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Music

Staff Picks and Good Shit for the Week of February 27

Here's what the Noisey editors were listening to this week while glued to The Great Llama Chase of 2015.

This was a rough week here at Noisey. Like your office, we were also sucked into the internet pummeling of memes du jour. Llamas and dr*sses and a bunch of other stuff overshadowing the passing of Mr. Spock. But we are woke enough to know that these were all just false flags for something that the Illuminati doesn't want us to know about it. Here's what we were listening to this week while staying as woke as possible despite the fact that the dress is fucking blue.

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NicX - "MERK Remix" f/ Rome Fortune & Jazz Cartier

I didn't know who NicX was before I heard this song and I only clicked play because I knew that Jazz Cartier and Rome Fortune are popular internet rappers. But boy am I happy I did, because I haven't been able to stop screaming "merk" at random pedestrians in the 48 hours since it's come out (I've had the cops called on me twice). I still haven't decided who had the best verse on this song, but right now it's between NicX and Jazz Cartier. NicX does a great job of getting into the song and using his voice as an instrument, plus he shouts out Peja Stojakovic, but Jazz Cartier starts his verse by saying he's "in a hotel with eight white bitches / exercising my white privilege" which is a lyric so filthy, I would tweet it all the time if it didn't make me look like an even bigger asshole.

Slava Pastuk, Noisey Canada Editor
Slava Pastuk on Noisey | Slava Pastuk on Twitter


Torpor - "From This Time"

I listened to this album at least three times yesterday, and will probably listen to it three more times today. Brighton, UK four-piece Torpor is a sludgy doom band, sure, but they're far from content to coast along on recycled Iron Monkey riffs; rather, they channel genre-twisting sadists like Khanate, the Melvins, and Thorr's Hammer, dredging up all manner of noisy distorted menace in the process. Crank this up to 11 if you're having a shitty day, or a shitty week, or a shitty life.

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Kim Kelly, Contributing Editor
Kim on Noisey I Kim on Twitter

Oh Wonder - "Lose It"

Thanks to the crew over at i.D the only thing I've been about this week is London duo Oh Wonder. The vibe is very Wet, but like the British incarnation of, with added sax and boy-girl vocals that mirror each other in plush synergy. For fans of Jesse Ware and Janet J circa "Got Til It's Gone." Pretty much perfect.

Kim Taylor Bennett, Style Editor
Kim on Noisey | Kim on Twitter


Future - "Codeine Crazy"

I discussed this in a

staff pick post a couple weeks ago

because all I listen to anymore is Future, but Future is in a really interesting career phase right now. He was (probably fairly) maligned and found himself unable to land a hit, and his response was two very dark, occasionally paint-by-numbers and occasionally great mixtapes that delve into the psyche of someone with irrepressible instincts for making great rap songs who also appears to be on the edge of a complete drug-fueled collapse. I'd completely overlooked

Monster

closer "Codeine Crazy" until the video came out earlier this week, but now I can't stop listening to it or thinking about it. It's Future at his best as a rapper, hopping from smart, multilayered punchlines to grandiose boasts to completely disarming moments of emotional honesty. It's six minutes and four verses long. The hook is a loopy lament pushed through Auto-Tune to a point that it sounds completely surreal. Everything I have ever loved about Future is in this song. He says things in ways that I've never heard, like when the word "children" just melts away in his mouth. He brags about taking a girl to Chipotle and buying a $60,000 watch in the same line. He tells us over and over that he's "celebrating like the championship." Oh, and he takes a fucking bazooka of realness and shoots it through everything, dropping the impossibly sad line "I'm an addict and I can't even hide it" in the final verse. Is Future actually losing himself to addiction? It would be unfair to speculate too much. But the music he's making is great and heartbreaking and worth all your attention.

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Kyle Kramer, Editor

Kyle on

Noisey

| Kyle on

Twitter


Taylor Swift/Kanye West - "We Are Never Ever Coming Home Again"

The only thing that I, Eric Sundermann, love more than Taylor Swift is Kanye West. Here, a brave internet hero combines—or in music parlance, "mashes up" my two favorite things. I, Eric Sundermann, would let Taylor Swift peg me in the butt.

Eric Sundermann, Managing Editor
Eric on Noisey | Eric on Twitter


Pale Angels - "If Only You're Gone"

Pale Angels, you may be young but I definitely love you. You sound like Dinosaur Jr, Husker Du, Replacements, and 100 bands that I worshipped growing up, and you aren't that far off from The Men considering that Ben Greenberg worked on the record. So what if Mikey Erg has moved on from the band? With this track, you sound no worse for wear.

Fred Pessaro, Editor-in-Chief

Fred on

Noisey

| Fred on

Twitter


Humpback Whale feat. Leonard Nimoy - "Qeepeg and I / The Water Is Wide"

Earlier today, Leonard Nimoy died. I wrote a bit about it here, but I cannot stress enough the absolute bizarreness of Nimoy's musical output. He recorded a bunch of objectively insane albums, some literally as Mr. Spock, and also narrated this album of whale songs. Listen to it, and wonder at the gravitas with which Nimoy infuses a song featuring whale sounds and readings from Moby Dick. You will be missed, Leonard. Live long and prosper.

Drew Millard, Features Editor
Drew on Noisey | Drew on Twitter

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Los Crudos – “Asesinos”

Holy crap, this band comes to the East Coast at the end of March. I have approximately four weeks to learn Spanish. Bueno.

Dan Ozzi, Editor
Dan on Noisey | Dan on Twitter