NEW RELEASES: Single Reviews

 Hey yall! Welcome back to the new releases I didn't do last week because it was as dead as our Idaho summer is making us. I wanted to get some of the new release single fly throughs since interesting enough you guys read it!

For starters, I wanted to discuss Halsey's album announcement. I love when people choose artistic rather than just "sales". By that I mean the bit of NSFW album cover art. The beauty of it is I did not immediately go "oh sex sales..." It seems truly artistic and I thought the cover looked great. We have preorders for the cds and vinyl, so if you are looking for Halsey, you may want to check in with us when you have time. There's no song, there's just me being weird about the cover art. That is because there's such a decline in people CARING how their album art looks. I realize in the streaming era no one cares but I do. I have always been more inclined to listen to something solely based on the chosen cover. I have found some great artists this way. 

Now, on to actual single reviews.

We are gonna start with "Carolesdaughter" whom I never listened to before now. To give some perspective, the song is actually titled "please put me in a medically induced coma."

Okay then. At least for once the alternative genre sounds like it has something truly alternative in it. 

In the era of early 2000s pop/punk coming back, you occasionally get these modern cringey girls trying to make themselves sound so much deeper, darker, and edgier than they are. This song is trying too hard to be an emo song with no originality in the riffs and the chorus is just jammed together. The song is an absolute trainwreck and I wouldn't waste your time. If you make me listen to this again I might need a medically induced coma myself... 1/10. NEXT.

Note before we step into this, I absolutely love AURORA. She is one of my favorite new artists. If you haven't tried any of her previous work, I highly recommend it. I paid for a dang Japanese import cd to get all of the tracks together on one disc of her "Infections of a Different Kind" and "A Different Kind of Human" (and if you are looking for it, the import is called Infections of a Different Kind of Human, and you're going to at the very minimum pay at least $35 for it and at high you're going to pay $100 when you include shipping. As in I wasn't cheap with this one.) She has kept hinting she has a new album in the work and on the 7th we finally got a new single from her. "Cure for Me" is a bit poppier than her other brand of work. I love the unique melody mixed in with it, it makes me think of the circus a bit. Her singles tend to be the poppiest and sometimes take a little to grow on me but I immediately was hooked on this one, compared to Queendom being the last lead single and not grabbing me. I hope "Cure for Me" leads into another masterful album from her and I will be looking pretty closely for it. 8/10. 

I wanted to give a shout out to Doja Cat for being another one of those annoying people who does a digital only deluxe a few days AFTER the release date of the original album. It is such an annoying cash grab if you actually try and have full albums. In this case though, most of these songs really are piss-poor b-sides that aren't worthy so I did not have to feel disappointed by a terrible back half. I did go on iTunes and pay my $1.29 for the extended version of "You Right" though because I have a weird obsession with the Weeknd and any tone of singing that comes from him regardless of trashiness. 

After I had to restart my page because Carolesdaughter was so bad it froze my music player apparently, there's this country song that's been rising on the charts known as "Fancy Like" by Walker Hayes. Let me save you the trouble and tell you it is Florida Georgia Lines level of cringe with cheese and boring like every other Luke Bryan bro-country song. 1/10. Try again.

Since I am a sucker for pain (no pun intended to the Suicide Squad imagine dragons track) today I decided to choose the new BTS song. In particular a bird yesterday said it had Ed Sheeran's credit to it and I'm also weirdly a sucker for Ed Sheeran so here I am. Again. Waiting to be disappointed. I did not hear that in my head as Behind These Hazel Eyes melody at all. Why, I even opened the music video! So I can look at korean boy faces and try to be as obsessive! 

Okay time for some honesty: They sound better when they sing in Korean.

It is painfully obvious they do not have english quite down yet. They then end up using more autotune to suffice for the difficulties they have in singing these english speaking songs, which still cannot cover the brokenness of the english. I am not JUDGING them, but I am saying their actual Korean songs are far better than any english sung release they've done. Nevertheless, I still like this slightly more than Butter. Not as cringey. I'll give this a 3. 3/10. I won't come back to it though.

In a secondary form of pain, the Kid Laroi has released a collaboration with Justin Bieber. I went into this with absolutely 0 expectations since I haven't enjoyed a Kid Laroi song because he sounds like he can't sing and Justin Bieber isn't someone I like to willingly discuss listening to. His Believe album was quite catchy and his latest "Justice" returned to a sound he is better at minus Peaches. I DON'T CARE WHERE YOU BUY YOUR PEACHES BIEBER. Anyway. No expectations. 

To be clear - it still kind of sounds like he can't sing but I am beginning to wonder if he is trying to emulate the Post Malone shakey vibrato effect. This song would probably sound better with solely Bieber on it but the production is way better. Maybe because Bieber is on it and requires that. I'll give it a 5/10. It didn't burn my ears as much as expected.

SPEAKING OF POST MALONE, His new song "Motley Crue" dropped today. I immediately said when my mom told me "oh let me guess he is gonna say he is as high as Motley Crue or something." I gotta admit something - I actually like Post Malone. I will take your smug faces and disgust now. But despite it, if you listen to a full Post Malone album, you get a story and better songs. I hate Rockstar with a passion but I will listen to "Hollywood's Bleeding" regularly. Nevertheless this song is absolute garbage and I hope the album doesn't follow the production trend of this. 1/10. 

On another note, let's shift to the broody vocals of Troye Sivan. WAIT, BROODY? 

Bloom and other output has been so upbeat I forgot he started broody. Woops. Guess he realized Blue Neighborhood WAS his better sound! I actually really like this one, which I should inform you is titled "Could Cry Just Thinkin About You". 8/10.

Of course the biggest premiere single of today goes to Billie Eilish's new single "NDA". And if you liked Bad Guy and If You Could See Me in a Crown, you'll absolutely love NDA. It has the dark vibe of her old album so much more than some recent singles. I am LOVING the direction of Happier Than Ever despite some people calling it underwhelming thus far. I think she took thus far what worked from both her previous works and is making a perfect album and I am suddenly very excited to hear it. 8/10.

Also we have a new Nina Nesbitt single. I know, no one cares but I do. Her debut album was very solid and I was looking forward to hearing her future endeavors too. The lyrics aren't spectacularly different, but it is a good catchy pop song and I'll give it credit because I know I am gonna return to it. 6/10. 

This concludes my new release pops, as there was not a lot of noteworthy full releases. Everyone's saving that to kill me in August obviously with Halsey, Big Red Machine, and CHVRCHES all dropping on the SAME DAY.