Tracks of the week reviewed: Dora Jar, Viagra Boys, Tom Morello

Dora Jar

Multiply

Managed, presumably, by Tim Vine, California’s Dora Jar actually leans existential, with Brechtian visuals and haunted glitch-folk about self-doubt that’s about as boom-tshh as a Covid briefing. This excellent second single finds her cutting people at parties for fun in the style of Laura Marling catching “the quirk” from Regina Spektor, then gets gatecrashed by a surprise Killers chorus at the end. Ann Predictable, more like.

Viagra Boys ft Amy Taylor

In Spite of Ourselves

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We all found new mood swings and bad habits to love about our partners in lockdown, as reflected in this clatter-country John Prine cover, a degenerate redneck romance worthy of Wayne and Waynetta Slob. He loves the way she swears while shaving her legs; she adores catching this dumb alcoholic sniffing her underwear. A timely reminder that there’s someone for everyone.

Tate McRae

r u ok

Canada’s answer to Billie Eilish (Billie Eh-lish?) provides her nearly half a billion streamers with an update on the surprise un-ghosting that prompted last year’s sullen TikTok sensation You Broke Me First. She’s a jaunty ukulele skip along the road to “screw you”; he’s still beg-texting like a human cry emoji. It nonetheless raises the question: when did future soul become so last decade?

Postdata

Nobody Knows

Canada’s answer to Frightened Rabbit – because everywhere needs one – the side project of Wintersleep’s Paul Murphy lead off their third enormo-folk album collaborating with, well, Frightened Rabbit. Nova Scotian enormity meets Scottish self-hatred on a song that sounds as if it’s surfing an avalanche on a copy of Rumours.

Tom Morello and Serj Tankian

Natural’s Not in It

“The problem of leisure, what to do for pleasure … The body is good business, sell out, maintain the interest.” Yes, Gang of Four’s Andy Gill didn’t just predict lockdown on this acerbic 1979 track, but OnlyFans too. To honour Gill’s death in February, Tankian and Morello present the chaotic reading the past 12 months deserves.