Music update, July 2016.

I don’t know if this was a weak month for new music or if I was just too busy to find as much of it as I normally do; either way this is a shorter-than-normal playlist, but anything I didn’t discover in July will just have to come find me in August. If the embedded panel doesn’t work you can access the Spotify playlist directly instead.

The Naked And Famous – Higher. I’ve liked most of the Naked & Famous’ output to date, including this anthemic new single, but they also seem to me like CHVRCHES without the charisma of Lauren Mayberry. N&F’s lead singer Alisa Xayalith does her job, and the group’s lyrics typically bring a few clever flourishes, but for whatever reason her voice doesn’t compel you to listen. “Higher” is their most radio-friendly track since “Young Blood,” though, and I’m hopeful they’ll get some crossover airplay.

Jagwar Ma – O B 1. Jagwar Ma is among the leading lights of Australian indie pop, with drawn-out takes on spacey psycheledic pop music. Their first hit “Save Me” appeared in 2011, followed by a full-length album in 2013. This track appears to be the first ahead of their second album, and it’s just as weird and spaced-out as their work to date, almost defying you to grab hold of its twisted melody.

ELEL – When She Walks. ELEL – again with the all caps, although I suppose Elel might look odd – is a pop octet (yep) from Nashville led by Ben Elkins, with a sort of roots-rock element to its instrumentation and arrangements. I kind of liked their debut single last year, “40 Watt,” but this is much catchier and the instrumental bridges elevate the song well above your standard alt-pop track.

Biffy Clyro – Howl. Biffy Clyro is a band name you could only get away with if you were from Scotland, but this trio is, so it’s all good. Once an experimental rock act, they’ve gone indie-pop as they’ve gotten older, with this track reminiscent of another Scottish power-pop act, Teenage Fanclub. Their seventh album, Ellipsis, is due in September.

Local Natives – Fountain Of Youth. Good Local Natives have a little more tension, almost a yearning, the way “Heavy Feet” stood out from the overall mellow Hummingbird album. This song, like “Past Lives” earlier this year, has me cautiously optimistic about their upcoming album Sunlit Youth.

HUNGER – Amused. HUNGER (stylized in all capitals because reasons) is an Austrian electronic pop trio about to release its second album, which is a deep throwback to the post-new wave synthpop era – mid-period Depeche Mode, for example. They also really remind me of Cause & Effect, a band I don’t even know that well.

Jeff Beck – Right Now. Jeff Beck’s guitar work, both technical proficiency and his ability to craft compelling riffs, is incredible for someone in his ’70s, and while the vocals of Rosie Bones are a distraction here I’m still buying in to hear Beck’s fretwork.

Wild Beasts – Tough Guy. Wild Beasts are huge critical darlings in the U.K. but are probably too strange and artsy to find much of a following here; if you’re a fan of alt-J or Everything Everything, then you’d probably enjoy their work, which has a heavy electronic component and plays around with song structures. It’s also very distinctly British, which I consider a positive but others may not.

Zhu – Palm of My Hand. Stephen Zhu had one of my favorite songs of last year with “Hold Up Wait a Minute,” an inspired collaboration with Bone Thugs N’ Harmony and Trombone Shorty, but the California-based DJ and producer’s output is so all over the place I haven’t found another song I’ve liked from him until this almost completely instrumental electronic track, which starts with a melodic guitar solo before spacing out with a mournful piano riff, mostly over a throbbing drum-and-bass line. Zhu’s debut album, Generationwhy, came out last Friday.

Of Montreal – it’s different for girls. These guys are delightfully bizarre; their sound doesn’t always come together for me, but when it does they make some of the most unique alternative pop music out there. Lead singer Kevin Barnes’ lyrics don’t always rhyme, and they cover topics not typically found in pop music. His delivery is over-enunciated and effeminate. The song structures vary from track to track and often fall apart mid-song, like Barnes forgot where he started and didn’t bother to go back to it. This song, which is like a psychedelic reimagining of a vintage Blur track, is the lead single ahead of their album Innocence Reaches, due out August 12th.

Prophets Of Rage – Prophets Of Rage. Prophets of Rage are a supergroup that could easily end up a disaster – the three musicians from Rage Against the Machine together with Chuck D (Public Enemy) and B Real (Cypress Hill). On the plus side, either one of those guys would represent an upgrade over Zack de la Rocha. On the minus side, this could end up some cliche-ridden rap-rock. This lead single, bearing the band’s title, is probably a 55: above average, better than I’d feared, not as good as it might have been 20 years ago.

Pixies – Um Chagga Lagga.

Nani – I Am Volcano. This LA-based quartet, featuring a singer born in Bosnia and raised in Canada, just dropped this lead single in June, a manic punk rush powered by lead singer Nina’s tumbling, vaguely poetic lyrics.

Descendents – Beyond The Music. The Descendents are pretty much an automatic inclusion on these lists; they’re older but they haven’t grown up musically, just in their lyrics (like “No Fat Burger,” an ode to fighting high cholesterol). Their new album Hypercaffium Spazzinate features twenty-one mostly short, mostly similar tracks, but there are a half-dozen with melodies just a bit better than the rest, including this one, “Without Love,” and “On Paper.”

JEFF The Brotherhood – Idiot. I saw JEFF (grr) the Brotherhood in Tempe in 2012 with Nick Piecoro. They were … adequate. Kind of loud, not very hooky, but “Idiot” definitely brings the hook without materially changing their heavy guitar/drum sound (think Drenge, Royal Blood, and all these other rock duos mining the same formula).