Are you ready to beat my heart?

2025 Mix 24: Accidental protest anthems, catching up on various Francophone scenes, Xtian Xrossover, and the curious case of an easy listening smash hit I've never heard of

Soft sounds for a hard summer

I’m getting ahead of my mixes in preparation for various summer activities, so I have no idea what will be happening in the world when this post (or the next one) drops. So far there seems to be no great summer shake-up in the global charts, but the appropriately named “Shake It to the Max” has broken through to the Top 10 at press time, while the soft sounds of sombr and the continuing “ok, sure” ascendancy of Tate McRae are both providing some chart fungus harm reduction. But the 2024 biggies (plus Alex Warren’s “Ordinary”) still haven’t been dislodged. I’ve come around on Sabrina Carpenter’s “Manchild,” which might make a go at the top of the charts.

My own recommendations for Songs of the Summer this week both come from outside the US — “Kill Ma Bo$$” by KIIRAS and “Queimando Ice” by Irmãs de Pau. A bolder US pop star might find a way to take executive violence and/or the burning of ICE and roll them into what I am presuming at the beginning of June will be a long hot roiling summer.

But I should note here that I really don’t usually put much stock in the charts, and have only been paying attention lately because of my A-pop writing—and specifically my growing interest in the format of the Billboard Global 200, which as a measurement tool feels true to the current pop moment in the way that many regional charts (including the Hot 100 and UK charts) don’t. But this has also made me more interested in learning more about the regional peculiarities of different chart systems, including whatever the US charts are becoming.

There’s an interesting NPR piece this week about the crossover from the Christian charts to the Billboard Hot 100. Although I think this is an interesting phenomenon, I can’t help but bring an A-pop lens to it—this is a distinctly regional American phenomenon with, as far as I can tell, zero impact on global charts so far (though there are large faith-based groups abroad comprising a sizable minority of listeners to the Christian artists, like in Brazil). When the piece describes Christian music outpacing “world music,” I can’t help but think at some level this is a US charts skill issue.

I don’t plan on following CCM anytime soon, but I might do something more with easy listening and adult contemporary rather than anything in the current chart landscape. I’ve been once again nudged in this direction by a recent revelation by Andrew Hickey of the History of Rock Music in 500 Songs podcast. According to BMI’s accounting in the late ‘90s, the song “Traces” by Classics IV, a song I have not only never heard but never heard of, was the 32nd most played song on the radio of the 20th century. I don’t know whether to trust this accounting, but it showing up for whatever reason is a reminder to follow the footnotes sometimes (“Traces” went to #2 on the Hot 100 and #2 on the Easy Listening charts).

Hey, another song of the summer contender — soft sounds for hard times. If Connie Francis can get a durable TikTok resurgence, why not Classics IV?

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Previous 2025 Mixes

Tidal || YouTube

1. KIIRAS: Kill Ma Bo$$
South Korea

Country remains a bit difficult to absorb in international pop scenes, but not only do KIIRAS try their damnedest with this one, they’ve also released a “straight” country version that if I squint I might like better. (…Nah.) As far as I can tell, the lyrics are a nonsensical syllabic glitterbomb but the chorus hook is, er, evocative.

2. JRBUBBLEGUM f. BIZCUITBEER, GUNNER: แจว
Thailand

A minor dipping of toes beyond my Thai playlists this week reveals plenty of likably goofy rap I’ve missed, including this one by a former member of goof troupe Bear Knuckle, and featuring GUNNER, a consistent presence on the Thai playlists.

3. Theodora f. Thisizlondon: Massoko Na Mabele
France/Nigeria

Was too late to Theodora’s album Bad Boy Lovestory that dropped late last year considering I had ample warning to check it out from friends. So to make it up to everyone I will hype up the deluxe version, MEGA BBL, which is convenient because the new tracks are all great. Really liked this one—sounds like breakneck Ivorian pop.

4. Irmãs de Pau f. Brunoso, Duquesa: Queimando Ice
Brazil

The burning “ice” in question seems to be a drug thing, but I’ll go ahead and put it in all caps. Whole album, Gambiarra Chic, Pt. 2, is a lot of fun—there are already more movers and shakers on my albums list since last week. Was particularly surprised that Lil Wayne immediately stormed the top ten (more on that next week).

5. Says’z: Nathalie
Comoros

6. Meryl: Mentalité block
Martinique

Stumbled on a few Francophone Caribbean songs I liked after writing about Jonathan Bogart’s top 50 of 2024 last week. Meryl was an entry point into the shatta scene for me back in 2023, and the playlists I built out of Meryl, Kryssy, and a few others probably led me to Comoros rapper Says’z, who keeps things casual until he starts blowing raspberries in the hook. The Meryl song is uncharacteristically slow, sweet, and world-weary—maybe she’s growing into the monsterverse.

7. Kybba, Leftside f. Bamby: Buss a Whine
Netherlands/Jamaica/Guyana

Have been giving short shrift to Bamby this year, who has an excellent album out (Muse). I seem to have a tin ear for dancehall, rarely picking things out without some heavy nudge—a featured name I recognize or a song on the charts. (Or, in the case of “Shake It to the Max,” both.)

8. PIAO, Stephanie Poetri: Just a Girl
China/Indonesia/US

A collaboration on US-based Asian rap label 88rising, between Chinese artist based in L.A. PIAO and Indonesian singer Stephanie Poetri. Very hard to go wrong with that title.

9. XAMIYA: GG
Japan

A little pop-punk attitude in this otherwise firmly electro-pop single from a Tokyo duo.

10. Jeff Redd: bAy bAy
Turkey

Fun Turkish deadpan dance song, pronounced like “bye bye,” which makes a solid hook. See also: “Lei Lei” (1998).

11. Mina Koniarikova, Giovanni Ricci: Babie Leto
Czech Republic

A single from the life partner duo of a participant in the Czech Superstar reality TV contest (Koniarikova), but this sounds like slick bedroom fare, with light hyperpop affect over a fuzzy bass riff.

12. DVTR: Couleur peau (Your Next Token Asian Friend)
Canada

More bass fuzz from dependable Montreal post-punkers DVTR. I have managed to avoid the adjective “spiky” to describe this, which I used in both of their previous appearances, but I have not managed to conjure up a more substantial blurb.

13. Laguna Bollente: Campari Noia
Italy

And in case that wasn’t enough, here’s even more hard to describe but fun to listen to post-punk, this one from an Italian band with a more or less random album cut from a strong album overall, Fanta Sbocco.

14. Flava D, SOLAH: Can’t Get It Back
UK

One third of TQD does very British electronic music that people with more chops than I have would probably be able to describe in more detail than giving you an impressionistic percentage breakdown of the pop vs. dnb in “pop-dnb,” which is not the same as dnb-pop. 40-60, maybe?

15. Rochelle Jordan: Crave
UK/Canada

Mm, the sort of house beat infiltration that would sound good in a wine bar before they give up and put on a Sade playlist. (That’s a compliment.) I’ve really liked Rochelle Jordan’s throwback house-pop, including her duet with Kaytranada in his underrated album last year and her own underrated 2021 album Play with the Changes. And by underrated I mean underrated by me—I never really returned to the Kaytranada album despite really liking it, and I see no sign of Jordan on my 2021 list even though I know I heard it at the time.

16. Sawa Angstrom, xiangyu: Ride
Japan

An electropop group provides dreamy J-pop backdrop for featured rapper xiangyu, a charmer whose Japanese bio, which I didn’t bother to translate, includes “gqom” and “amapiano.” That was good enough for me to confirm that these are sounds she has been lightly incorporating into her hard-to-pin-down recent music. Subject for future research.

17. Le Couleur: Moderne, transgressive, et excessive
Canada

Montreal outfit with funk so light you probably shouldn’t even call it that, airy and just this side of cloying.

18. Ana Lua Caiano: Manjericão (Live)
Portugal

Portuguese “one-woman band” grooves and loops her way to one-woman party, if a low-key one where everyone mostly remains seated.

19. Gen Hoshino f. Louis Cole, Sam Gendel, Sam Wilkes: Mad Hope
Japan/US

Hoshino appears to be a more major, and more mainstream, Japanese celebrity than I’d expect for this ragtag collection of fusion folks, though maybe he has the sort of clout to put together whatever cockeyed band he can imagine for a gnarly little album that sounds designed not to spend as many weeks on top of the Japanese charts as he did about ten years ago.

20. LAÏ f. HANIMAMI: WAJA3
Lebanon

The sort of warm Autotune bath (hypopop?) that I don’t usually hear from Middle Eastern artists, seems more indebted to Latin American pop. Should probably be filed under “cosmo” but I’m keeping it in the Middle East/Turkey/North Africa folder to juke my stats at the end of the year.

21. Yumi Zouma: Blister
New Zealand

22. GOON: Patsy’s Twin
US

Ending with two songs to fill my indie quota for June, the Amerindiest one actually from New Zealand. GOON, an L.A. band, dips into sludgy screamo, but in an oddly pleasant way, like they screamed into a pillow out of consideration for their neighbors.

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That’s it! Until next time, scream into a pillow if need be out of consideration for your neighbors, or go meet up with them in the streets and you can scream together at full blast.

—Dave Moore (the other one)

Title from KIIRAS: Kill Ma Bo$$