With so much good music being released all the time, it can be hard to determine what to listen to first. Every week, Pitchfork offers a run-down of significant new releases available on streaming services. This week’s batch includes new albums and EPs from Huerco S., Blood Incantation, Sasami, WifiGawd, Caroline, Conway the Machine, EarthGang, RIP Swirl, and Nyokabi Kariũki. Subscribe to Pitchfork’s New Music Friday newsletter to get our recommendations in your inbox every week. (All releases featured here are independently selected by our editors. When you buy something through our affiliate links, however, Pitchfork earns an affiliate commission.)
While the Kansas-based producer Brian Leeds has recently released music under the name Pendant (2021’s To All Sides They Will Stretch Out Their Hands and 2018’s Make Me Know You Sweet), Plonk is his first new album from the Huerco S. moniker in six years. The follow-up to 2016’s For Those of You Who Have Never (And Also Those Who Have) and QTT4 was inspired by Leeds’ childhood love of cars—“especially rally ones.”
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Blood Incantation: Timewave Zero [Century Media]
The Denver death metal band Blood Incantation have released a new album that has very little to do with death metal. The follow-up to 2019’s Hidden History of the Human Race is the band’s attempt at “stripping away the Metal and emphasizing the Dark, Cinematic, and exceedingly Cosmic atmosphere [its] music is known for.” The record features two songs—“Io” (21 minutes) and “Ea” (20 minutes)—with a third, 27-minute song featured on the limited-edition CD copy.
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Squeeze is a multi-faceted new album from Sasami. The album’s intensity is intended to help the listener process “anger, frustration, desperation, and more violent, aggressive emotions.” She made the album with help from a array of contributors, including Vagabon’s Lætitia Tamko, comedian Patti Harrison, Megadeth’s Dirk Verbeuren, Hand Habits’ Meg Duffy, King Tuff’s Kyle Thomas, Christian Lee Hutson, No Home, and others.
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WifiGawd: Chain of Command [POW]
WifiGawd, the SoundCloud rapper from Washington, D.C., has had a prolific run over the past several years. Chain of Command marks a milestone, as critic Dean Van Nguyen wrote in his review, calling it “a natural point of entry, distilling what makes Wifi such a gripping virtuoso in 11 distinct but successful cuts. The fact that it’s his first album to be pressed on vinyl solidifies the feeling that this is the deepest version of WifiGawd to date.”
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Caroline: Caroline [Rough Trade]
Originally just the duo of Casper Hughes and Jasper Llewellyn, Caroline are an eight-piece band from London whose music melds folk, emo, and post-rock. Their ranks include members playing cello, clarinet, flute, trumpet, and violin on their debut album. Caroline features the singles “Good Morning (Red),” “Dark Blue,” and “IWR.”
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Conway the Machine: God Don’t Make Mistakes [Shady]
God Don’t Make Mistakes is the Shady Records debut from the Buffalo rapper Conway the Machine. The LP features contributions from Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, Jill Scott, Westside Gunn and Benny the Butcher (“John Woo Flick”), the Alchemist (“Piano Love”), Hit-Boy, Keisha Plum, and more. “It was tough opening up doors that I haven’t opened up in a while,” Conway the Machine said in a statement. “This is my story and sharing it all with the world is different for me, but I was happy to do it.”
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EarthGang: Ghetto Gods [Dreamville/Interscope]
More than two years after their 2019 debut Mirrorland, Atlanta duo EarthGang return with Ghetto Gods. The project had originally been set for a late January release, but it was delayed by a month. EarthGang shared several singles from Ghetto Gods ahead of its arrival, including “Amen,” “All Eyes on Me,” and “American Horror Story.”
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RIP Swirl: Blurry [Public Possession]
Hamburg-born producer and Berlin club scene mainstay Luka Seifert has released an album that, while rooted in dance music, is inspired by ’90s alternative music like trip-hop, Dinosaur Jr., and the Trainspotting soundtrack.
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Nyokabi Kariũki: Peace Places: Kenyan Memories EP [SA]
Nyokabi Kariũki collected field recordings from her ambles in her home country for the six compositions of Peace Places: Kenyan Memories. On “Equator Song,” weaver birds flutter as Kariũki grapples with outlining her identity; the tide washes around her on the haunting “Galu.” Having split her young adult life between New York, Maryland, and Nairobi, Kariũki illuminates the spaces where her investigations overlap.
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