Billboard’s Friday Music Information serves as a useful information to this Friday’s most important releases — the important thing music that everybody will probably be speaking about as we speak, and that will probably be dominating playlists this weekend and past.
This week (July 28), Travis Scott takes listeners to Utopia, Submit Malone introduces his followers to Austin, and Offset and Cardi B brush off the haters (with a film star’s assist). Take a look at all of this week’s picks beneath:
Travis Scott, Utopia
No pyramids, no drawback: Even with its much-hyped premiere occasion in Egypt delayed till a date TBD, Travis Scott nonetheless dropped his long-awaited Utopia — 5 years after his 2018 blockbuster Astroworld — this Friday at midnight. Like Astroworld, the album is a winding journey by means of Scott’s sonic universe, with such A-list visitors as The Weeknd, 21 Savage, Future and naturally his outdated “Sicko Mode” collaborator Drake — although you’ll have to really take heed to know that they’re on there, because the streaming tracklist is as soon as once more function spoiler-free. Probably the most thrilling cameo this time round: fellow H-City native Beyoncé, detouring from the Renaissance Tour to Utopia, together with her first-ever look on a Travis Scott album.
Submit Malone, Austin
Guitar Posty was promised, and Guitar Posty was (largely) delivered. Which isn’t to say that Austin lastly options Submit Malone dwelling out his Kurt Cobain fantasies in full — you most likely wouldn’t even fairly name it a rock album, extra only a pop album with an influence ballad or two, a disco jam (!!) and an excellent quantity of six string over all of it. Some are enjoyable, some are despairing, some someplace in between, however all clearly extra by the person behind “Circles,” than the one behind “Rockstar” or “Congratulations.” It’s an pleasurable hear — and an attention-grabbing profession transfer for Submit, who skilled a little bit of a business downturn with final 12 months’s wrenchingly private Twelve Carat Toothache, and who has but to actually recapture the chart dominance of his late 2010s this decade.
Offset feat. Cardi B, “Jealousy”
Cardi B’s absurd run of scene-stealing options continues with an overdue solo collaborator — her personal husband, Offset. “Jealousy” doesn’t have a lot of a refrain or hook to talk of — it could simply get in the best way of the couple’s bars, as Offset insists “I’m Michael, I’m not no Jermaine” and Cardi attests, “B–ches don’t wanna go Birkin for Birkin/ B–ches ain’t acquired sufficient hits for a Verzuz/ B–ches be actin’ so completely different in particular person.” The music is helped by a pattern of Three 6 Mafia’s “Jealous Ass B–ch” and a music video that sees the duo paying tribute to the 2001 John Singleton traditional Child Boy, with unique star Taraji P. Henson even making a cameo.
Mitski, “Bug Like an Angel”
After 2022’s high five-debuting Billboard 200 hit album Laurel Hell, critics’ darling turned viral indie sensation Mitski is already scheduled for the follow-up LP, The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We, out in September. This week, we get the primary style: “Bug Like an Angel,” a Cowboy Junkies-like acoustic ballad with occasional jarring choral punctuations, and the form of poetic lyrical exhaustion followers have come to anticipate from her the previous half decade: “After I’m bent over wishin’ it was over/ Makin’ all number of vows I’ll by no means hold/ I Attempt to keep in mind the wrath of the satan/ Was additionally given him by God.” A 12 months and a half for the reason that final album? Already method too lengthy a wait.
Gucci Mane, “Woppenheimer”
By no means let it’s mentioned that Gucci Mane doesn’t give the folks what they need. A meme nostalgic for Guwop’s peak mixtape run went viral final weekend, theorizing that if we had been nonetheless in 2009, we’d have gotten a Woppenheimer venture pegged to the Christopher Nolan-directed field workplace smash. Immediately, La Flare says “honest sufficient” and does certainly launch a “Woppenheimer” — with the fan’s proposed cowl artwork and every thing — although solely a single moderately than a full mixtape. The narcotic entice banger certainly may have appeared on an Obama-era Gucci launch, as he raps on the hook, “Broke folks like bringin’ up the previous, I’m talkin’ lately/ I do know what I did for you, however what you probably did for me?” The ball is certainly again of their court docket.
Carly Rae Jepsen, The Loveliest Time
In 2022, she was having The Loneliest Time — however these days are over, and the Canadian pop favourite is again this week and apparently having a a lot nicer go of it. From the jazzy friskiness of “Something to Be With You” to the neon synth drama of “Kamikaze” to the Midnight Star-interpolating electro-pop of “Shy Boy,” Carly Rae Jepsen does certainly appear to be feeling unfastened and carefree, hopscotching from one sound to a different and usually holding the vibe constant all through. Followers can solely marvel what set may be finishing the trilogy in 2024: The Luckiest Time? The Looniest Time? The Languorousest Time?
