5 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 Tyler, the Creator, Madonna, Paul Weller, Mabel and Alice Cooper.

Tyler, the Creator – Don’t Tap the Glass

Clocking in at just 28 minutes, Tyler, the Creator’s ninth album deliberately wastes no time in grabbing our attention, as shown on the bass-y opener ‘Big Poe’. This arguably fits the man himself’s mantra that this record was not made “for sitting still” and is instead informed by his friends choosing not to dance in public “because of the fear of being filmed”.

“I thought damn, a natural form of expression and a certain connection they have with music is now a ghost,” he said. “It made me wonder how much of our human spirit got killed because of the fear of being a meme, all for having a good time.” Instead, it’s an album that goes some way in reviving that aforementioned spirit. Another stroke of genius from one of modern rap’s great innovators.

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

Mabel – Mabel

On her latest mixtape, Mabel says she’s keen to offer a “raw and unfiltered” depiction of where she finds herself right now. “The tape is all new music made in the last few months with some of my nearest and dearest,” she explains. “It’s really important to me with this project that people know that this is where I’m at now and I wanted it to come out without too much overthinking. It’s a blend of all the genres and cultures that make me who I am and I would say it’s beautiful organised chaos.” The flittering ‘Love Me Gentle’ is the perfect reflection of what this new era is all about.

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

Madonna – Veronica Electronica

While we’re waiting for Madonna’s first album of original material since 2019’s Madame X to emerge, offerings like Veronica Electronica are more than enough to tide us over. The album features rare and previously unreleased remixes by several of Madonna’s collaborators from the singer’s Ray of Light era, including the late Peter Rauhofer, electro pioneer William Orbit and New York producer Victor Calderone. Rauhofer’s take on ‘Nothing Really Matters’ gives the song a spiky urgency, while the ‘Ray of Light’ remix allows the song to take on a new lease of life. Madge devotees will lap it up.

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

Alice Cooper – The Revenge of Alice Cooper

The Godfather of Shock Rock returns to his roots for the first record from The Alice Cooper Band since 1973’s ‘Muscle of Love’. Early tracks, such as the punk-flecked ‘Wild Ones’, suggest that time and age has done little to quell the band’s unrepentantly spooky spirit. Here is a band refusing to go gently into that good night.

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

Paul Weller – Find El Dorado

On 2024’s 66, Paul Weller keenly offered up a sense of soul-searching and questioning one’s place in the universe as he reached that eponymous birthday and took up his position as a legendary elder statesman of British rock. Those themes continue on Find El Dorado, which sees the Modfather offering up his own unique take on the tracks that have defined his life. The result is a record that ranks among the most powerful, heartfelt and beautiful things he’s ever done.

That’s only too evident on ‘I Started a Joke’, which sees the former Jam frontman faithfully lean into the Bee Gees’ classic’s baroque pop stylings but inject the track with a new haunting, emotional edge. It’s also a vehicle to show off the lasting quality of his voice, that raspy timbre sounding as comforting and familiar as it ever did. The sleeve notes of the record state that this is one of the songs Weller wishes he had written himself, and this fresh take might just be the next best thing to that.

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