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Music

Staff Picks and Good Shit for the Week of October 24

Here's what the Noisey editors were listening to during this Ebola-free week.

It’s a busy time in New York, what with the CMJ and Ebola and all. By the way, you’re not gonna get Ebola at a show. We checked. If the bullshit people spew on the internet is to be believed, you are nine million times more likely to marry Kim Kardashian than to get Ebola. Or something. That’s science. Memes rock. We love memes. Bazinga. Anyway, here’s all the music we were listening to. Oh, and above is our intern John, who has become a meme himself among the djent community because of this thing he wrote. Someone please photoshop him drinking Kermit’s tea from Pharrell’s big hat.

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Alkaline Trio - “Private Eye”

This week, I’ve set out to do something I probably would’ve been super stoked on at age 20: See Alkaline Trio four nights in a row. I’m on night three, with the final night tonight. I like to imagine that my 20-year-old self is there with me and as we hear “Private Eye,” I give him advice. “Self,” I say, “you have to start getting smarter about the women you date or you’re gonna listen to these wrist-slitting tunes for the rest of your life.” Or maybe I would tell him that the problem is me. Wait… is the problem me? Have I been the cause of all my dating woes over the last decade? Nah, couldn’t be. LA LA LA CAN’T HEAR YOU SELF, AT THE RIIIGHT PLACE AT THE RIIIIGHT TIME, I’LL BE DEAD WRONG AND YOU’LL BE JUUUUST FINE.

Dan Ozzi, Editor
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Modern Vices - "Cheap Style"

I've been in Tokyo this week, wandering about, pretty much lost the entire time. I guess that's not that different than my daily life because when you really think about it, we're all a little bit lost all the time, right? (Sorry, being alone in Japan has me asking a bunch of existential questions.) Anyway, the record that's soundtracked my time walking across a city I don't understand is Modern Vices' self-titled debut from earlier this year, an album I've come to love after premiering their first single "Cheap Style." I wrote that this was a summer beachy record, but that's probably because it was July and I'd just come from shooting fireworks off at my friend's house on the ocean. This is actually just a record that, like all great music, is good for simply feeling some type of way, whether that's lonely or happy or nostalgic or hopeful. The Chicago band channels a sound that's familiar—it's as if their swinging guitars are echoing from amps that are trapped at the bottom of a well—but they do it so damn good. Look for me today flying over the Pacific Ocean with "Cheap Style" on repeat.

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Eric Sunderman, Managing Editor
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Run the Jewels - Run the Jewels 2

Killer Mike and El-P are one of the best hip-hop duos around. Last night, they leaked their second album a few days early early. Since it is now cold and shitty outside and the world sort of feels like it's ending, it's all I'm going to listen to for the next few days.

Drew Millard, Features Editor

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NZCA/Lines - "Not Strong Enough"

If you've been to see Metronomy in the past six months, you may have noticed a new member lurking in the live lineup. A whippet-thin man with floppy hair and sharply angled cheekbones. His name is Michael Lovett and when he's not interning with Metronomy he makes fantastic, falsetto synth-pop as NZCA/Lines—all juddering Timbaland-like rhythms and strange sci-fi strange narratives. Since his debut album a couple of years ago he's been a wee bit quiet until this week when he dropped "Not Strong Enough" (above), and "New Atmosphere" which is extraordinary: svelte and strangely heartbreaking. LOVE.

Kim Taylor Bennett, Style Editor

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Jessie Ware - "Champagne Kisses"

Jessie Ware is one of the greatest people. Not only did she just release a smash album, she also managed to create a perfect first-dance-wedding song without one ounce of corniness.

Marissa G. Muller, Guest Editor

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T.I. feat. Jeezy, Lil' Wayne, Young Thug

Not only do we get a brand new verse from T.I. and Young Thug on this remix, which is a rare occurrence these days, but we also get a Jeezy and Wayne inclusion! This whole Lil' Wayne/Young Thug bromance has evolved to the point where Wayne is sounding like Thugga in some sort of sonic teacher/student ouroboros. Thugga came up on Wayne, and now Wayne is sounding like he's been listening to nothing but Thugga for the last year. I'm not complaining. In fact, I think this is the sort of shake-up Wayne's style needed for him to do something interesting. I'm the biggest Lil Wayne fan in the world, but I haven't been excited about an album of his for a long time, and that includes Carter V (which apparently comes out on Tuesday?) so this new blood is a welcome change of pace. I look forward to ushering in a new era of Wayne, and hope this works out better than that time he had Drake writing for him and his punchlines became really timely and funny, but didn't hold up well. Slava Pastuk, Canadian Editor
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DeJ Loaf - Sell Sole

As I wrote the other day, this was the week that DeJ Loaf proved herself as an artist who can actually have lasting appeal. After I first heard "Try Me," I went to check out the rest of her songs and was not particularly taken. But after listening to Sell Sole, the mixtape she released this week, I am ready to put DeJ in the top tier of interesting, groundbreaking contemporary rappers. Sitting in the sing-song, sonically twisted, feather-soft territory of Chief Keef at his most zoned out, Juice-era Soulja Boy, Tink, and Lil B, DeJ's new mixtape is quietly open about her feelings and goals, frank about topics like her dad's death, and feminine in tough and subtly assured way that feels pretty novel. It sounds beautiful, and I wouldn't be surprised if producer DDS finds himself in high demand in the next few months as well (I say as well since one of the reoccurring lyrical themes on the tape is people asking DeJ for features). Anyway, it's awesome and comforting and novel, and not only do I recommend it, Birdman does too, via a guest appearance with Young Thug. And unlike plenty of other rappers DeJ actually owns her track with Thugger rather than the other way around. Kyle Kramer, Editor
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Sir Lord Baltimore - "Helium Head"

Sometimes things just put you in a mood, and after a binge with Pentagram and Witchfinder General lately, I settled into the pretty much untouchable Kingdom Come LP by Sir Lord Baltimore. It's a perfect record of psych, prot-metal, and 70s jam badassery. What a monster. Fred Pessaro, Editor-in-Chief
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