totw #3 (consistent posts?!? so proud of me x)

Well, folks. It turns out lightning does strike the same place twice. (I still don’t know if that’s even the right phrase. It feels too clunky to be a saying? But guess what? I’m choosing not to care. Mind over matter, babe.) This week’s lightning bolt comes from my weekly Release Radar, courtesy of Spotify. I thought I was going to be inspired by one of Dua Lipa’s 4 (four!) new tracks on Future Nostalgia (The Moonlight Edition). Dua Lipa choosing to release her album at the end of March 2020, when everyone else was pushing back releases and the sudden erasure of live music was all too fresh… that was iconic. That was history. Future Nostalgia and The Strokes’ The New Abnormal were my soundtrack to the early pandemic. It’s cool that the pandemic has been so long there’s an “early pandemic” category, isn’t it? And that I’m nostalgic for the early pandemic because, in a way, things were simpler then. We were just enough in the dark to be a little hopeful. Very neat. Love that.

Anyway, I love Dua Lipa. Even if her problematic pandemic globe-trotting is so bad it’s become a meme. She kept us fed the entire year. Between Future Nostalgia, Club Future Nostalgia (DJ Mix), her collab with J Balvin/Bad Bunny, her collab with Belgian pop sensation Angéle, her collab with Miley Cyrus, her Studio 2054 virtual live event, the Levitating remix with DaBaby, and now Future Nostalgia (The Moonlight Edition)… she’s been b u s y!! And I’ve been busy, streaming her release du jour. All of this to say… that Dua Lipa isn’t my pick for this third ever Track of the Week is significant. So what caught my ear instead? I’m glad you asked…

THIRD EVER TRACK OF THE WEEK: Sagittarius Superstar (feat. Faye Webster) – COIN (2021)

I first got into COIN on iTunes, I think? I had their single Run on my iTunes Wishlist for, like, months. Which is so random? I don’t think they were a Free Single of the Week. Remember that? When iTunes would just give you a song for free every week. In retrospect, those really shaped my music taste. What can I say, I am a product of The Man in every possible way. Why does discovering music on iTunes feel like churning butter in Colonial America? There’s so much at our fingertips now with the ever-present algorithm and an unending list of curated playlists for every mood, vibe, genre, event, activity under the sun. But I would spend hours bopping around iTunes, adding shit to that Wishlist, and then waiting for the next holiday wherein extended family would inevitably mail me an iTunes gift card. (Maybe I pirated some/most of that music, maybe I didn’t. Who’s to say? Don’t worry about it.)

COIN’s debut album came out in that weird transition time between iTunes and Spotify for me. A black hole in my personal music history. So I don’t have vivid memories attached to it. Just that it was the beginning of my enduring indie pop, etc. obsession. Their sophomore effort, How Will You Know If You Never Try… now that’s a different story. Soundtrack to my junior year of college. (Including cliché semester abroad with equally cliché life-changing abroad experiences.) I so distinctly remember sitting on mysteriously crusty college-housing carpet in front of my $10 Target mirror, blasting Talk Too Much on repeat while I alternated ripping shots to pregame for fraturday and applying way too much eyeliner for a daytime look.

Their third album cycle, Dreamland, hit my year in Australia and subsequent adjustment to life back in America. Right before COVID hit pandemic levels. I thought being back in the States for a few months was soul-crushing. Oof. I guess that brings us to now! The Rainbow Mixtape. They’re releasing a series of EPs, organized by color and theme. Here are some tweets to kind of explain the whole thing and the vibes of the first EP, Indigo Violet. Or here’s a cheeky little interview with LADYGUNN Magazine with a lot of the same information.

This week’s Track of the Week is the first track from the next color movement EP, Green-Blue: Sagittarius Superstar. Where Indigo Violet was inspired by early 2000s rock, this next EP centers around 60s and 70s rock. This song jumped out of my Release Radar and right into my soul. Similar to last week’s tune, a feature from a female artist, this time Faye Webster, brings ~dynamic depth~ and helps the song build. Crescendo? Is that… is that a way to use a music term?

Paper Magazine described it as “a plush, lush, sugar rush of a song.” COIN frontman Chase Lawrence tweeted “I love this song makes me melty.” I agree so heavily with both of those characterizations. It’s chill. It’s sweet. It’s sweeping. It makes me feel like skipping? It sounds like restored vintage. Sonic upcycling. It pairs very nicely with the $13 disco light. I enjoyed the Indigo Violet EP. I appreciated conceptually what they were doing. But this tune just hits different. Strikes a chord. I simply cannot wait to hear the rest of the EP.

It’s crazy how I have such intense imposter syndrome writing about songs I genuinely like to an audience of one. (Myself. I’m the audience.) I don’t even think my mom reads these.

Anyway, catch you next week.