These are the highlights of this past week in music! Well actually… the past two weeks in music since we missed last week while were out of the office for Coachell! So with two weeks of music, this week’s installment is definitely stacked. Hopefully you can bump these tracks on your way to work to brighten up your Monday mornings, and to stay up-to-date on today’s music.
This week we have new music from Vic Mensa and Kanye West, the return of Mike Posner, Run The Jewels and more. Get started at the jump below to check out our favorite records of the past week.
After initially having a physical release date of April 28th, Tyler, the Creator’s new album Cherry Bomb has already started to hit stores across the United States. Tacked onto the end of the album is a new Kali Uchis assisted ballad-with guitar solo and all. The love song references the synesthesia that Tyler shares with buddies Pharrell and Kanye West .
Over the years, my relationship with Tyler, the Creator and Odd Future, the collective he helms, has become strained. I’ve simply grown out of them thanks to a large number of back-to-back mediocre projects and lack of progression. However, while I may not be a big fan of the other members of the group, I still have hope in Tyler and Frank Ocean. After his last album, Wolf, I was extremely impressed with the progression he made in his production and rapping, which made me excited to see if he would further hone his crafts on Cherry Bomb, his new album. Well, let’s just say he honed one craft and let one sit at the wayside.
The main progression Tyler made on this new album is obviously the production. Pulling from a number of jazz, funk, rock, and R&B influences, along with artists like the Neptunes and Death Grips, Tyler puts together his most diverse set of production yet. We see Tyler pull out punk-rock guitars from Black Lips’ Cole Alexander on ‘DEATHCAMP,’ noisey and distorted production on ‘CHERRY BOMB’ inspired by Death Grips, lush production on ‘FUCKING YOUNG / PERFECT’ inspired by the Neptunes, and jazz on ‘FIND YOUR WINGS’, which featured legendary jazz, funk, and soul producer Roy Ayers.
Sunday wrapped up our amazing experience during our first year at Coachella. The weekend was surreal, as music fans saw performances from Drake, AC|DC, The Weeknd, Tyler the Creator, FKA Twigs, Vic Mensa, Run The Jewels and many more! While we posted a small selection of our favorite photos last weekend, to share our experience with our readers, we will be posting new photo galleries from Coachella EVERY DAY FOR THE NEXT MONTH. We saw over 30 great performances this past weekend and we will share our collection of photos of each until we run out!
Check out our second Coachella Photo Series, of Tyler the Creator’s energetic performance, below.
Last night Odd Future’s Earl Sweatshirt brought the “Not Redy 2 Leave” Tour to The Rave in Milwaukee, WI. Kicking things off for the Wisconsin crowd was the talented Queens native, rapper Remy Banks. Performing a number of songs from his growing collection of tracks, the highlight of Banks’ set came with the drop of his new Left Brain produced and ‘C.R.E.A.M.’ inspired single, ‘.rem’. Following Banks’ energetic performance was Vince Staples, easily one of the most talented young lyricists who made quite a buzz last year with his Hell Can WaitEP. And soon after the Long Beach rapper’s performance of his ‘Blue Suede’ track, Staples brought out the man of the night, OFWKTA’s Earl Sweatshirt.
Earl Sweatshirt’s been through a lot. Whether it’s his much-publicized disappearance to some sort of juvenile centre in Samoa, his constant label disputes, his familial struggles, and even a recent breakup, there always seems like there’s a lot to talk about. However, often times Earl’s life outside of music tends to cast a shadow on the content itself—something Earl revealed to be a cause for concern in a recent interview with NPR’s Microphone Check. Earl’s intended promotion for his sophomore album I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside was to put out a video for a single first, with the title of the record at the end of the clip leaving fans to generate buzz from the cryptic nature of the rollout; instead, the label randomly blindsided Earl with releasing the album title, cover art, track-listing, and features on iTunes prior to the video even being released. “It’s now back to a hype-machine, where ‘Earl Sweatshirt is mad at the label’”, he said. “It was what I was trying to avoid”, he continued, adding that he wished his album promotion involved people “just talking about the content”.
Soon after his surprise sophomore album, I Don’t Like S***, I Don’t Go Outside: An Album by Earl Sweatshirt, appeared on iTunesfor pre-order, Earl Sweatshirt blowed off some steam towards Sony Music. We aren’t sure how mad he actually was or if he was just mocking the similarly-worded tweets sent that week from Top Dawg Entertainment‘s CEO, but either way Earl blessed fans with the official video for his forthcoming LP’s first single ‘Grief’. Check out the video below and if you live in the Chicago area, be sure to enter our ticket giveaway for Earl’s upcoming concert in Chicago.
Appearing out of nowhere and with no formal announcement, Earl Sweatshirt’s highly anticipated sophomore album is set to release in just a week (check out a tracklist and more details here). You can preorder Earl’s new album, titled I Don’t Like S***, I Don’t Go Outside: An Album by Earl Sweatshirt, now on iTunes, and if you live in the Chicago area, be sure to enter our ticket giveaway for Earl’s upcoming concert in Chicago. And while you wait out the next week until its release, you can stream its first single ‘Grief’ below (while it’s still up).
Out of nowhere and with no announcement from the man himself, a new album from Odd Future’s Earl Sweatshirt appeared on iTunes. The sophomore LP and followup to his debut album Doris, titled I Don’t Like S***, I Don’t Go Outside: An Album by Earl Sweatshirt. is set to release in just one week on March 23rd. The 10-track album will feature Vince Staples, Wiki, Dash and Na’kel and you can check out the full tracklist below. Preorder I Don’t Like S***, I Don’t Go Outside: An Album by Earl Sweatshirt and download its first single ‘Grief’ now on iTunes, and if you live in the Chicago area, be sure to enter our ticket giveaway for Earl and Vince Staples’ upcoming tour stop in Chicago.
Odd Future’s Earl Sweatshirt has announced his “Not Redy 2 Leave” tour with Vince Staples and Remy Banks. The tour kicks off next month in St. Louis and runs until May. This will definitely not be a tour to miss, as Earl is one of the many reasons why Odd Future is arguably the best collective in rap and Vince Staples made quite a buzz for himself last year with his Hell Can WaitEP (one of our favorite projects of 2014). Check out the dates below!
The Early Registration 