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The Round-Up: Best Songs of The Week - ft. Miles Davis, Prince, Mahalia and More [Playlist]
The Round-Up: Best Songs of The Week - ft. Miles Davis, Prince, Mahalia and More [Playlist]

The Round-Up: Best Songs of The Week - ft. Miles Davis, Prince, Mahalia and More [Playlist]

Lenny Kravitz, Grace Jones, Lauryn Hill, Lion Babe, Thundercat, SZA & More Rock The Afropunk Festival 2015 in Brooklyn, NY.

With selections from Miles' elastic mid-80s flex, Prince's jazz-junkie Madhouse phase, and Mahalia's triumphant major label debut.

Happy Friday, good people. And a righteous Release Day unto you. The heat's breaking, the kids are back in classroom mode, and the house is (hopefully) starting to resemble something close to pre-summer form. So let's get to these drops while you still have a moment to actually enjoy them.

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The week is led by a heavy haul of new long plays. Mahalia's Love and Compromise is a sprawling and dynamic tour de force from the rising r&b star. IDK's Is He Real?explores the secular/sacred divide with an irreverent, categorically millennial, lens. Childish Major's Dirt Road Diamonis equal parts nostalgic and future-proof with cover-to-cover potency. EARTHGANG's Mirrorland establishes a new strain and era of funk-fortified, Southern-stewed rap. Moonchild's Little Ghost revives the Soulquarian sound with moving minimalism and lo-fi wizardry. Oh, and there's newly-unearthed mid-80s Miles Davis project to comb through.

READ: Malcolm Cecil Breaks Down the Making of Music of My Mind — the Album that Launched Stevie Wonder's "Classic Period" 

On the singles side, Danny Brown's upcoming Q-Tip-produced album is finally taking shape with the release of his stuttering, punchline-packed, new single "Dirty Laundry." Skyzoo and Pete Rock drop off another Beast Coast boom-bap anthem. Homeboy Sandman sends out a stray transmission over a breezy bookworm loop. Stones Throw's Kiefer continues the march towards his next project with a velvet key and kung-fu swung drum combo. Kanye West and Bon Iver's Justin Vernon staged a short reunion on Francis and The Lights' latest gospel-tinged loosie. There's even a touch of Prince's jazz-junkie phase in a newly released Madhouse morsel. And that's just half the script.

Hear it all in this week's episode of The Round-Up below. Hit the link to subscribe to Okayplayer's Spotify channel and never miss another true note.

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