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New Music Friday – March 14, 2025

This New Music Friday is the gift that keeps on giving. Get it? “The Giver” by Chappell Roan is finally here. There are a number of great singles and records out now worth a listen. Scroll down to check out the complete list of new releases to que up. First, we’re giving what readers came for.

The Best of New Music Friday:

Chappell Roan – “The Giver”

For weeks, Chappell Roan has popped up on posters and billboards in major cities across the world, suggesting she “gets the job done,” and now that promise is delivered. Roan, whose meteoric rise couldn’t have been prophesized in 2017, has had fans asking her to give “The Giver” since she first performed the previously unreleased song on a November 2024 episode of Saturday Night Live.

With a snazzy fiddle jamming under Roan’s trademark pop vocals, plus lyrics stuffed with innuendos about sex, glitter, glam and deer antlers, the singer quickly has fans hooked (a better phrase though, according to her lyrics, is that she can close her eyes and have you wrapped around her fingers “like that”).

Time to ponder on that phrase: “I get the job done.” Does Roan really mean she’s “no country boy quitter,” as the lyrics in “The Giver” straight up suggest? Is it that she always does a task well, like the dentists, construction workers, and Cleveland, Ohio based personal injury attorney Tim Misny (all of whom she cosplays as in recent promo photos), do for their clients? Maybe Roan is just trying to be her charmingly odd self. That is who so many fans have come to adore in the past two years, anyways. And those fans should remain thrilled for what may come next.

“We have a country song,” Roan described of her unannounced next big album to Rolling Stone last year. ”We have a dancy song. We have one that’s really Eighties, and we have one that’s acoustic, and we have one that’s really organic, live-band, Seventies vibe. It’s super weird.”

So, it’s giving “super weird.”

“I am just here to twirl and do a little gay yodel for y’all,” Roan captioned an Instagram post last week.

Look, that’s enough deep reading into any potential meaning of a generational pop star’s fun country song. Just enjoy doing a little yodel and twirl. Take what you are given, and right now, Roan is giving everyone “The Giver.” Thank you, Chappell. You’ve gotten the job done.

New Music Friday Top Picks:

Bambara – Birthmarks [Wharf Cat]

Barry Can’t Swim – “Different” [Ninja Tune]

Charley Crockett – Lonesome Drifter [Island]

Circuit des Yeux – Halo on the Inside [Matador]

Kaleah Lee – “Fever” [Self-released]

Matt Berninger – “Bonnet Of Pins” [Concord]

Mark Pritchard and Thom Yorke – “This Conversation is Missing Your Voice” [Warp]

Nova Twins – “Soprano” [Marshall]

Ty Segall – “Fantastic Tomb” [Drag City]

Which of these tracks from New Music Friday will you add to your favorite playlists today? Any we missed? Let us know in the comments or on Instagram!

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Ben Pagani

Music Projects Manager at Beyond The Stage Magazine

Ben is a music journalist living and working in Chicago. They joined Beyond The Stage as an intern and have stayed on the staff for several years. Now serving on the editorial board, Ben is proud to be BTS' Music Projects Manager, coordinating coverage between international record labels and our staff. Ben has interviewed, photographed and written about bands from across the world. Ben has lived all over the United States working in television and media. They are an Emmy Award-winning writer. Ben can be found spinning records as 'DJ Wearing Sunglasses' in clubs and basements across the US.