12 Best Songs of the Week: Hinds, Naima Bock, Karen O and Danger Mouse, GIFT, and More

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12 Best Songs of the Week: Hinds, Naima Bock, Karen O and Danger Mouse, GIFT, and More 

Plus Peel Dream Magazine, Why Bonnie, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE, and a Wrap-up of the Week’s Other Notable New Tracks

Jul 26, 2024 By Mark Redfern (and Marina Malin)

Welcome to the 24th Songs of the Week of 2024. This week’s list covers the last week. This week Andy Von Pip, Caleb Campbell, Marina Mallin, Matt the Raven, and Scotty Dransfield helped me decide what should make the list. We considered over 20 songs and narrowed it down to a Top 12.

Recently we announced our new print issue, The ’90s Issue, featuring The Cardigans and Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth on the covers. Buy it from us directly here.  

In recent weeks we posted interviews with Acid Klaus, “Weird Al” Yankovic, and more.

In the last week we reviewed some albums.

To help you sort through the multitude of fresh songs released in the last week, we have picked the 12 best the last seven days had to offer, followed by some honorable mentions. Check out the full list below.

1. Hinds: “Superstar”

Madrid-based band Hinds are releasing a new album, VIVA HINDS, on September 6 via Lucky Number. This week they have shared another song from it, “Superstar,” via a self-directed video.

VIVA HINDS is the band’s first album since becoming a duo again. Hinds were founded by co-vocalists and co-guitarists Carlotta Cosials and Ana Perrote in 2011, but for most of their career they’ve been a four-piece. Ade Martin and Amber Grimbergen left the band in 2022, returning them to a duo.

The band collectively had this to say about the new single in a press release: “‘Superstar’ talks about the disappointment and the pain you feel when someone you love deeply, disappears with no explanation. You feel worthless, you start thinking you never really knew that person and you question your shared past, and if what you remember really happened. It’s hard to let people go but writing this song helped. People need closure, and this song is ours.”

VIVA HINDS features “Coffee,” a new song the band shared in February. When the album was announced, they shared another new song from it, “Boom Boom Back,” which features Beck and was one of our Songs of the Week. They also announced some North American tour dates. Then they shared another song from it, “En Forma,” which is their first-ever Spanish language single.

Pete Robertson (The Vaccines, beabadoobee) produced the album, which was mixed by Caesar Edmunds (The Killers, Wet Leg) and engineered by Tom Roach. It was recorded in rural France.

“This isn’t a rational album, this is made with emotions, in no specific order,” Cosials says in a press release. “We never sat down to think what we should write about, we sat down to write about what we were going through. We didn’t choose a ‘new look,’ we didn’t wanna pretend to be mature, or appear as a more sophisticated band. To me it is cohesive, but it’s not a fairy tale or a brainy narrative. It’s heart-driven.”

Of keeping the band going despite the line-up change and other challenges (the pandemic, no label), Cosials says: “We started the band because we are so safe and comfortable with each other. Our relationship is unbreakable. This connection between us hasn’t changed since the very beginning. We still finish each other’s ideas, laugh at each other’s jokes and rhyme each other’s lines. Maintaining that enthusiasm for music and for Hinds through the years may seem extremely difficult to find, but it’s something that only can happen with your very best friend.”

Hinds’ last album, The Prettiest Curse, came out in 2020. Read our interview with the band about it. By Mark Redfern

2. Naima Bock: “Gentle”

London-based artist Naima Bock is releasing a new album, Below a Massive Dark Land, on September 27 via Sub Pop/Memorials of Distinction. This week she shared another new song from it, “Gentle,” via a music video.

Bock had this to say about “Gentle” and its video in a press release: “I’ve lived with this song for a couple of years. It’s a kind of copy and paste of different sections of my life, each verse is a different version of myself or situation I was in. None of them link in reality, but they fit together in this song, which leaves me with a sense of union and satisfaction. I would like to allow for the listener to take the lyrics in whatever way is relevant to them. I can say it’s my favorite song to play and one of my favorite songs that I’ve written. It means a lot to me.”

Ellie Wintour and Sophie Lincoln directed the video and collectively had this to say: “Our jumping off point for the video began with the lyrics ‘You want me to be gentle, fragile, you want me to stay young. I pray that I stay gentle, fragile, I pray that I stay.’ We developed Naima a character playing on femininity as facade, but also her sense of easygoing style. In using two-dimensional substitutes for three-dimensional objects – mixing worlds of the real and make-believe – we tried to play on the song’s themes of expectation, assigned roles, and conformity.”

When the album was announced, Bock shared two new songs from it, “Kaley” and “Further Away,” and announced some tour dates. “Kaley” was one of our Songs of the Week.

Below a Massive Dark Land is Bock’s second album, the follow-up to 2022’s debut album, Giant Palm. Jack Osborne and Joe Jones produced the album, with additional production and arrangement by Oliver Hamilton and Bock. It was recorded at The Crypt in north London. By Mark Redfern

3. Karen O and Danger Mouse: “Super Breath”

This week, Karen O and Danger Mouse shared their new song “Super Breath.” “Super Breath” is Karen O and Danger Mouse’s first new music since their Grammy-nominated 2019 collaborative album Lux Prima, which will be reissued and available on September 20.

September’s reissue of Lux Prima arrives with a 7-inch of “Super Breath” on the A-side and a cover of Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day” on the B-side. The reissue will also have a 16-page booklet highlighting the four-day communal listening experience, “Encounter with Lux Prima.”

Karen O is a post-punk icon and lead singer for her band Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Danger Mouse is an artist and producer who recently collaborated on an album with Black Thought.

When the duo first shared title track “Lux Prima,” it became out #1 Song of the Week. When they officially announced the album they shared “Woman,” followed by “Turn the Light.” Read our review of Lux Prima. By Marina Malin

4. GIFT: “Light Runner”

Brooklyn-based psych-rock quintet GIFT are releasing a new album, Illuminator, on August 23 via Captured Tracks. This week they shared its third single, “Light Runner,” via a music video directed by the band’s TJ Freda.

GIFT features vocalist/guitarist TJ Freda, multi-instrumentalists Jessica Gurewitz and Justin Hrabovsky, drummer Gabe Camarano, and bassist Kallan Campbell.

Freda had this to say about “Light Runner” and its video in a press release: “The album and song ‘Ray of Light’ by Madonna was a massive inspiration while recording Illuminator—I wanted to pay homage to the brilliant music video directed by one of my favorite directors Jonas Åkerlund. ‘Light Runner’ celebrates the triumph of emerging from a dark time while acknowledging the transformative power of overcoming it. It’s a testament to the euphoria of personal achievement.In 2023, during our first European tour, we were enthralled by the origins of ’90s UK bands like Primal Scream, Massive Attack, and Oasis. Following a show in Glasgow, the promoters treated us to an underground Jungle/DnB rave, blowing our minds wide open.”

Illuminator is the band’s sophomore album and first for Captured Tracks. It follows their 2022 debut, Momentary Presence, released via Dedstrange. The album includes “Wish Me Away,” a new song GIFT shared in April via a music video. “Wish Me Away” was one of our Songs of the Week. When the album was announced they shared its second single, “Going In Circles,” via a music video. It was also one of our Songs of the Week. Then they shared its third single, “Later,” via a music video. “Later” was again one of our Songs of the Week.

Of the new album as a whole, Freda says: “We had a lot more confidence going in. The main goal was to take a big swing, embrace the pop sounds we love and clear the mist and clouds surrounding the last record to make it a lot punchier.” By Mark Redfern

5. Peel Dream Magazine: “Wish You Well”

This week, Peel Dream Magazine shared “Wish You Well,” the second single ahead of the release of their fourth full length album, Rose Main Reading Room. The album is due out on September 4 via Topshelf.

Previously the band shared the album’s first single, “Lie in the Gutter,” which was one of our Songs of the Week.

Rose Main Reading Room follows their 2022 release of Pad (one of its singles, “Hiding Out,” was chosen for one of our Songs of the Week).

In a press release, Peel Dream Magazine’s Joe Stevens had this to say: “‘Wish You Well’ is a song about the animality that we are all hardwird with, and how it can bring out the worst in us. Instinct drives some people to be ruthlessly competitive, Rose Main Reading Room deals a lot with this juncture of the civilized and natural world. I wrote this song as a statement, like, freeing myself from the influence of people who’ve pushed me around at different points in my life. In the music video, Olivia and I are portraying people who secretly try to undermine others. Everyone’s behavior is juxtaposed with these brutally violent scenes from nature, as well as all of this DNA and celluar imagery to establish this idea that it’s completely elemental. We shot this video with an awesome filmmaker who goes by Otium, and got to play around with all these different performance setups in front of a cyclorama wall in downtown LA.” By Marina Malin

6. Why Bonnie: “Rhyme or Reason”

Why Bonnie (the project of Blair Howerton) is releasing a new album, Wish on the Bone, on August 30 via Fire Talk. This week, she shared another new song from it, “Rhyme or Reason,” and also announced some new tour dates. Find her tour dates here.

A press release describes the inspiration behind “Rhyme or Reason” in greater detail, saying that it “is about regenerating a sense of hope after the loss of Howerton’s brother, which happened just as she was beginning to come into her own as a songwriter. To cope, she wrote song after song, built a catalog despite her suffering, and in doing so, developed a new relationship to spirituality, one that she defines on ‘Rhyme or Reason.’”

Howerton adds: “‘Rhyme or Reason’ is about coming to terms with the impermanence of life and how that’s scary but also really beautiful.”

Wish on the Bone includes “Dotted Line,” a new song Why Bonnie shared in May via a music video. It was one of our Songs of the Week. Then when the album was announced, she shared “Fake Out,” which was also one of our Songs of the Week.

Why Bonnie released her debut album, 90 in November, in 2022 via Keeled Scales. In 2023 she shared a brand new single, “Apple Tree,” which isn’t featured on the new album. Previously the project was presented more as a band, but now it seems to be more of a solo enterprise.

“I’ve changed since that album, and I trust that I’ll probably continue to change,” Howerton says of the years since her debut. “Maybe I won’t be the same person entirely two years from now.”

The new album also features Howerton’s regular bandmates Chance Williams, and Josh Malett. She co-produced the album with Jonathan Schenke. “We were trying on musical hats,” says Howerton. “There’s still some country on this record, but I wasn’t thinking about sticking to one thing. Personal experience of learning to be bolder and more assertive and trusting myself has carried over into my music.”

She adds: “These songs were written out of hope for a better future. I’m not naïve, the world is fucked up, but I think you can radically accept that while still believing it’s possible to change things.”

Read our 2022 interview with Why Bonnie. By Mark Redfern

7. Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds: “Long Dark Night”

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds are releasing a new album, Wild God, on August 30 via Bad Seed/Play It Again Sam. This week, they shared its third single, “Long Dark Night,” via a lyric video.

The song was inspired by the poem “Dark Night of the Soul” by the Spanish 16th-century poet St. John of the Cross.

Cave further explains in a press release: “‘Long Dark Night’ is inspired by one of the greatest and most powerful poems of conversion ever written. Ultimately, though, it’s a beautiful country tune. It feels like a sweet companion to the song, ‘Wild God.’”

Previously Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds shared the album’s first single, title track “Wild God,” which was one of our Songs of the Week. Then they shared its second single, “Frogs,” which was also one of our Songs of the Week.

Wild God is Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds’ 18th studio album and is the follow-up to 2019’s acclaimed Ghosteen, which was #3 on our Top 100 Albums of 2019 list.

Cave and bandmate Warren Ellis produced the album, which was mixed by David Fridmann. Cave started writing the album on New Year’s Day 2023 and there were recording sessions at Miraval Studios in Provence, France and Soundtree Studios in London, England. Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds are Cave, Ellis, Thomas Wydler, Martyn Casey, Jim Sclavunos, and George Vjestica. The album also features Colin Greenwood of Radiohead (who contributes bass) and Luis Almau (on nylon string guitar and acoustic guitar).

“I hope the album has the effect on listeners that it’s had on me,” Cave said in a previous press release. “It bursts out of the speaker, and I get swept up with it. It’s a complicated record, but it’s also deeply and joyously infectious. There is never a master plan when we make a record. The records rather reflect back the emotional state of the writers and musicians who played them. Listening to this, I don’t know, it seems we’re happy.”

Cave added: “Wild God…there’s no fucking around with this record. When it hits, it hits. It lifts you. It moves you. I love that about it.”

Nick Cave and Warren Ellis recently scored the new Amy Winehouse biopic, Back to Black. Two albums for the film were released, its soundtrack and its score album. In April, Cave and Ellis shared “Song For Amy,” which is found on both albums. By Mark Redfern

8. SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE: “SOMETHING’S ENDING” and “I’VE BEEN EVIL”

SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE are releasing a new album, YOU’LL HAVE TO LOSE SOMETHING, on August 23 on Saddle Creek. This week, they released two new songs from it, “SOMETHING’S ENDING” and “I’VE BEEN EVIL,” which follow the release of the album’s lead single, “LET THE VIRGIN DRIVE.” The two songs arrive in a double video directed by Kelsea Dakota Larson. Since the songs very much blend together, we are considering them as part of one entry on this week’s list. Find SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE’s tour dates here.

Larson had this to say about the video in a press release: “My collaborator and spouse Jim and I have been waiting for the right project to film here in rural Appalachia since we moved a few years ago, when we heard these new tracks, we knew this was the right one. We took the titles literally, and wanted to highlight the darkness that can be right under your nose in a beautiful little mountain town, or anywhere really, while outsiders carry on.” By Marina Malin

9. Sunflower Bean: “Shake”

This week, New York trio Sunflower Bean announced their first self-produced and recorded EP, Shake. They also shared its lead track—which is also the title track—“Shake.” The EP will be released on September 27 via Lucky number. Find the album details and Sunflower Bean’s tour dates here.

In collaboration with rising director Issac Roberts, Sunflower Bean will release a 14-minute performance based video for each track that interprets a natural element such as earth, wind, water, fire, and metal. Today’s title track and lead single “Shake” is an interpretation of earth. Watch the video below.

Sunflower Bean is vocalist and bassist Julia Cumming (she/her), guitarist and vocalist Nick Kivlen (he/him), and drummer Olive Faber (she/they).

Featuring Sunflower Bean’s most unapologetically grunge music yet, the band had this to say of their EP in a press release: “Shake was inspired by our first years as a DIY band, the spirit that birthed us and gave us the chance to have this enduring journey together. We wrote, recorded, engineered, and produced these songs so nothing was filtered through anyone else’s idea of us. We always felt like rock and roll was a feeling, not a sound. But sometimes there is no subverting it or explaining it. We’re now offering it exactly as it occurred to us.”

Read our rave review of their 2022 album, Headful of Sugar. By Marina Malin

10. Being Dead: “Van Goes”

Austin’s Being Dead is an unpredictable group of multi-instrumentalist best friends who this week have shared their new single, “Van Goes,” which follows the release of “Firefighters” from their forthcoming album EELS. EELS will be Being Dead’s second studio album and is set for release on September 27 via Bayonet. The new track arrives with a music video. Find Being Dead’s tour dates here.

Today’s moody track “Van Goes” opens in obscurity, with the spoken word lines: “I’m not trying to be rude or any of that—this is for your own good and I’m not going to be traumatized because you want to be dumb.”

In a press release, the band added this on their music video: “Our goal is simple. When you die and your life flashes before your eyes we’d like this video to be included in the reel. (Or at least lay a blueprint for how yours might be). Fast and furious is one’s life when betrayed. And in a flash, your whole life before you: everyone you’ve ever known, everything you’ve been brave enough to feel—extinguished in a twinkle of clarity.” By Marina Malin

11. Tess Parks: “Koalas”

This week, London-based singer/songwriter Tess Parks announced her third solo album, Pomegranate, and shared its lead single “Koalas” (which features Molly Lewis). Pomegranate will be released on October 25 via Fuzz Club and Hand Drawn Dracula.

Pomegranate was recorded between London, Toronto, and Los Angeles as Parks collaborates with long-term band members Ruari Meehan and engineer Mikko Gordon. Pomegranate follows Parks’ 2022 album, And Those Who Were Seen Dancing.

Of the new track, Parks said this in a press release: “In November 2020, Ruari was in London and I was in Toronto and he sent me the music for ‘Koalas.’ At this point, we hadn’t seen each other in over a year. It would be another year before we saw each other again. I was suffering from severe PTSD at this point in my life, and to be honest, I couldn’t bring myself to listen to the song properly until early February. When I finally did—it was one of those moments when you hear a song and you know it’s going to be one of your favorite, most cherished songs for your whole life. It’s the most beautiful music I’ve ever heard.

“Ruari sending me this song instigated the making of this album—a daily back and forth correspondence where he would send me music and I would sing some words over it and then he would sing other ideas back to me. It was a true lifeline at what felt like the end of the world. I don’t know who I would be without these songs, this song particularly, and waking up everyday looking forward to what he was going to send me next.”

Pomegranate is a record that explores pain, resilience, and hope. Parks adds this on the record: “Look—there’s so much tragedy happening in the world right now. It’s so easy to feel helpless. It feels self-indulgent to be someone singing at all from their own perspective. But if anything, this album is a gift of love, our contribution to the world of something beautiful that we made amongst so much pain. It’s our message of empowerment to keep going even when life feels unliveable and unjust—having faith that this moment will pass if you can find a way to just breathe into the next moment. Believing that the future could possibly be really bright… knowing that sharing your light really does have a butterfly effect, even in a small way within your community and your family and friends, you are capable of making a greater impact than you understand.

“I went through a long period of feeling like I never wanted to make music again. What is the point of singing? Everything is pointless. I was taking refuge making paintings, sitting in silence for hours. There was a lot of processing to do. I am so grateful that I was given the encouragement to continue creating with sound, and that’s what Ruari has done for me. It seems only right to give back that encouragement to others.” By Marina Malin

12. King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard: “Disgust”

Melbourne-based psych-rock group King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are releasing a new album, Flight b741, on August 8 via the band’s own p(doom) label. This week they shared its second single, “Hog Calling Contest,” as well as a making of the album video entitled Oink Oink Flight b741: The Making of….

The band collectively had this to say about “Hog Calling Contest” in a press release: “While recording Flight b741, we occasionally had these ultra inspired tune-up/warm-up jams. Of course, we were never actually recording during these moments though. Lost to time. Except one time; this time. We learnt to record these moments; ‘Daily Blues’ came together this way too. But ‘Hog Calling Contest’ retains a unique unhinged-ness that only comes when you’re fooling around with your mates and you don’t think you’re being recorded. Happy in mud!”

Guy Tyzack directed Oink Oink Flight b741: The Making of…, shooting it on 16mm film, which only allowed for about five minutes of film per day. Tyzack had this to say in a press release: “We were tasked with capturing the band make an album from scratch in two weeks, they purposefully didn’t prepare much for the recordings so it was very difficult for me to plan what to film. I just knew they’d be in one room and three of them might drop out at any moment because they were expecting babies. The room looked brown and boring so I painted it like the sky to match the theme of the album in one 17hr stretch with three friends and a slab of mids.”

Flight b741 is the prolific band’s 26th album. It was first announced on their social media channels. Then they shared the album’s first single, “Le Risque,” via a music video. “Le Risque” was one of our Songs of the Week.

Last year the band released a new album, The Silver Cord, via KGLW. There were two versions of The Silver Cord, an extended one and a version with shorter tracks. The Silver Cord followed the elaborately titled PetroDragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation, which also came out last year.

This time King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard wanted to make a “no concept” album. “We wanted to make something that was primal, instinctual, more ‘from the gut,’” says frontman Stu Mackenzie in a press release, “just people in a room, doing what feels right. We wanted to make something fun.”

Mackenzie adds: “This is our most collaborative record—the collaboration was occurring in the room, it was free, and everyone was bringing in songs and ideas. And we wanted to have as many lead vocalists as we could, and to pass the mic, like, ‘This is my part, my idea, I’m gonna sing it and then I’m gonna pass the mic along to you and you can do your thing.’ The whole record is built around that. We ended up doing a lot of backing vocals and extra recording, everyone in a room around a couple of microphones, just to give it that feel.”

That collaborative spirit also extended to the lyrics. “We had broad themes for every song, and for the bigger picture of the album as a whole,” says Mackenzie, “but once the mic was passed it was all up to the person who was singing. These songs weren’t written in isolation – someone would write their verse, sing it for the demo, and that would inspire the next person’s part. So we were riffing off each other. Lyrically, it’s all pretty introspective—we’re having a lot of fun, but we’re often singing about some pretty heavy shit, and probably hitting on some deeper, more universal themes than usual. It’s not a sci-fi record, it’s about life and stuff.”

Summing up Flight b741, Mackenzie says: “The record is like a really fun weekend with your mates, you know? Like, proper fun.” By Mark Redfern