With Q4 well underway on the release calendar, there are just a few months left in 2015 for artists to step in as contenders for Album of The Year consideration. With a strong run of releases already dropping some serious fire on wax this year, we’re looking forward to seeing if Kanye, Sia, Boots, Deftness, Puscifer and others can up the ante with their upcoming releases. Check out ten upcoming album releases to close out the year in our 2015 Fall Album Release Guide.
Kanye West, Swish – TBA
We’re now two-plus years past the dark-industrial protest album that was Yeezus, and Kanye West’s promise of a massive new album has yet to materialize – it’s been a year since the egomaniac pulled Seth Rogen into the back of a van and rapped his entire new record for the director/star of The Interview, and the same since G.O.O.D Music signee Malik Yusef promised that Kanye has “20 finished songs”.
But the signs are promising, from the list of collaborators – including Paul McCartney, Rihanna, Sia, Travis $cott, Ty Dolla $ign, Hudson Mohawke, and Mike Dean – to the contrasting teaser singles — “Only One,” a ballad sung from the perspective of West’s late mother to him, “FourFiveSeconds” with Rihanna and McCartney, and “All Day,” featuring Theophilus London, Allan Kingdom and McCartney.
The man whose motto is “my life is dope and I do dope shit” needs to drop that dope shit soon.
YACHT, I Thought the Future Would Be Cooler – October 16
Get out your white thigh-high pleather boots, YACHT are back. The L.A.-via-Portland outfit have slated a return with I Thought the Future Would Be Cooler, an 11 track endeavor marking YACHT’s sixth effort to date – following 2011’s well-received Shangri-La. The album has thus far been promoted in unconventional means, through fax machines and other odd novelties. So it makes an abstract kind of sense that the album is a disco dance party of the future, with poetic-robot vocals.
Sia, This Is Acting – TBA
Sia’s new album is a collection of songs intended for other artists, but what’s the holdup? It’s been finished since February, and is said to be far more pop driven than her previous works. She also has another album completed as well. This Is Acting includes new single “Alive”, a co-write with Tobias Jesso Jr. and Adele, along with songs written for Beyoncé and Rihanna. Among the smash hits she’s penned for her peers are Rihanna’s “Diamonds,” Britney Spears’ “Perfume,” Ne-Yo’s “Let Me Love You,” and Beyonce’s “Pretty Hurts,” plus tracks for Kelly Clarkson, Pitbull, Shakira, Jessie J, and Katy Perry. She also worked with Kanye West on the recently-unveiled track “Wolves” for his next album.
Kurt Cobain, Montage of Heck Soundtrack – November 6
An album of unreleased Kurt Cobain solo tracks is the latest in the diminishing stream wrung from the archives of the late Nirvana frontman. Very little of what we’ve heard so far from the companion soundtrack to Brett Morgen’s documentary qualifies as ready-for-release, but that’s what you get with home demos never intended for public consumption. The record will feature a previously unheard 12-minute acoustic song, a comedy sketch and nearly 90 minutes of music – but to casual fans, the collection is likely to be completely unlistenable – as evidenced above.
Read our review of the film, as well as our interview with Morgen on the impact of the project.
In an interview with Billboard, Morgen said the album will include “audio montages that Kurt Cobain created” such as interludes and “a sketch comedy routine featuring Kurt voicing all of the characters.” As for the demos, he adds, those run the gamut “from thrash to ragtime and everything in between” while remaining “familiar to Nirvana fans.”
BOOTS, Aquaria – November 13th
The man behind the sounds of Beyoncé’s eponymous album back in 2013, expanded his palette with FKA twigs on her M3LL155X project, but now Boots is stepping into his own limelight with his first solo project, Aquaria. The indie slow jam “Mercy” and R&B gravity of “Dreams” featuring Beyoncé guarantees that this one isn’t going to fit into conventional boxes, but it’s the title track featuring Deradoorian that’s got us most excited. Hell, the thing is co-produced by El-P and Carla Azar of Autolux – that alone is worth the price of admission.
Baroness, Purple – December 18
Purple is Baroness’ first album since a devastating tour bus accident that disrupted half the lineup, and their followup to the tremendous Yellow and Green. It’s being released on the band’s newly founded label, Abraxan Hymns. We saw their triumphant return at Bonnaroo 2013, after a devastating bus crash put bassist Matt Maggioni and drummer Allen Blickle out of commission. With bassist Nick Jost and drummer Sebastian Thomson in their place, the current lineup is no less badass – as evidenced by new song “Chlorine & Wine” (above).
Puscifer, Money Shot – October 30
Tool/A Perfect Circle frontman Maynard James Keenan has fired up the Puscifer machine once again for Money Shot, the band’s first album in four years and by far its most focused & personal. There’s no doubt that we’ll get a salty taste of that trademark raunchy humor the outfit has served as Keenan’s outlet for in the past, but the singer’s hyperintellectual musings don’t lend themselves to the tongue-in-cheek approach for very long. Thankfully, this record appears to be the long-awaited intersection where the goof of “Cuntry Boner” and the emotive weight of “Potions” meet and play to each other’s strengths.
The album was orchestrated with co-producer–multi-instrumentalist Mat Mitchell and singer Carina Round over a three-year period — with help from a cast of musicians that includes keyboardist Juliette Commagere, Maynard’s son, Devo Keenan, on cello, and drummers Tim Alexander (Primus), Jon Theodore (Queens of the Stone Age) and Jeff Friedl (A Perfect Circle).
EL VY, Return To The Moon – October 30
El VY is a new project featuring Matt Berninger, the vocalist of The National, and Brent Knopf from Menomena. Their collaborative LP under the alias EL VY will see a full release in October. Berninger’s darkly funny, lyrical storytelling and his immediately identifiable sense of melody offset by Knopf’s playful, architectural arrangements and inventive production. Knopf explains, “I never worried about sending Matt something unfinished. He’s able to imagine where it can go. He can grab the four bars that will become the core of the track and develop them into something amazing.” The name is “pronounced like a plural of Elvis; rhymes with ‘hell pie,'” according to a press release. That’s weird, but the downtempo title track jam is strong, and we’re curious to hear what comes next from the new project.
Deftness, TBA – TBA
The follow-up to 2012’s tremendous dark-beauty album Koi No Yokan is finished and ready to fire, with just a few final-prep details before release. This one is a little different from its predecessor, however, Frontman Chino Moreno said: “Every time we make a record, our main focus, with anything, is to try different things, and try things maybe outside our comfort zone a little bit. But this time, this record, one thing that’s really cool, sonically, is that our bass player is really not so much playing… He does play bass on some of the record, but a lot of the record he plays a Bass VI, which is a six-string bass, which is more like a baritone guitar, sort of. So the way his frequency works with my guitar frequency and Stephen’s guitar frequency, it kind of gives it a different sound.”
According to Moreno, sixteen songs were written for the new CD, which was once again produced by Matt Hyde (Slayer, Children of Bodom). The effort will feature a guest appearance by Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains as well.
Tool, TBA – TBA
Just kidding. We’re never getting this goddamned album.
