The final round of new releases for July. Info and links for the ones you want to know about most below, plus some other ones you may not have heard of (but should know), with audio & video for your listening and viewing pleasure. Click here to check out releases that dropped over the past few months.
Alela Diane, About Farewell (Rusted Blue)
Folks songstress Alela Diane presents her new record issued on her own label, which deals most directly with her recent divorce while looking back at her entire last decade of relationships, and is delivered in a stripped-down format built around her voice and simple guitar arrangements. Video for the title track below.
AlunaGeorge, Body Music (Vagrant)
Backstreet Boys, In A World Like This (K-BAHN/BMG)
Chimaira, Crown of Phantoms (eOne)
Earl Sweatshirt, Doris (Columbia)
Obi Fernandez, Confessions, Waves and the Garden State Obi Fernandez (Paper + Plastick)
Five Finger Death Punch, The Wrong Side of Heaven and the Righteous Side of Hell Volume 1 (Prospect Park/Universal)
Fortune Howl, Earthbound (Relief In Abstract)
Vince Gill&Paul Franklin, Bakersfield (MCA Nashville)
Buddy Guy, Rhythm & Blues (RCA)
Heaven, Telepathic Love (Goodnight Records)
Joan of Arc, Testimonium Songs (Polyvinyl)
Russell Howard, City Heart + (Rock Ridge Music)
Ethan Johns, If Not Now Then When? (Three Crows Records)
The U.S. release of the full-length debut album by Johns, a British producer, engineer songwriter and multi-instrumentalist who's worked with the likes of Ryan Adams, Ray LaMontagne, Tom Jones, Rufus Wainwright, Crowded House, and Crosby, Stills and Nash, among others. Music video for "Don't Reach Too Far" after the jump along with the rest of this week's releases...
The Mallard, Finding Meaning In Deference (Castle Face Records)
Michael Franti & Spearhead, All People (Capitol)
Moreland & Arbuckle, 7 Cities (Telarc)
Harry Nilsson, The RCA Albums Collections (RCA/Legacy)
The legendary singer-songwriter finally gets his due in a new 17-CD deluxe box set ranging from classic covers he made his own (like Badfinger's "Without You," Fred Neil's “Everybody’s Talkin’” from Midnight Cowboy) to hits we all know and love (“Coconut”) and loads more.
Robin Nolan, Gypsy Blue (H.O.T. Records Ltd)
Rainbow Chan, Long Vacation (Silo Arts & Records)
Sydney solo artist and producer Rainbow Chan is a storyteller who makes glo-fi masterpieces by mixing electronic and acoustic textures. She loops sounds from music-boxes, thumb-pianos and vintage toys sourced from antique fairs, adds finger-picked guitar, 8-bit keyboards, distorted beats and glockenspiels, and ends up with an appealing idiosyncratic sound. Her latest is described as "a clever and cheeky love affair, flirting with 90's RnB, videogame soundtracks and oriental folk ..." Listen to the title track below.
Raw Geronimo, Dream Fever (Neurotic Yell)
Soft Swells, Lifeboats EP (Modern Outsider)
Tech N9ne, Something Else (Self-Release)
These Animals, Pages (Self-Release)
Robin Thicke, Blurred Lines (Star Trak / Interscope)
The album that spawned the sticky hit of the same name featuring Thicke (son of Growing Pains Alan) with Pharrell and T.I. — the song you've probably heard at least 1,000 times by now — finally drops. Check out his second single with Kendrick Lamar (yes, you read right), "Give It 2 U" below.