What's new from Gorillaz, Pixies, Beyoncé, Christina Rosenvinge, Drake and other songs from June

Gorillaz feat.

Thundercat – 'Cracker Island'

The first shot of whatever is to come from Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett's animated band is just as impressive as their last work, the massive and talent-packed

(2020).

His peculiar

industrial

, was allowed to be redrawn by giants like Robert Smith, Elton John, Björk, Beck and St. Vincent, in an album of

collaborations that looked like the first installment of something.

His return since then sounds like he's following the same path, this time, along with Thundercat, who diverts the sound towards

palatable (and catchy) to the maximum degree that brings back the darkest (and danceable) part of the nineties, and everything that came after.

They say that “a new dawn is coming”.

But it has, without a doubt, the same unbeatable

.

Christina Rosenvinge –

'

That Boy'

Composed expressly for the closing of

, the television series in which Bob Pop turns his life into a fabulous

against the world at a time when being gay was not easy at all —yes, that was the eighties, with its promises of freedom, but also the families of before the eighties, with all their 'what will they say'—, the first single from the always brilliant Christina Rosenvinge since

—and the cuts composed for

, the cinematographic delicacy that starred in 2020—sounds almost like a discard from their last album and, at the same time, a kaleidoscope of their unique sound.

Its always something

and luminous pop of the author, added to witty and poetic

build a hymn for the gay boy, and his first torments, from a modestly almighty self that observes and understands and confesses: “I who aspired to be a gay diva / I want to encourage him to fly”.

An instant classic, and not just from Pride.

Pixies – 'There's a Moon On'

Black Francis and Joey Santiago say they are growing up.

That

is something of the past.

That from now on they want to deliver songs like this, the second installment of their eighth album, a

that will land everywhere at the end of September, which sounds complex —there's his epicentric guitar solo, a little further on a distorted extension of the same—and slightly domesticated—even catchy, in a purely pop sense, of a battling pop.

And they want to do it because they are finding “an extra energy”, they say, that is allowing them to expand the universe that

lost sight of too long ago.

There is something of redemption, and of mere enjoyment in the sketch of an architecture, yes, more juicy in a cut in which Francis admits “

” (“I do not like to fight, I do not like to spit”).

And he adds: “

”.

And despite this, she continues to sound like a small shot.

American singer Regina Spektor, in a promotional portrait.

Regina Spektor – 'Becoming All Alone'

That Russian-born singer-songwriter who emerged from the prodigious Brooklyn scene of the early 2000s is now 42 years old.

Six have passed since her previous record.

The one she just published,

is the eighth of her career, and the song that opens it starts off misleading.

For a few seconds she looks like she's going to go for the atmospheric pop of Mercury Rev from

(1998) before showing us the usual Regina Spektor, that delicate and powerful singer who makes the piano the driving force of some songs with a certain almost cabaret element.

The theatricality is provided by the lyrics, which tell of a chance encounter between the singer and none other than God on the streets of New York.

And what would anyone do if she meets God in the middle of the city?

Obviously she would buy him a beer to ask him a few essential questions that don't quite add up.

And in this song the questions are more important than the answers.

Fontaines D.C. – 'I Love You'

Apparently it's a love song, but it turns out that this ballad with a certain air to The Cure is the most political song of the entire career of the Irish Fontaines DC, who read the primer to the two main parties in their country.

So that sad romanticism and even a tad sordid that comes off for five minutes is just a way of questioning things like chichinabo's patriotism.

A question that has obsessed the inhabitants of the Emerald Isle since it was split in two.

Sea como sea is one of the best songs from

, the very appreciable third album by the Dublin group, released this spring.

Elizabeth King – 'I Got a Love'

In the 1970s, Elizabeth King was one of the few women to lead an all-male gospel group.

Leading Elizabeth King & The Gospel Souls, this singer from Memphis managed to establish herself on the national scene and achieve hits like 'I Heard The Voice'.

However, King decided to leave the stage and recording studios to raise up to 15 children.

There is nothing.

Now, almost four decades later and with a supermom title, she returns as if she were reborn.

This advance is part of what will be her next album,

.

A

with a

mournful and spiritual choruses, but that sounds too classic, like very marked by a past time.

King has the makings of a great performer, but here he sticks too close to the canons and doesn't offer anything very impressive.

Result without more.

Country singer Amanda Shires, in a 2022 photo.Michael Schmelling

Amanda Shires – 'Take It Like a Man'

Within the contemporary

, Amanda Shires is a born worker.

With a consolidated career of a dozen albums and as a sideman for musicians of the caliber of Chris Isaak, Justin Townes Earle and, especially, Jason Isbell, with whom she has shared albums and projects together with the band The 400 Unit, this singer has stood out in recent years for her membership in The Highwomen, a supergroup made up of her, Brandi Carlile, Maren Morris and Natalie Hemby.

The Highwomen have shaken American

with pride and quality.

Now, Shires is preparing a new solo album, becoming more somber on songs like this one.

Solo, she remembers Emmylou Harris when she files

to give a pop layer to your compositions.

It's a suggestive voice, perhaps lacking the sentimental depth and grit of Brandi Carlile, the most powerful of all the Highwomen.

Metronomy – 'Love Factory'

Far from the crunchy sound that made them the headliners of festivals some time ago, the British Metronomy returned a few weeks ago with 'Small World', an

arrangements

of those that have

brightness and hours of study.

'Love Factory', the fourth

, responds to all that, however, contributing something extra.

We are talking about five minutes that bring us closer to the interesting way of composing by Joseph Mount, author of

like

'The Look' or 'The Light', with keyboards and arrangements weaving a lush background reminiscent of the most simple and beautiful compositions of the Beach Boys.

The voices are as stimulating as the lyrics, extremely intelligent in their structure and playing with the clueless.

As the dating industry moves the market and promotes potential lovers as if they were objects, you stop being yourself, abandon friends and start being the bad cop of the movie.

Canadian rapper Drake, during a concert in Toronto in 2019. Arthur Mola/Invision/AP

Drake – 'Falling Back'

We do not know the origin of the release of

, aka Drake's

album , which has already generated a whole ton of

in the purist sector of the genre.

Those who know his career would know how to draw the hook line.

When

came out in 2017, one of the most surprising songs was the

'Get it together', with Black Coffee producing and the voice of Jorja Smith making a cameo.

For his seventh album, the Canadian once again has this producer, an expert in deep and throbbing rhythms, and the move is not as crazy as they say.

Beyond some dubious technical decisions and less inspired lyrics, some songs shine like this contagious 'Falling Back', with a sensational falsetto navigating with ease over a sensual atmosphere of discreet synths.

And all this without exceeding 120 bpm, drawing a theme that rhythmically allows voices and phrasing with the appearance of being improvised.

In fact, everything flows so naturally that when the end comes, you need to listen to it again.

Beyonce – 'Break My Soul'

House

never died, but it seems to be experiencing a second wave in

culture , decades after its moment of glory, at the hands of extremely popular artists who claim elements of the genre that set the dance floors on fire in the 1980s and 1990s

After Drake and Charli XCX, Beyoncé herself joins the trend with a new

that borrows the rhythmic base of

, the Robin S. classic

It's a simple but captivating song, resoundingly effective, like everything His Majesty touches.

In this long-awaited return, one can only regret, if one gets demanding, that she abandons the cycle of deep innovation of the last two decades, which saw her sign from unrivaled pop breakers to bold forays into hip hop, to deliver a song that the ears more severe will interpret it as a pastiche.

British singer Beth Orton, in a promotional portrait of 2022.

Beth Orton – 'Weather Alive'

She seemed destined to be one of the greats of her generation, but Beth Orton got lost along the way.

With a career of almost 30 years behind her, the British singer will return in September with a new album, with which she ends six years of record silence.

Its first advance, a seven-minute cut inscribed in an ethereal folk and bordering on jazz —it is accompanied by figures from the London scene of the genre such as Tom Skinner, Tom Herbert and Alabaster dePlume—, hints at a more pronounced ambition than in previous installments. , which could lead her, who knows, to match the exceptional triplet of albums she signed back in the last turn of the millennium:

,

and

.

Her voice is more broken than ever, but she hasn't sounded this good in years.

Lana del Rey & Father John Misty – 'Buddy's Rendezvous'

Lana del Rey reinterprets one of the new songs from Father John Misty in this portentous version intended for a vinyl included in the

reissue of the last album of the second,

.

Limiting himself to doing the choirs in the final section, Josh Tillman gives all the prominence to her traveling companion, to the point that the guest star looks like him and not her.

Del Rey sings this elegy for a broken doll leaning back to a

based on piano, strings and saxophone.

To evoke his dour melancholy is almost a pleonasm.

Every day more inspired, the singer adapts to the poetics and melodic lines of her author, but takes her result to her own terrain, to the point that her song seems written for her.

“What happened to the girl I met?

/ She didn't pay her debts and she ended up in the news”, reads a chilling chorus.

One of the wonders of the year.

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