STACK #251 September 2025

MUSIC FEATURE

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WHAT’S OUT

Whether it’s a voyage of musical discovery or a sonic reacquaintance with a favourite band or artist, check out these fresh releases heading to JB this month.

MARIAH CAREY Here For It All INERTIA

As she gets set to tour Australia, Mariah Carey is releasing her first studio album in eight years. Her sweet 16th album actually

features a song called Sugar Sweet . She says the sound is “summery”, as well as songs that reflect being the mum of 14-year-old twins, Moroccan and Monroe. It’s the first release through Carey’s own label. She says she’s “owning my narrative and creating freely on my own terms”. OLIVIA DEAN The Art of Loving UNIVERSAL

EDITOR’S PICK THE LIVING END I Only Trust Rock’n’Roll BMG The Living End’s ninth album, their first in seven years, is a ripping rock record – from go to woe. Yep, the Aussie band is not afraid to address the woes of the world, taking savage swipes at Australia Day, the selfie generation, influencers, social media, and interest rates. Then there’s Private Hell , which sounds like a punked-up version of Joe Jackson’s Is She Really Going Out with Him? Double bass man Scott Owen has the perfect description of the album: “It grabs you by the face and it doesn’t let go until it’s done.” Yes, the world has gone crazy, but you can trust The Living End to deliver. Rock record of the year? You betcha.

BIFFY CLYRO Futique INERTIA

CARDI B Am I the Drama? INERTIA

The Art of Loving is the second album for English neo soul star Olivia Dean. It follows her 2023 debut Messy ,

The Great Scots have made it to album number ten. They have never revealed the exact origins of their band name, so what does Futique mean? The band says it’s “an exploration of ideas, objects or relationships that exist across time – we are never aware when we do anything for the last time, and there’s a beauty and sadness within that. What will be your Futique ?”

Belcalis Almánzar, the artist known as Cardi B,

unleashes her long-awaited second album, posing the question: Am I the Drama? The album features her 2020 smash hit WAP , as well as the recent singles Outside and Imaginary Players . Responding to criticism regarding the inclusion of WAP and its 2021 follow-up Up , the rapper said: “They are two of my biggest songs… they deserve a home.”

which was a Top 5 hit in the UK. She says the record is a “tender, intentional deep dive” into the many forms of love – romantic, platonic, self, and everything in between.

BIG THIEF Double Infinity ROCKET American indie

DAVID BYRNE Who Is the Sky? ROCKET

SPINAL TAP The End Continues UNIVERSAL

David Byrne turned 73 this year, but he remains one of rock’s most relevant artists. Who Is the Sky? , a collaboration with New York’s Ghost Train Orchestra and producer Kid Harpoon, is a record

The wait is over! Forty-one years after This Is Spinal Tap , the English metal legends have re-formed for one final show, with all the

folksters Big Thief – fronted by Adrianne Lenker – celebrate their tenth anniversary

with the release of their sixth studio album. Lenker says: “ Double Infinity is like shouting from the mountain, these deepest things, all the way into the sky, and all the way into the core of the earth.”

where each song is “a new adventure”. Byrne – who’s touring Australia in January – says: “At my age, there’s a ‘don’t give a sh-t about what people think’ attitude that kicks in. I can step outside my comfort zone with the knowledge that I kind of know who I am by now and sort of know what I’m doing.” Guests include St. Vincent, Paramore’s Hayley Williams, and The Smile’s Tom Skinner.

gory details captured in the new movie Spinal Tap II: The End Continues , featuring cameos from Elton John, Paul McCartney, and Garth Brooks. The soundtrack is Spinal Tap’s first album since 2009’s Back from the Dead . Turn the volume up to 11. SUEDE Antidepressants UNIVERSAL

CALUM SCOTT Avenoir UNIVERSAL

LED ZEPPELIN Live E.P. INERTIA

Calum Scott, who broke big on Britain’s Got Talent , issues his third album, which follows 2018’s Only Human (a Top 5 hit in Australia) and

As Physical Graffiti turns 50, Led Zeppelin are releasing the Live E.P , featuring four tracks from the album,

Antidepressants is the tenth studio album for much-loved English band Suede. The album, which had the

2022’s Bridges . Explaining the title, Scott says it comes from John Koenig’s The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows , which defines “avenoir” as “the desire that memory could flow backward”. He likens it to a rower, “who is always moving forward but facing backward, seeing where we’ve been, but not where we’re going”.

drawn from two gigs, in 1975 at Earl’s Court, and 1979 at Knebworth: In My Time of Dying , Trampled Under Foot , Sick Again, and Kashmir . The recordings could originally be found on the 2003 Led Zeppelin DVD.

working title of Broken Music for Broken People , follows 2022’s Autofiction . Singer Brett Anderson says, “If Autofiction was our punk record, Antidepressants is our post-punk record.”

14 SEPTEMBER 2025

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