New Music Round-Up 10/26/18: Cardi B, Black Eyed Peas, Blackberry Smoke, Tory Lanez, Brass Against and More

Welcome to the BroBible New Music Round-Up, where we see what new music has been released this week. Follow me @ryanoconnell79

File under: In Case You Missed It, but Cardi B dropped a new single earlier this week, a song that was originally supposed to come out on Thursday. But if we’re to take anything away from “Money,” it’s that Cardi isn’t messing around and this couldn’t wait.

“Money” is straight up menacing and if you thought motherhood might slow her down at all, I’m afraid you are sorely mistaken. Cardi is out there dropping lines like these: “All y’all bitches in trouble, I bring brass knuckles to the scuffle / I heard, ‘Cardi went pop,’ I did go pop — that’s me bursting they bubble.” Some say the track is taking shots at Cardi’s occasional nemesis Nicki Minaj and while Cardi has denied it, you know, it probably is. Or maybe is. I don’t know. Rap beefs can be hard to keep track of.

I love Cardi B though. She raps with the untamed ferocity of someone angrily returning their order because the food is cold and those are onions and YOU SPECIFICALLY ASKED FOR NO ONIONS! I pity the poor fools at the NFL who are negotiating with her when it comes to how long she’ll perform at this year’s Super Bowl. They don’t stand a chance. And please keep in mind that this is a good thing. No one really wants to see Maroon 5 anyway.

Quavo was on The Bill Simmons Podcast this week and pitched an idea of an all-Atlanta halftime show. Giddy up, Quavo. Giddy the eff up.

Speaking of Super Bowl Halftime performers, the Black Eyed Peas, veterans of Super Bowl XLV, are back with their seventh album, Masters of the Sun Vol. 1. It’s the group’s first new release since 2011’s The Beginning & The Best Of The E.N.D., which was really just a rehashing of the two albums they released before that. Get that money, Black Eyed Peas. Get that money!

In all our seriousness though, the video for the album’s first single, “Big Love,” is intense and deals with both gun violence and the anti-family separation movements. All profits from the single will go directly to March for Our Lives and Families Belong Together. As for the album, it’s the Peas returning to life as a trio as Fergie elected to sit this one out. However, the album does feature guest spots by Nas, Slick Rick, Nicole Scherzinger, De La Soul’s Posdnuos and the late Phife Dawg of A Tribe Called Quest.

It has been a little over a year since Tom Petty passed away and the New York-based band The Pains of Being Pure at Heart are taking a run at paying tribute to the rock icon by releasing a cover of Petty’s classic album Full Moon Fever. Yeah, the whole damn thing. The release will be available via Turntable Kitchen’s Sound Delicious series. It will also be available on vinyl.

“Petty was an arena act, at home and enabled by large record labels and big budget videos, and (by this era at least) had about zero reputation as ‘cool,’” Kip Berman told Rolling Stone. “So I thought it would be a great tribute to one of my heroes to re-imagine his music in the context of my own – to wonder what it would be like if the songs he wrote sounded a bit more like the artists that were working in the underground at the time he was making this iconic record.”

If the band’s take on “Runnin’ Down a Dream” is any indication on how they fared, I’d say they were pretty successful.

It’s fall. It’s fire pit season and studies have repeatedly shown that when it comes to sitting around a fire pit, nothing beats doing it while listening to the sweet sounds of some good old acoustic guitar and choruses that are fun to sing along too. So enter stage right Blackberry Smoke, who have released The Southern Ground Sessions, a six track collection of acoustic takes on songs from their last album, Find a Light.

The EP also features yet another tribute to Petty, a melancholy version of “You Got Lucky, and was recorded at Zac Brown’s studio in Nashville, which for those playing along at home, is called Southern Ground Studios. And now it all makes complete sense.

I don’t believe there is a Tom Petty tribute on the new album from The Struts, but there are plenty of non-specific tips of the cap to the majestic glory of glam-rock’s heyday. Young & Dangerous is the follow-up to their 2016 breakthrough album Everybody Wants. The album’s closer, “Body Talks,” features Kesha on vocals, which is not to be confused with the album’s opening track, “Body Talks,” which does not feature Kesha on vocals. The Struts are currently on tour, playing shows with the Foo Fighters, The Wrecks and Thunderpussy.

Let me tell you a little something about Brass Against – these guys rock. For a little over a year now, the New York-based outfit has been releasing horn heavy covers of classic tunes by Rage Against the Machine, Living Colour, Audioslave, Run the Jewels and Tool. They release their music primarily via YouTube in the form of refreshingly straight forward videos of them playing the songs in a wood-paneled studio. Vocals on most of their songs are handled by Sophia Urista, as was the case with their last release, a cover of Pantera’s “Walk.” Yet with their latest release, a cover of “Lateralus” by Tool, the band has brought in vocalist Samuel Hope to handle Tool singer’s Maynard James Keenan’s vocals.

For me, it’s pretty simple. I like big, strong horn sections. I like the music of Rage and Living Colour and Tool. Thus, I like Brass Against. If only everything in life was that simple.

Former Drake nemesis and current Drake dude Tory Lanez has a new album out, Love Me Now. It’s the Canadian rapper/singer’s third album. Apparently the sound of this new album reflects Lanez’ new digs, as he’s ditched the unforgiving climate of Toronto for the friendly confines of Miami, resulting in an album that is sunnier and less heavy. Love Me Now features a track with XXXTenacion, who was murdered in June, as well as tracks with Chris Brown, A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie, 2 Chainz and Lil Baby.

I don’t know if emo rock is still a thing, but Saves The Day are, so it seems like it’s at least kind of still a thing. But yes, New Jersey’s Saves The Day are back with their ninth album. What is it called? You’ll never guess. Or you will. It’s called 9. You probably guessed. According to frontman Chris Conley, the new album is a trip down memory lane for the band, as well as for himself.

“This album is the story of Saves The Day and my own personal journey through life, which all unfolded as my relationship with music progressed,” Conley recently said.

9 is the band’s first album since 2013. The band heads out on tour at the beginning of November.

You know how there are songs you heard once, maybe on the radio or on some Spotify playlist, and even though you don’t actively seek them out all that often, they stick with you? “Golden Touch” by Razorlight is one of those songs for me. The song originally came out in 2004 and I’ll still find myself listening to it from time to time. And every time I do, I love it. Yet I probably couldn’t name another Razorlight song if I were asked. You say ‘Razorlight,’ I say “Golden Touch,” and that is where the conversation ends.

I bring this up because Razorlight have released their first new album in a decade. Olympus Sleeping is the band’s fourth album and in an interview, Johnny Borrell of Razorlight said the goal was to make an album that had “the electric energy of their first album, the pop-rock craftsmanship of the second and the lyrical ambition of the third.” What’s crazy is that I have the same goal for this column.

These Ones Slipped By Me…

Major Lazer released a greatest hits style compilation, celebrating 25 years of majorly lazering the (expletive deleted) out of summer jams everywhere. The 25 track album features the group’s new single “Blow That Smoke,” featuring Tove Lo, as well as “Lean On” with MØ and DJ Snake and “Cold Water,” featuring Justin Bieber and MØ. Put this album on, close your eyes and pretend it’s still summer. That’s my plan.

Future and Juice WRLD dropped a joint effort, WRLD on Drugs. The album features guest spots by Future’s tour mate Nicki Minaj, Lil Wayne, Young Thug and all the auto tune you could ask for.

Pinegrove were making a moves a year ago, following the release of their album Cardinal and the overwhelmingly positive response it received. But forward progress was stalled just short of the first down when the band’s frontman Evan Stephens Hall took to Facebook to discuss being accused of “sexual coercion” by a former lady friend. As a result, tours were cancelled, as was the release of the follow-up to Cardinal. Now a year later, Skylight has been released, with the band donating proceeds from album sales to charity. The band’s new album is a continuation of the excellent, low-fi, country-tinged sound that Pinegrove have been honing over the past few albums.

What is Jason Isbell Tweeting About This Week?

Uh, (cough, cough, Greta Van Fleet, cough, cough.)

This Week’s Playlist

https://open.spotify.com/user/1221630762/playlist/1fOu8CYAwMyG8x7HqZlfLN?si=UcjCLTx2Ra2aLN2B3hiM5A