8 New Albums You Should Listen to Now: Billie Eilish, Crumb, Shellac, and More

Billie Eilish, photo by Petros Studio

With so much good music being released all the time, it can be hard to determine what to listen to first. Every week, Pitchfork offers a run-down of significant new releases available on streaming services. This week’s batch includes new albums from Billie Eilish, Crumb, Shellac, Beth Gibbons, Mach-Hommy, Rapsody, Wolfacejoeyy, and Lip Critic. Subscribe to Pitchfork’s New Music Friday newsletter to get our recommendations in your inbox every week. (All releases featured here are independently selected by our editors. When you buy something through our affiliate links, however, Pitchfork earns an affiliate commission.)

Billie Eilish: Hit Me Hard and Soft [Darkroom/Interscope]

Billie Eilish didn’t release any singles before dropping her full new album, Hit Me Hard and Soft, but she is making up for it by going on a massive tour. She begins the trek in September and will be on the road for the better part of a year. By the time she’s done playing shows, you’ll forget you ever hadn’t heard these songs.

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The pop phenom’s third album, released with no advance singles or videos, strikes a melancholy chord while fleshing out her sound with strings, mid-song switch-ups, and vocals that can rise to a scream.

Crumb: Amama [Crumb]

Crumb venture further into their psychedelic pop wonderland on Amama, the follow-up to 2021’s Ice Melt. Produced alongside Johnscott Sanford and Jonathan Rado, the album broaches a cosmos of daydreamy sound collage, insistent beats, and yearning melodies from singer and multi-instrumentalist Lila Ramani. The title track, Ramani said in press materials, is a tribute to her grandmother, whose voice is sampled on the song. “A video sent to me over WhatsApp of her singing originally inspired the melody and ethos of the song, from which I built its glitchy, warped foundation. It’s a love song!”

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Shellac: To All Trains [Touch and Go]

As rock fans of all stripes mourn the death of Steve Albini, a bookend to his unparalleled legacy comes with the final Shellac album, To All Trains. Announced in March, after a 10-year wait since Dude Incredible, the record of righteous, riotous noise features a number of songs that had become setlist staples, such as “Scrappers,” a tribute to street-scrap collectors, and the Bob Weston–helmed “Chick New Wave.” There is also a Fall homage, “How I Wrote How I Wrote Elastic Man (Cock & Bull),” and a wry nod to Albini’s poker career, “WSOD”—otherwise known as “The World Series of Dick-Sucking.” Read Grayson Haver Currin’s Afterword “Steve Albini Did the Work.”

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Beth Gibbons: Lives Outgrown [Domino]

Beth Gibbons toiled on her debut solo album for a decade before unveiling Lives Outgrown, a follow-up to her orchestral album with Krzysztof Penderecki and the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, as well as Portishead’s Third. The record plays like an uncanny lost document of a vanished folk era, full of ancient longing and musty guitar tones. The songs address anxieties about aging, Gibbons said in a press release. “I realized what life was like with no hope. And that was a sadness I’d never felt. Before, I had the ability to change my future, but when you’re up against your body, you can’t make it do something it doesn’t want to do.”

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Mach-Hommy: #RichAxxHaitian [Mach-Hommy]

The elusive and revered Mach-Hommy began to catch ears in 2016 with HBO (Haitian Body Odor). The Newark-raised rapper continued to honor his Haitian heritage in 2021 on the albums Pray for Haiti and Balens Cho (Hot Candles). He’s now completing his “tetralogy” with #RichAxxHaitian. Guest contributors to the full-length include Kaytranada, 03 Greedo, Roc Marciano, Tha God Fahim, Georgia Anne Muldrow, Quelle Chris, Black Thought, Your Old Droog, and Conductor Williams.

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Rapsody: Please Don’t Cry [We Each Other/Jamla/Roc Nation]

Please Don’t Cry follows a near half-decade break from releasing solo music from Rapsody, after leveling up with her 2019 album, Eve. She returned in style with singles including the Erykah Badu collaboration “3:AM.” The North Carolina MC brings Phylicia Rashad along for several songs, with other guest spots from Bibi Bourelly, Alex Isley, Amber Navran, Bee-B, Baby Tate, Keznamdi, and Niko Brim; Hit-Boy and Terrace Martin are among the musical contributors.

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Wolfacejoeyy: Valentino [Alamo]

At just 21 years old, Staten Island rapper Wolfacejoeyy unleashes his first full-length, Valentino. He worked on the project with produces Powr Trav, SoundByNova, Matt Nadler, and WhereIs22. Check out Alphonse Pierre’s take on Valentino’s “Alexis Texas.”

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Lip Critic: Hex Dealer [Partisan]

On their debut album, Hex Dealer, Lip Critic thrash together a delirious hybrid of hardcore and hyper-speed dance, their two drummers racing through an industrial assault course while Bret Kaser barks, yelps, and half-raps about the ills of modern society. Singles including “Milky Max” and “The Heart” preceded the LP.

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Originally Appeared on Pitchfork