Upcoming Album of the Week (Ending October 1)

There was a new study published this week that found that most indie bands, unsurprisingly, are not very good at business communications. They have a product to sell, their music, but no knowledge of how effectively sell it. As much as I think that I try to find new music organically, I'm painfully aware that most of what I find represents artists who were able to figure it out. For what it's worth, check out the artists that I have found who have new music coming on my Upcoming Releases page!

This week, Solange Knowles announced and released her third studio album, A Seat at the Table.

stereogum.com

It would be easy to peg Solange as little more than Beyoncé's little sister, but to do so would be to ignore a spectacular artist in her own right. At the beginning of her career more than a decade ago, she fit pretty well within a standard female R&B singer trope, but over time she began to flex her experimental and political chops.

Her profile has risen greatly over the past few years. She released an EP in 2012, True, which seemed to represent her move away from the mainstream. She had just split with Interscope records and partnered with Dev Hynes (Lightspeed Champion and Blood Orange) to write and record the album.

Knowles has stayed busy since that EP, starting her own record label and releasing a series of songs. Somehow, this is only her third album, and first since 2008. The album's announcement, which came on Tuesday, was preceded by a new book of the same name; 86 lucky fans received a hard copy. For the rest of us, we can read the digital version online, which was released this week.

A Seat at the Table is out now.

Also announced this week:

~j~ - Will2Change (out now)
Alex Frankel - Negative Space (September 30)
The Band - The Last Waltz 40th Anniversary Edition (November 11)
Bob Dylan - The 1966 Live Recordings (November 11)
Bob Dylan - The Real Royal Albert Hall 1966 Concert (November 25)
Cut Copy - January Tape (out now)
David Bowie - David Bowie Legacy (November 11)
Ex Reyes - Do Something (November 4)
Fucked Up - This Mother Forever (out now)
Jean-Michel Jarre - Oxygene 3 (December 3)
John Hassall & The April Rainers - Wheels to Idyll (November 25)
Lou Barlow - Apocalypse Fetish (October 28)
The Magnetic Fields - The Wayward Bus/Distant Plastic Trees Remastered (December 2)
Pete Doherty - Hamburg Demonstrations (December 2)
The Rolling Stones - Havana Moon (November 11)
Cashmere Cat - “Trust Nobody” (out now)
Sia - This Is Acting Deluxe Version (October 21)
Spiritualized - TBA (June 16)
Tycho - Epoch (out now)
The Weeknd - Starboy (November 25)