Tracks we love right now, in no particular order.
Each week, The FADER staff rounds up the songs we can’t get enough of. Here they are, in no particular order. Listen on our Spotify and Apple Music playlists, or hear them all below.
Doechii, “Anxiety”
The lore of Doechii’s “Anxiety” is long and twisty but the short version is that she’s rapping over Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used To Know” and absolutely floating over the 2011 hit. The rapping is pacy and effortless as the confidence in her words leaves you gassed up, only for the song to switch up with Doechii singing about her anxious feelings that arrive like an unwanted visitor. Digging up a loosie from the archives and it sounding better than anything else out there is testament to the roll Doechii is on right now. —David Renshaw
Little Simz, “Flood”
The first taste of Little Simz’ upcoming album Lotus (due May 16) is “Flood,” a darkly confident vibe check featuring Obongjayar and Moonchild Sanelly. Simz uses her time to lay out a blueprint for her success and her tips include avoiding snakes, keep moving forwards, and “being as free as I can.” If the last few years have marked an ascendance for the U.K. rapper, now it sounds like she’s ready to soar. —DR
Chloe Qisha, “Sex, Drugs, & Existential Dread”
Rising British pop star Chloe Qisha channels the loose funk of Prince and David Bowie in a song that (reasonably) suggests the solution to personal boredom and global collapse is getting naked and making out with a friend. “We’re all going to die,” Qisha reminds us over a taut bassline, “So if you got something to say, just say it.” It’s a sort of carpe diem statement for doomscrollers and bed rotters. —DR
The Residents, “Prelude / Metal Madness”
In the late ’80s, two metal-obsessed teens shot themselves in a Reno, Nevada, playground sparking national moral panic, a conspiracy that centered on supposed subliminal Satanic messages inserted backwards into the grooves of Judas Priest records. The Residents, purveyors of musical horror and comedy for half a century, became fascinated with the court case that followed the suicides, and turned the sordid tale into an opera titled Doctor Dark, featuring orchestration from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Edwin Outwater. The saga opens with “Prelude / Metal Madness.” A minute-long intro of increasingly dissonant strings and chirping birds dissolves into the madness section of the song featuring crashing drums, punishing power chords, and screamed vocals (“I hate you / You hate me / I hate you too”). It teleports us back in time to the chaos that set off the air raid sirens for America’s “moral majority” nearly 40 years ago. —Raphael Helfand
bdrmm, “Snares”
British band bdrmm have pulled off the indie-to-electronic transition with superb finesse. On “Snares,” the titular drums dance near the back of the mix, hiding in the shadows of a heavy kick, a hit that sounds like a cowbell stuffed with papier-mâché, and lush synth pads that sweep in as Ryan Smith monotones, “Believe me when I say this is not all we have / There’s plenty more to come.” —RH
Elita, “Planet Paparazzi”
From the stormy minds of Elita — the Newfoundland trio of Elita, Krank, and Tim — comes the eerie new single “Planet Paparazzi,” released alongside the announcement of their debut LP, HELL HILL. The track is slick slacker trip-hop on its face, but beneath seethes a squall of glitchy synth-pop, its tortured synths twisted around the tentacles of 21st-century Q2 dystopia. —RH
ADÉLA, “Machine Girl”
ADÉLA came out of the reality competition show that formed KATSEYE and was disqualified by the judges because they thought she’d be a stronger solo artist. “Machine Girl,” her latest single that’s co-produced by Grimes, proves that assessment a hundred times over. Her Auto-Tuned vocals are sleek, her face magnetic, and she dances her complete ass off in the music video. Pop girlies, eat this one up. —Steffanee Wang
ilham, “roster”
There’s something about the hook melody on ilham’s “roster” that’s so familiar to me, like I heard this song from the car radio many years ago. The “boy, bye” song is built around that slinky turn-of-the-millennium R&B production that itches the nostalgic spot in your brain, and ilham’s silky vocals just make me want to listen on a loop. —SW
Lord Jah-Monte Ogbon, “Nah, You’re Mad Extra”
Unabashedly trunk-rattling singles are not Lord Jah-Monte Ogbon’s preferred wheelhouse, but the rapper makes it sound like his home on his latest single “Nah, You’re Mad Extra.” The new song from his upcoming, as-yet-untitled album (out this summer) balances his southern roots and N.Y.C. home base with a candy-painted beat underneath deliriously neurotic verses. —Jordan Darville
Syzy, “Industry Corporate Freak”
The weight of the world, the 2024 debut from Syzy, was one of the year’s most exciting electronic albums, a feast of bass music created with the mindset that the catharsis of the drop can be a bold, multicolored thing. Their new single “Industry Corporate Freak,” thankfully, isn’t cynical as the title suggests. If The weight of the world was an ecstatic party in the early hours of cyberpunk techno hell, “Industry Corporate Freak” is the moment dawn breaks, flooding the dance floor with dissected French touch melodies and big, buzzing beats. —JD
lade, “Different Shit”
After your first listen, the title of “Different Shit” might feel like a misnomer. Pi’erre Bourne’s influence runs deeply throughout the song and much of lade’s new EP, but the airy melodies and heavy bounce don’t feel derivative. Instead, the rapper wears the sound like a finely tailored luxury suit, not a thread out of place. It helps that there’s a sense of awareness, too: “I ain’t on some different shit / Skirt off in a foreign while the phone ringing, who is dis?” lade knows where his pocket is, and he sounds perfectly stylish in it. —JD