\n<\/p>\n
Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week\u2019s most notable new songs<\/a>. After six months of listening, here\u2019s what they have on repeat. (Note: It\u2019s not a ranking, it\u2019s a playlist.) Listen on Spotify<\/a> and Apple Music<\/a>.<\/p>\n Atop a mid-tempo beat that recalls the muffled retro-funk of Doja Cat\u2019s smash \u201cSay So,\u201d<\/a> Sabrina Carpenter plays the unbothered temptress with winking humor: \u201cSay you can\u2019t sleep, baby I know, that\u2019s that me, espresso.\u201d Make it a double \u2014 you\u2019ve surely heard this one everywhere. LINDSAY ZOLADZ<\/p>\n Following her worldwide 2023 hit \u201cWater,\u201d<\/a> Tyla pulls away from temptation in \u201cSafer,\u201d harnessing the log-drum beat and sparse, subterranean bass lines of amapiano. Her choral call-and-response vocals carry South African tradition into the electronic wilderness of 21st-century romance. JON PARELES<\/p>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n At once strobe-lit and silky, Ariana Grande appropriately channels Robyn<\/a> \u2014 the patron saint of crying in the club \u2014 on this nimbly sung, melancholic pop hit, a highlight from her bittersweet seventh album, \u201cEternal Sunshine.\u201d<\/a> ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n Billie Eilish extols her own composure and skill at dissembling \u2014 holding back her unrequited love \u2014 in \u201cThe Greatest\u201d from \u201cHit Me Hard and Soft.\u201d<\/a> Delicate picking accompanies her as she sings about how she \u201cmade it all look painless.\u201d Then she shatters that composure, opening her voice from breathy to belting while the production goes widescreen with drums and choir. When the music quiets again, her furious restraint is as palpable as her regret. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Folky fingerpicking and new-agey thoughts about self-help make \u201cDeeper Well\u201d a gentle but firm rebuff. After musing on astrology and negative energy, Kacey Musgraves<\/a> notes, \u201cI\u2019m saying goodbye to the people I feel\/are real good at wasting my time.\u201d In the next verses, she leaves behind marijuana and rises above the limits of her upbringing. There\u2019s no rancor, no gloating, just added shimmery reverberations as she grows up and moves on. PARELES<\/p>\n In \u201cFire Excape,\u201d Zsela croons what turns out to be a love song \u2014 but only eventually, after she notes, \u201cThere\u2019s a fire in the ocean when the oil starts spilling.\u201d The song takes shape over a lurching, start-stop beat, with some gaping silences, odd harmonic turns and sudden electronic surges, but amid the asymmetries Zsela proffers some husky reassurance: \u201cWe\u2019ll get along quite fine, thank you.\u201d PARELES<\/p>\n In a flex of genre-spanning musicianship that\u2019s also a workaholic\u2019s lament, Beyonc\u00e9 recalls her past and doubles down on her ambition, singing, \u201cAin\u2019t got time to waste, I got art to make.\u201d The music is an arena-country crescendo, from acoustic-guitar strum to full-band impact topped by pedal-steel guitar. She\u2019s not only claiming an expanded demographic base; she\u2019s using her celebrity clout to force some doors open<\/a>. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n A virtuoso with both fingers and effects, the guitarist, songwriter and producer Mk.gee (Michael Todd Gordon) creates murky, contrapuntal tracks suffused with yearning and diffidence. In \u201cLittle Bit More,\u201d from his album \u201cTwo Star & the Dream Police,\u201d he promises, \u201cBaby, take what you want\u201d to the one who \u201copened the door.\u201d A hopping six-beat guitar loop, a conversational bass line, high backup vocals peeking in here and there and occasional piano interjections conjure an elation that may not last. PARELES<\/p>\n \u201cI can hold my arms wide open\/but I need you to drive the nail,\u201d St. Vincent<\/a> sings in \u201cBroken Man.\u201d It\u2019s a volcanic buildup of a song, from the sparsest ticking electronics to a hard-rock stomp to a full-scale pileup of guitars, drums and horns. PARELES<\/p>\n Over a hurtling beat and a chain of frantic, trilling, overdriven guitar riffs, the Tuareg guitarist Mdou Moctar<\/a> insists that African leaders should work together and push back against foreign interests, to \u201cRetake control of your resource-rich countries.\u201d The band couldn\u2019t sound more urgent. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n Kim Gordon<\/a>, 71, explores the common ground between no-wave cool and SoundCloud rap on this corrosive opening track from her second solo album, \u201cThe Collective.\u201d Atop an abrasive, hypnotic beat, she recites a fictional tour packing list, contrasting the chaotic and banal with flair. You\u2019ll never enunciate \u201cEckhaus Latta\u201d the same way again. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n The zany electronic producer A.G. Cook<\/a> turns a simple, hypnotically repeated Charli XCX refrain \u2014 \u201cBrit, Brit, Brit, Brit, Brit, like Britpop\u201d \u2014 into an alternate-universe national anthem. Blur and Oasis never did it quite like this. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The London-based, Nigerian-rooted band Ibibio Sound Machine has evolved into a starkly efficient electro-funk group, delivering community-minded messages in English and the Nigerian language Ibibio. \u201cPull the Rope\u201d deploys an octave-hopping bass line, video-game blips and eventually a horn section to propel a constructive chant: \u201cEven though we\u2019re eager to trigger\/Let\u2019s pull the rope, together we hope.\u201d PARELES<\/p>\n The rising pop star Chappell Roan<\/a> sends an ex-lover off with an eye roll on the wrenching \u201cGood Luck, Babe!,\u201d a synth-driven tune topped by her best Kate Bush. Roan imagines her former flame kissing \u201ca hundred boys in bars\u201d and eventually becoming a man\u2019s dissatisfied wife in the aftermath of their affair. But ultimately, Roan chooses herself, singing with all her heart, \u201cI just wanna love someone who calls me baby.\u201d ZOLADZ<\/p>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n Dua Lipa\u2019s album \u201cRadical Optimism\u201d<\/a> cruises past heartaches, treating bad choices and failed romances as setbacks that might be painful, but not for too long. In \u201cFrench Exit,\u201d she decides to ghost a relationship that\u2019s not working, comparing it to ducking out of a party early. The ingenious track, produced by Kevin Parker (Tame Impala<\/a>) and the hyperpop pro Danny L Harle, stacks up syncopations \u2014 drums, acoustic guitar, flamenco handclaps, a little flute lick \u2014 behind her not-too-regretful voice. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Maggie Rogers<\/a> admits her friends\u2019 relationships don\u2019t provide models for what she\u2019s looking for: Sally\u2019s getting married, Molly\u2019s out partying every night. She\u2019s after something more casual \u2014 but still lasting in its own way. \u201cLove me till your next somebody,\u201d Rogers sings to whomever\u2019s listening. \u201cAnd promise me that when it\u2019s time to leave, don\u2019t forget me.\u201d ZOLADZ<\/p>\n Waxahatchee\u2019s Katie Crutchfield marvels at long-term love by admitting how much she tests it. \u201cI let my mind run wild\/Don\u2019t know why I do it,\u201d she sings, \u201cBut you just settle in like a song with no end.\u201d The track is easygoing and countryish, and MJ Lenderman provides supportive harmony vocals and electric guitar. But the scratchy tension in Crutchfield\u2019s voice betrays her continuing self-doubts. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Like the rest of her latest album, \u201cVisions,\u201d \u201cStaring at the Wall\u201d is a collaboration between Norah Jones and the producer and drummer Leon Michels. Between his backbeat and her twangy guitar, understated keyboards and reassuring vocal harmonies, it\u2019s clear she\u2019ll make it through her misgivings just fine. PARELES<\/p>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n The milky-voiced singer-songwriter Jessica Pratt<\/a> brings her sepia-toned sensibility to this dreamy folk-pop tune, making it sound like a glowing portal to an alternate past. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n \u201cI still don\u2019t know where I am going\/But I have joy in my heart,\u201d the Colombian-Canadian songwriter Lido Pimienta<\/a> sings in \u201cHe Venido al Mar\u201d (\u201cI Have Come to the Sea\u201d). She\u2019s making a journey toward renewal, with her guileless soprano sailing above a track that begins with sparse electronic chords and gathers layers of percussion and voices, assembling a cumbia and a community out of thin air. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n This salvo in Kendrick Lamar\u2019s feud with Drake<\/a> starts with Lamar rapping quickly but calmly over a smooth-jazz backdrop, taunting, \u201cI make music that electrify \u2019em, you make music that pacify \u2019em.\u201d But after he warns, \u201cDon\u2019t tell no lie about me\/And I won\u2019t tell truths about you,\u201d the track changes to a tolling, droning trap dirge and Lamar\u2019s delivery becomes biting, nasal and percussive. He switches from flow to flow with an accelerating barrage of attacks, professional and personal, from recording deals to parenting skills: \u201ccringe-worthy\u201d is a milder one. PARELES<\/p>\n In snaking melodies atop shimmering club beats, Charli XCX<\/a> pivots between cool-girl braggadocio and raw confessions of insecurity on her new album, \u201cBrat.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s so confusing sometimes to be a girl,\u201d she sings on the chorus of one of its most vulnerable songs, which explores her ambivalent relationship with a certain unnamed pop star doppelg\u00e4nger. Her unabashedly messy, run-on candor is especially refreshing. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The Canadian songwriter and producer Saya Gray\u2019s voice is wry and a little sleepy as she reconsiders a relationship, singing, \u201cI bent over backwards so many times\/I turned into a golden arch for you to walk through.\u201d But her production is alert, hyper-detailed and surreally unpredictable, segueing among ticking electronics, syncopated indie-rock, spacey vocal chorales, distorted guitars and what might be a koto. She may be lonely, but she\u2019s resourceful. PARELES<\/p>\n One We Missed<\/p>\n The laptop-wielding Japanese musician Hakushi Hasegawa delivers a manic demolition derby of a song with the hyperpop of \u201cDeparted.\u201d Sweet vocal harmonies top a barrage of drums and sliding-pitch synthesizers; a brief respite midway through only makes the closing blitz sound more lightheartedly merciless. PARELES<\/p>\n \u201cMusow Danse\u201d (\u201cWomen\u2019s Dance\u201d) is the title track of the jubilant new album by Les Amazones d\u2019Afrique \u2014 a Pan-African, proudly multilingual alliance of singers and songwriters carrying feminist messages to dance floors, like this chorus: \u201cRise up African woman!\u201d PARELES<\/p>\n \u201cI run away, \u2019cause I\u2019m on precious time,\u201d the British musician Nil\u00fcfer Yanya<\/a> sings. In classic Yanya fashion, \u201cLike I Say (I Runaway)\u201d has an almost collagelike feel, reveling in contrasting textures and suddenly erupting into a blaze of guitar distortion on the chorus. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The alt-pop singer Clairo yearns to be the object of just one person\u2019s affection \u2014 \u201cnothing more, nothing less,\u201d she sings on a track that pairs her breathily muttered vocals with a persistent groove, resulting in a kind of strutting summer anthem for introverts. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The music sounds absolutely joyful: major chords, a waltzing but flexible beat, a supportive backup choir reinforced by orchestral strings. But Ang\u00e9lica Garcia<\/a> is singing, in Spanish, \u201cWhat is the color of pain?\u201d with vocal inflections that hint at both Latin pop and Indian ghazal. PARELES<\/p>\n \u201cMary Boone, Mary Boone, I hope you feel like loving someone soon,\u201d Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend<\/a> sings, name-checking a once-powerful art dealer who recently served a prison sentence for tax fraud. The song itself is a kind of musical mosaic, combining floating atmospherics that recall the band\u2019s \u201cModern Vampires of the City\u201d with breakbeats and a lush, heavenly choir. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n The arrangement is largely acoustic, yet there\u2019s almost a trip-hop undertow to \u201cRaat Ki Rani\u201d (Urdu for \u201cQueen of the Night\u201d) by Arooj Aftab<\/a>, the Grammy-winning, culture-fusing Pakistani singer. One piano note repeats throughout; Asian percussion supplies deep, deliberate syncopation; and Maeve Gilchrist\u2019s harp swirls between verses. Aftab sings about allure and desire in a long-breathed melody suffused with melancholy poise. PARELES<\/p>\n Polyamory gets complicated in this yearning reggae duet. \u201cDon\u2019t be too quick to judge,\u201d the Jamaican singer Lila Ik\u00e9 urges; H.E.R. counters, \u201cYou just keep lying to yourself.\u201d Neither of them wanted to \u201close a good thing just because,\u201d but that\u2019s all they agree on. The man in question never states his case. PARELES<\/p>\n Usher embraces South African amapiano, with a tinge of Nigerian Afrobeats, in \u201cRuin,\u201d a track produced by Pheelz, a Nigerian songwriter who adds a rap verse. Mixing accusation, plaint and humblebrag, Usher croons, \u201cYou broke me and took your time with it\/you gave me all these memories that I regret.\u201d But he also makes clear he has options: \u201cA different girl be on my line\/Constantly be calling, every day I still decline.\u201d PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nSabrina Carpenter, \u2018<\/strong>Espresso<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Tyla, \u2018<\/strong>Safer<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Ariana Grande, \u2018<\/strong>We Can\u2019t Be Friends (Wait for Your Love)<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Billie Eilish, \u2018The Greatest<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n
Kacey Musgraves, \u2018<\/strong>Deeper Well<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Zsela, \u2018<\/strong>Fire Excape<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Beyonc\u00e9, \u2018<\/strong>16 Carriages<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Mk.gee, \u2018Little Bit More<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n
St. Vincent, \u2018<\/strong>Broken Man<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Mdou Moctar, \u2018<\/strong>Funeral for Justice<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Kim Gordon, \u2018<\/strong>Bye Bye<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
A.G. Cook, \u2018<\/strong>Britpop<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Ibibio Sound Machine, \u2018<\/strong>Pull the Rope<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Chappell Roan, \u2018<\/strong>Good Luck, Babe!<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Dua Lipa, \u2018French Exit<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n
Maggie Rogers, \u2018<\/strong>Don\u2019t Forget Me<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Waxahatchee featuring MJ Lenderman, \u2018<\/strong>Right Back to It<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Norah Jones, \u2018<\/strong>Staring at the Wall<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Jessica Pratt, \u2018<\/strong>Life Is<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Lido Pimienta, \u2018<\/strong>He Venido al Mar<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Kendrick Lamar, \u2018<\/strong>Euphoria<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Charli XCX, \u2018<\/strong>Girl, So Confusing<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Saya Gray, \u2018<\/strong>AA Bouquet for Your 180 Face<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Hakushi Hasegawa, \u2018<\/strong>Departed<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Les Amazones d\u2019Afrique, \u2018<\/strong>Musow Danse<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Nil\u00fcfer Yanya, \u2018<\/strong>Like I Say (I Runaway)<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Clairo, \u2018<\/strong>Sexy to Someone<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Ang\u00e9lica Garcia, \u2018<\/strong>Color de Dolor<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Vampire Weekend, \u2018<\/strong>Mary Boone<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Arooj Aftab, \u2018<\/strong>Raat Ki Rani<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Lila Ik\u00e9 featuring H.E.R., \u2018<\/strong>He Loves Us Both<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
Usher and Pheelz, \u2018<\/strong>Ruin<\/a><\/strong>\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n