Listen Tracks: Björk, Sorry, Blackstar Kids and more

‘Atopos’ is so much business-as-wonderfully-weird-as-usual for Björk that the only truly jarring aspect of this first tease of forthcoming album ‘Fossora’ – among a cacophony of bass clarinets and visuals featuring dancing mushrooms – is a rather strait-laced message. “Special thanks to… Squarespace for helping in creating special web sites to launch these audio-visual projects” Iceland’s most famous export there, hand in hand with every second podcast host. Facetiousness aside, it’s rather excellent. (Bella Martin)

While previous single ‘Let The Lights On’ gave us a hint of Sorry being - gasp! - happy, ‘Key To The City’ sees the North London outfit back to their good old wallowing ways. The track leans into their heavier side, gloomy guitar plucks and rising drums sparring as lead Asha Lorenz snarls “I know that you’re somewhere out there, out there, getting fucked in someone else’s bed”. The song swells with an ominous countdown, the band back to anticipating a doomed and dying love. (Mia Smith)

Biig Piig is on fire. She always manages to make her tracks sound sunny, but now she’s setting her music fully alight. Liquid-y and bubbling, ‘Kerosene’ sees her revelling in the last dregs of summer. The song throbs with sweaty tension, smirking whispers of ‘I want you tonight’ pulsating with an effortless swagger. There’s also sighs of ‘oh daddy’ that pierce the hook - ‘Kerosene’ is silky and sultry, our final hot girl summer anthem of the year. (Mia Smith)

Placebo have covered a plethora of ’80s classics in their time, most famously Kate Bush’s ‘Running Up That Hill’, but this reinterpretation of Tears For Fears’ 1984 hit is their most urgent cover to date. With its dystopic sounding fusion of metallic percussion, whirring synths and thrumming bass, it manages to feel stately and even grave as much as it feels defiant. While, stylistically, it could well be an offcut from the duo’s recent album ‘Never Let Me Go’, it still has the faint hallmarks of the era it came from. In a way, it’s a homage as much as a cover. (Emma Wilkes)

Live, Blackstarkids are a tour de force, the trio’s heady, rock-influenced hip hop following in the footsteps of the likes of the Fugees and Beastie Boys in equal parts (think riff-heavy, but with added silky vocals if the song suits). ‘Cyberkiss 2 U*’, the not-quite title track of the Missouri outfit’s upcoming project ‘CYBERKISS*’ is a much more subdued affair, however, taking the same kind of cues from turn-of-the-millennium UK garage as PinkPantheress, or Mura Masa in his latest guise to centre around a somewhat subdued chorus – courtesy of labelmate Beabadoobee – and slyly infectious beat. Less a banger than a mild toe-tapper, there’s 16 more where this came from, so that it’s enough to whet the appetite is enough. (Louisa Martin)

Tags: Björk, Listen, Features, Tracks