Gold Soundz: April 11, 2025

This week's suggested new music, curated by omg!nyc

For the first time in five years, a new album from Bon Iver has arrived! Last fall, the Justin Vernon led band released an EP that signaled a return to their earliest sounds of acoustic-driven tunes and in the process set up a lot of anticipation for what Bon Iver would do next. The new album contains the songs from that EP and while those tracks hinted at one sound, the follow-up singles have shifted towards more of an electronic sound wrapped in cellophane layer of ‘80s synth-pop and the rest of the album goes even deeper. “From” draws from Paul Simon heroics and “I’ll Be There” is a yacht-rock indebted R&B number that drips with charisma in a way we’ve never heard Bon Iver before. Taking risks has been part of Justin Vernon’s musical DNA throughout his career and SABLE, fABLE is another unassuming risk that makes for some of the most upbeat music in the Bon Iver catalogue. It’s a record that will keep on giving just like his best work and there’s no reason why this album can’t be part of the conversation.

I’ll admit that I fell off on The Mars Volta not too long after Frances the Mute, but as the group has become active again, they’ve returned to playing a lot of their classic hits. However, the band has recently been opening for the Deftones arena tour and have used their set to debut their brand new album in-full, ditching any of their past highlights. It’s a bold and respectable move that feels worth highlighting.

In 2019, Stereolab reunited to play some shows and have been keeping it up ever since. What seemed at first like a one-off has blossomed into a recurring experience and now, for the first time since 2010, the band will have new songs to play on tour as they’re set to release a new album. Our first taste is a track called “Aerial Troubles” that sounds like it could be made from no one else with that motorik beat and modular sounds of futuristic retro-pop.

An underlying group of the great Britpop wars were Pulp, a band that never got their proper due in America on their first go around, but have since been rewarded on their reunion tours. In June, the band will release their first album in 24 years and it’s lead by the sleek and chic new song “Spike Island” which drips with Jarvis Cocker’s forever cool vocal stylings that showcase his everlasting talents.

It’s going to be tough to be Turnstile for a little bit. After dropping their last album in 2021, the band has skyrocketed and taken hardcore to unimaginable heights, somehow getting bigger and bigger while still blasting away off their last record. Now the band are set to release its follow-up and it’s going to be divisive. Lead single “NEVER ENOUGH” is a dreamy tune with twinkling piano vibes that never quite crashes into the hardcore breakdown you’re waiting for, but rather cruises along with a different kind of mood. Right towards the end, things pick up which could suggest the rest will result in their brilliant intensity, but even if things stay at this pace, it’ll be an enjoyable one to behold.

Riding high on their excellent last album, Hotline TNT are back with a glorious new song full of rich guitar textures and heaps of flowing sound. Like a dreamy cloud of swirling chords and echoy vocals, the song transcends and reaches for new heights with each wash of billowing guitar.

Scratchy indie rock will always find its way to the right ears and Lifeguard are ready to be that band for anyone ready to get that itch. Announcing their debut album and sharing the awesome new song “It Will Get Worse,” the band has found their stride as they hit a pummeling punk beat over wiry guitars. It rushes with sincere urgency and finds the band in their natural groove.

Afro-jazz band KOKOROKO made their stateside debut last year and now they’re getting ready for some of their biggest shows on this side of the Atlantic. Ahead of that, the band will release their new album and it includes the new song “Sweetie” which features more of their breezy melodies, angelic vocals, and bubbling rhythms. There’s a tropical, calypso kind of feeling to it as well and paired with the sultry sounds of their crooning horns, it’s one meant to make the dance floor come to life.

Bringing jazzy saxophone solos to shoegaze-style walls of sound is something Cole Pulice has been perfecting as of late. Their newest song continues to blend the boundaries between these two perhaps unlikely pairings, but with an added wash of spaced-out ambient textures it creates a euphoric sound that reaches for the stars, powered by the ultimate bliss.

Albums:

BON IVER | SABLE, fABLE
THE MARS VOLTA | Lucro Sucio; Los Ojos Del Vacio
VALERIE JUNE | Owls, Omens, And Oracles
RÖYKSOPP | True Electric

Songs:

STEREOLAB | “Aerial Troubles”
PULP | “Spike Island”
TURNSTILE | “NEVER ENOUGH”
LANA DEL RAY | “Honey, come on”
BILLY WOODS | “BLK ZMBY” (ft Steel Tipped Dove)
HOTLINE TNT | “Julia’s War”
LIFEGUARD | “It Will Get Worse”
KOKOROKO | “Sweetie”
MARK PRITCHARD / THOM YORKE | “Gangsters”
TUNE-YARDS | “Heartbreak”
COLE PULICE | “Fragments of a Slipstream Dream”
SUMAC / MOOR MOTHER | “Scene 4” (ft Sovie)
JLIN | “B12”
ANGEL BAT DAWID / NAIMA NEFERTARI | “Black Stones of Sirius”

If you’re a Spotify user, you can listen to these songs (and more from 2025) here!