Happy Friday! Alternative New Music Friday #Happens with The Black Keys rolling out their new album, Ohio Players, today.

Before we dive into New Music Friday, I wanted to give a shoutout to WAQX (95X)/Syracuse on ratings increase 2.2-2.4 in the latest Nielsen February ‘24 12+ Ratings. Congrats to Joe D, dXn, and the 95X team!

Grouplove announce I Want It All Now Deluxe album will drop in May, including a new live track with Jake Clemons. I have more details in the latest Music Info.

New Music that needs to be on your radar. Something special and very cool just released today is MKH “One Way,” an unreleased Michael Hutchence song that has been made available by producer Danny Saber thru Christopher The Minister exclusively on Happens.vip Alternative Downloads. Glass Animals is buzzing this week at Alternative with their “Creatures In Heaven” single. Dead Poet Society “My Condition” has big early adds at KPNT & KDKB. GXTP return with a very different sounding new single “Leather & Lace.” 

Let’s take a deeper dive into the latest new music available for airplay on Happens.vip Alternative Downloads.

Also out this week is new Imagine Dragons “Eyes Closed” and the follow up single from The Black Keys “On The Game” from their just released, Ohio Players, album.

THIS WEEK’S ALTERNATIVE NEW MUSIC DISCOVERY  

MKH (Michael Hutchence & Danny Saber) “One Way” (Boss Sonics)

(Photo Credit: Chris Cuffaro)

MKH is Michael Hutchence & Danny Saber (Madonna, Rolling Stones, U2) and the single “One Way” is from unreleased demos that first resurfaced in 2006 and was released today as an exclusive Happens.vip Download via Boss Sonics. Snippets of the unfinished tracks were first heard in a documentary about Hutchence’s life titled The Last Rocker released in Australia and New Zealand in 2017. This is the first of the fully mastered version available via a new 10″ picture disc single only on May 15th. Before Hutchence died in 1997, he and Saber became friends and creative partners. “Over the next two years, we became very close collaborators, and the period we worked together was one of the best times of my life,” said Saber. “I had just broken through with a #1 record and having Michael as a ‘big brother’ to help me navigate this was so important to me.” Saber notes, “‘One Way’ is the culmination of nearly two decades of work. One of the fundamental reasons for releasing this music is to allow the fans to hear Michael’s voice on something new and fresh, offering a glimpse into what might have been, and, in turn, reawakening millions of people who may have simply forgotten about him.” 

Glass Animals “Creatures In Heaven” (Republic)

UK 4-piece Glass Animals released their new single “Creatures In Heaven” on April 3rd. It’s the lead single from the band’s fourth album, I Love You So F***ing Much, to be released on July 19th via Republic Records. Glass Animals lead singer David Bayley said, “I love you so f***ing much, I LOVE YOU SO F***ING MUCH, I love you SO f***ing MUCH, I love you so F***ING much, I LOVE you so f***ing MUCH. These words take on a different meaning every time you say them.” I Love You So F***ing Much is the follow-up to the band’s 2020’s critically revered Dreamland, which sold over 12 million copies globally and featured the breakout single “Heat Waves.”

On the new single “Creatures In Heaven,” Bayley says, “It’s about a moment in time, be it a split second or a year or whatever, having the capacity to be enormously formative and life-changing. Even if it is over. Or if it doesn’t go as planned. Or if it dies too soon. It is still fucking beautiful. The love and care and the feeling in that moment lives forever. It never really dies. If that’s how you choose to see it.” Glass Animals has also announced intimate pop-up shows for this spring, selling out instantly. They’ll be taking place in California (at the legendary Pappy + Harriet’s in the Mojave Desert) on April 11th and Mexico City on April 15th. The day after release, Glass Animals announced “Human Musical Group Sensations Glass Animals Tour Of Earth.” There will be a ticket presale for all shows on April 9th. The tour begins in Charlotte on August 7th. Find the tour dates HERE. 

Dead Poet Society “My Condition” (Spinefarm)

Los Angeles 4-piece Dead Poet Society released their new single “My Condition” on April 3rd. It’s from the band’s second album Fission, which was released on January 26th. The band’s frontman Jack Underkofler says, “This song took years to write and it’s one of our favorites. It’s about knowing that nothing matters, so might as well go for what brings you fulfillment and do what you want.” Dead Poet Society head out on “The Fission Tour beginning April 16th in Seattle with a performance at Shaky Knees Festival on May 4th. Find the tour dates HERE.

GXTP “Leather & Lace” (NFARTAM, LTD) 

The trio known as GXTP (Guns And Toilet Paper) is a collaboration of Jason Paul, Triple Sixx, and Sasha Sirota. Their newest single is “Leather & Lace,” which was released on April 3rd. While the nation fought and scrambled for supplies upon the news of the devastating COVID outbreak in 2020, these three artists came together to create GXTP, an abbreviation for what the news and communities placed the most importance on, guns and toilet paper. “Leather & Lace is a mirror image, through the eyes of each partner in a relationship, questioning the benefits of togetherness or loneliness, at a time of self-reflection and doubt,” said Jason Paul.

Looking for Alternative Downloads? Listen/Download/Song Info HERE.

New Music Friday #Happens With The Black Keys

Akron, OH’s The Black Keys release their 12th studio album Ohio Players today via Nonesuch/Warner Records. 

The 14 song collection was written by The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney with longtime friends Dan “The Automator” Nakamura and Beck. The new album includes collaborations Noel Gallagher, Greg Kurstin, and others.

Speaking on the collaborative nature of the album, Carney shares, “We had this epiphany: ‘We can call our friends to help us make music.’ It’s funny because we both write songs with other people – Dan all the time [as a solo artist and producer], me when I’m producing a record. That’s what we do.”

Auerbach adds, “No matter who we work with, it never feels like we’re sacrificing who we are. It only feels like it adds some special flavor. We just expanded that palette with people we wanted to work with. We were there to support them and their ideas, to do whatever we could to see that moment flourish. But when it came time to finish the album, it was just Pat and me. We’d never worked harder to make a record,” he continues. “It’s never taken us this long to make an album. We took our time and did it right.”

“What we wanted to accomplish with this record was make something that was fun,” Carney adds. “And something that most bands 20 years into their career don’t make, which is an approachable, fun record that is also cool.”

While making Ohio Players, a title inspired by the legendary Dayton, OH funk band of the same name, The Black Keys were also DJing dance parties in cities around the world that they called “record hangs,” spinning 45s from their own eclectic and growing collections.

Formed in 2001, The Black Keys are singer/guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney. The band’s previously 11 studio albums are: The Big Come Up (2002), Thickfreakness (2003) Rubber Factory (2004), Magic Potion (2006), Attack & Release (2008), Brothers (2010), El Camino (2011), Turn Blue (2014), Let’s Rock (2019), Delta Kream (2021), and Dropout Boogie (2022). 

New Music Friday Albums To Check Out Today

The Black Keys – Ohio Players (Nonesuch/Warner)

Dead Pony – Ignore This (LAB Records/Music Is Fun/AWAL)

Last Dinosaurs – KYO (Nettwerk)

The Libertines – All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade (Casablanca/Republic)

Lo Moon – I Wish You Way More Than Luck (Strnngr/Thirty Tigers)

The Palms – Wonderland (The Palms)

Smallpools – Ghost Town Road  (east) (EP) (Nettwerk)

Vampire Weekend – Only God Was Above Us (Columbia)

MORE ALT ALBUMS HERE

GOING FOR ADDS

Impacting Songs Next Week (4/9):

Glass Animals “Creatures In Heaven” (Republic)

Imagine Dragons “Eyes Closed” (Interscope)