ONE DIRECTION
Steal My Girl
Syco
To judge from some recent comments by Simon Cowell, as well as applying Louis Walsh's dictum about boybands and tattoos, it seems likely that the heavily inked One Direction may soon be going their separate ways. In these dog days of their reign at the top, then, anxiety and paranoia are beginning to creep into the One Direction camp. "Everybody wants to steal my girl," they fret here. "Everybody wants to steal her heart away." Their new album, Four, is out November 17th. And by the way, organ trafficking is prohibited under the Istanbul Declaration of 2008.
APHEX TWIN
Minipops 67
Warp
In an interview to promote his Syro album, the reclusive Richard D James revealed that he watches a lot of YouTube documentaries, believes in the Illuminati and thinks the 9/11 attacks were an inside job. So it turns out there is something to be said for enigmatic silence.
LORDE
Yellow Flicker
Beat Republic
From the soundtrack to the latest Hunger Games movie, Yellow Flicker Beat is Lorde's first new material since last year's Grammy-winning Pure Heroine album. And if the opening line was any more Lana Del Rey, it would have a beehive hairdo and death fixation. "I'm a princess cut from marble," coos the Kiwi singer. "Smoother than a storm." ("Paler than a ghost" would also have scanned. Just a suggestion.)
ARETHA FRANKLIN
Rolling in the Deep
RCA
On her new Great Diva Classics, the Queen of Soul performs songs made famous by such modern artists as Adele, Alicia Keys and Sinéad O'Connor. But it's very much an old-school album, overseen by legendary Clive Davis (82), with backing vocals by Whitney's mother Cissy Houston (81) among others. On the lead single, Franklin even throws in a few bars of Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell's Ain't No Mountain High Enough. Rolling in the deep and rolling back the years.
