Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.
Ariana Grande featuring Justin Bieber, ‘Stuck With U’
Riskless and beautiful, the first collaboration between Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber is a fluttering prom-core ballad about the resilience of love, even when things get a little messy. Grande and Bieber are radically different singers, but they find common ground here, Bieber’s percussive patterns shimmying in and around Grande’s mountainous howls. For a moment in which every choice feels tenuous, this song exudes a slow, legible certitude. (Proceeds benefit the First Responders Children’s Foundation.) JON CARAMANICA
Bob Dylan, ‘False Prophet’
The songs Bob Dylan has been surprise-releasing every few weeks are starting to add up. He has tied “False Prophet,” the latest one, to the announcement of an album due in June: “Rough and Rowdy Ways.” As in his April 16 song, “I Contain Multitudes,” his band sets up a vamp and Dylan talk-sings his way through a proud self-assessment that mixes biblical, mystical and literary allusions with bits of rock ’n’ roll lore. He rasps, “I ain’t no false prophet, I just know what I know/I go where only the lonely can go.” This time, the vamp is a slouchy blues shuffle and the lyrics are pointed. Dylan is a longtime expert in toggling between the apocalyptic and the individual: “I searched the world over for the Holy Grail/I sing songs of love, I sing songs of betrayal.” What’s startling is that after decades of shrugging off that specific role, he’s willing to play the prophet. JON PARELES
Ian Isiah, ‘N.U.T.S’
The self-love strut “N.U.T.S” is a pitch-perfect revisiting of the issues-soul of the 1970s. Isiah has a lithe, poignant, carefully sweet voice, and he sings about how important it is to allow others to see the real you over a Chromeo production full of prideful strings, weepy sax and warm-bath keys. CARAMANICA
Peter Manos, ‘Tennessee’
Peter Manos is from Texas, but “Tennessee” is no country song. It’s an electronic lament, Auto-Tuned and steeped in James Blake and Frank Ocean; it also hints at the Beatles’ chromatic chord progressions. The singer is bereft that “You don’t answer my calls,” and even as programmed arpeggios swell to support him, he’s left uncomprehending and alone, pure male angst: “How could I understand?” he wonders. PARELES
Keith Jarrett, ‘Answer Me’
Don’t expect a livestream concert from Keith Jarrett any time soon. If this pre-eminent pianist were of that mind, he’d probably have done one long ago. As Nate Chinen wrote in 2013, “It’s hard to think of a major jazz figure who has been as cloistered as Mr. Jarrett, while remaining a vital force.” He hardly gives interviews and lives on a sprawling property in northwest New Jersey, touring only occasionally. His albums in recent years have consisted of archival recordings from years-old concerts. On the occasion of Jarrett’s 75th birthday on Friday, ECM Records has released a single track from a 2016 performance in Budapest. “Answer Me” originated as a midcentury German pop song before becoming a hit for Nat King Cole. Unlike the version from last year’s live full-length, “Munich 2016,” Jarrett starts this performance with the bridge, a dolorous minor passage that in his hands sounds like lieder; before long he’s fallen into the gentle, ribboning symmetry of the main melody, from which he hardly strays. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO
Blake Mills, ‘Summer All Over’
Blake Mills has been a guitarist and producer for musicians as diverse as John Legend, Fiona Apple and Alabama Shakes. His new album, “Mutable Set,” is deliberately and startlingly restrained, though far from simple. “Summer All Over” has a waltzing pulse and a vocal just above a whisper; most of its backup is chords played on a creaky piano, but they are quietly bolstered by orchestral instruments. He’s sings about global warming with cleareyed, pragmatic details: “Looking for water, looking for shade/And there’s only sunblock and beer.” PARELES
Rhiannon Giddens featuring Sxip Shirey, ‘Just the Two of Us’
Rhiannon Giddens commemorates Bill Withers, who died in April, with a fondly idiosyncratic version of “Just the Two of Us,” backed by the unlikely combination of harmonica, drums and the hoot of low brass (sousaphone and trombone). She hints at New Orleans, reggae and jazzy scat-singing as she proclaims one-on-one affection. PARELES
The Weeknd, ‘I’m a Virgin’
The Weeknd co-wrote the most recent episode of “American Dad,” and there’s a plotline that involves him confessing a dark secret to a fan trying to seduce him. He does so in song: “I’m a Virgin” functions well as both songcraft and self-parody. His voice is that familiar shrill exhale, and it’s chilling to hear it applied to such unlikely confessions: “Underneath the lies and the big talk, I’ve been waiting for a wife/Never watched porn, never did drugs, ’cause I’m terrified.” CARAMANICA
Jamie xx, ‘I Don’t Know’
The producer Jamie xx whips up phantom drumlines, laced with sirens and warped vocals, working through beats that shift and accelerate but still haven’t peak before the track plays out. PARELES
Folie, ‘Cortisol’
Nerves not jangled enough lately? Try Folie, which shares the razor-wired bubble gum aesthetic of last year’s blitz-pop sensation, 100 gecs. “Cortisol” is full of concise, catchy little pop devices, from its bits of singsong melody to the thumping beat that arrives about midway through. But every one of those devices is tweaked to maximize irritation: pitched up, distorted, perforated with silences or followed by chemtrails of dissonance. And every so often the whole thing comes unsprung, only to regroup and leap ahead again. It’s not aggressive; it’s just having noisy fun. PARELES
Aaron Parks, ‘Solace’
What Aaron Parks has in common with Keith Jarrett — in addition to onetime status as a child prodigy, and a clarion touch at the piano — is his sometimes-dangerous belief in the primacy of precision. “Solace” starts with 70 seconds of quizzical, disarming solo piano, the occasional discolored harmony catching your ear. Then the members of his band Little Big arrive, and the music fastens down tightly around the shared melody. The querying feeling is basically gone: In its stead is a polished cohesion, the reassurance of something executed crisply and masterfully, almost without encumbrance. RUSSONELLO
Source: Music - nytimes.com
