Listen Up

Languid R&B, upbeat indie-pop, self-reflective pool rock and more new music this week

Monophonics: Last One Standing California-based band Monophonics makes music that sounds plucked from another era, with tinges of Curtis Mayfield and Al Green. There’s a timelessness to their releases and their newest single, “Last One Standing,” is no exception. The seven-minute song ebbs and flows: there are groovy, cinematic cuts carried by drums, a bass guitar and horns, and crescendoing choruses built around vocalist Kelly …

Link About It: This Week’s Picks

Putting excess London Underground heat to use, an app for analog photography, a 2,000-year-old sarcophagus and more

NASA’s Highest-Resolution Photo of Mars NASA’s new image of the surface of Mars—the space agency’s highest-resolution photograph of the Red Planet ever—comprises 1,200 total images. The wide-pan photograph features what researchers hypothesize are former sites of lakes and streams that dried up over the course of several billion years. The 1.8-billion-pixel shot was taken by the Curiosity Rover during November and December of 2019 and …

Kacy Hill feat. Francis and the Lights: I Believe In You

Pretty and powerful, “I Believe In You” from Kacy Hill’s forthcoming album, Is It Selfish If We Talk About Me Again, grapples with doubt and the repetition of everyday life. Ultimately, however, the song offers thoughtful affirmation. Halfway through, the break’s distorted vocals contrast Hill’s otherwise airy crooning. The silken tune’s hopeful subject matter reflects a real-life “coming to” moment for Hill, as she explains in a …