Tuesday Tune-Up is a weekly sampling of music worth adding to your iTunes. Focusing on a different theme each week, we’ll cover territory from old to new, local to export, and mellow to bangin’ with one constant: it’ll be pretty, pretty, pretttty good.
Jai Paul: “Str8 Outta Mumbai”, “Crush”
The (unofficial) album, with a number of unfinished projects from the UK artist, leaked last month. Finished or not, the premature release includes some of the spring’s best tracks, from the giddy “Str8 Outta Mumbai” to a velvety cover of Jennifer Paige’s unexpected ’90s hit “Crush”. While I can’t embed these tracks directly, check them out for yourself here or here.
Chance the Rapper: “Good Ass Intro”
When I first heard this song, I thought it was the best Weezy song ever made. It sounded like “Let The Beat Build” on acid, I thought. Turns out, I wasn’t so far off: The track is from the second mixtape from Chance the Rapper (alias: Chancelor Bennett), Acid Rap. It is well worth the trip.
Thundercat: “Oh Sheit It’s X”
If disco really was dead at one point, then it looks like it came back as one of those zombies from MJ’s “Thriller” video, and it’s pelvic thrusting its way into your home and out into the streets. Co-produced by FlyLo, the song is a four minute ode to rolling on the funk life – and on, um, X.
Vampire Weekend: “Step”
From their recently realeased third studio album Modern Vampires of the City, “Step” was one of three teaser singles to hit the WWW earlier this spring. Hovering over “Ya Hey” and “Diane Young” (pronounced “dying young”) the track stands out as the single that reminded me why I fell for Vampire Weekend back in highschool. “Back back way back I used to front like Angkor Wat / Mechanicsburg Anchorage and Dar es Salaam / while home in New York was champagne and disco / tapes from L.A. slash San Francisco.” Wait, what?
James Blake: “Retrograde”
I was hesitant to include “Retrograde” in this list, partly because of its release in February when spring had not yet sprung, and partly because it’s been everywhere, all the time, always. The first single released from Blake’s new, ‘techier’ album Overgrown, the song is undeniably some pretty powerful stuff. If you can make it to the 1:45 mark without seeing your past, present, and future all at once, then you’re not doing it right.
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Jeremy Schipper is an intern at Toronto Standard. You can follow him on Twitter at @jeromeoschipps.
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