Every Monday, 88Nine music director Erin Wolf shares a sonic gem she found using her nearly 20 years of new-music exploration experience. You can hear all her discoveries at 2 p.m. every Sunday on What’s All This: Adventures in New Music.
U.K. rockers Pulp just turned out their first single in a long time. And it’s really good.
“Spike Island” carries euphoric appeal with soaring guitar and is overall pretty epic, promising great things for all Pulp fans in the days ahead. One of those days (June 6, to be precise) will bring the band’s first album in nearly a quarter-century: More, which feels like an appropriate and hopeful title for Pulp fans everywhere hoping for more of that big, Britpop sound with anthemic choruses, wry humor and bleeding-heart sentimentality.
With “Spike Island” as the seemingly clear leader, the new record produced by Simian Mobile Disco and Last Shadow Puppets member James Ford (who’s worked with quintessential Brit bands like Arctic Monkeys, Blur and Pet Shop Boys) is sounding like something special and fitting to resuscitate our love for Jarvis Cocker and Co.
Hear Pulp’s “Spike Island” on the latest episode of What’s All This using the player at the top of the page and in rotation on 88Nine starting this week. Then set a reminder to tune in at 2 p.m. every Sunday for another collection of fresh tracks on What’s All This: Adventures in New Music.
Best new indie music this week
- Pulp, "Spike Island"
- tUnE-yArDs, "Under Rats"
- Sorry, "Jetplane"
- Stereolab, "Aerial Troubles"
- Softie, "Kiss Kiss Kiss"
- Lifeguard, "It Will Get Worse"
- Hotline TNT, "Julia's War"
- Casper Skulls, "Spindletop"
- Spacey Jane, "Through My Teeth"
- Frankie Cosmos, "Vanity"
- Juan Wauters, "If It's Not Luv"
- Cold Specks, "How It Feels"
