Laji George just dropped his new single, "This Is My World," and it hits like a sudden, heavy rainstorm cracking open a stifling afternoon. The New York City-based singer-songwriter, usually found commanding massive festival stages as the frontman for Pseutopia, strips away the grand sheen here to deliver something thrillingly unpolished. https://open.spotify.com/track/32zzsQsR13YQhzjbTA6wid There is absolutely no modern digital gloss suffocating this alt-rock power ballad. Instead, we...

Violet Love has offered up an EP titled "Destined to Fail," and it arrives less like a prediction and more like a pre-existing condition, a medical chart for a soul that’s been diagnosed with itself. The DIY recording quality doesn’t feel lo-fi for aesthetics; it feels necessary, like these songs could only have been born in a sealed-off room where the air was getting...