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Happy Friday, everyone, from NPR Music. It's New Music Friday. I'm Stephen Thompson, here with Robert Moore from 90.9 The Bridge in Kansas City. Hey, Robert. How's it going, Stephen? We've got a ton of great new music on this week's show, including new albums by Squid and Nadia Reid and Heartworms and Adrian Crowley. It's funny I never knew The true measure of joy
So, Robert, I swear it is just a coincidence that we asked you on this show right as Kansas City is about to play in the Super Bowl. But I have it on good authority. You are not actually a lifelong Kansas City Chiefs fan. No, I grew up in Southern California, so I've been a lifelong San Diego, now L.A. Chargers fan. But I've come to love the Chiefs in recent years just because of certain players and what they do for the city here, as well as especially this year, the bizarre hatred towards the franchise. Yeah.
It's amazing how quickly our underdogs become hated Goliaths. Oh, definitely. First, we wanted to talk about the new self-titled album by Sharon Van Etten and The Attachment Theory. How much do you take to start a regeneration? Who wants to live forever?
I love this new record. I mean, a solid, solid backup band. I remember bassist Debra Hoff when she worked with Nels Klein and Juju as well. And it just, I first became aware of Sharon back from her flawless 2014 album, Are We There? She's amazing. I mean, she's definitely been an NPR music favorite for people who've listened to this podcast for a long time.
Robin Hilton and I have spent a lot, many a South by Southwest, weeping in churches while Sharon Van Etten performs. It's been really lovely to see her kind of expand her sound as she's moved through her career. She started out as this very, very quiet singer-songwriter. But on this record, there's this kind of synth rock vibe.
that she's working with. She's collaborated with her band in the songwriting and recording more than she's ever done before. And so you have this full band sound that feels really dynamic. What I like is that they pretty much recorded live in the studio and it has that feel. Oh, she's a new chick. What's up? My hands are shaking.
I've read a lot of the recent reviews are comparing her to Springsteen now, which, I mean, that's upper, upper shelf. And I think at this point, it's deservedly so. Do you think, will you see me?
Can you imagine, I mean, when you were first discovering Sharon Venetian's music, could you have ever imagined that she would be getting comparisons to Bruce Springsteen? No, not at all. I thought she would just be another, you know, great kept secret for non-com radio. Ha ha ha ha!
Well, consider the world fortunate that she's been given opportunities to branch out. Do you have any favorite songs from this record you wanted to talk about? I think my favorite single is Trouble, and upon first listening, it really reminded me of early Annie Lennox and Eurythmics, especially Here Comes the Rain Again and
What surprised me when I was reading about the recording process, that they actually recorded it in the Eurythmics' old studio in London. You know, you sometimes hear about, you know, so-and-so recorded in such-and-such an iconic studio, and I sometimes think, like, okay, whatever, it's a space, it's a room. But it really does feel like this record embodies the spirit of the Eurythmics. Oh, I think it definitely informed the sound. I really do. ♪
That is the new self-titled album by Sharon Van Etten and The Attachment Theory. Next up, pretty big pivot here. We're going to go to a wonderful singer, songwriter, and poet from Dublin, Adrian Crowley. Adrian Crowley has a new album called Measure of Joy.
I heard you came back to the City of Light with the sole intention of saving a life. You fell to your knees to drink at the fountain, Genevieve of the Mountain. I left you a message at the top of the steps that lead to the Church of Saint Germain, but it was written in tears and may well have been washed away in the rain.
So as I mentioned, Adrian Crowley is a poet, singer, songwriter from Dublin. Hard not to compare him with another deep-voiced poet, Leonard Cohen.
This is Adrian Crowley's 10th album, and it's full of sadness and resignation, but there's also something strangely soothing about it. I mean, it's hauntingly beautiful, in my opinion, and
He's always reminded me of kind of a David Berman, the late great David Berman. Silver Jews and Purple Mountains meets Bill Callahan, two of my favorites. Oh, yeah. I'm a sucker for a baritone. Love a deep-voiced poet. Oh, yes. I mean, Ryan Adams once called him the greatest songwriter you've never heard of, and I think that still holds true. It's funny because there's such a mixture of darkness and light. And the stars still twinkling like trinkets sing.
A pawn shop window I wonder if they know I'm tangled in your shadow
The album is called Measure of Joy, and there's definitely elements of, you know, finding beauty and grace in the world about kind of walking through the woods at night and, you know, feeling some sense of connection. But there's also, he's so deeply aware of what's wrong in the world and what's hard in the world and what's dark in the world. Down the misty lane
The milk truck clinks along its way My favorite track on the album was Tangled. Crowley described it as the shady realm of a sleepless mind and it does, it just feels like a dreamscape. I could free myself from the dark tendrils that cling to me if I didn't find them
But at the same time, there's also a certain sense of playfulness that sometimes seeps in. I mean, it's hard not to fixate on the closing track on this record, which is called Cherry Blossom Soft Confetti. And it closes the album on a note that I would say is almost, I would describe it as like zesty. ♪ I stepped through the cherry blossoms ♪ ♪ That blew along Sycamore Street ♪
A lot of his songwriting comes now with
his age, you know. He knows there's not a lot of time left because he's up there in age, but he's also picking out, you know, what's great about life, but also the reality of life. And Robert, it's worth noting, you know, John Parrish, the great producers, worked with people like PJ Harvey. He produced this record and you can really, you can feel his stamp on it, right? Oh, definitely. I think everything Parrish does has a really dark elegance to it.
If you haven't dug into this guy and you're hearing some of the names that we're comparing him to and you think, ooh, check out this record. So I walk through fields of longing To a grove of forget-me-nots Where I spend half the morning remembering...
That's Adrian Crowley. His new album is called Measure of Joy. We've got some more records we're going to get to, but first, let's take a quick break. This message comes from Charles Schwab. When it comes to managing your wealth, Schwab gives you more choices, like full-service wealth management and advice when you need it. You can also invest on your own and trade on Thinkorswim. Visit Schwab.com to learn more.
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Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be, to be. It's New Music Friday from NPR Music. I am Stephen Thompson here with Robert Moore from 90.9 The Bridge in Kansas City. Robert, tell me about your show because you have had this show for a long time. Yeah, my show Sonic Spectrum actually turns 22 this week and it's just an old school freeform radio show. Cutting edge classics, you know, from the past and present and I just...
I try to show the links and progressions between artists, genres, and scenes. So give people a sense of what genres we're talking about here. It's definitely heavy on what was once considered alternative music, you know, underground sounds. But I'll throw in some old Neil Young or an old Booker Irvin or John Coltrane track. So it's really all over the place. Just whatever in the moment, you know, moves me. We're going to have a link to Sonic Spectrum in this show's episode notes. Do definitely check it out.
Next up, we've got a new album from Heartworms. Heartworms' new album is called Glutton for Punishment. Glutton for Punishment
Yeah, that's the single Warplane from Heartworms, my favorite of the singles so far. A feeling of such urgency in that track, in my opinion, and it really showcases her passion for military history. Military history even informs her fashion sense, which she calls military chic. Now, when you say she, you're talking about the singer Jojo Orme. This is her first full-length album. She had an EP in 2023 called A Comforting Notion, and it's a song that she's been
It's so interesting. Like, her music has, you know, gets described a lot as, like, post-punk, but there's something so much more mysterious and kind of devious to it than that. This record really weaves in a lot of electropop sounds. I found this record so kind of spiky and strange and slithery. It's got a really cool vibe to it. ♪
She's mixed culture, Afghani, Pakistani, Chinese, and she always felt like an outsider growing up in the English countryside of all places, and I think her music reflects that a lot because her vocals always seem to be hovering above the soundscape she creates, and I just love that about her. I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don't wish, I don
She grew up in an extremely strict household and had this really tortured relationship with her mother, which inspired her to take up music. And to me, like, what is more punk rock than raging against your parents?
Oh, definitely. I mean, it's been her escape since she was a kid. I think a great boost for her career was being originally signed to Speedy Wonderground Records, which has pretty much been the It label in the UK for the last decade. And Dan Carey has really been her champion. Do you have another song that you wanted to recommend that people check out? Jacked is one I really like as well. It's kind of a soundtrack to a paranoid fever dream. And who among us is not living a paranoid fever dream right now? Ha ha ha ha.
These songs are so vibrant and catchy, and they're just never really staying in one place for very long. No, and I think that's what's exciting about her from a listener's standpoint. You just never know where it's going, but it's always worth the wait. That's the new debut album from Heartworms. It's called Glutton for Punishment. Next up, a singer-songwriter I've really loved for a while now, Nadia Reid. Nadia Reid's new album is called Enter Now Brightness.
I see it. It was it. What is fine between us and a lot of reason and fuel?
So I first heard Nadia Reid in 2020. She put out a record called Out of My Province. And, you know, I just really liked her as kind of a folk-pop singer-songwriter. Just some really sharp songwriting chops. I kind of filed it away that she was a person of interest whose music I would continue to check out. And then she released this new record, Enter Now Brightness, and it really adds a lot of muscle to her sound. With many hoops to know
There's an edge to it that I think wasn't there as much, while she still manages to maintain one foot in kind of folk-pop sounds on songs like Even Now, there's still a softness to it. I can't help but kick out Try to find a word out Covering my loneliness, no See it for the odd at any rate To suffer in that chain
And how would you compare this to her earlier work? I think there's a level of depth here that I'm not sure she was fully reaching the first time around. I heard like a lot of potential. And then listening to this record and kind of reading about what it came out of, you know, she is from New Zealand. New Zealand had very strict lockdown and COVID, which kind of hit right as her
album Out of My Province was coming out. She was about to kind of go out on tour and connect with the world and suddenly found herself kind of like everybody, you know, kind of stuck at home. And then life kind of intervened. She had a couple of kids, wrote and recorded a lot of this album while she was pregnant and kind of battling morning sickness. There's a sense of somebody who's spent a bunch of time living life
And the songs just have more depth to them, more oomph to them, and arrangements that feel really rich and vibrant. You think about a song like Second Nature. Now I talk about you were part of my plan. And I did not doubt you. Before the sun rises, I needed an answer. Found it in your eyes.
This is somebody who's really found comfort with songs that have one foot in folk music and one foot in something bigger and catchier and louder and just more potent. So that is Enter Now Brightness, the new album by Nadia Reid. We're also going to do a lightning round of some of the other records we love that are out this week. But first, let's take a quick break.
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Very highly anticipated follow-up to their second album. Some proggy post-punk out of Brighton, England. To me, it's a band that's really showing how much and how quickly they mature, sonically at least, at a very fast rate. I mean, you can really feel their buzzing energy with every single track on this record. One thing that really came through for me listening to this record was just the humor.
Frank's my friend, he's my friend, we are friends, there's medicine to hide, but he's a real nice guy.
Lyrically, it's very pitch black and very funny. You think about a song like Building 650 that just kind of has these strange asides and quips and jokes in the midst of this song that is just constantly pulsing through different sounds. You know, sometimes post-punk music can be very rigid, but this is just one of the least rigid bands working right now.
Ollie Judge wrote that tune on their first tour to Japan, which they arrived just two days after the COVID travel ban was lifted. And he talked about how surreal it felt really being the only tourist in Japan at the time. A friend could know his nose and mouth. A friend could know almost anything. Shopping, some currency, like the shoes.
Being able to tap into that isolation. You know, it's just so interesting. There's something really kind of strangely euphoric about this band's sound, even though it's made up of a lot of kind of icy post-punk building blocks. It feels organic and alive and has this creativity that keeps it from sounding cold or distant. It can even feel psychedelic. ♪
I think that, you know, with each of their songs, it almost feels like they are inventing it in the moment when they're in the studio. They really don't know where the ending is going to be until they get there. I really dug the single "Crispy Skin" because it was inspired by the dystopian novel "Tender in the Flesh" about cannibalism, which somehow Oli can make, you know, hilarious. ♪ Come, share those little books ♪
Think about a song like Blood on the Boulders, where it kind of takes this turn about halfway through and is suddenly and just picks up in intensity.
It's hard to even excerpt this band, because you can get a sense of the vibe and the feel of any given song, but that song might careen into an entirely different direction.
That is Cowards, the new album by the terrific band Squid. Obviously, we can't get to every single record that we wanted to talk about this week. More and more new records coming out every week as the year rolls on. But we did want to do a lightning round of some of our favorites. Never come true.
I'm going to kick us off. I wanted to mention an album by three really huge names in hip-hop who are releasing an album together. The San Francisco rapper Larry June, the deeply inventive producer The Alchemist, and the Atlanta rap superstar 2 Chainz are all working together on an atmospheric and philosophical new record called Life is Beautiful. I'm self-made, made to influence. I turn your castle into a ruin. Selling the season and the mark
I'm really excited about the latest release from FACS, F-A-C-S, a band that's named after the filing system for the extremely influential Manchester label Factory Records. It's just some great, refreshing 90s style indie rock. The album is called Wish Defense from FACS.
The French DJ, producer, and singer Oklou, that's O-K-L-O-U, makes fizzy, kind of ambient, futuristic pop with an experimental quality that doesn't drown out her keen instinct for pop music. Oklou's new album is full of searching songs that sprawl in a lot of different directions at once. The album is called Choke Enough. ♪ Stay louder than me ♪
We have two reissues to get into now, beginning with Cowboy Junkies, a band that I've had a love affair with for almost 40 years. It's their debut album, Whites Off Earth Now. It's a vinyl-only reissue, which has long been out of print.
Love that record. Love that band. One, two, three. Finally, Wilco is releasing a 20th anniversary edition of A Ghost is Born. The original album is arty and ambitious and searching. And now if you want to embark on that journey again, you can do so with as many as 65 previously unreleased tracks, depending on which edition you seek out. Just in case you were wondering how my colleague Robin Hilton was planning to spend his weekend.
That is our show for this week. Thank you, Robert Moore, for joining us. Absolutely. My pleasure. Everyone go out and check out Sonic Spectrum on 90.9 The Bridge. It really is unlike any other show on public radio. Again, we'll have a link in our episode description. If you enjoy New Music Friday and want more people to hear it, we would...
really, really appreciate if you left us a positive review on Apple or Spotify or whatever app you're listening to right now. Back next week to talk about new albums with our dear friend from Philadelphia public radio station WRTI Nate Chenin who will either be elated or devastated depending on what transpires Sunday night at the Super Bowl. Until then...
Take a moment, be well, reach out to a friend, enjoy Kendrick Lamar's halftime show, and treat yourself to lots of great music. And down the city street, people are climbing the tree.
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