Freshly Squeezed, Vol. 84: Lake Folks, The Currys, XYLØ & more

Welcome to Freshly Squeezed, a weekly new music playlist: spanning country, pop, EDM and urban, mainstream and other.

French singer, songwriter and musician Martin Costaz, known onstage as Lake Folks, carves out a fantastical story of romance with his new song “Astronaut,” sampling a new EP out later this month. Caked in harmonica, which acts as a smoking locomotive cascading down iron-wrought tracks, it’s a sweet, jovial and slick little ditty detailing a love-sick entanglement between the narrator and an astronaut, who remains unpinned from the earth’s classic orbit. Instead, the guitar falls as a shooting star through the night, and Costaz’s voice is siren-like, calling you into a lush soundscape and sending you spiraling outward into an abyss. “In your arms, it does feel right,” he sings.

The Currys have been kicking it around the Americana scene for a number of years already. Their new record, This Side of the Glass, is enriched by both the soil and the sun. Tommy, Jimmy and Galen Curry magnetize with closing number “Garden,” from which the album’s title is drawn, and it’s the kind of timeless performance, serene and soothing while lugging about the heavy melancholy of the world’s troubles. Even the choral “ooo”s have a rather towering, undeniable weight to them, leaving the listener both parched and satiated. Then, Americana finger-picker Andy Hughes explores a life-long love with “Tell Me Darlin’,” a scrappy bluegrss toe-tapper that only seems to flourish in the knowledge that not even death can stop the rush to the cheeks. In fact, the pearly gates will only extend the love forever and ever, amen. “Feels like home when you hold me close,” he sings in gentle chirps, the production heaving and sighing in true honky-tonk fashion on a Friday night. The cloud-bound tune is lifted from his upcoming Songs for Sunday album, expected later this year.

The odds are always stacked against you. Just ask any working musician these days. “All we had was this sinking ship to fill all of the holes in our hearts,” warns lead singer Billy Campbell of blues-rock trio Company of Others. “Diminishing Returns,” a slow-burning rollick off their new EP, Arcane Dreams, confronts the sometimes devastation reality of taking one step forward, 10 steps back. But Campbell’s voice is laced with optimism, mirror the arrangement’s beguilingly jaunty uptick. Later, The Pierce Project prove the bonds of family can result in appetizing and downright magical compositions, cobbled together from vast vantage points. “Cry Me a River,” another sample of their forthcoming double-album debut, dips into the classic folk-rock style of the ’60s and ’70s, slathered with a nearly Beatles-esque layer and a gurgling Tom Petty scratch.

The new playlist also includes: Maggie Rose, Gina Brooklyn, Rue Snider, The Darcys, HARLEY, Kid Bloom, Sigrid, Josh Gray, Smithfield, Husky, Hezen, Stealing Sheep, Maddie & Tae, Lydia Halloway, Matthew Pinder and countless more.

In all, we’ve got 50 new songs to bop along to as you ready for the impending three-day weekend. Leggo and let music.

Each playlist will be refreshed every Friday morning/afternoon. We reserve the right to update anytime during the week, so make sure you bookmark this page.

Take a spin:

https://open.spotify.com/user/bsidesbadlands/playlist/5lJi18d3QYbsbJ6ZD4CNwn?si=AY_edaKGQoC5D2lxx_tmgw

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