Stumpwork cover

Stumpwork

Released

The second album by this London band does something you don’t see much anymore, which is almost jettison everything from the very successful first album entirely. Florence Shaw is the deadpan poet, constantly adduced as the female Mark E. Smith, which is simply wrong (he says, furiously googling to discover whether or not he’s done just that). She simply doesn’t sing or do normal front person stuff, but she’s closer to Billie Eilish than Smith, though she’s not really either. She does not yell, but there’s enough weight and spit in the voice to keep her a few doors away from ASMR. Her worldview is sort of daily facts, minor complaints, big pleas. She has a lot of fun with the word “booze.”

Sasha Frere-Jones

Recommended by

Suggestions
Ballads cover

Ballads

Time is Away
Headful of Sugar cover

Headful of Sugar

Sunflower Bean
Moten cover

Moten

Gerald Cleaver, Brandon López, Fred Moten
Salad Days cover

Salad Days

Mac DeMarco
Pacer cover

Pacer

The Amps
Brothers cover

Brothers

The Black Keys
Cardinology cover

Cardinology

Ryan Adams & the Cardinals