this: My mom is convinced that the 1996 song “One Headlight” is a late-career highlight of The Band’s Robbie Robertson’s solo career. Most ’90s Adult Contemporary-heads will know that “One Headlight” is written and performed by The Wallflowers, featuring Jakob Dylan. Despite my efforts to show her the music video, album credits, and other formal documentation, she still insists the song is performed by Robbie Robertson, and not The Wallflowers. She claims that Robertson performed the song on a January 17, 1992 episode of Saturday Night Live (Setlist.fm lists his performances as “Go Back to Your Woods,” and “The Weight”), four years before the release of “One Headlight.” I acknowledge Jakob Dylan, the song’s true architect, is the son of Robertson’s collaborator Bob Dylan. How do I approach a musical debate that has no factual basis, other than a few loose cross- generational threads? It has become problematic for us to debate the cultural connectivity of the 1960s to the 1990s without resorting to verbal and physical violence. — Davin from Brooklyn

First of all, this is my favorite question in the history of the “Ask A Music Critic” column. Thank you for your service, Davin.

Before I answer your question, I must tell you that I have a similar story. For years, my mother-in-law has asked me to identify a song from the ’70s in which a group of female vocalists sing the words “dance, dance, dance” in the chorus. She has sung the chorus for me, and explained that it is a “disco-type” song. She’s even sung the rhythm part, which (according to her) goes like this: “do-do-do-de-do.”

Right away, I suggested that the song is probably “Dance, Dance, Dance (Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah),” the first single and subsequent hit by the legendary disco band Chic. After all, the chorus is literally “dance, dance, dance,” it features prominent female voices, and it’s a quintessential disco song. But my mother-in-law insists it’s not this song. And then she’ll sing me the song in her head, and she’ll sound more or less like Chic’s “Dance, Dance, Dance.” And this just goes round and round. I happen to think this whole ongoing family argument is hilarious, but it so annoys my wife that she gets physically angry with me whenever I sing “dance, dance, dance” in my mother-in-law’s voice.

Back to your question: You’re wondering what you should do about a music-related argument that’s not even an argument, because you are unequivocally correct and the older loved one in your life is unequivocally mistaken. Here’s my advice: Tell your mom she’s right. Tell her that “One Headlight” is indeed by Robbie Robertson, and that it stands as one of his great late-career achievements. Apologize to her for insisting that it’s a song by The Wallflowers. And then tell this story to everybody that you know and make fun of your mom behind her back. That way, everybody wins.

What is the life of a music critic like, day to day? Do you ALWAYS have music playing? If so, does it drive your family insane? Also if so, what kind of set up are you using? Do you insist on only listening to vinyl while sitting in your most comfortable chair? Do you have speakers in every room in the house? Do you always have headphones on? Do you ever just yearn for silence? — Michael from Vancouver

I sit in a chair in my office and listen to music. Some days, I type a lot.

Yes.

It depends on what I’m playing.

My “set-up” is embarrassingly basic (from an audiophile’s perspective) but relatively inexpensive.

Vinyl is overrated! CDs, however, are properly rated.

No (unless it counts that I carry headphones pretty much everywhere).

Yes!

Yes but thankfully not very often. To do so would be an occupational hazard.

Kanye West hears the criticisms against him, but he won’t back down. That’s the message of his new single, “Wash Us In The Blood,” featuring Travis Scott, which he released today after teasing the new song in his return to Twitter earlier this week. The song is accompanied with a surrealist music video which incorporates CGI animation, social media video clips from recent protests against police brutality, and home movie footage from what looks like a church concert in the ’90s.

“Wash Us In The Blood” is prime latter-day Kanye, based around a gospel-inspired chant evoking the blood of Jesus, imagery that appears repeatedly in the Bible and in the music of Black American churches. Despite opening the video with images from protests against police brutality, it appears Kanye has a broader agenda, as both the lyrics and the video reference the social cost of gang culture, as well as Kanye’s prior comments on slavery. However, it sounds like Kanye expects some controversy, as he raps over the bridge, “They don’t want Kanye to be Kanye / They wanna sign a fake Kanye / They wanna sign a ‘Calm-ye.’” As the first single from Kanye’s upcoming album, God’s Country, it’s an intriguing glimpse at what’s to come.

If Kanye won’t calm down, at least he has plenty to keep himself busy. Earlier this week, he announced a 10-year partnership with The Gap, while Kid Cudi shared a teaser of the duo’s upcoming Kids See Ghosts animated sow.

Listen to Kanye West’s “Wash Us In The Blood” featuring Travis Scott above.