New Music Friday: The best albums out Feb. 14
39:25 Share

This message comes from Best Western Hotels and Resorts. From adventures to new places, Best Western has you covered. With over 4,000 hotels worldwide, you're sure to find the right hotel for your next getaway. Life's a trip. Make the most of it at bestwestern.com. Happy Friday, everybody, from NPR Music. It's New Music Friday. I'm Stephen Thompson, here with Nate Chenin of WRTI in Philadelphia. Nate...

Go Birds! I can't believe I said Nate and it took, what, like a second and a half for you to yell Go Birds. You're off your game. It is a euphoric week here in Philadelphia. And watch our eagles.

Actually, the music you heard coming in was a version of Fly Eagles Fly recorded at WRTI. That is Lady Alma singing with Anthony Tidd on bass. I know you as a Packers fan, but come on. Please tell me that you got caught up in the spirit of the Packers.

Oh, absolutely not. No, I refuse. You know, February 9th may have been Saquon Barkley and rookie cornerback Cooper DeJean's actual birthday, but I, watching from my living room, I kind of felt like it was my birthday with all those elements coming into place. I mean, wow. Yeah, the Eagles dominate in the Super Bowl, and also, we all love jazz. There you go.

That is exactly the spirit that we're going to take into this discussion of a bunch of great new music out today, February 14th. Starting with Bartice Strange. Bartice Strange has a new album called Horror. I'm gonna show you. Too much.

Barty Strange has very quickly become a beloved DC institution. We talk a lot on this show about artists who kind of operate in a world untethered from genre. But Barty Strange kind of kicks that up a notch. His music smashes together rock and hip hop and dance music and so many different styles kind of swirling together, sometimes even within individual songs.

There's a lot of sonic density and a lot of sonic design on this album. And I think we came in with the opening track on the album too much.

It applies to the musical influences that are extant on this album, but it's also like the themes and ideas and conflicts that grappling with as a singer songwriter. He's kind of like giving you a glimpse into, you know, the churn inside his psyche. Yeah.

The album is called Horror, and that kind of alludes to the fact that when he was growing up, he used horror movies to kind of make himself feel strong. Like, if I can endure this, I can handle the world, which is really interesting, because

thing to reflect on as an adult and kind of how and why you did that and how and why that might have shaped you. And when you listen to the sound of this record, he's got such a firm grip on ways to sound

Sly and funky, but there's this unsettling undercurrent to these songs that I think really fits the title, that fits that overall vibe. These songs are catchy. They're sometimes extremely propulsive. Sometimes in the case of a song like Doomsday Buttercup, there's a strangely danceable quality to it.

but at the same time there's this undercurrent that feels very uneasy and i think that's part of what keeps me kind of hooked on his music

as I was listening and just kind of thinking about descriptors, one that floated into my psyche that I quickly batted away, but it kept coming back, was like transgressive black Bon Iver. Ooh! Like, because there's this hauntedness and this kind of like, when Bon Iver made the move, the shift from like solo, acoustic, echoey,

introspection to more of a band sound but still sort of retain that haunted core yeah

A lot of his associations are within this kind of atmospheric indie rock nexus. He's toured with The National. He travels in those circles. But there's another element, right? I mean, he was born in England and raised in Mustang, Oklahoma. There's just a really powerful sense of displacement and adaptation, I think, in his songs. Yeah.

And there's one song in particular that captures that. It's called "Seventeen." Yes! When he sings the lyric "Sometimes I don't know where I belong" and as he sings that down a major scale

And so it's just like, just going down the stairs, you know? It's such a disarmingly open-hearted and simple confession. Later in the song, he talks about just being aware sometimes that he is like too black for the room. First time that I felt impending doom Was realizing I'm too black for the room I was pushing it down, pushing it down Just for you, for you

Think about his journey as an artist, you know,

working in these indie rock spaces and sometimes feeling like I'm maybe putting words in his mouth, but he is working within kind of white-coated spaces and bringing his blackness as part of his lived experience and perspective and musical influence into that equation. You ain't wrong What I give to pay Not for nothing hard

Well, it's interesting that you mentioned Seventeen because in addition to containing those insights, that song also rocks extremely hard. Yeah. And as much as we've talked about, what did you say, transgressive black Bon Iver, which I love, that might suggest a more insular sound than this album necessarily suggests.

has from start to finish. I mean, we haven't yet mentioned that this record is co-produced by Jack Antonoff. Right, right. There is also an eye toward the stadium. There is also an eye toward big rooms in this sound that you get when you work with arguably the biggest mainstream pop producer in the world. Yeah, yeah. I mean, every time I think that I've heard enough Jack Antonoff, he turns around and just like,

delivers another wallop. That's Horror. It's the new album by Bartice Strange. Next up, a new album from the singer-songwriter Denison Whitmer. It's called Anything At All. One, two,

To have a hat full of So I bought feeder Bags of seed, hooks and chain And hung them all around the yard Just outside of every window Spam, jungle, flanker Wax swing

This is Denison Whitmer, a singer-songwriter who's been kicking around for quite a while, originally from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The song that we just came out of is titled "A House With," and Stephen, I'm really curious, because I don't have as deep a relationship with Denison's music,

I hear a lot of Sufjan Stevens in the arrangement and in the sort of building, you know, mounting crescendo of this song. How much Sufjan is in this album and how much is purely Denison?

Well, he comes by it honestly. I'll start there. And it's funny, I was listening to this record the other night and my partner walked by and said, oh, this is lovely. Perhaps has this singer-songwriter ever heard the music of Sufjan Stevens? Can I interest him in the music of Sufjan Stevens? And that is certainly a fair point to acknowledge. ♪

He works with Sufjan Stevens on this record. Sufjan Stevens' fingerprints are everywhere here in the production. He's not just an influence, he is a collaborator. Carry a torch for me, Christina My life's gone face down in the dirt

Denison Whitmer has been recording for the Asthmatic Kitty label since 2012. That's Sufjan Stevens' label. Denison Whitmer has worked with Rosie Tucker, who's part of the Sufjan Stevens cinematic universe. He is definitely embedded in that world and has clearly been influenced by that world.

But, you know, Denison Whitmer's been putting out records since 1998. He's been floating around for a really, really long time. He actually started out, the first comparison that I was going to throw out was to a band that we talked about on this show a couple months ago, The Innocence Mission, which is also from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. And I was listening to this record and I was like, you know what, I'm going to tie this back to The Innocence Mission and how we talked about sometimes it's lovely to just sit back

with a spare, beautiful, extremely warm and heartfelt record, especially kind of in the dead of winter. And I was going to make these comparisons to The Innocence Mission, in part because both artists are from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. And Don Paris of The Innocence Mission was Denison Whitmer's guitar teacher. Oh, wow. ♪

The Innocence Mission brings kind of this plain-spoken insight. Sufjan Stevens brings these flourishes that all tie into human connection and warmth. And I think he is certainly drawing on those influences, but he is also his own person. He's also a distinctive singer-songwriter. I'm at the edges of my mind again.

For me, like, this is your perfect kind of mid-February, winter in the cabin reflection record. Sometimes it's extremely spare and simple. Sometimes it has these curlicues and these Sufjani swirls around them. But it's all coming from this extremely warm-hearted place and from a singer-songwriter who's been at this for decades.

He has continued to be an extremely reliable craftsman who puts out gorgeous, heartfelt music. I can't tell the fashion that I've worn Nothing feels as random as the gift of love I hope I'm not wasting more

Now my kids run circles through the kitchen. I pour a second glass of wine. Nothing feels as random as the love of God. I hope I'm not wasting mine. Nothing feels as random as the gift of life. I hope I'm not wasting mine.

I also want to throw out there, for those who are wondering just how Sufjani, this Sufjan Stevens adjacent record can get, there's a track on the song late called Slow Motion Snow that really builds into this full circle moment where you're like, this guy's been adjacent to Sufjan Stevens for ages. Now he's just going all in.

I think the slow motion snow, when you talked about how this is like a perfect wintry album, it's like, well, it's right there. Slow motion snow falls from the sky. The curve over my head.

That's Anything At All by Denison Whitmer. His new album is out today. Well, we've got a few more records that we're excited to talk about, as well as a lightning round of some of the other albums out today. But first, let's take a quick break. This message comes from BetterHelp Online Therapy. Relationships of all kinds are complicated, and they tend to come with a lot of tough questions.

From questions about coworkers to family to romantic partners, therapy can be your safe space to talk about challenges you face in any of life's relationships. BetterHelp offers therapy 100% online and sign up takes only a few minutes. Visit betterhelp.com slash NPR to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.com slash NPR.

Support for NPR and the following message come from Bowlin Branch. Change your sleep with the softness of Bowlin Branch's 100% organic cotton sheets. Feel the difference with 15% off your first set of sheets at bowlinbranch.com with code NPR. Exclusions apply. See site for details.

This message comes from Carvana. Finance your next car the convenient way with customizable, transparent terms all online. Make your budget work for you and swap hassle for convenience with Carvana.

Hey, it's A. Martinez. I work on a news show. And yeah, the news can feel like a lot on any given day. But you just can't ignore las noticias when important world-changing events are happening. So that is where the Up First podcast comes in. Every single morning in under 15 minutes, we take the news and boil it down to three essential stories so you can keep up without feeling stressed out. Listen to the Up First podcast from NPR.

From NPR Music, it's New Music Friday. I'm Stephen Thompson here with Nate Chenin from WRTI. Nate, tell me, besides the Super Bowl, I would imagine there's a lot going on over at WRTI. There really is. And actually, at this moment, there is some exciting transition because, Stephen, I think you remember my podcast co-host, Greg Bryant, who left WRTI to move to Los Angeles, who

well, that has left us in the search for a new full-time jazz host. And I've been involved in some of the interviews and I got to say, it's actually really exciting to,

to see how much talent is out there. And we are very soon going to make an announcement for a new evening jazz host at WRTI. Well, speaking of jazz and Philadelphia, I wanted to get to our next record. It is by Marshall Allen, a young whippersnapper with a new record called New Dawn. ♪

So Marshall Allen holds the distinction, Nate, of being the oldest person ever to perform a Tiny Desk concert. Back in 2014, when he was but 91 years old, he led the Sun Ra Orchestra in a Halloween Tiny Desk concert, which if you have not seen it, please watch.

Get online and check it out. It is wonderful and colorful and strange and beautiful. And now he began the recording process two days after his 100th birthday, his first ever solo album. And it's just gorgeous.

And also, so I don't think that this has been certified, but wouldn't this make Marshall Allen the Guinness World Record holder for oldest artist to release an album? Because it was previously held by Tony Bennett, who released an album at 95, and Marshall's 100th.

The title track of this album, New Dawn, it features Nenna Cherry. Some may know for her 90s sort of electropop hits, but Nenna is also the daughter of the wonderful trumpeter, composer Don Cherry. I don't know time I will create Just mine Be it me or you

I hope you listen with rays of the sun. We have to say, Marshall Allen, at 100, this is his solo debut. Incredible. Not only is he the oldest artist, but this is his first album under his own name by himself. Yeah.

And I think what that speaks to is, first of all, how synonymous he has been with the Sun Ra Orchestra. He's led the band since 1993. When Sun Ra died in 1993. But he's been a member of the Sun Ra Orchestra since the 50s. Right. It's really impossible to imagine the orchestra without Marshall Allen. ♪

It is still kind of an orchestra record. He collaborated on this album with Noel Scott, who is a fellow member. So it's not like a wild departure, but there are certain things in it that feel a little bit more small group. One song I'm thinking of in particular is titled African Sunset. Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you.

You know, as much as Marshall Allen and as much as the Sun Ra Orchestra are avant-garde jazz, when you hear the phrase avant-garde jazz, you think of something a little less accessible and a little less emotional than what's going on here. This is a very approachable record. Right. There are also these little bits and infusions of real energy to this record. There's a hi-fi...

Juan Garcia, Esquivel cocktail jazz feel to it, which, you know, I've been a fan of Esquivel for decades and have dipped into his catalog constantly when I kind of need a palate cleanser. And I like that this record is drawing not only on kind of the spacier and more searching qualities of like

the Sun Ra Orchestra, but they're also dipping into jazz from the last 80 years. That sort of like lounge sensibility or like edging up into exotica or, you know, what have you, that's all very true to form as well. You know, you heard on that track that

a little bit of like a, you know, a sort of swoopy synthesizer sound. You know, we should say that, you know, that is Marshall. You know, he plays alto saxophone and he has this kind of signature skronk

But he's also a virtuoso of the EWI, which is an electronic wind instrument. It looks a bit like a soprano saxophone, but it is a synthesizer. And his command of the timbre and the pitch modulation and all these elements that you only get from an instrument like that.

about a year or so ago, before he turned 100, but not too long before, I went to see a show he did here in Philly at Solar Myth. And I was around for the soundcheck, and when he showed up to the venue and saw the bassist William Parker to greet him, he did a little soft shoe. Wow. At age 99. So, you know, that's who we're dealing with. And the music sounds like somebody who's still doing a soft shoe at 100. ♪

That's New Dawn from Marshall Allen. Next up, we're going to keep it jazz. We're going to go with Sullivan Fortner and his new album, Southern Nights. ♪

So you may recognize that tune. It is the title track in Alan Toussaint's song called "Southern Nights." The lyricism, Sullivan really captures that. This is an album I was especially excited to talk about because Sullivan Fortner, you may know him as a celebrated accompanist

to Cecile McLaurin-Salvant, and he's won multiple Grammys with Cecile. He's also collaborated with Curt Elling. But this is what I consider to be a long-awaited band effort by a trio that he put together with a bassist named Peter Washington and the drummer Marcus Gilmore.

They come from different corners of the modern jazz landscape. Peter Washington plays in the Bill Charlap trio. He's generally known as kind of a swinging jazz traditionalist. And Marcus Gilmore works along the super contemporary hybridist, like adventurous sector of modern jazz. But the thing is, they all are so fluent in this common language. And Sullivan just unites everything. ♪

I was really struck by

The style of Sullivan Fortner's piano playing, there's such a conversational quality to it. At times, it can feel almost, on this record, like you're listening to a chatty friend, you know, where he's just filling the air with notes. He can be very busy while still being very colorful. ♪

so

His playing can be almost frenetic, even discordant, but he never loses sight of kind of this warmth and musicality. Yeah, I think that warmth is just who he is. One word that I always reach for when I'm thinking about Sullivan is personal. It's different than a word like distinctive or unmistakable, though those also apply, right? But the thing with him, you know,

you use the metaphor of conversation. Like, I really do feel like Sullivan speaks through his instrument. You know, he feels like somebody that you know. ♪ One example of that sort of chatty quality you describe is on an original tune that he titled Nine Bar Tune. ♪

so nine bar tune if you know anything about music you know that's an unusual length for uh a form so there's a little bit of an off-kilter quality but right you know what you also hear on this track is just what a what an incredible player marcus gilmore is

hyper articulate, maybe even over articulate, but also impart a feeling of space and proportion and patience.

That is Southern Nights from Sullivan Fortner. We've got one more jazz record that Nate's going to guide us through. It's also great, as well as a lightning round of some of the other albums that are out today. But first, let's take one quick break.

Support for NPR and the following message come from LinkedIn ads. As a B2B marketer, you know how noisy the digital ad space can be. If your message isn't targeted to the right audience, it just disappears into the noise. By using LinkedIn ads, you can reach professionals who are more likely to find your ad relevant. Target them by job title, industry, company, and more. Get a $100 credit on your next campaign at linkedin.com slash all songs. Terms and conditions apply.

It's New Music Friday from NPR Music. I'm Stephen Thompson here with Nate Chenin from WRTI. Before we get to our lightning round, we got one more record we want to get to. It is by the bassist John Patitucci and it's called "Spirit Fall."

So my first impression listening to this record was, wow, this is a band that leans really hard and really effectively on its rhythm section. And that rhythm section, it's John Patitucci on acoustic and electric basses and Brian Blade on drums.

Brian Blade, you know, a lot of people know him for his work with Nora Jones, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, like lots of people, right? But Patitucci and Blade together were members of the celebrated Wayne Shorter Quartet. ♪

When you think of that hookup and you think about Wayne Shorter, this is a person who is famously kind of mysterious and mercurial and like elusive. And the saxophonist on this album is Chris Potter, who, while he has like

fully mastered the language of Wayne Shorter, among others, you don't think about mystery and inarticulacy and, like, elusiveness with him. Like, he's very direct and clear and, like, super articulate. And so that's a different energy. ♪

John Patitucci, he's also worked with Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock. I mean, these are some of the Mount Rushmore figures in jazz that this guy has worked with directly. So on his own record as a band leader, he's trying to invoke some of their sounds on an album that is conveying entirely instrumentally these ideas around unity and spiritual growth. He is a very spiritual person, Patitucci. Yeah.

Those artists that we've named, they all come from a cohort that was under the wing of Miles Davis during the electric years. Bitches Brew and beyond. And one thing that unites them is a total curiosity about sound and style. ♪

He's also really drawn to the groove aspects of different kinds of music. So he loves Brazilian music. And there's a track on this album that features a Brazilian groove, and it also has Chris Potter doing a little bit of multi-tracking. So it doesn't sound like a three-piece band. This is a tune called "Lipim."

There's a tradition of saxophone-based drums in jazz, and its most famous reference point is the Sonny Rollins Trio of the late 1950s. And there's a track on here that seems to very specifically evoke that precedent. It's called Sonrisa. It's a calypso. And you can just hear how much fun these guys have with that idea. ♪

♪

Well, that is Spiritfall. It's the new album by John Patitucci. It is fantastic. Thank you for bringing it to my attention. Nate, we did want to do a quick lightning round of some of the other records that are out today, February 14th. I'm going to kick us off with the Chicago indie rock band Horse Girl. They've got a new record and a newly stripped down sound, thanks in part to the presence of the producer Kate LeBond, who from her own music knows a little something about weaving music.

kind of beautiful sounds from spare ingredients. This new record most directly to me invokes classics by The Velvet Underground and Nico, but it's got an energy of its own. It's called Phonetics On and On. Just to you

We've also got Satchel Vasandhani's Best Life Now. Now, if you don't know Satchel, he is a jazz vocalist. There's a really silky and knowing quality to his singing. And on this album, he works with the drummer and producer Nate Smith, just an absolute groove maestro. So he's a really good singer.

So there's a lot happening here, but it's a very sort of cool and seductive.

John Glacier is a UK rapper and poet who's worked with other inventive musicians like Sampha, Floom, MKG. Her music is full of contradictions in its sound. It's minimalistic and enveloping. It's calm and unsettling. It's blurry and revealing. It is a land of contrasts. John Glacier's new album is called Like a Ribbon. You best believe it.

The War and Treaty is a husband and wife duo that works within the Americana zone and on their fourth full-length album, Plus One, they're kind of

doing more of what they do so well, which is to blend country and folk and blues and gospel influences in a really communicative package. They also welcome some input from people who are fans of their work. There's a song here that was co-written by Miranda Lambert. So this is a very sort of Nashville Americana record. ♪

So if you love that dap tone sound, vintage horns, timeless soul, make sure you make room in your life for the Altons. The group is putting out its first album on dap tone, and it's full of songs that channel...

classic 60s style pop and soul through a prism of Tejano music. It's classic and vibey and timeless. It is alt-Latino approved. I know my colleagues are huge, huge fans. And dare I say, it is a perfectly stylish soundtrack for Valentine's Day for those who celebrate. It's called Heartache in Room 14. And that is our show for this week. Thank you, Nate Chenin, for joining us during a very busy week in Philadelphia. Be careful around the lampposts. Goldberg!

You got one more. That was your last one. If you believe New Music Friday to be the Philadelphia Eagles of podcasting, or some other good thing, we implore you to share that very accurate take with the world via a positive review on Apple or Spotify or whatever app you are listening to right now. This episode was produced by Simon Retner and edited by Otis Hart.

The executive producer of NPR Music is Soraya Mohamed, and her boss is Keith Jenkins, NPR's vice president of music and visuals.

We'll be back next week to talk about new albums with the host of the long-running public radio show Mountain Stage, Kathy Matea. Yes, the same Kathy Matea who recorded 18 Wheels and a Dozen Roses, one of my favorite songs of the 80s. We will be talking about new albums by Sam Fender, the drive-by truckers Patterson Hood, and more. Until then, take a moment to be well, eschew the trappings of Valentine's Day, and treat yourself to lots of great music. ♪

This message comes from NPR sponsor, Sotva. Founder and CEO, Ron Rudson, shares why Sotva sales associates are focused on finding the perfect mattress for their customers.

It's hard to have a 365-day home trial. Why would we want to rush you or try to push you into something that's not right for you? We want to make sure that we guide you to the right mattress. Our team is always available to be helpful, to make sure you make the right choice.

To learn more, go to s-double-a-t-v-a-dot-com-slash-n-p-r. This message comes from Capella University. With Capella's FlexPath learning format, you can set your own deadlines and learn on your schedule. A different future is closer than you think with Capella University. Learn more at capella.edu.