The first song we heard from Tame Impala's Currents was a seven-minute-plus disco-prog opus that Daft Punk (real talk) wished they came up with. Leave it to psychedelic warrior Kevin Parker to flip the script again with the follow-up, "Cause I'm a Man," unleashing a buttery electro-R&B ballad complete with the glowing, candy-coated sine-wave effects that recently caused a friend to ask me, "How does this guy do this stuff, man?" Here's an even crazier realization: this is a major-label rock song in 2015. Say that three times in the mirror. Life is insane. — Larry Fitzmaurice
An impromptu DIY video featuring only the hottest tween stars (and a copy of Hunger Games, for good measure) propelled Carly Rae Jepsen to superstardom for a single summer three years ago. But now what? The breathy 29-year-old singer is back at it, preparing for the release of a new album. If this gooey, soft-lit slow jam that she co-wrote with Dev Hynes and Ariel Rechtshaid is any indication, it won't be about just one hit this time. — Zara Golden
The first lyric on Future's acclaimed 56 Nights is this bitch from Australian and I'm a alien. It's not the start of a verse, or a precursor to a hook that pops up later, just a detached stray thought—the kind of grammatical flub that happens when you try to say two different sentences in your head at once: in this case, "this bitch is Australian," and "this bitch from Australia." And we've all been there, right? This seriously might be the best project out this year so far, give Future all the awards, drop the boxset and take my money please. — Matthew Trammell
I remember talking to a friend after Aquarius, the debut full-length from angel-voiced Tinashe, dropped last year. "You know how hard it is to make an R&B record like this?" he gushed. "Everyone's been trying. And Tinashe did it." I mostly agreed with him then, but I think the rest of the universe is finally catching up. Between the just-experimental-enough haze of her new mixtape—and now the slick, expertly choreographed video for Cashmere Cat and Stargate-produced Aquarius highlight "All Hands on Deck," she's turning about a million new heads. Whether you've been a stan or Kanye brought you there, you're in the right place. — Patrick D. McDermott
Sharon Van Etten is one of the best singer-songwriters working because of her way of taking a simple element—a melody, a turn of phrase—and subtly expanding on it until it feels all-encompassing, like a tornado about to engulf your home. "Your Love Is Killing Me," from last year's incredible Are We There, was the kind of emotional steamroller that emphasized this quality of hers so well, a song so massive that lesser artists would wither after unleashing it, and this new one from her forthcoming EP is basically "Your Love" in miniature, a pleading statement repeated and enlarged until it becomes the only thing you think about. — Larry Fitzmaurice
A.L.L.A is getting a lot of chatter for being a left turn for, but "M's" gave me a sigh of relief, personally, because it sounds exactly like what I want and expect from Rocky right now. Specifically: hollow, echoing production from Honorable C-Note and Mike Dean with Rocky's cadence resting on it, sometimes riding the beat as hard as he does on excellent singles like "Multiply" and "Lord Pretty Flacko Jodye II." — Larry Fitzmaurice
I've been checking in with UK producer Throwing Snow for nearly a half-decade now, but "Lumen" is the tune that has really bowled me over—and I'm not alone, as it dropped on Jamie xx and Four Tet's incredible Essential Mix last week. With complicated percussion and tart melodic lines, "Lumen" actually sounds like it'd fit perfectly on either artist's album. More importantly, it represents Throwing Snow stepping into his own. — Larry Fitzmaurice
Hey, I like this Tyler, the Creator song! The statement warrants an exclamation point because I personally wasn't really feeling his last record, Wolf—to the point where I can't name a single song from it off the top of my head. This Cherry Bomb cut is very pretty though, kind of reminds me of what would happen if Pharrell had produced The Love Below. I imagine Tyler would love that comparison. — Larry Fitzmaurice
If you haven't read it, our new profile on LA's WEDIDIT crew is essential: Emilie Freidlander's primer on the gold-soaked days and weird af nights that define bohemian life on the left coast. It reads like the kind of scene you could stumble into and never grow out of, and it looks like Tory Lanez is fitting right in. The ease of his latest RL Grime collab "In For It" suggests these guys could make bangers like this between naps, A1 freak music to make morning commutes feel that much sweatier. — Matthew Trammell
Post-James Blake, there are a thousand songs that sound like smooth, velvety, lounge-club electro-pop fare—and "Coastal Love," from English duo Honne, certainly keeps the trend going. But songs like "Coastal Love" stick out simply because they sound good, the kind of soothing midtempo pulser that you'd want to hear on a 3AM cab ride after a long night out. — Larry Fitzmaurice
As a completely areligious person, sometimes I need my music to take me to church. That's exactly what Towkio's "Heavenly Only Knows," featuring Chance the Rapper and Eryn Allen Kayne, has been doing. Lido brings together triumphant piano, soul claps, a choral hook, and two earnest-sounding verses that build progressively; by the end of his contribution, Chance even sounds a bit like he's speaking in tongues. The track recalls the heyday of Kanye's mid-aughts John Legend collaborations, and that's a wonderful thing. — Rawiya Kameir
On the Jahlil Beats-produced "Oh My," lisped Angeleno rapper Boogie paints the picture of his backstory in a succinct three words: Before I started rapping, if you niggas heard my story bet you'd be like, oh my goodness! Our sources tell us that this song has been popping off locally in Compton and Long Beach, and the official video dropped this week and gave it a broader push. Start brainstorming your oh my goodness Vines now. —Zara Golden