5 songs you should hear this week - w/e 12 January

Every day we play you a track that has just grabbed our attention. As soon as we hear it, we send it into the digital ether for you all to enjoy. Sometimes it's an exclusive, sometimes it's a favourite artist and, at other times, it'll be someone brand new. Here's this week's choice selection. Just click on the links to see the full Just Added playlist:

Riton x Kah-Lo - Fake I.D
We launched the week with a brilliant banger from Riton (pronounced Reet-on), AKA Newcastle-born DJ and producer Henry Smithson, and Nigerian singer Kah-Lo. Last time they paired up, a Grammy nomination followed - for Rinse & Repeat, the 2015 track whose title we took literally And we weren’t the only ones, because that floor filler has now clocked up over 47 million streams. Our days of needing to prove our age may be largely behind us, but we’re still enjoying Kah-Lo’s lyrics, which include a diss to dudes that don’t dance, as well as a nod to The Handclapping Song, via the usual three, six, nine, wine rhyme, and now a “one, two, three: take a Fake I.D.”

David Byrne – Everybody’s Coming To My House
This Brian Eno co-write appeared late on Monday, to announce David’s next solo record, and sounds as great as you’d hope: a bit saxy, a bit disco, with great percussion and those distinctive vocals (“We’re only tourists in this life. Only tourists but the view is nice”). After Björk’s Utopian contemplation at the end of 2017, the former Talking Heads frontman’s turned his focus stateside with LP American Utopia. It’s out on the 9th March and Byrne’s said: “the songs are sincere - the title is not ironic. The title refers not to a specific utopia, but rather to our longing, frustration, aspirations, fears, and hopes regarding what could be possible, what else is possible.” He’s coming to our house (6 Music HQ) at the end of the month, when we’ll quiz him some more.

Gaz Coombes - Deep Pockets
We marked midweek with the very welcome return of the Supergrass-turned-solo-artist Gaz Coombes, who picked up a Mercury nomination for his last album Matador (in 2015). Deep Pockets describes a surreal night-time car journey but the driving beat put us more in the mood for a jog, and this track’s gone straight onto the New Year’s running playlist. It’s the lead single for World’s Strongest Man, which is due out in May, and has been inspired “variously by Grayson Perry’s the Descent of Man, Frank Ocean’s ‘Blonde’, Californian weed, British woodlands, unchecked masculinity, Neu! and hip hop”.

Karen O feat. Michael Kiwanuka - Yo! My Saint
The stylish Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ frontwoman has teamed up with director Ana Lily Amirpour to create a five minute film for a fashion campaign. “For the music, I immediately wanted to do melodramatic and romantic and with lots of yearning and high stake,” Karen says, and she has nailed that brief. Her vocals flit between dreamy and bluesy and pair beautifully with Michael’s deep baritone, which sets the dramatic tone from the off. The “yo!” is for “you” but we kind of like going with a dramatic exclamation in the title. This track’s earned it.

U.S. Girls – Pearly Gates
Meg Remy returns with a song which, on the surface, is about a woman who wishes to seduce St Peter to secure entry to the heavenly realm but was actually inspired by a cautionary tale about unprotected sex. It’s the third taste of Meg’s upcoming album, In A Poem Unlimited, which is due out next month. The castanet clicks and closing harmonies (not to mention the religious iconography in the video) bring Madonna to mind. Hell (or, should we say, Heaven) yeah!

You can hear all the tracks via the Just Added Playlist

Discover more new music with 6 Music Recommends

<<Last month