There’s so much music coming out all the time that it’s hard to keep track. On those days when the influx of new tracks is particularly overwhelming, we sift through the noise to bring you a curated list of the most interesting new releases (the best of which will be added to our Best New Songs playlist). Below, check out our track roundup for Tuesday, April 22, 2025.
Friendship – ‘Resident Evil’
Friendship have previewed their forthcoming LP Caveman Wakes Up with a bleary new single called ‘Resident Evil’. “Guess this is how some people live,” Dan Wriggins sings of the “shithead in my living room” playing the titular video game. He wrote the song while crashing at the Asheville house then occupied by Wednesday’s Karly Hartzman and MJ Lenderman. “I needed somewhere to stay in the summer of ’23, and Jake and Karly let me stay at a place they had outside of Asheville while they were on tour,” Wriggins explained. “The only guy around was [songwriter and drummer for the Wind] Colin Miller, and I would write all day and go over to Colin’s porch at night to drink and shoot the shit. I remember coming up with the refrain, ‘Who’s that shithead in my living room / Playing Resident Evil’, and Colin telling me it was a great line. It’s a bit of a stolen valor song; the only game I’ve played in the franchise is 7, and I played it on VR. Very scary.”
Sharpie Smile – ‘The Slide’
Sharpie Smile – the duo of Dylan Hadley and Cole Berliner, who used to make music together as Kamikaze Palm Tree – have announced their debut full-length. The Staircase arrives June 27 on Drag City, which is not necessarily a label you’d associate with this brand of art-pop, though it’s nothing short of experimental. Lead single ‘The Slide’, which follows February’s ‘Love or Worship’, is delightfully punchy and playful.
Maria Somerville – ‘Spring’
Maria Somerville’s 4AD debut, Luster, comes out Friday, and today she’s sharing one more single from it, the aptly timed, beautifully slippery ‘Spring’. It follows earlier offerings ‘Projections’ and ‘Garden’.
Luster – ‘Close My Eyes’
‘Close My Eyes’, the latest single from Luster, leans more heavily into shoegaze than Maria Somerville’s latest Luster single. Mixed and mastered by Whirr’s Nick Bassett, the track is uproarious and immersive, better still if you do close your eyes to it.
Billy Idol – ’77’ [feat. Avril Lavigne]
Billy Idol has shared a new single from his imminent new album Dream Into It, a hooky collaboration with Avril Lavigne called ’77’, about a punk revolution that happened way before Idol’s duet partner was born. They’ll perform the song together on Jimmy Kimmel Live on April 28.
Samia – ‘Carousel’
“You find solace in the horror/ I hear your heart beat for Florida/ All of your celebrity crushes/ Are asymmetrical like me,” Samia sings on ‘Carousel’, the piercing, climactic final preview of her new album Bloodless. “‘Carousel’ is a shadow of a long song – it’s about spinning your wheels, and being afraid to make someone’s life less beautiful if you’re in it,” the singer-songwriter explained. It follows previous singles ‘Bovine Excision’, ‘Lizard’, ‘Hole in a Frame’, and ‘Pants’.
Sunflower Bean – ‘There’s a Part I Can’t Get Back’
Ahead of the release of their new album Mortal Primetime on Friday, Sunflower Bean have shared another single, ‘There’s A Part I Can’t Get Back’, which is particularly vulnerable.“This song is about the lasting scars of grooming — the parts of yourself that are stolen and the anger you carry because of it,” vocalist and bassist Julia Cumming explained. “It came to me in such a raw and direct way, there was no second-guessing or wondering how I felt. I didn’t want to write a song about being healed, I wanted to be angry about needing to heal at all. The line, ‘If I die before I wake, I pray the Lord lets me get even first,’ is important because it captures the intensity of these feelings and how they go beyond logic. I am confronting the pain and the questions that will never be answered.”
Jawdropped – ‘Outside’
Jawdropped have dropped a new track from their debut EP Just Fantasy ahead of its release on Friday. “‘Outside’ is about feeling like you never really fit in,” the band said of the defiant single. “But when you have true love in your life, feeling like an outsider doesn’t matter as much. The little voice in your head isn’t as loud when you have someone that knows exactly how you feel.”
Oddisee – ‘A Rare Thing’
Brooklyn-via-DC rapper and producer Oddisee has announced a new EP, En Route, which led by ‘A Rare Thing’, which is intricate and radiant with gratitude. According to the EP’s Bandcamp page, each of its four tracks “is a reflection of movement – physical, emotional, and spiritual.”
Say Sue Me – ‘In This Mess’
South Korean indie rock band Say Sue Me have an incredible, soaring new song out called ‘In This Mess’. Taken from their forthcoming EP Time Is Not Yours, it follows lead single ‘Vacation’, a collaboration with Silica Gel’s Kim Hanjoo.
Foxwarren – ‘Yvonne’
Andy Shauf’s Foxwarren have put out ‘Yvonne’, the second preview of their upcoming second album 2. (Nice.) ‘Yvonne’ is subtler in sound and less lyrically enigmatic than lead single ‘Listen2me’, but certainly no less enchanting. “Yvonne, the woman scanning the beach each morning for buried treasure, deserves a love song too,” the band remarked.
Ben LaMar Gay – ‘yowzers’
Chicago composer Ben LaMar Gay has announced a new album, Yowzers, introducing it with the opening title track. The album features the multi-instrumentalist alongside Tommaso Moretti (drums, percussion, voice), Matthew Davis (tuba, piano, bells, voice), and Will Faber (guitar, ngoni, bells, voice). About the title, Gay said: “‘Yowzers’ was a word and a sound that came to mind while observing the intersection of humor and horror in our present reality. On one side of a coin flip, ‘Yowzers’ is a deep sigh that quietly exits the body after facing the absurd. On the other side, it is a cry of amazement at how many secrets were left behind to help us endure and transcend the absurdity.”
