Songs of the week: New tracks by Rodney Fisher, Luana Gordon, Paramore with Wet Leg

Luana Gordon, Molly Burch and Wet Leg. Photos / Supplied

Rodney Fisher and the Response

ICU

More sand-in-the-Jandals sounds for lazy afternoons at the beach, the latest single and comfortable opener on Rodney (Goodshirt/Breaks Co-op) Fisher’s album Art School Dropout, which establishes the wistful mood. In these divisive times, it’s comforting to know music can come on like a cuddle under a blanket. – Graham Reid

Drunk in the Living Room

By Luana Gordon

If summer is on its way, we get hints of it in the air(waves) with breezy songs like this debut single from Samoan-Pākehā New Zealander Gordon, which is all shimmering guitars and a family affair: it’s produced and brought together by her brothers Peter (keyboards for Teeks and Bella Kalolo) and Oliver Leupolu. Nice to keep drunkenness off the streets, too. A socially responsible single.

– Graham Reid

Mrs Postman

By Black Pumas

Slinky R’n’B soul with jigsaw-puzzle jazzy piano from the multiple Grammy-nominee Texas duo of Adrian Quesada and Eric Burton. Mrs Postman sets up their second album, Chronicles of a Diamond, and they’ve slid between psychedelic soul and rock, but were also nominated for best American Roots Performance for their 2019 single Colors. So they are hard to pigeon-hole, and the earlier single, More Than a Love Song, from the new album was more than a little Marvin Gaye. An act to watch, enjoy and decode.

– Graham Reid

Sure Enough

By Two Door Cinema Club

The Northern Ireland band know how to open a song. Layering the bass synth with a simple drum and then diving into an energetic full-blown chorus within seconds. Sure Enough could easily have been too much in its peppiness, but they keep it short and sweet and vary the tone, particularly through lead singer Alex Trimble’s vocals, to make sure the single is an earworm to stick around rather than a sugar high.

– Alana Rae

Made of Glass

By Molly Burch

When this song opened, I almost thought Rod Stewart was going to start singing, but I was sorely mistaken when Molly Burch’s ethereal vocals took the instrumentation in a different direction. The track on her new record Daydreamer details how uncertain she is of herself, but conversely sounds so confident and grand, explaining how she’s breakable and always will be. Burch cites a love of polished pop, and she certainly delivers a cleanly produced album opener.

– Alana Rae

C’est Comme Ça (Re: Wet Leg)

By Paramore, Wet Leg

The one-time stadium-filling American emo-plus band released their first album in nearly six years in February, and now they’ve released a companion piece, Re: This Is Why, a set of do-overs by other bands (Foals, Panda Bear, the Linda Lindas) and remixes (including one by our very own Zane Lowe). But the stand-out track is Wet Leg’s deadpan rethink of C’est Comme Ça, which, like their own Chaise Longue, has a certain je ne sais quoi.

– Russell Baillie

News Has a Kind of Mystery

By John Adams, from Nixon in China

Featuring Robert Orth (Richard Nixon), Thomas Hammons (Henry Kissinger), Chen-Ye Yuan (Chou En-lai). Colorado Symphony Orchestra, with Marin Alsop conductor.

The polling booths are open ahead of next weekend’s election. Don’t forget to vote, folks.

– Richard Betts