Five songs you need to hear right now!

Five songs you need to hear this week are in, and it’s a wild cross-section of what’s shaping music right now.

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Death Of Love – James Blake

English singer, songwriter, and producer extraordinaire James Blake is a one-of-a-kind voice in the world of contemporary R&B and pop music. James’ discography is dense, with his Post-Dubstep background informing his music with an abstract and hyper-electronic tinge, bridging the gap between the softness of the human voice and the rigid sounds of his bass music upbringing. Having a versatile career as one of mainstream Hip-Hop’s most enigmatic producers alongside his solo work, James Blake is back with his newest single, Death Of Love, ahead of the release of his ninth studio album, Trying Times, releasing this March. His latest offering is a refined collection of all the sounds developed across his nearly twenty-year-long career, defined by its stipulating trap drum sequences, echoing dub sirens, subtly rhythmed synths, psychedelic, hefty bass passages, and his manipulated-yet-angelic vocals.

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Sebastian Tellier, Kid Cudi – Amnesia

Sebastian Tellier is a pioneer of the 90s and 00s French Touch revolution that dominated the face of dance music at the beginning and middle of the 2000s, around the same time Kid Cudi first made waves in Hip-Hop as the genre’s party-ready and emotional storyteller, having crossed paths with French Touch and Electroclash early in his career. This crossover is decades in the making, with the two seasoned musicians releasing a brilliant breakbeat track, titled Amnesia, featuring deeply ambient passages and Cudi’s iconic blend of rap and psychedelia, alongside Tellier’s tender balladry, which builds into a grandiose psych-rock track in its final crescendo.

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Sophia Stel, Cecile Believe – Everyone Falls Asleep In Their Own Time (Cecile Believe’s Version)

Sophia Stel is swiftly becoming the new face of alt pop as we know it. The autotuned, embellished underdog made waves in indie circles last year with her two EPs and a string of remixes that shook the conversation for its modernist combination of Trip Hop and P.C. Music era pop. On her latest set of remixes, the Vancouver musician recruits a string of iconic dance-pop names, from Mura Masa to Tommy Genesis, to reinterpret her delicate offerings. Among these names was the voice of many of P.C. Music’s iconic releases herself, Cecile Believe, bringing a classically infectious house groove to Sophia’s song, Everyone Falls Asleep In Their Own Time.

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Peter Gabriel – Put The Bucket Down – Bright Side Mix

Perhaps one of music’s most iconic names, Peter Gabriel, is back with his second of many moon cycle-inspired offerings ahead of his next album, o\i. Titled, Put The Bucket Down – Bright Side Mix, the track is one of two mixes set following the moon’s cycles, with the dark side mix set to be released later in the month following the beginning of the new moon. The track is a nearly seven-minute adventure through its funk-impassioned elements and interstellar group vocals that define the jangly grooves, intensifying the whirring song.

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MJ Cole, PinkPanthress – Still Sincere

MJ Cole and PinkPanthress are two iconic faces from two vastly different eras of UK dance music. MJ Cole’s iconic two-step grooves have become a genre-defining staple of his sound, forever shaping the direction of the UK’s most sought-after musical export. Onboarding PinkPanthress, who is reintroducing all flavors of electronic music onto the global stage with her pop-oriented style, the two created a brilliantly smooth R&B and two-step track titled Still Sincere, which wizzes by you with a classically English hustle. The track is skippy, lush, and carries a nineties UKG nostalgia on its tail, featuring all the iconic aspects of the genre that made it so adored by generations.

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You can find these songs and many more in our “Now Playing at Activaire HQ” playlist on Spotify. We update it weekly, so be sure to hit that heart button.