August was the month that made it seem like things slowed down the most. I’m not talking about slowed to like, a manageable pace, but to a arthritic snail’s pace. Reality slowed and stretched and took on new forms, like a pop song that’s been slowed down 500%. I started forgetting about music from earlier this year and was only listening to Jessie Ware’s What’s Your Pleasure? with any regularity (the fact I can’t listen to music on commutes now really sucks). I had to catch up on like 30 records I neglected to check out on their respective release weeks over the last few days before writing this. Nevertheless, I managed to find some true gems in a bloated month, some records that really floored me from Tkay Maidza, Merce Lemon, Nubya Garcia, Breaking and more. I hope everyone is doing ok, and remember to register to vote!

Breaking – Breaking [Orchid Tapes]
Riding a bike down a wet rural street with a giant, post-fall storm sunset casting a magic glow across the sky.

Duma – Duma [Nyege Nyege Tapes]
The blood moon casts a chaotic carnivorous curse upon the villagers of a remote town.

Kelly Lee Owens – Inner Song [Smalltown Supersound]
A soundtrack to a point-and-click rhythm-based game set on a dreamy island with a mysterious past.

The Microphones – The Microphones In 2020 [P.W. Elverum & Sun]
Rewatching the most impactful moments of your life on 35mm as you plummet to Earth from space.

Merce Lemon – Moonth [Darling Records / Crafted Sounds]
Making a fort out of sticks in the woods with a hole in the ceiling to peer at the moon & lighting sparklers to read the backpack of books you brought while in your sleeping bag.

Nubya Garcia – Source [Concord Jazz]
A generation of genius, prodigal children beyond their years begin solving complex world problems and develop psychic powers they ultimately use for good in their communities.

Silvia Tarozzi – Mi specchio e rifletto [Unseen Worlds]
A person sitting on a luxurious sofa slowly drifting off into a dream about wandering through an empty mansion begins to unfurl thorny rose vines from their hair and fingernails.

Sweeping Promises – Hunger For A Way Out [Feel It Records]
A posse of very cool young adults develop a new fad of shooting bouncy balls out of a slingshot to do gravity-defying, ricocheting stunts + taping it like a skate video.

Tkay Maidza – Last Year Was Weird, Vol. 2 [4AD]
Every step down a city sidewalk leads to the individual slabs of cement to launch out of the ground and land perfectly back in place, essentially turning the city into a concrete bouncy castle.

Young Jesus – Welcome To Conceptual Beach [Saddle Creek]
A person resolves all their mental motivation problems by crafting intensely elaborate, barn door-sized dreamcatchers, then marvels at their work as massive floodlights cast a symphony of endless, intricate shadows across their backyard.

Also want to shout out a live album from Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, AXIOM, which was taped during a run at the Blue Note in NYC, right before the world shut down in March 2020. His music is masterful and I encourage everyone to listen. Same goes for They Hate Change’s 666 Central Ave. EP that I featured a few days back – it’s HOT.

GR8 SONGS OF AUGUST 2020:

Listen to my running Best Songs of 2020 playlist here!

• Aluna – “Don’t Hit My Line”
• Aluna – “Sneak”
• Angel Olsen – “Chance (Forever Love)”
• Angel Olsen – “Waving, Smiling”
• Angel Olsen – “Whole New Mess”
• Breaking – “Cars”
• Breaking – “Tremmmur”
• chelmico – “Limit”
• Deli Girls – “feedback/failure”
• Deli Girls – “motherless fuck”
• Dog Day – “Trouble”
• Duma – “Kill Yourself Before They Kill You”
• Duma – “Lionsblood”
• Duval Timothy – “Groundnut (feat. Twin Shadow)”
• Jaga Jazzist – “Apex”
• Kelly Lee Owens – “L.I.N.E.”
• Kelly Lee Owens – “On”
• Kelly Lee Owens – “Night”
• Machinedrum – “Kane Train (feat. Freddie Gibbs)”
• Marcos Valle, Ali Shaheed Muhammad & Adrian Younge – “A Gente Volta Amanhã”
• Marie Davidson & L’Œil Nu – “Renegade Breakdown”
• Marlowe – “OG Funk Rock (feat. AFRO)”
• Marlowe – “Otherworld”
• Merce Lemon – “Chili Packet”
• Merce Lemon – “Those Eyes”
• Nubya Garcia – “Before Us In Demerara & Caura (feat. Ms MAURICE)”
• Nubya Garcia – “Inner Game”
• Nubya Garcia – “Pace”
• Nubya Garcia – “Source (feat. Ms MAURICE, Cassie Kinoshi, Richie Seivwright)”
• Oceanator – “I Would Find You”
• Open Mike Eagle – “Bucciarati (feat. Kari Faux)”
• Silvia Tarozzi – “Che cos’è una primavera”
• Silvia Tarozzi – “La forza del canto”
• Sneaks – “Faith”
• Sweeping Promises – “Uptight”
• Sweeping Promises – “Safe Now”
• They Hate Change – “Stunt Cams”
• They Hate Change – “Screwface”
• Tkay Maidza – “Grasshopper”
• Tkay Maidza – “Shook”
• Tkay Maidza – “24k”
• Tomberlin – “Wasted”
• TSHA – “Sister”
• Widowspeak –  “Jeanie”
• Young Jesus – “(un)knowing”