New Music Sunday: The Best 5 Songs Released This Past Week Pt. 6

Hope you’re having an enjoyable long weekend! Here are our picks for the best five songs released this past week.

Noteworthy album & EP releases:

Doomin’ Sun, Bachelor
LUNO, Blood Cultures
We’re all gonna die, but here’s my contribution, Boyish
Digital Meadow, Dora Jar
Go The Other Way, Call The Echo, LPX

“Polly” – Dora Jar
Release date – May 26

If you’re looking for your new favorite artist (which you are, because you’re on our website), HERE SHE IS!!!! LA-based artist Dora Jar’s new EP is one to get to your radar, because I’m convinced she’s on the rode to being a major superstar. “Polly,” a standout song on the seven-song EP, encapsulates the entire body of work in one song. Dora weaves different genres seamlessly into “Polly:” indie pop, hip-hop, borderline dance music with flashes of ’90s influences like Ace of Base. “Polly,” and the rest of Digital Meadow, has an incredible balance of what’s popular in commercially successful music while simultaneously being a little weird and unconventional. 1000/10 would recommend.

“TIME 2” – Half Alive
Release date – May 26

There goes Half Alive again, releasing another song that makes me incredibly emotional! In their first single of 2021, “What’s Wrong,” the band sings about our autonomy to take charge of fixing something that’s bothering us, regardless of what phase of our lives we’re in. Deep, right? Now in “Time 2,” a song produced by Grammy winning producer Ariel Rechtshaid (Vampire Weekend, Adele, HAIM), and co-written by Daniel Nigro (most recently known for his work with Olivia Rodrigo), is one all about the beautiful ignorance of living life as a child. Trying to take on the every day frustrations of what it means to live as an adult, but with a childlike mindset. Yes, I’m crying.

“Take It Back” – Jawny
Release date – May 26

Jawny, who I just realized recently got over a split with Doja Cat, is back with a banger of a breakup song (“If she never loved me / then I’m better off alone”). The track supports the resurgence of alternative rock music coming back to the mainstream, reminiscent of ’90s rock like Beck and Weezer. In an interview with Fader, Jawny speaks on the track: “I tried to dance on the line between acceptance and anger, ‘If she never loved me then I’m better off alone’ seemed like a mantra for self-worth.”

Jawny’s next project drops in July.

“Reason In The Noise” – LPX
Release date – May 26

I strongly believe that Lizzy Plapinger, or LPX, is an underrated powerhouse in the industry right now. Not only was she was one half of the pop dup MS MR, but she now co-owns Neon Gold Records, a label that helped jumpstart the careers of artists like Marina and the Diamonds and Passion Pit. Now, Neon Gold Records is home to artists like Charli XCX and Mattt Maeson.

Lizzy started making music under the moniker LPX back in 2017 and has been releasing EPs and singles ever since. She’s back with Go The Other Way, Called The Echo, featuring six songs, including a wonderfully chaotic cover of “Deceptacon” by Le Tigre. “Reason In The Noise” and the rest of the EP shows off LPX’s rugged vocals quite nicely.

“BODIES” – Sipho.
Release date – May 26

Another artist that I had never heard of before this weekend: Sipho. After a quick Google search, I discovered that he’s recently signed to Dirty Hit Records (the 1975’s record label, home to other artists like Beabadoobee and Wolf Alice), so anything is possible when you have Matt Healy in your corner. The track has incredibly gritty, grungey production that show off equally gritty and grungey vocals, reminiscent of other British artists like Rag’n’Bone Man, but a guitar riff that sounds like it should be off a new Arctic Monkeys album.

“BODIES” comes ahead of a debut EP set to drop in June. The track, which has religious undertones, coming to fruition after a realization SIPHO had about church and religion. Sipho notes in a press release: “It was then that I realised there’s a 50/50 to this – you can believe, but we can never truly know. I’ll always have that awareness of something bigger than us, but I can’t tell you what it is. Nobody can.”

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