Essential Tracks This Week: Tunde Adebimpe, Bartees Strange, and more

We took a brief moment out of our busy schedule listening to the new album by The Cure to bring you a roundup of five of the week’s best new songs. There was a brief moment where we nearly said “fuck it” and made this week’s column five selections from Songs of a Lost World though it’s not like we won’t have more to say about this soon enough. So we just went with one of the deeper cuts, along with new music from Tunde Adebimpe, Cloakroom and more. Turn up this week’s best new songs.

Tunde Adebimpe – “Magnetic”

TV on the Radio singer Tunde Adebimpe has been making a transition into acting, appearing in this year’s Twisters, but in 2025 he’ll return to music with the release of his solo debut. Newly signed to Sub Pop, he’s shared his new single “Magnetic,” a pulsing, buzzing, high-energy track that recalls the thrilling future-post-punk sounds of his famed band on their first couple of albums—which is fitting since Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes turns 20 this year. “Magnetic” is all forward momentum while Adebimpe’s voice sounds as mesmerizing as ever. It’s a promising sign of good things to come.

Out now via Sub Pop

Bartees Strange – “Too Much”

Two years after the excellent Farm to Table, singer/songwriter Bartees Strange is preparing for his third album to arrive in 2025. And “Too Much,” an early taste of that record, leans heavy on Strange’s earthier folk rock sensibility, but with a spectacular array of fuzzed-out guitar leads and gorgeous vocals (never let it go unspoken that dude can sing). But shape-shifting artist that he is, he transitions seamlessly into a rap-sing cadence in the song’s second half, by which point it seems like he’s just showing off. And why shouldn’t he, when he pulls it off this well?

From Horror, out February 14 via 4AD

Full of Hell & Andrew Nolan – “Sphere of Saturn” (feat. Justin Broadrick)

Full of Hell have been on a collaborative streak over the past couple years, having made records with both Primitive Man and Nothing. And now they’re preparing to release another new collaborative album with industrial artist Andrew Nolan. But what puts “Sphere of Saturn” over the top is the presence of Godflesh and Jesu’s Justin Broadrick, which turns “Sphere of Saturn” into a haunted and brooding ambient industrial metal dirge standout. In fact, there’s more eerie brooding than outright pummeling here, which makes it all the more fascinating, the barest specter of menace rather than an outright threat.

From Scraping the Divine, out November 15 via Closed Casket Activities

Cloakroom – “Unbelonging”

Midwest trio Cloakroom announced their signing to Closed Casket Activities this week, and that announcement arrived with a brand new single that leans away from their heavy shoegaze sound toward more of a shimmering post-punk. They cited the influence of the Psychedelic Furs on a statement they made with the release of “Unbelonging,” which isn’t hard to hear in the song’s dreamy and melodic new wave hooks. Cloakroom have gradually been exploring more immediate and upbeat pop sounds, and while the heavy grunge element is definitely still here, it’s fun to hear them push their evolution ever farther forward.

Out now via Closed Casket Activities

The Cure – “Endsong”

The Cure know how to wrap up an album. They know how to start one and fill the middle with great songs, too, but there’s a lot of outstanding closing tracks in their catalog, and “Endsong” maintains that tradition with a lengthy, slowly expanding piece of gothic majesty, growing from “Plainsong”-like ethereal wonder into a heaviness that they’ve achieved before on career highlights such as “Prayers for Rain” and “Watching Me Fall.” “Endsong” likewise recalls the hypnotic gloom of another album closer, The Head on the Door‘s “Sinking,” but with its own richly intoxicating atmosphere. Yep, they’ve done it again.