Selective listening | Our playlist, from Adib Alkhalidey to LCD Soundsystem

Every month, our music journalists add about 20 songs to the playlist of The Press on Spotify. These recent titles can be found in our selection.

Adib Alkhalidey, To kill time

Adib Alkhalidey launched a first album two years ago, evil hearts, under the pseudonym of Abelaïd. This time, it is under his real name that the comedian offers a new song, To kill time, which will also be the title of his upcoming album on November 11. “To kill time / I apprehend the worst”, a strong line that he repeats in his muffled voice, on a heavy and slightly anxiety-provoking rhythm, makes all the power of this dark and explosive song.

Gabrielle Shonk, How We Used to Be

It’s been a long time since we heard from Gabrielle Shonk, whose debut album dates back to 2017. The singer-songwriter makes a beautiful and gentle return with How We Used to Be, magnificent R&B ballad which speaks of the end of a love. Carried by the rich and nuanced voice of the singer, composed with Jessy Caron and produced by Jesse Mac Cormack, this new song announces a second album to come in the winter of 2023.

French 79, FOIX

French electronic musician French 79, born Simon Henner, has unveiled a new single, FOIX, accompanied by a video where he is at the turntables at the top of the castle of Foix, in the department of Ariège, in France. We find the ardor of the melodic master of keyboards, to whom we owe the hit Diamond Veins (with Sarah Rebecca), and the production of an album by his friend Kid Francescoli. To discover if you like CRi, for example.

Jeanne Added, Antidote

Jeanne Added, winner of the 2019 Female Artist of the Year Award, is about to launch her third album, By Your Side, recorded with renowned French director Renaud Letang (Feist, Alain Souchon). The invoice turns out to be resolutely more intimate and fragile than its previous material, as evidenced by the extract Antidote. The singer-songwriter also unveils two first songs in French.

LCD Sound system, New Body Rhumba

A first piece in five years for the New York group LCD Soundsystem, taken from the soundtrack of the film White Noise by Noah Baumbach. Yes, the wait was worth it. The group, led by a James Murphy in great shape and all in voice – which recalls more and more the good years of Bono, moreover -, proposes to take the direction of the dance floor. The electro-pop sound heard in the opening is camouflaged in the last third of this piece of more than seven minutes behind heavy layers of rock guitar, while Murphy’s voice takes flight. Difficult not to wiggle!

Kanen, Nimueshataten nete

Innu singer Kanen is another talented artist from the fertile Uashat-Maliotenam basin, near Sept-Îles. She just started Nimueshataten nete (“ I’m bored of there”), a very beautiful song with indie-rock accents that she wrote and that she performs in duet, in French, with Louis-Jean Cormier, in which they pay a vibrant tribute to their Native North Shore. The singer-songwriter will release an album in the winter of 2023.

Arctic Monkeys, bodypaint

The Arctic Monkeys are back, unveiling their new album in dribs and drabs until its release on October 21st. Second extract from the disc The Carthe room bodypaint, is another great promise for this upcoming album. Something comes to remind Bowie here, between the piano, the strings and the feeling of hearing several songs in one. The vaporous atmosphere of the beginning becomes theatrical, then more electric towards the end. Alex Turner brings out his falsetto voice here, which blends divinely well with the music. Long live the sequel.

Steve Hill, Everything You Got

The Trois-Rivières Steve Hill still has the sacred fire, 25 years after the start of his illustrious career. The six-string maestro launches Everything You Gotfirst extract from his 12^e album, Dear Illusion, which will be released on November 11. The clip that accompanies the song sets the tone, a sequence shot full of spontaneity directed and played by Jean Pellerin, alias Johnny Pilgrim, who has already worked with Kiss, Guns N’Roses, Def Leppard and Metallica.

Vulgar Things, Asylum

One sentence would suffice to dispel all our fears: no, Vulgaires Machins has lost none of its acute sense of the formula that does good, even if the contradictions it encapsulates hurt. “I complain in the line-up to Tim / that the world is made sad”, sing Guillaume Beauregard and Marie-Eve Roy in this sort of sequel, twenty years later, at like a brick. Recognized for their protest refrains, the punks are however never as poignant as when they describe the consequences on our small hearts of the ugliness – social, political, urbanistic – which surrounds us.

Steve Nicks, For What It’s Worth

In 1966 Stephen Stills was recording with Buffalo Springfield For What It’s Worth in order to denounce a curfew imposed on Hollywood in an effort to chase hippies off the Sunset Strip. Propelled by an unforgettable proto hip-hop rhythm, the protest song was to become one of the quintessential anthems of the Vietnam War generation. With her hoarse voice, smoldering all the storms of the world, the singer of Fleetwood Mac reminds us in this pretty cover that if the reasons for being indignant are no longer the same, they are no less numerous.

Maude Audet, Always a sun

After a few original covers – from Nirvana to Marjo – Maude Audet offers this pop piece reminiscent of the 1960s – we think of Aline, by Christophe, for the first chords heard. The songwriter adds thoughtful classical elements, courtesy of Quatuor Esca. We listen while whistling to the chorus of this ballad of possible loves – “Warm me up stronger, Love me as I adore you, It takes almost nothing, Only a sun always” –, all accompanied by chords of flute, violin, harp and timpani.

Weyes Blood, It’s Not Just Me, It’s Everybody

Piano. Felted battery. Discreet harp. And a warm voice. Weyes Blood – Natalie Mering – does not seek to dazzle with added instruments. Rather, she achieves this by focusing on what makes her one of the best authors and composers: the search for simplicity and musical harmony. It’s still a success here. A perfect balance between an adult pop sound and contemporary and mature lyrics, where loneliness rubs shoulders with social incomprehension.

Ingrid St-Pierre, mothers

It is impossible to remain unmoved while listening to this new song by Ingrid St-Pierre who, with her concern for the right word and her images that speak volumes, recounts the total and unfailing love of mothers for their children, and celebrates its strength as much as the fragility. Interpreted simply piano-voice with extreme sensitivity by the singer-songwriter, mothers announces an album for 2023. If the rest is in order, we are already preparing our box of tissues.

Lesser Evil, Fiction

Lesser Evil, a “dark pop” duo formed by Ariane M. and Christophe Lamarche-Ledoux (Chocolat, Organ Mood), unveiled Fictionfrom his album Subterranean, which comes out October 14. We are seduced by the hushed voice of the singer and lyricist, as well as by the nocturnal and heady sound quality. Twisting electro sounds are next to a rock that tries to sneak into the depths of our soul as the music of Beach House can do.