Absolutely: FKA twigs featuring Future, “holy terrain” – twigs’s music went slightly left field after her astonishing 2014 full-length, LP1, so it’s nice to hear her working with more accessible sounds and melodies on “holy terrain,” the second single from her upcoming Magdalene album. She strikes me as someone with that Kate Bush-Björk-Prince-Missy/Timbaland gift of being able to make the alien make sense to an ear attuned to pop. In a sophisti-trap framework, twigs snakes around the pre-chorus like she’s invoking Sade’s slinkiest melodies, but when she gets to the chorus, it’s almost astonishing how much she sounds like Ariana Grande (especially on the first two lines: “For a man who can follow his heart/Not get bound by his boys and his chains”). That’s audacious. Future is here, but his verse is neither here nor there. —Rich Juzwiak
I don’t think so, sweetie: Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus, and Lana Del Rey, “Don’t Call Me Angel” (music video) – I’ve done everything in my power to pretend like the Charlie’s Angel’s reboot isn’t coming to a multiplex near me. That’s why I feel upset about this song, which features three women I like individually, but do not understand as a unit? Ariana Grande is here doing her standard Ponytail Princess shtick; Lana Del Rey is in this for like, two seconds; Miley Cyrus is wet. Like, physically wet. Suffice it to say, the video is somehow better than the song, only because I am trying to figure out what products and why Miley has decided to use in order to fully embody this new look, which is a return to her naked-on-a-wrecking-ball roots, but updated for 2019, right? Oh, Elizabeth Banks is in this. That’s all. —Megan Reynolds
Nah: Post Malone feat. Travis Scott and Ozzy Osbourne, “Take What You Want” – I’ve been guilty of requesting a rap rock revival in the past, but I assure you this isn’t what I was asking for. I guess I’m happy Ozzy’s still out there doin’ his thing, but this is extremely corny. Like, so corny it veers on Christian Rock? Anyway, you should probably skip this one this week. —Maria Sherman
Absolutely not: Green Day, “Father of All…” – I’m not sure what’s happening here—I think it’s a refusal to grow up as you age, and I’m not here for it. Just… what? Certainly this couldn’t be what Billie Joe Armstrong had in mind when he sought to destroy the phrase “pop-punk” forever? —MS
Yes: Great Grandpa, “Digger” – Seattle band Great Grandpa wrote their latest indie rock heartbreaker about a dog. Sort of. “I used to have a dog who would get into this intense and almost manic trance when he would dig a hole in the yard. We called him Digger because he just became obsessed with these seemingly pointless pits. Something about his eyes in this state has lingered with and haunted me for years. It felt familiar, human even,” singer Alex Menne wrote in a statement for Gold Flake Paint, “I began to liken it, even using the name, to describe ourselves when our mental health was spiraling or/and we were diving into the dangerous game of obsessive existential inquiry/patterns.” That certainly comes across on the track. And you will love it.
No, which is strange, because I genuinely liked his last album: Charlie Puth, “Mother” – After bingeing Songland on NBC, my latest musical competition program, I’ve become endeared to Charlie Puth. He appeared to be a genuinely kind and talented guy intimately moved by music in a way far too few people are—and then I heard “Mother.” This is Justin Timberlake worship. The world already has one of those. Get weird, Puth, come on! —MS
I don’t think so, sweetie: Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus, and Lana Del Rey, “Don’t Call Me Angel” (music video) – I’ve done everything in my power to pretend like the Charlie’s Angel’s reboot isn’t coming to a multiplex near me. That’s why I feel upset about this song, which features three women I like individually, but do not understand as a unit? Ariana Grande is here doing her standard Ponytail Princess shtick; Lana Del Rey is in this for like, two seconds; Miley Cyrus is wet. Like, physically wet. Suffice it to say, the video is somehow better than the song, only because I am trying to figure out what products and why Miley has decided to use in order to fully embody this new look, which is a return to her naked-on-a-wrecking-ball roots, but updated for 2019, right? Oh, Elizabeth Banks is in this. That’s all. —Megan Reynolds
Nah: Post Malone feat. Travis Scott and Ozzy Osbourne, “Take What You Want” – I’ve been guilty of requesting a rap rock revival in the past, but I assure you this isn’t what I was asking for. I guess I’m happy Ozzy’s still out there doin’ his thing, but this is extremely corny. Like, so corny it veers on Christian Rock? Anyway, you should probably skip this one this week. —Maria Sherman
Absolutely not: Green Day, “Father of All…” – I’m not sure what’s happening here—I think it’s a refusal to grow up as you age, and I’m not here for it. Just… what? Certainly this couldn’t be what Billie Joe Armstrong had in mind when he sought to destroy the phrase “pop-punk” forever? —MS
Yes: Great Grandpa, “Digger” – Seattle band Great Grandpa wrote their latest indie rock heartbreaker about a dog. Sort of. “I used to have a dog who would get into this intense and almost manic trance when he would dig a hole in the yard. We called him Digger because he just became obsessed with these seemingly pointless pits. Something about his eyes in this state has lingered with and haunted me for years. It felt familiar, human even,” singer Alex Menne wrote in a statement for Gold Flake Paint, “I began to liken it, even using the name, to describe ourselves when our mental health was spiraling or/and we were diving into the dangerous game of obsessive existential inquiry/patterns.” That certainly comes across on the track. And you will love it.
Oh, and if you’re a sentimental little shit like myself, maybe wait to watch the music video when you’re home alone and can shed a single, lonely tear in the comfort of your own anonymity. —MS
No, which is strange, because I genuinely liked his last album: Charlie Puth, “Mother” – After bingeing Songland on NBC, my latest musical competition program, I’ve become endeared to Charlie Puth. He appeared to be a genuinely kind and talented guy intimately moved by music in a way far too few people are—and then I heard “Mother.” This is Justin Timberlake worship. The world already has one of those. Get weird, Puth, come on! —MS
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