A sneak peek at “Say You Love Me,” provided exclusively to BuzzFeed.

Next week, newly wed Jessie Ware will release the video for her excellent new single "Say You Love Me," a soaring, acoustic ballad that reminds us of Whitney Houston and Michael Jackson.

But you don't have to wait until then to get a taste of what's to come. These behind-the-scenes photos, provided exclusively to BuzzFeed, give a sneak-peek at a darkly regal Jessie looking like the goddess of some fallen realm.

Jon Stone.

Jon Stone.

The "Say You Love Me" video was directed by music video newcomers Tell No One, a visual art collaboration between Luke White and Remi Weekes, which has been featured in the Guggenheim and the British Film Institute.

Jon Stone.

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A match made in heaven or Los Angeles.

It's been a quiet year for Kendrick Lamar, who's popped up only a handful of times while working on his highly anticipated follow-up to 2012 debut Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City — expected to be released in the fourth quarter.

AFP / Getty Images ROBYN BECK

But he just came out of hibernation to team up with experimental electronic producer, and fellow Los Angeles native, Flying Lotus, who's releasing his own new album You're Dead! In October. Hear the fruits of their collaboration, "Never Catch Me," below.

The frenetic, jazz-infused song is the first to be released from You're Dead!, which will also feature appearances by Herbie Hancock, Snoop Dogg, and FlyLo's frequent partner-in-crime, Thundercat.

From the looks of it, Flying Lotus, whose last LP, 2012's Until The Quiet Comes, cemented his status as one of American electronic music's most exuberant innovators, has really outdone himself. Watch a mind-bending trailer for You're Dead! below.

Out Oct. 7 via Warp.

Warp Records.

Meanwhile, Kendrick's sitting on his own new music like:

media.giphy.com

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“And YOU get U2! And YOU get U2!”

One of the few totally unexpected moments at Apple's big iPhone 6 and Apple Watch event today came from none other than U2.

Interscope.

The massively popular rock band, and longtime Apple affiliates, were expected to play the event. But they went much further than that by announcing a new album that would be available for free instantly.

Justin Sullivan / Getty Images

Songs of Innocence, U2's 13th album and first in five years, was automatically pushed to over 500 million iTunes accounts via the cloud. iTunes users can access the album for free just by searching their libraries.

"I do believe you have over half a billion subscribers to iTunes, so — could you get this to them?" Bono said to Cook from the keynote stage, after a performance of new single "The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)" that was somewhat less than awe-inspiring.

iTunes.

Then, to celebrate the release, Cook and Bono did this:

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The choreography-filled clip for “How We Be” premieres exclusively on BuzzFeed.

Sinkane, the exuberant international pop project of London-born Sudanese producer Ahmed Gallab, is known for blending African beats, funk, and soul into joyously kinetic concoctions.

City Slang/DFA

His new video, for effervescent single "How We Be," celebrates those moments when everything is going your way, the sun is shining, and you just want to move.

City Slang/DFA

To help capture the song's irrepressible groove, Gallab and director Nick Bentgen recruited Beacon's Finest Step Team and other dancers to take to the streets, rooftops, and baseball fields of New York and Boston with infectious choreography.

"I wanted to express the joy of listening to that song for the first time," said Bentgen. "Ahmed and I talked about making a dance portrait that plays around with time — moving backwards, forwards, at high speed, in slow motion. We wanted to fill the video with all kinds of movement."

City Slang/DFA.

"Ohhohhohhohhohh, we've got life right in the pocket," Gallab sings.

City Slang/DFA.

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Here are the songs that defined America from Sept. 1 to Sept. 8, presented in a new data map premiering this week from BuzzFeed and Spotify. A state’s “Signature Song” is not its most popular, but its most distinctive — that is to say, the one that residents of that state streamed proportionally the most as compared with the U.S. as a whole.

Chris Ritter / BuzzFeed

For the week ending Sept. 8, Minnesota and Mississippi showed a strong preference for tradition-bucking country singer Sam Hunt, sunny California and Florida danced to Tove Lo and Kiesza, respectively, Florida Georgia Line found a new border to cross in Kansas/Nebraska, and New York adopted breakout Parisian pop stars Lilly Wood and The Prick. Next Thursday, more distinctive songs from BuzzFeed and Spotify.

Alabama: Rae Sremmurd, "No Flex Zone"
Alaska: AWOLNATION, "Sail"
Arizona: Enrique Iglesias, "Bailando"
Arkansas: Sam Smith, "Stay With Me"
California: Tove Lo, "Habits (Stay High)"
Colorado: Arctic Monkeys, "Do I Wanna Know?"
Connecticut: Clean Bandit, "Rather Be (feat. Jess Glynne)"
Delaware: Bobby Shmurda, "Hot Boy"
District of Columbia: Ella Henderson, "Ghost"
Florida: Kiesza, "Hideaway"
Georgia: T.I., "About the Money"
Hawaii: Kat Dahlia, "Crazy"
Idaho: Imagine Dragons, "Radioactive"
Illinois: MKTO, "Classic"
Indiana: Luke Bryan, "Play It Again"
Iowa: Jake Owen, "Beachin'"
Kansas: Florida Georgia Line, "This Is How We Roll"
Kentucky: Jason Aldean, "Burnin' It Down"
Louisiana: Schoolboy Q, "Studio"
Maine: KONGOS, "Come With Me Now"
Maryland: Nicki Minaj, "Anaconda"
Massachusetts: Mr. Probz, "Waves (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
Michigan: Eminem, "Guts Over Fear"
Minnesota: Sam Hunt, "Leave the Night On"
Mississippi: Sam Hunt, "Break Up in a Small Town"
Missouri: 5 Seconds Of Summer, "Amnesia"
Montana: Miranda Lambert, "Somethin' Bad (duet with Carrie Underwood)"
Nebraska: Florida Georgia Line, "Dirt"
Nevada: Magic!, "Rude"
New Hampshire: Kenny Chesney, "American Kids"
New Jersey: Ariana Grande, "Best Mistake"
New Mexico: Passenger, "Let Her Go"
New York: Lilly Wood and The Prick, "Prayer in C (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
North Carolina: Iggy Azalea, "Fancy"
North Dakota: Chase Rice, "Ready Set Roll"
Ohio: Shawn Mendes, "Life of the Party"
Oklahoma: Katy Perry, "Dark Horse"
Oregon: Lorde, "Royals"
Pennsylvania: 5 Seconds of Summer, "She Looks So Perfect"
Rhode Island: Tinashe, "2 On"
South Carolina: Rich Gang, "Lifestyle"
South Dakota: Dierks Bentley, "Drunk on a Plane"
Tennessee: Hozier, "Take Me to Church"
Texas: Lil Wayne, "Believe Me"
Utah: Ingrid Michaelson, "Girls Chase Boys"
Vermont: Milky Chance, "Stolen Dance"
Virginia: Fifth Harmony, "BO$$"
Washington: Capital Cities, "Safe and Sound"
West Virginia: Brantley Gilbert, "Bottoms Up"
Wisconsin: Jason Derulo, "Trumpets"
Wyoming: Lady Antebellum, "Bartender"

Listen to this week's distinctive songs on Spotify:

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Record executives are enamored with the loopy video service, which they view as part talent show, part viral distribution network. But how much is Vine stardom really worth?

Vine star-turned-major-label-recording-artist Shawn Mendes.

Robin Marchant / Getty Images

As president of Island Records and a veteran A&R man, David Massey would like to think that he can find talent anywhere. His ears are open and his senses battle-tested. In some instances, he says he can tell whether an artist will have a career in music within two minutes of meeting them.

Thirty years ago, Massey might have found the Next Big Thing at an open-mic night in a dimly lit dive. Ten years ago, he and his team were crawling Myspace for signs of life. But these days it's thriving digital platforms like YouTube, Soundcloud, and, most recently, Vine — the Twitter-owned social network comprised solely of looping, six-second, user-generated video clips — that Massey looks to as a hotbed for gifted young performers.

"It's a viable way to glance at someone and see if there's magic," Massey told BuzzFeed News of the bite-size video service. "In that short window of time you can get a real sense of their intelligence, their sense of humor, their vocal talent."

Since its launch in January 2013, Vine, which now draws more than 100 million visitors per month, has often felt more like a hyperactive talent show than a social network. Unlike the gaping maw of its bigger cousin YouTube, where videos can stretch the length of a feature film, or even the comparatively generous Instagram Video, which allows for 15-second clips, Vine's unsparing six-second rule seems to have attracted a disproportionate number of exceptionally creative strivers.

In six seconds, an aspiring filmmaker may not be able to tell much of a linear story, but they can use slick editing skills to turn ordinary household chores into treacherous sorcery. In the hands of Vine's many devoted comedians, the service's abbreviated videos become mini-master classes in setup and punchline. When it comes to musicians, the brief runtime affords only the tiniest taste of a song, but it can be more than enough to spotlight a winsome personality, telegenic face, or sticky hook — all important prerequisites for any would-be superstar.

"Getting across your charisma does not take long — even a photograph can tell you a lot about a person," said Massey. "You take a combination of a few great little Vine ideas and a face-to-face meeting with someone, and then you know."

Earlier this year, Island Records signed Vine phenomenon Shawn Mendes, a 15-year-old singer and guitarist with a Clark Kent jawline and a cherubic grin. Mendes migrated to Vine in 2013 from YouTube, which was by then saturated with wide-eyed bedroom crooners dreaming of becoming the next Justin Bieber. On Vine, Mendes posted a video of himself playing guitar while singing the hook to Bieber's song "As Long As You Love Me" and received 10,000 likes overnight. He followed that up with covers of Bruno Mars and other pop singers, and, by this spring, when Island and Massey came calling, had already amassed over 2.5 million followers on the service. (He now has 3.1 million.)

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After firing his team earlier this year, the R&B singer regroups.

Frank Ocean's hotly anticipated sophomore album is still somewhere on the horizon, but there's a new sign that the celebrated R&B talent may finally be ready to begin his reintroduction to the world.

Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images

As Billboard reports, Ocean has signed with Three Six Zero Management, home to EDM superstars Calvin Harris and Deadmau5. In June, BuzzFeed reported exclusively that Ocean had parted ways with longtime managers Christian and Kelly Clancy of Odd Future.

Three Six Zero is partnered in the U.S. with Roc Nation, the record label, management company, and sports agency owned by Frank Ocean friend and collaborator Jay Z.

Three Six Zero.

With new management in place, Ocean may yet be able to roll out a new album before the end of the year. In June, sources told BuzzFeed News that the new project has many layers and "blows the sophomore-album myth out of the water."

Jason Merritt / Getty Images

Can't. Wait.

media.giphy.com

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What the music consumer looks like today versus 10 years ago.

Jenny Chang/BuzzFeed

On the week ending Aug. 25, Billboard reported that the United States had gone through the worst sales week for music since at least 1991, when Nielsen's SoundScan first began tracking those figures. That week in August, during which Wiz Khalifa's Blacc Hollywood topped the chart with a mere 90,000 copies sold, just 3.97 million albums were purchased in America, down 19% from the same period the year before. Last year, album sales also hit a historic low.

Of course, it should come as a surprise to no one that music is scraping the bottom of the consumer shopping cart in 2014. More than a decade after illegal downloading first took the floor out from underneath the music industry, we've entered the era of the stream, when cheap server space means that all the music you can eat is never more than a click away. Even the inventors of Napster and iTunes, the two most important music downloading services of the last 15 years, have now concluded that the very concept of owning music is becoming a little passé.

And yet, music sales haven't hit zero. Somewhere shy of five million albums are still sold in America every week, despite what your Spotify- (or YouTube, or Soundcloud) obsessed friend may tell you — and that's not to mention genuine blockbusters like Beyoncé and the Frozen soundtrack. To shed some light on who still shells out for music in 2014 and how the profile of music consumers has changed over the years, we partnered with the music data and analytics firm MusicWatch to compare music consumption patterns today with that of 10 years ago. MusicWatch conducted online surveys of over 5,000 music buyers ages 13 and older in both 2004 and 2014. These were our findings.

Sixty-one percent of people who buy CDs are 36 and older, according to MusicWatch's estimate. Ten years ago, that figure was just 36%. Back in 2004, people over 50 made up just 19% of the CD-buying population, but today they're more than a third.

This could help explain the relatively high number of veteran artists who have notched their first career No. 1 albums in 2014, including Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, The Black Keys, Sia, and Weird Al Yankovic.

As a group, 13 to 17-year-olds have plummeted to a mere 7% of the CD-buying population, down from 14.9% in 2004. Their share of digital purchases, either singles or albums, is also down a healthy 12 percentage points — to just 13% — as downloading has become more mainstream among older demographics.

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Here are the songs that defined America from Sept. 9 to Sept. 15, presented by BuzzFeed and Spotify. A state’s “signature song” is not its most popular, but its most distinctive — that is to say, the one that residents of that state streamed proportionally the most as compared with the U.S. as a whole.

Chris Ritter/BuzzFeed

For the week ending Sept. 15, Pennsylvania got "Wasted" with Tiesto, Rhode Island embraced Childish Gambino, Connecticut adopted The Chainsmokers' single "Kanye," Indiana got on board with the Fall Out Boy revival, and Delaware stayed loyal to Bobby Shmurda. Next Thursday, more distinctive songs from BuzzFeed and Spotify.

Alabama: Rae Sremmurd, "No Flex Zone"
Alaska: AWOLNATION, "Sail"
Arizona: Sia, "Chandelier"
Arkansas: Fifth Harmony, "Bo$$"
California: Tinashe, "2 On"
Colorado: Milky Chance, "Stolen Dance"
Connecticut: The Chainsmokers, "Kanye"
Delaware: Bobby Shmurda, "Hot Boy"
District of Columbia: Ella Henderson, "Ghost"
Florida: Kiesza, "Hideaway"
Georgia: T.I., "About the Money"
Hawaii: Kat Dahlia, "Crazy"
Idaho: Passenger, "Let Her Go"
Illinois: MKTO, "Classic"
Indiana: Fall Out Boy, "Centuries"
Iowa: Florida Georgia Line, "Dirt"
Kansas: 5 Seconds of Summer, "Amnesia"
Kentucky: Jason Aldean, "Burnin' It Down"
Louisiana: Rich Gang, "Lifestyle"
Maine: Kenny Chesney, "American Kids"
Maryland: Jeremih, "Don't Tell 'Em"
Massachusetts: Clean Bandit feat. Jess Glynne, "Rather Be"
Michigan: Eminem, "Guts Over Fear"
Minnesota: Sam Hunt, "Leave the Night On"
Mississippi: Sam Hunt, "Break Up in a Small Town"
Missouri: Imagine Dragons, "Radioactive"
Montana: Miranda Lambert, "Somethin' Bad (Duet With Carrie Underwood)"
Nebraska: Jake Owen, "Beachin'"
Nevada: Magic!, "Rude"
New Hampshire: Mr. Probz, "Waves (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
New Jersey: Ariana Grande, "Best Mistake"
New Mexico: Enrique Iglesias, "Bailando"
New York: Lilly Wood and The Prick, "Prayer in C (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
North Carolina: Iggy Azalea, "Fancy"
North Dakota: Lady Antebellum, "Bartender"
Ohio: 5 Seconds of Summer, "She Looks So Perfect"
Oklahoma: Katy Perry, "Dark Horse"
Oregon: Lorde, "Royals"
Pennsylvania: Tiesto, "Wasted"
Rhode Island: Childish Gambino, "3005"
South Carolina: Wiz Khalifa, "We Dem Boyz"
South Dakota: Dierks Bentley, "Drunk on a Plane"
Tennessee: Ed Sheeran, "I See Fire"
Texas: Schoolboy Q, "Studio"
Utah: Ingrid Michaelson, "Girls Chase Boys"
Vermont: Hozier, "Take Me To Church"
Virginia: Ed Sheeran, "Don't"
Washington: DJ Snake and Lil Jon, "Turn Down for What"
West Virginia: Luke Bryan, "Play It Again"
Wisconsin: Jason Derulo, "Trumpets"
Wyoming: Florida Georgia Line, "This Is How We Roll"

Listen to this week’s distinctive songs on Spotify:

embed.spotify.com

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According to Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace.

Maybe you've heard of Against Me!, the incredible Florida punk rock band whose literate and voluble anthems have been celebrated by basically every major music outlet and Bruce Springsteen.

Warner Bros. Records.

Early this year, the band released Transgender Dysphoria Blues, its critically acclaimed sixth album and first since lead singer/songwriter Laura Jane Grace came out as transgender in 2012.

On Oct. 10, Grace will follow up Transgender Dysphoria Blues with True Trans, a 10-part AOL web series about the real lives of transgender people across America.

Against Me!

Grace stopped by BuzzFeed recently for some real talk about the annoying/hurtful questions transgender people deal with every day.

David J. Bertozzi / BuzzFeed

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“i” sets the table for the popular and critically beloved rapper’s sophomore album, due later this year. But are his fans ready for what’s in store?

Early this morning, Kendrick Lamar made his proper return to music and, naturally, everyone rejoiced. Here's "i", the first single from the Compton rapper's wildly anticipated (and still untitled) sophomore album.

The song was produced by Rahki, an L.A. producer and protege of DJ Khalil who worked previously with Lamar on "Black Boy Fly," a bonus track from his 2012 debut Good Kid, M.A.A.D City.

"i" contains an expensive sample of the Isley Brother's 1964 classic "That Lady," making it the latest in a long line of noteworthy hip-hop songs to sample the iconic soul trio, including Ice Cube's "It Was a Good Day" and The Notorious B.I.G.'s "Big Poppa."

Interscope.

As Kendrick Lamar songs go, "i" is unabashedly uplifting and message-driven, a psychedelic guitar-based call for self-love and acceptance that will be sung in showers and out of car windows.

After a summer marked by violence and brutality at home and abroad, the song is undoubtedly political, but its politics are of peace and humanism, not fury or righteous indignation. "If you read between the lines, you'll learn how to love one another," a preacher bellows at the beginning of "i". "But you can't do that without loving yourself first!"

Christopher Polk / Getty Images for Anheuser-Busch

After the largely narrative and introspective work of Good Kid, Lamar seems to be revisiting the more overtly socially conscious inclinations he displayed on his 2011 independent album Section.80.

Section.80 songs like "Fuck Your Ethnicity," "No Make Up (Her Vice)" and "HiiiPower" wore their politics on their sleeves, addressing everything from racism to self-worth to representations in media.

TDE.

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The Compton rapper has a hidden history of promoting peace and love.

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Here are the songs that defined America from Sept. 16 to Sept. 22, presented by BuzzFeed and Spotify. A state’s “signature song” is not its most popular, but its most distinctive — that is to say, the one that residents of that state streamed proportionally the most as compared with the U.S. as a whole.

Chris Ritter / BuzzFeed

For the week ending Sept. 22, Minnesota discovered G.R.L.'s jangly kiss-off "Ugly Heart," Rhode Island embraced the Spanish version of Enrique Iglesias' "Baillando," Vermont adopted Alt-J's soulful psych rock, and Arizona dusted off a Drake classic. Next Thursday, more distinctive songs from BuzzFeed and Spotify.

Alabama: Rae Sremmurd, "No Flex Zone"
Alaska: A Great Big World, "Say Something"
Arizona: Drake, "Hold On, We're Going Home"
Arkansas: Fifth Harmony, "Bo$$"
California: Tinashe, "2 On"
Colorado: Milky Chance, "Stolen Dance"
Connecticut: Bobby Shmurda, "Hot Nigga"
Delaware: The Chainsmokers, "Kanye"
District of Columbia: Ella Henderson, "Ghost"
Florida: Kiesza, "Hideaway"
Georgia: T.I., "About the Money"
Hawaii: Kat Dahlia, "Crazy"
Idaho: Mary Lambert, "Secrets"
Illinois: MKTO, "Classic"
Indiana: 5 Seconds of Summer, "She Looks So Perfect"
Iowa: Jason Derulo, "Trumpets"
Kansas: Sam Hunt, "Leave The Night On"
Kentucky: Jason Aldean, "Burnin' It Down"
Louisiana: Rich Gang, "Lifestyle"
Maine: Kenny Chesney, "American Kids"
Maryland: Jeremih, "Don't Tell 'Em"
Massachusetts: Vance Joy, "Riptide"
Michigan: Fall Out Boy, "Centuries"
Minnesota: GRL, "Ugly Heart"
Mississippi: Sam Hunt, "Break Up in a Small Town"
Missouri: Imagine Dragons, "Radioactive"
Montana: Maddie & Tae, "Girl In A Country Song"
Nebraska: Dierks Bentley, "Drunk On A Plane"
Nevada: Magic!, "Rude"
New Hampshire: Mr. Probz, "Waves (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
New Jersey: Ariana Grande, "Best Mistake"
New Mexico: Luke Bryan, "Play It Again"
New York: Lilly Wood and The Prick, "Prayer in C (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
North Carolina: Iggy Azalea, "Fancy"
North Dakota: Florida Georgia Line, "Dirt"
Ohio: Jason Derulo feat. Snoop Dogg, "Wiggle"
Oklahoma: Katy Perry, "Dark Horse"
Oregon: AWOLNATION, "Sail"
Pennsylvania: Clean Bandit feat. Jess Glynne, "Rather Be"
Rhode Island: Enrique Iglesias, "Bailando (Spanish Version)"
South Carolina: Ed Sheeran, "Thinking Out Loud"
South Dakota: Florida Georgia Line, "Sun Daze"
Tennessee: Hozier, "Take Me To Church"
Texas: Lil Wayne, "Believe Me"
Utah: Ingrid Michaelson, "Girls Chase Boys"
Vermont: Alt-J, "Left Hand Free"
Virginia: Ed Sheeran, "Don't"
Washington: Fences feat. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, "Arrows"
West Virginia: Lady Antebellum, "Bartender"
Wisconsin: Florida Georgia Line, "This Is How We Roll"
Wyoming: Sam Smith, "Stay With Me"

Listen to this week's Signature Songs on Spotify.

embed.spotify.com

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Their excellent debut album is in stores next Tuesday. Thumbnail image by Liberty Cramer.

This is The Preatures, a five-piece rock band from Sydney, Australia whose soulful, toe-tapping songs are pretty much impossible not to dance to.

Harvest Records.

After releasing the great, Fleetwood Mac-worthy single "Is This How You Feel?" last year (above), the band will release its first full-length album Blue Planet Eyes on Sept. 30.

Harvest Records.

For the video for new single "Somebody's Talkin'," premiering exclusively on BuzzFeed, the band recruited two female surf pros to ride crystal blue waves on the beaches of northern Sydney.

"It was shot during one of the wildest weeks of weather ever," says frontwoman Isabella Manfredi by email. "I wanted the song to sound like Jackson Browne covering Jackson 5 (‘Doctor My Eyes’!), but for the video, the director Gemma Lee and I wanted something a bit darker and dangerous."

Harvest Records.

Meanwhile, they did their own shredding on dry land.

Harvest Records.

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Because Thom Yorke.

Good morning! Here's a new album from Thom Yorke, Tomorrow's Modern Boxes.

Thom Yorke.

Watch the video for single "A Brain in a Bottle" below.

SIDE A
a brain in a bottle
guess again!
interference
the mother lode

SIDE B
truth ray
there is no ice (for my drink)
pink section
nose grows some

A deluxe vinyl version of the album, with high quality digital files, is also available for 30£ at a dedicated website.

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Normal.

En ce beau vendredi d'automne, Thom Yorke a décidé de sortir un nouvel album.

Thom Yorke.

Vous pouvez voir le clip de « Brain in a Bottle », ici.

Thom Yorke.

Voici la liste des titres :

SIDE A
a brain in a bottle
guess again!
interference
the mother lode

SIDE B
truth ray
there is no ice (for my drink)
pink section
nose grows some

Une version vinyle deluxe de l'album est aussi disponible pour 30£, ici.

View Entire List ›

F*** whatever y’all been playin’.

Wednesday night in Paris, approximately 20 lucky souls heard what is apparently a completed Kanye West album.

"So shortly after this picture I Only remember kanye playing his new album 3 times in a dark room of 20 people last night and moshing drunk with mad babes haha," wrote Theophilus London, whose own forthcoming album is being executive produced by Kanye.

In the below Instagram, hear a few unconfirmed (but very convincing!) seconds of said album.

A 2014 follow-up to last year's Yeezus has been teased since as early as last November, when Kanye responded to rumors of a "Yeezus 2" in an interview with Philadelphia's Power 99.

“I haven’t named my next album but I have started on it,” he said, adding. “I’d like to have out another album by next summer.”

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“Yellow Flicker Beat” from the new Hunger Games soundtrack. ASDFUINELKHOEGGKHH.

Rejoice! The long global drought is over. Here's "Yellow Flicker Beat," the actual, brand new, original Lorde song recorded for the soundtrack to the next Hunger Games movie, "Mocking Jay Part 1."

In case you forgot, Lorde has been chosen as the ~official~ curator of the new Hunger Games soundtrack, following her cover of "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" from Catching Fire last year.

“It’s so rewarding, but it blows my mind that this massive studio has just handed the reigns over to a 17-year-old,” she told Billboard of working on the soundtrack back in August. “I’ve literally been doing it by myself, contacting every artist, sorting everything out. I don’t know if I want to tell you anything yet! It’s very new. But there are some people on there that you’re going to be super surprised by. You’ll be like, what? I haven’t heard form them in ages… but in a great way.”

"Yellow Flicker Beat" fits snugly into the Lorde repertoire — brooding, beat-driven and impervious — but has a midsection that explodes into big, pulsating synths — perfect for the arenas and stadiums the 17-year-old is already beginning to master.

media.giphy.com

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The jazz-vocalist-turned-stylish-pop-singer has a new EP out 10/28.

This is Niia, a Berklee and New School-educated jazz vocalist who recorded and toured with Wyclef Jean before striking out with her own brand of stylized pop.

Niia.

She has a knack for sultry and atmospheric ballads that split the difference between Jessie Ware elegance and Sky Ferreira cool.

Something Local Records.

Her new single "Body," premiering below exclusively on BuzzFeed, was produced by Robin Hannibal of Rhye and pairs that group's luxurious, come-hither instrumentation with Niia's own classically pretty croon.

In an email to BuzzFeed News, Niia said the song was six years in the making. "Over the years it stayed in a folder as I gained new experiences, new lovers and ultimately grew up," she said. "For me the challenge was to find a way to make sure the song felt true to who I was back then, but also who I am now... the song is a perfect blend of the young me — eager to fall in love — and the current me that has a better idea of what I want and deserve."

Something Local Records.

Niia's debut EP, Generation Blue, is produced by Hannibal and out October 28 from Something Local Records. Listen to the EP's title track here.

Something Local Records.

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Here are the songs that defined America from Sept. 23 to Sept. 29, presented by BuzzFeed and Spotify. A state’s “signature song” is not its most popular, but its most distinctive — that is to say, the one that residents of that state streamed proportionally the most as compared with the U.S. as a whole.

Chris Ritter / BuzzFeed.

For the week ending Sept. 29, Kendrick Lamar's feel-good new single "i" crash landed in Massachusetts, country stud Dustin Lynch strode into West Virginia, Ohio discovered Irish pop-crossovers The Script, and affable pop upstarts Walk The Moon captured the capital with "Shut Up And Dance." Next Thursday, more distinctive songs from BuzzFeed and Spotify.

Alabama: Rae Sremmurd, "No Flex Zone"
Alaska: AWOLNATION, "Sail"
Arizona: 5 Seconds of Summer, "She Looks So Perfect"
Arkansas: Jason Aldean, "Burnin' It Down"
California: Tinashe, "2 On"
Colorado: Milky Chance, "Stolen Dance"
Connecticut: The Chainsmokers, "Kanye"
Delaware: T.I., "About The Money"
District of Columbia: Walk The Moon, "Shut Up And Dance"
Florida: Kiesza, "Hideaway"
Georgia: Iggy Azalea, "Fancy"
Hawaii: Sam Smith, "I'm Not The Only One"
Idaho: Mary Lambert, "Secrets"
Illinois: Clean Bandit feat. Jess Glynne, "Rather Be"
Indiana: 5 Seconds of Summer, "Amnesia"
Iowa: Chase Rice, "Ready Set Roll"
Kansas: Imagine Dragons, "Radioactive"
Kentucky: Blake Shelton, "Neon Light"
Louisiana: Rich Gang, "Lifestyle"
Maine: Jason Derulo, "Trumpets"
Maryland: Chris Brown, "New Flame"
Massachusetts: "i", "Kendrick Lamar"
Michigan: Fall Out Boy, "Centuries"
Minnesota: GRL, "Ugly Heart"
Mississippi: Sam Hunt, "Break Up in a Small Town"
Missouri: Jason Derulo feat. Snoop Dogg, "Wiggle"
Montana: Dierks Bentley, "Drunk On A Plane"
Nebraska: Florida Georgia Line, "This Is How We Roll"
Nevada: Magic!, "Rude"
New Hampshire: Mr. Probz, "Waves (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
New Jersey: Bobby Shmurda, "Hot Nigga"
New Mexico: Luke Bryan, "Play It Again"
New York: Lilly Wood and The Prick, "Prayer in C (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)"
North Carolina: Jeremih, "Don't Tell "Em"
North Dakota: Florida Georgia Line, "Dirt"
Ohio: The Script, "Superheroes"
Oklahoma: Katy Perry, "Dark Horse"
Oregon: Alt-J, "Every Other Freckle"
Pennsylvania: Nicki Minaj, "Anaconda"
Rhode Island: Enrique Iglesias, "Bailando"
South Carolina: Wiz Khalifa, "We Dem Boyz"
South Dakota: Maddie & Tae, "Girl In A Country Song"
Tennessee: Hozier, "Take Me To Church"
Texas: Lil Wayne, "Believe Me"
Utah: Imagine Dragons, "Warriors"
Vermont: Alt-J, "Hunger Of The Pine"
Virginia: Ella Henderson, "Ghost"
Washington: Fences feat. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, "Arrows"
West Virginia: Dustin Lynch, "Where It's At"
Wisconsin: Sam Hunt, "Leave The Night On"
Wyoming: Kenny Chesney, "American Kids"

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