Now Hear This: New music from D-Block Europe, Max Pope and DTF (but not Kanye West)

In her weekly column, our music correspondent goes through the best releases of the week

Max Pope

Kanye West may have failed to release his new album Jesus is King (is anyone really surprised?), but there’s plenty of other great new music you can check out.

Let’s start with Sturgill Simpson’s fourth record, Sound & Fury, which I reviewed this week. You can read the full write-up here, but basically it’s a rollicking rock’n’roll record that is, possibly, my favourite work of his to date. There are also new releases from Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds (reviewed by Elisa Bray), and pop duo Tegan and Sara.

The charismatic rap duo D-Block Europe, who recently sold out not one but two dates at Alexandra Palace for November, have dropped “Playing for Keeps” with this year’s Mercury Prize-winner Dave. I love the whispery opening lines on “Second Guessing” from Arlo Parks: “Eating Parma Violets/ On the way back from therapy/ Bleeding out on a velvet couch/ They’re kind of worried about me.” The whole song is beautiful, from the heavy ticks of a clock in the background to the drop that blossoms into layers of instrumentation – whirly synths, sharp beats and a neat electric guitar line.

Charlotte Lawrence, who recently popped into the Music Box studio to film a session (yes, they’re back!), has released “Navy Blue”, an epic-sounding ballad that alternates between gossamer-like, stripped-down vocals and instrumentation to a pounding chorus that recalls Taylor Swift’s “… Ready for It?” The brilliant Mercury Prize nominee Cate le Bon teamed up with Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox (she co-produced their latest album) for the whimsical chimes of “Secretary”, ahead of a new Mexican Summers Myths EP they’re releasing in November.

The film looks terrible but I love Christina Aguilera’s outrageous new single “Haunted Heart”, from the forthcoming Addams Family animation – it’s suitably spooky. Non-English language stuff I’m listening to this week includes Latin American boyband CNCO’s new single “La Ley”, and Maluma and J Balvin’s “Que Pena” (quite the pairing). I’m also intrigued by “Veni Qui” (“Come Here”) from DTF, a French rap duo who are part of PNL’s crew, and Damso’s collaboration with Ikaz Boi, “SOLITERRIEN”.

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I’ve been to a few gigs this week: Duckwrth (another artist who swung by the Music Box studio) at Jazz Café was phenomenal, particularly having seen him do a stripped-down session: he turned up in this stunning Paul Smith suit and kept the energy levels going right until the final song.

I also caught Marika Hackman at Islington Assembly Hall, where she played with her band who were kitted out in boiler suits (it looked hot). She just released a superb video for “Hand Solo”, about female masturbation, which is a visually arresting piece of art and also an important commentary on the stigma that still surrounds female sexual pleasure. Full marks for the Star Wars-style font at the end of the video quoting women’s personal experiences, too. Among the many gigs taking place next week, Johnny Greenwood at St Pancras Old Church showcasing music from his new classical label Octatonic sounds excellent.

If you’re looking for some music-related reading material, Bloomsbury is releasing an illustrated edition of Patti Smith’s seminal 2010 book Just Kids that is, in my opinion, one of the greatest music memoirs of all time. It captures a moment in New York where Smith arrived as a teenager and encountered Robert Mapplethorpe, resulting in a life-long friendship between two phenomenal artists. The new edition of Just Kids is out on 3 October and features a new introduction by Smith and more than 100 photographs by era-defining photographers, including Mapplethorpe, Judy Linn, Kate Simon and Lynn Davis. There are also never-before-seen images from Smith’s own collection.

My spotlight artist this week is young Max Pope, who just released his EP Up. He’s got a pleasing, sultry croon and deals in Eighties-influenced indie-soul. I caught up with him as he releases a video for “You’ll Never Die” and prepares to head out on tour in the UK.

Hey Max, how's your 2019 going so far?

It’s going so well! I’ve been in LA a lot, writing and hiking and have just released an EP, with a video for each track. One of them was filmed in LA with all these cool kids. It felt like I was in a movie. I’ve also been gardening like a nutter and getting more and more into plants.

How are you feeling now the EP's out in the world?

Relieved, excited and ready for more. It’s been a long time since I released music as I took a bit of a break from it. I approach music now with a genuine love for the creative process, which gives me so much joy. I think before I was focussing on the outcome a little too much. These songs weren’t all written at the same time, but we recorded all of the demos in this weird studio on a farm in Essex, throughout the winter. It took a lot of hard work and when I was recording them I really didn’t have a plan, I just knew I wanted to record them. So it’s really special the way that things have come together. I’m particularly proud of the video for ‘You’ll Never Die’.

Was there a key influence for this new music?

There were several. I’d been listening to a lot of very classic songwriters from the early 80s. The music of Joe Jackson had a huge impact on me. Also Nick Hakim’s stuff, in which the vocals have so much space.

What are your plans for the rest of the year?

I’m about to go on a short UK tour. I’m finishing my next EP and I’m planning to release one more song before the end of the year. Yay :)