Best New Releases of 2020 So Far

Tame Impala - The Slow Rush

The Australian psychedelic rock band released their fourth album following the release of a series of singles, like Posthumous Forgiveness and It Might Be Time, which are included in the album. Influences come from Philly soul and early prog to acid house and adult-contemporary R&B.

Bob Dylan - Rough and Rowdy Ways

First time to release new songs in eight years. Showing another side of himself, Bob Dylan talks about the difficult times of America.

Halsey – Manic

Halsey’s raw autobiographical portrait of the artist craving for love and tenderness in a hostile world. Includes collabs featuring Alanis Morissette and Suga from BTS. As she said, Manic is “hip-hop, rock, country, fucking everything.”

Bombay Bicycle Club - Everything Else Has Gone Wrong

It is the fifth studio album by the British indie rock band. The lead single, Eat, Sleep, Wake (Nothing but You), was promoted with a music video directed by Louis Bhose, the bands former touring keyboardist and was shot in Ukraine.

Selena Gomez - Rare

Given how publicly and privately painful Selena Gomez’s last few years have been — worsening struggles with lupus, a kidney transplant, stays in mental-health treatment centres, high-profile breakups — her new album is shockingly, and beautifully, upbeat. Her third solo album is an act of divine ruthlessness. 

Hinds - The Prettiest Curse

The Prettiest Curse is the third studio album by the Spanish garage rock band. The band opted for more songs with pop melodies than on their previous albums. The albums fourth single, Just Like Kids (Miau), addresses the all-female bands experiences of sexism in the music industry.

Lady Gaga - Chromatica

Chromatica is a return to form, and a return to the dance floor for Lady Gaga. The singles “Stupid Love” and “Rain on Me” remind us of her early hits, and the music throws back to house, disco, and even New Wave, but still progressing as Gaga sings about rising above past bad romances and her hope for the future. Includes collaborations with Ariana Grande, Blackpink, and Elton John.

Mac Miller - Circles

Before he died of a drug overdose in September 2018, at age 26, Miller put out the two most complete albums of his career: The Divine Feminine, a jazz-rap record, and Swimming, in which he talks about his attempts to come to terms with depression and heartbreak. His newly released album Circles, is not something fresh but accompanies Swimming. 

BTS - Map of the Soul: 7

Showing their diversity in their music with different pop styles from rap-bangers to slow-dance ballads to post-Swedish electro-disco to prog-style philosophising, the seven members celebrate being together for seven years and talk about where they’ve been even as they look ahead to their future.

Kesha - High Road

In her newest album, High Road, Kesha she sings about her therapist and tarot readings and her aura, but she’s also back to clubbing with a vengeance. She recently said, “To quote one of my favourite songs of all time, I’ve decided to ‘fight for my right to party!’”

The Strokes - The New Abnormal

The American rock band’s sixth studio album received positive reviews from critics, with many seeing it as a return to form for the band. Praise was directed mainly towards the maturity of the lyrics and improved cohesion among band mates. It reached number 1 in Scotland and the top ten in six other countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom.

Hayley Williams - Petals for Armor

Released in three parts throughout this spring, Petals for Armor can be viewed as a trilogy of five disco-funk grooves, where Hayley explores her changing coping mechanisms in the midst of hardship.

Nadine Shah – Kitchen Sink

Kitchen Sink is the fourth album from the English singer-songwriter. In her rock anthem, 'Buckfast', Shah sings about gas-lighting and toxic relationships, while in 'Ladies for Babies (Goats for Love)' she sings in a hypnotising but sinister tone about the treatment of women in a fable about a farmer who neglects his wife.

Kehlani – It Was Good Until It Wasn’t

Filled with smooth R&B, the second album from Californian singer Kehlani Ashley Parrish features a girl wearing denim shorts peeping over a concrete wall to an idyllic sky of palm trees; an illustration of the grit and glamour, darkness and light that weave against each other on the album.

Phoebe Bridgers - Punisher

An indie rock and emo-folk album by the American singer-songwriter. Lyrically, it tackles themes of missed connections, the tension between the inner and outer self, and the pain of watching things end. Bridgers used the words "crying" and the feeling of numbness to describe its contents.

- Maria Peftouloglou

Instagram: @mariapeft