Post Malone
F-1 Trillion
What’s the story?
F-1 Trillion is the sixth studio album by American rapper and singer Post Malone. The album marks Malone’s transition to country music and features guest appearances from Tim McGraw, Hank Williams Jr., Morgan Wallen, Dolly Parton and more. Malone began exploring country music for the first time in 2023, before reaching out to collaborators to create this album.
Worth a listen?
F-1 Trillion is smoother than the blustering country of the 2010s, with sanded-down edges and aerodynamic verses that tumble pleasantly into hooks. These tricky little songs are powered by momentum, and yet they’re oddly wordy, overburdened by their ‘cleverness.’ You needn’t get too deep into the weeds of F-1 Trillion to sense that Post is shy about his place in country music in a way he never seemed to be in rap. Of the album’s 18 tracks, he handles three alone: a halfway-decent love song, a ballad for his daughter on her future wedding day, a synth-pop slow dance number perhaps left off his last record and gussied up with pedal steel. The rest are duets with country’s luminaries, then and now.
Oasis
Definitely Maybe
(30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)
Fresh from breaking the Internet with their reunion announcement, Oasis’ debut album Definitely Maybe celebrates its 30th anniversary. The fastest-ever selling debut in the UK on release, this seminal album marked the point when Oasis became a cultural phenomenon. Including the classic singles Supersonic, Live Forever and Cigarettes & Alcohol, its songs sound as fresh and relevant as they did in 1994. This Limited-Edition Deluxe 2CD / Limited-Edition Deluxe 4LP includes the 2014 remastered album plus the previously unreleased and discarded original recording session from Monnow Valley along with outtakes from Sawmills Studios plus a demo of Sad Song featuring Liam’s vocal – all recently mixed for this release by Noel Gallagher and Callum Marinho.
Nick Cave
Wild God
Nick Cave doesn’t do happy. He’s a remarkably literate and insightful songwriter, and he can be one of the most intense and magnetic performers you’re ever likely to see, yet even at his liveliest, his work looks to the dark side of the human experience. Wild God sounds like the work of a man who is still coming to terms with heart-breaking loss, and is utterly unashamed to show us his scars. At the same time, it sounds bold, impassioned, and very much alive, acknowledging the yin of grief and the yang of survival. It’s a potent celebration of life amidst chaos and cruel fate, and while it still doesn’t sound exactly happy, in its way it is the most optimistic album Cave has ever made.
Mercury Rev
Born Horses
On Born Horses, Mercury Rev still has the power to deliver powerful musical experiences. Free jazz, torchy ballads and show tunes have all been a part of the Mercury Rev brew since the beginning, but on their first new music since 2015, they’re the main ingredients. This time, the band deploys them with a maturity and control that only heightens the album’s fusion of experimental sounds and genuine emotion. More grounded and yet more transporting than many of their later albums, Born Horses is ample proof that Mercury Rev are still making moving, thoughtful, exciting music.