9 albums you need to hear this week

In the age of streaming, it’s never been easier to listen to new music — but with over 60,000 new songs added to Spotify every day, it’s also never been harder to know what to put on. Every week, the team at Rolling Stone UK will run down some of the best new releases that have been added to streaming services.

This week, we’ve highlighted records by Jamie T, Pet Shop Boys, Chase & Status, Troye Sivan, Cameron Winter, Chloe Slater, Rora & the Untamed, Remi Wolf and Jess Williamson.

Jamie T – Ghosts (100 Days of Morning)

On his sixth album, Jamie T looks into his past to analyse the effects of the eponymous spirits haunting his psyche. Ghosts, they follow you”, he posits on the scrappy rock of ‘Waist 36 Leg 32’, reflecting a universality of being stuck in the past that we’ve all dealt with at some point. ‘3310’ is a classic Jamie T ripper destined to be shouted back at him, while the brooding ‘Tallahassee’ sees him reflect on his own integral role within the lives of people in their mid-thirties and now, indeed, early forties. This album ensures that he’ll continue to be there for some time yet.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Pet Shop Boys – A Man from the Future

Britain’s pop band par excellence return with a concept album which explores eight integral moments in the life and death of Alan Turing, the pioneering English mathematician who famously played a key role in cracking the Enigma code and is now considered to be the father of modern computing. Though originally written in 2012, the project has now been revisited with stunning and genuinely emotional results.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Chase & Status – Generic Everything

Despite what the title of Chase & Status’ latest may have you believe, there’s very few generic things to be found here. Little Simz fronts single ‘Carnage’, while other featured stars include Giggs, Blanco, and grime legend D Double E.

“In a world shaped by AI, algorithms and endless content, creativity is constantly being pushed towards what’s familiar, safe and predictable,” the duo say. “The cube is our symbol for that pressure; a place where original ideas are squeezed into the same shape. This album is about pushing back. Every song, visual and show is an attempt to break out of the cube and create something that feels genuinely different. The idea isn’t simply that creativity is trapped. It’s that it’s being forced to conform.”

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Troye Sivan – She’s the Best

There’s a contrast at the heart of Troye Sivan’s new album, as he told Rolling Stone recently. “There is this high-octane side to the album that feels really bombastic, and then there are the songs that feel like the interior of my mind,” Sivan explained. In contrast to the sexed-up and vibrant Something to Give Each Other, She’s the Best allows for introspection to peek through, which Sivan says comes from “going home to the hotel by myself, and actually feeling deeply lonely a lot of the time” during his last tour.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Cameron Winter – Live at Carnegie Hall

As well as being the frontman of Geese, the hottest new band on the planet, Cameron Winter is experiencing a parallel explosion as a solo singer-songwriter. Beginning with the surprise sleeper hit of debut album Heavy Metal, Winter’s new live album – shot by Paul Thomas Anderson at the legendary Carnegie Hall – strips songs from his debut album back to their piano-based bones, while sprinkling in new material from what could be the follow-up record from the most intriguing new songwriter around.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Chloe Slater – Riot Youth

On her debut album, rising rocker Chloe Slater lives up to the confrontational title and then some. The swaggering ‘Can I Finish Please’ is an almighty two fingers to patronising elders, while the rest of the record explores our own imminent climate doom, political fears and capitalist overlords. It’s an album with something almighty to say.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Rora & the Untamed – Do You Like Me Now?

Though Aurora Nischevci may be known for her sublime work with The Last Dinner Party (usually wielding a keytar), this debut solo album with partner Nathan Durasamy proves she’s a star in her own right too. Here, the duo offer up a brilliant palette of future-facing pop (as seen on ‘Savage White Swan’) and endlessly ambitious arrangements. It’s a perfect vessel to tide over our anticipation until the next Last Dinner Party record arrives.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Remi Wolf – Mud

Until now, Remi Wolf has been known for a technicolour aesthetic and music that’s just as vibrant. It feels very deliberate, then, for her new album to be named Mud, and her to be pictured on the cover absolutely caked in the stuff. Indeed, this is a grittier and less fantastical next step for the Los Angeles singer, but just as impactful in its reflections on her whirlwind career so far.

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music

Jess Williamson – A Mile South of Heaven

The title of the new album from Los Angeles-via-Texas singer-songwriter Jess Williamson points at the idea that we’re always chasing something just out of reach, always a mile south of a hypothetical heaven. “My point is, maybe that’s ok, because a mile is pretty close,” Williamson says. The album manages to balance a yearning for more with an acceptance of the now, all set to beautifully crafted country songs that feel like a warm embrace. “It’s about appreciating where we are now,” she says, “because there is no finish line. There is always more work to be done.”  

Listen on: Spotify | ‎Apple Music | TIDAL | Amazon Music