Playboi Carti declares he is music, Ruby Gill opens floodgates: Five new albums to listen to

Keep hearing some song that you used to know? US rapper Doechii has resurrected Gotye and Kimbra's Hottest 100 of 2011 winner as the instrumental for Anxiety, her ARIA chart-topping hit track.

Looking to hear something new? How about vulnerable folk from one of Australia's rising stars? Warm and woozy electronica? Or the latest from Playboi Carti? Here are five new releases worth your time and attention. 

Playboi Carti – Music

Playboi Carti’s 2020 album Whole Lotta Red made the Atlanta rapper a superstar. Soon after its release, he promised fans more new music was imminent. Five years and a whole bunch of confusion later, we finally have his third album Music. And it's a lot.

Everything is bloated to the extreme. More than 50 producers worked on its 30 tracks, some of which are spooky trap at its most explosive. Its guest list reads like the Hall of Fame of modern rap: Travis Scott, the Weeknd, Kendrick Lamar, Jhené Aiko, Skepta, Future, Lil Uzi Vert, Ty Dolla Sign, and Young Thug all drop by.

While there are many moments that ensure Carti remains atop the ever-increasing pile of formidable superstar rappers, there’s also an unwieldiness and lack of cohesion which ultimately makes it hard to say whether it’s good or bad. It’s both. 

While Crush uses the pervading spooky aesthetic to brilliantly build tension, Radar just feels like an excuse to put Metro Boomin in the credits. Philly doesn’t know whether it’s meant to be straightforward or unhinged, while Carti maintains the menace with more success on ‘HBA’. But even if he culled the less-than-great moments, the resulting product would probably still sound disjointed. It’s another album for the playlist era, and that's OK.

Expect a mixed response from fans, especially because Carti's gruffer delivery is a departure from his usual high-pitched spitting — an evolution that sounds natural but will rankle those not expecting it. People have already crafted their ideal trimmed-down versions, debated the use of this all-star cast, and weighed it up against his 2020 breakout. 

Time will likely be kind though, as Music suggests Carti has the intent and the talent to keep his flame and his fame burning for some time. 

For fans of: Travis Scott, Future, Lil Uzi Vert

• Dan Condon

Ruby Gill — Some Kind of Control

South African-born and Melbourne-based artist Ruby Gill's second album — following their Australian Music Prize-nominated debut — wasn't going to include most its tender, gorgeous and predominantly acoustic songs. They were too intimate, written for themselves.

Touch Me There, for example, was the first time they expressed their queerness out loud by singing "I haven't been kissing the people I want to" over a strumming guitar. 

That simple truth opens the floodgates for feelings submerged. Their voice immediately strengthens and deepens over the slow, rising arrival of marching drums and a humming choir of friends (including Angie McMahon), as it all — the desire, the shame, the explanation for years of confusion — has no choice but to pour out.

Despite the catharsis, Some Kind of Control is a gentle listen, with its deceptively paired-back production offering the breathing space that Gill searches for across the songs. The title track details frustration at losing themselves ("I couldn't have told you what my favourite colour is"), but Gill only commits to kindness and time to work through things. After an upbeat chorus, a blues riff gently plods along.

There's plenty of wit across Some Kind of Control, too, thanks to Gill's evocative, off-kilt imagery and lyricism — look no further than the title of 'How Chimpanzees Reassure Each Other', a modern-age lament about alienation. And for all the tenderness, embers of rage sometimes light on 'The Flood', where climate change inaction is seen as arrogance, and 'Room Full of Human Male Politicians', a folk protest track about restrictive laws on female and trans bodies, complete with a Dylan yelp.

For fans of: Joni Mitchell, Julia Jacklin, Sarah Mary Chadwick

• Jared Richards

clipping. – Dead Channel Sky 

If betting companies have a market for future EGOTs, Daveed Diggs would surely attract some smart money. His work in Hamilton already has won him a Tony and a Grammy, and after his stints on shows like Black-ish and films like The Little Mermaid, it’s easy to envisage him completing the set.

Diggs is also one-third of Los Angeles rap group clipping., and their fifth album Dead Channel Sky retains the darkness and experimental nature of their past work while leaning into production reminiscent of big beat dance music of the late 90s. 

Producers William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes have a knack for building sonic worlds that are a thrill to get inside. While clipping. albums always sound great on headphones thanks to Diggs's rich voice and precise delivery, and the always engrossing production, Dead Channel Sky feels like it’s built for the club. 

Its gargantuan beats and squelching acid synths provide a dark wonderland for Diggs's gripping verses. The thick groove on Keep Pushing' could be snipped from a Chemical Brothers record, the skittery beats in Mood Organ have more than a touch of Aphex Twin, while the hectic Change The Channel could have sound-tracked a chase scene in any number of late 90s blockbusters.

The group sit in a strange space where they’re not wholly embraced by the hip hop or indie communities, but their consistently exploratory records suggest they are always very much worth listening to. 

For fans of: Hamilton, The Prodigy, Danny Brown

• Dan Condon

Floodlights - Underneath

Melbourne five-piece Floodlights were already among Australia's most promising new rock acts, but they've hit their stride with Underneath, a rich and raw listen.

Written while touring the world, Underneath leans into the listlessness and reflections that come from a whirlwind of new experiences while being away from home.

Ecstatic opener Alive (I Want To Feel) is about overcoming fear to embrace experiencing it all, with melancholic horns giving way to a frenetic drum solo and a wall of sound, over which lead vocalist Louis Parsons sings about being ready for the symphony to begin. 

It's followed by the optimism of Cloud Away, where Parsons repeats "blue skies just a cloud away" as if fighting against the inherent melancholy and grit in his voice. Sarah Hellyer’s gorgeous backing yelps are reminiscent of The Cranberries.

There's a dramatic, livewire energy to Underneath, as harmonicas cut through guitar lines and Parsons adopts a romantic vocal delivery, haunting, pained and pleading. 

Nowhere is this clearer than the agony and ecstasy of Suburbia or Buoyant, a ballad about aging and letting go of some, but not all, of your starry-eyed ideals. Another highlight is Melancholy Cave, written after Sinead O'Connor's death about the way we valorise people only when they're gone.

For fans of: Midnight Oil, Fontaines D.C., Bad//Dreems

• Jared Richards

Logic1000 - DJ-Kicks

After releasing her debut album Mother last year, Sydney-born, Berlin-based DJ and producer Logic1000 (Samatha Poulter) is back already to showcase her more serene side with an album of mixes for DJ-Kicks –  a 30-year-long series from venerated Berlin label !K7.

Where Logic1000 is known for her sharp, delightfully unpredictable mix of house, garage and R&B, her mix is a shift for both her and DJ-Kicks into a steady stream of inquisitive, downtempo electronica. Where it’s bubbled underneath previous production, here it’s centred.

Picking and prodding at recent releases from French alt-pop star Oklou, ethereal Norwegian duo Smerz and Australian techno producer DJ Plead, alongside deeper cuts (Moon Holiday, Wamdue Kids), Logic1000 establishes not only eclectic, varied taste but an ability to harness many sounds and eras into one wonderful, warm mix.

Two original tracks are among the mix’s most transfixing, for the sheer nostalgic force of sampling old home movies over glitchy, water-logged beats (‘under the sun, beneath the rainfall’), and for Logic1000’s trademark slowed down loops, both meditative and danceable.

For fans of: Four Tet, Elkka, I. JORDAN

• Jared Richards