Mixtape

Every month, we bring you #Mixtape—a place to discover the best new music releases from emerging to established artists.

Ice Cube Sigrid Steve Aoki Chromeo Trace Mothica Jordan Hollywood Homeshake NGeeYL Paper Love Karen O and Danger Mouse Sônge Eminem

Ice Cube is back with a new 16-track album after 8 years — Everythangs Corrupt. “December 7, 2018. A day that will live in Infamy…” Ice Cube Tweted. “#EverythangsCorrupt – It explains our moment in time. It’s not just Trump and the government, there’s corruption everywhere.” Sample lyrics: “Everythang’s corrupt, everythang’s fucked up Everythang’s ’bout a buck, we shit out of luck”

Sigrid announces her highly anticipated debut album Sucker Punch, set for release on March 1, 2019 on Island Records. The Norwegian pop star’s experience over the last year has been the backdrop for her debut record. Her songs are tales of the unexpected; fearless musical collages and shout-outs to human resilience. “I figured out early on that it’s going to be difficult for me to try and be anything other than who I am. I always said if I’m going to do this it’s easiest to be myself and look like myself, where I can recognize myself,” says Sigrid.

Two-time Grammy-nominated DJ and Producer Steve Aoki embraces the holiday season by treating fans to a series of remixes for his Neon Future III hit single “Waste It On Me,” featuring BTS. “Waste It On Me” is the third project Steve Aoki and BTS have collaborated on, following Aoki’s RIAA certified gold remix of BTS’ “MIC Drop” featuring Desiigner. After debuting on iTunes at #1 in more than 60 countries, as well as becoming Twitter’s #1 worldwide trend, “Waste It On Me” has officially crossed 100 million on-demand streams in less than one month.

Funk legends Chromeo debut their video for “Don’t Sleep” starring 90s icon Robin Givens (Never Heard, Riverdale, The Bold and the Beautiful) and featuring French Montana and Stefflon Don. Directed by Allie Avital (serpentwithfeet, Moses Sumney), the visual is another sophisticated installment in Chromeo’s collection of artfully hilarious clips. Of the video Avital explains, “It’s lonely at the top. ‘Don’t Sleep’ is a 2018 satire for the age of dissatisfaction; the age of overstimulation and Tinder. Robin Givens plays a version of the ‘sad king,’ where the more pampered and entertained she is, the more disaffected she becomes. All the bulging biceps, sponge baths, and lap dances can’t cure her existential void.”

TRACE shares “Anxiety”, her most revealing track to date. In it TRACE unravels the isolating feeling that having anxiety can impose. The alt-pop song opens with soft-strummed acoustic guitar before morphing into something more menacing. Like a tidal wave, “Anxiety” continues to swell over its three and a half minute duration; darkly-shaded synths and haunting looped vocal “ahhs” slowly build throughout before the song reaches a sonic and emotional peak in the chorus.

Directed by Mr.Iozo, “By Now” is a work of cinematic imagery both in detailed set design and in dark realism. Starring Mothica, “By Now” paints a surreal picture of a failing relationship through all its turmoil and heartbreak. Described by Mothica as “a painful kind of honesty I wasn’t sure I was ready to release,” “By Now” visually portrays it’s message through a number of nuanced metaphors and imagery.

Jordan Hollywood releases his music video for “FINALLY”, which is the title track off his Quality Control Music debut EP FINALLY!. Jordan continues his trend of having cinematic visuals working with his longtime video director, Christian Breslauer. The opening scene finds Jordan and bystanders at his own funeral and then finds him in the center of a storm. This symbolizes Jordan‘s feelings about people who betrayed him. He was hurt but instead of dwelling he channels that energy into hustling harder. The final scene displays half the room waking up from a slumber, which symbolizes people are finally starting to notice Jordan Hollywood.

Homeshake, the project of Peter Sagar, shares new single “Nothing Could Be Better” with an accompanying video. Sagar says the song is about how “sometimes on the way to a social function you gotta ditch and hang out with your sweety instead because love is beautiful.” While video director Steve Smith “tried really hard [to capture] the dancing” in the animated clip.

South Carolina’s very own NGeeYL (pronounced “en-gee-why-el”) released his latest single, “Microsoft.” Shortly after the summer release of his mixtape, Tales of YL, NGeeYL has caught the attention of Pitchfork, The Fader, Nylon, Earmilk, Elevator, Daily Chiefers, Music on the Dot,Rapfest, andWith Guitars for his gritty delivery.

Paper Lovee teamed up with rising Detroit rapper, Sada Baby for the release of his high-energy single, “25 Rounds” produced by Helluva (Tee Grizzley). Paper Lovee just released his debut EP, Waiting to Exhale. The exciting new talent called on music’s hottest acts, Lil Baby, Yung Bans, and YNW Melly to assist him on the 15 track project.

Icons Karen O and Danger Mouse unveil their debut recording as a duo, “Lux Prima.” The song, out on BMG, is the first to be released from a forthcoming joint album. “After making music for the past twenty years and embarking on making this record with Danger Mouse I knew a couple things: one was that the spirit of collaboration between us was going to be a pure one, and two was that the more I live the less is clear to me. When you create from a blurry place you can go places further than you’ve ever been. I think we both were excited to go far out,” says Karen O.

Sônge’s new track “Magic Hairdo” is a tribute to afro hairstyles. “The Universe is full of mysteries, emotions, colors that we cannot describe, which we cannot name. This song produced by Myd and me and mixed by nkf talks about the parallel between the secrets of the universe and the beauty hair secrets of African women,” says Sônge.

Jessie Reyez teams up with award-winning rapper Eminem on his latest No. 1 album, Kamikaze, on two concept songs “Nice Guy” and “Good Guy”. Eminem’s official visuals for ‘Good Guy’ starring Jessie Reyez, opens with Jessie seemingly escaping from being buried alive along the coast. The video then cuts to her coming face-to-face with a hooded man, Eminem as they tensely and sparingly stare each other down.