The follow-up to Julia Jacklin’s critically acclaimed 2016 debut Don’t Let the Kids Win, Crushing finds the Australian artist continually acknowledging what’s expected of her, then gracefully rejecting those expectations.Her second full-length album, Crushing embodies every possible meaning of its title word, and is formed from sheer intensity of feeling, an in-the-moment narrative of heartbreak and infatuation. Produced by Burke Reid (Courtney Barnett, Liam Finn) and recorded at The Grove Studios in Sydney, Crushing sets Jacklin’s understated defiance against a raw yet luminous sonic backdrop. (Polyvinyl Record Co)

›› Buy Album

Australian pscyhe-pop band Methyl Ethel release their remarkable new album Triage — written, produced and performed by lead singer Jake Webb. Recorded in Jake’s home studio, this is the third album for the band, following the universally acclaimed Oh Inhuman Spectacle and Everything is Forgotten. Triage marks a more reflective album for this surrealist outfit — a dark and obscured expression of life set to the backdrop of dream pop hooks.(4AD)

›› Buy Album

Stuffed & Ready follows Cherry Glazerr’s Secretly Canadian debut Apocalipstick, an album that sizzled with frontwoman Clementine Creevy’s confidence, vision and fiercely idiosyncratic personality. When Creevy began writing Stuffed & Ready, she found unexpected inspiration by turning inward. Her unblinking honesty attempts to reconcile confusion and anger in the current political climate. (Secretly Canadian)

›› Buy Album

The music Cleo Tucker and Harmony Tividad release as Girlpool occupies a transient space of constant evolution, and their new album What Chaos Is Imaginary is no exception — a collection of songs unlike any of the material from their acclaimed 2015 debut Before The World Was Big and 2017’s Powerplant. Think drum machines, synthesizers, new harmonies, huge guitars and at least one orchestral breakdown. (Anti- Records)

›› Buy Album

›› ISSUE Feature: Interview and performance by Girlpool

Showcaller is the first book exploring the work of emerging New York-based artist Talia Chetrit. It brings together a broad range of her work made between 1994 and 2018 and is linked to a retrospective museum exhibition at the Kölnischer Kunstverein in early 2018. The title Showcaller is a theatrical term which references the performative aspects of Chetrit’s work, the power dynamic between subject and photographer, and, ultimately, between the photographer and her audience. (MACK)

›› Buy Book

With rumors percolating for months on fansites, Reddit boards and Twitter, fans of Phoebe Bridgers and Conor Oberst got a huge treat last night when the pair dropped an entire album, Better Oblivion Community Center, essentially announcing their partnership for the first time. The pair had kept their plans under wraps for months as they wrote and recorded in Los Angeles in the summer and fall of 2018. Within an hour of the album’s surprise release, the band were performing—for the very first time—on network television, on the Late Show With Stephen Colbert. (Dead Oceans)

›› Buy Album

New York trio Sunflower Bean released their critically acclaimed sophomore album Twentytwo in Blue last year, earning year-end list nods from the likes of Paste, NME and more. Now the band is kicking off 2019 strong with the release of their new EP King Of The Dudes. The EP features lead single “Come For Me,” which marks the band’s Billboard BDS Chart debut, coming in at #37. The band explains, “This EP does not give a fuck. It’s reactionary, and a sharpened response to our times. Death, birth, aggression, addiction, and power…no holds barred.” (Mom + Pop)

›› Buy Album

›› ISSUE Feature: Interview & Fashion Shoot with Sunflower Bean.

After migrating to New York City from Uruguay and working in a factory, Juan Wauters turned to music to alleviate his boredom and loneliness. He eventually formed garage act the Beets with a friend from a community college art class, releasing two records on Brooklyn label Captured Tracks. Wauters went solo in 2014 with another two critically acclaimed records on the same label. Now he makes a departure from his almost completely English-sung recordings: his third solo album, La Onda de Juan Pablo (2019), is sung entirely in Spanish and recorded with local musicians throughout Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, Chile. Mexico and Puerto Rico. (Captured Tracks)

›› Buy Album