From Kendrick Lamar to King Stingray, the best new albums you need to hear

Album releases typically dry up towards the end of the year, but that doesn't mean the quality should. And these five new records prove it.

This week's new-music round-up features the hottest rap record of the moment alongside Australian acts and one Kiwi well and truly worth your ears' investment. Shall we?

Kendrick Lamar — GNX

Named after a rare, vintage car model and bearing trunk-rattling tributes to West Coast hip hop, GNX is the surprise sixth album from Kendrick Lamar.

It follows his high-profile feud with Drake, a beef some criticised as ugly but that most agree Lamar soundly won. The fatal blow was 'Not Like Us', a chart-topping diss track so severe that its subject has resorted to court action, framing GNX as a victory lap for Lamar, and proof he has fighting words for anyone staking a claim to the rap throne.

Within the first few minutes of minimal, sinister opener 'Wacced Out Murals', he's taking pot shots at legends like Snoop Dogg and Lil' Wayne. He bemoans the "outdated, old-ass flows" of supposed contemporaries, then platforms underground L.A. up-and-comers (like AzChike, Lefty Gunplay, Peysoh) on several later tracks.

"Ni***s layin' on they death bed tryna match me," he declares on 'Hey Now', one of several tracks where Lamar's athletic flows sound looser over skeletal yet swaggering beats.

The clubby vigour of 'Squabble Up' extends the sound and success of 'Not Like Us'. Ditto 'TV Off', which reunites Lamar with producer DJ Mustard, bellowing his name over a villainous string sample in what swiftly became the internet's new favourite meme. 

Beyond the tougher tracks, 'Luther' is an infectiously soulful joint with neo-soul luminary (and former TDE labelmate) SZA, while 'Dodger Blue' crip walks over a smooth G funk groove.

It all feels like a response to critiques that arose during the Drake discourse that Lamar was 'too cerebral' and lacked commercial appeal following his last album, Mr Morale and the Big Steppers — a challenging double album riddled with self-doubt that provided no easy answers.

GNX is a tonal backflip, the leanest and most accessible music he could've made at the point he has the attention of a wider mainstream audience. Despite being a compact listen, it still contains the lyrical depth and storytelling you'd expect of the only rapper to claim a Pulitzer Prize.

On 'Reincarnated', he embodies the spirit of late, great Black artists (including his Californian idol 2Pac) while embodying a dramatic conversation between God and the Devil. 'Heart Part. 6' waxes nostalgic on Lamar's come-up with rap collective Black Hippy and label TDE, ultimately outgrowing them creatively but maintaining the love and respect.

Set to headline next year's Super Bowl Half Time Show, and likely add to his 17 previous wins after scoring seven 2025 Grammy Award nominations, Lamar isn't just ahead of the competition. He's in a league of his own.

"I deserve it all" he boasts on searing stand-out 'Man At The Garden'. It's hard to disagree on the evidence of GNX, another essential entry in a peerless discography full of them.

For fans of: ScHoolBoy Q, Ab-Soul, Tyler, The Creator

• Al Newstead

King Stingray — For The Dreams

King Stingray's self-titled debut album was Double J's favourite album of 2022. And we weren’t alone. 

The record won the NT group fans around the country and swept the Australian Music Prize, multiple ARIA, AIR and National Indigenous Music Awards, as well as the prestigious Vanda & Young Global Songwriting Competition.

How do you follow up that kind of success? Well, if you're the biggest band to come out of Yirrkala, in north-east Arnhem Land, the answer is more of the same great music.

For The Dreams makes it sound easy, offering a winning fusion of Yolŋu songlines and spirited rock music.

Vintage keyboards and chiming guitars blend with clapping bilma and blowing yidaki on 'Southerly', a tune as pleasant as its titular breeze, and 'Soon As', built around the heart-warming refrain: "It's good to be back on country".

There are some new elements in the mix — piano, synths, even some sitar — but it's all here to serve King Sting's core sound. Namely, uplifting choruses custom-built for the bigger stages have become the band's habitat in recent years.

You can almost feel the sun on your face in the bright production of 'Day Off', and the familiar bump of tyres on an outback road in 'Lookin' Out' and 'Best Bits', which is destined for festival sing-along status.

These infectiously optimistic odes to simple joys and living in the present are certainly appealing given how scary the world can currently seem — let alone for First Nations communities still hurting deeply a year on from the failed Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum.

There's zero politics to For The Dreams but King Stingray’s immaculate, feel-good anthems should – just like nature, community, culture, and hope – be treasured. 

For fans of: Warumpi Band, South Summit, Coldplay

• Al Newstead

Beckah Amani — This is how I remember it.

Beckah Amani has been one of our country’s most promising singers and songwriters for years now. Her debut album has arrived with less fanfare than it deserves, but you’ll be thankful you discovered it once it hits your ears. 

Some of these songs have been bouncing around in our heads for years now: ‘I Don’t Know Why I Don’t Leave You’, ‘Waiting On You’, and recent single ‘Superstar’ are every bit as good now as when they were released.

But it’s the fresh material that will excite her growing fanbase most. Her best performances to date come with songs like heart-filling ballad ‘Grow With You’, the luscious opener ‘Try For Me’, and the part-defiant, part-vulnerable ‘Call Home’. 

That Amani does not neatly fit into a genre would be a hindrance for a lesser artist. But the versatility of her voice and the consistently on-point music that accompanies her means the variety offered on her debut album will work in her favour. 

There’s something for almost everyone on here, and while her brilliant voice and songwriting might occasionally call to mind a great artist from the past, her open-hearted embrace of various styles makes her a unique proposition. 

For fans of: Tems, Michael Kiwanuka, Sade

• Dan Condon

Ella Thompson — Ripple On The Wing

Mentored by Australian soul pioneer Renée Geyer, and blessed with equally smooth pipes, Ella Thompson is a fixture of the Melbourne/Naarm indie music scene. 

She's also a keen vinyl enthusiast whose solo music tastefully draws from vintage sounds — 1960s jazz and funk, movie soundtracks, library music — to make soulful music that'd fit snugly in any self-respecting record collector's crate.

Her latest album is the warm, cinematic, instantly charming Ripple On The Wing, which continues to prove she's one of our country's underrated masters of this type of sound.

Following swiftly on from last year's excellent release, Domino, the album was cut live in just two days with the backing of a veritable supergroup of local hotshots. (If the names Surprise Chef, Karate Boogaloo, Saskwatch, and Hiatus Kaiyote mean anything to you, then you know what's up.)

Together, they dish out tasty grooves on 'Omen', spooky simmer on 'Let There Be Nothing', and sway with suitably sticky synergy as Thompson sings of "honeycomb, molasses" on closer 'Don't Be A Taurus'.

Easy to admire, and even easier to enjoy, these songs sizzle and swoon over timeless arrangements, feeling like they've been living in your head, and heart, for decades.

Reality is, Ella Thompson is operating right here, right now, and very much in her element.

For fans of: The Bamboos, Emma Donovan & The Putbacks, Thee Sacred Souls

• Al Newstead

Fazerdaze — Soft Power

New Zealand singer-songwriter Amelia Murray made a big splash very quickly with the release of Morningside, her debut album as Fazerdaze, way back in 2017. That rapid rise explains a little about why it's taken so long to get its follow up, Soft Power.

In a statement issued with the album last month, Murray said her new album was an anchor as she was "entering womanhood, navigating the world, the music industry and what I thought was love".

Even though much of the album may have come from darkness, there's plenty of sparkle here. The poised pop of 'So Easy' verges on Beatles-esque, the 80s pop production and sticky earworm melody makes 'A Thousand Years' land beautifully, and even on more pained moments, like the great 'Bigger', you can feel glints of hope flickering through the pain.

While the vocals retain a little of that haziness that was so appealing on her first LP, there's a sharpness to the production here that makes the songs feel very present. The shout-along chorus of 'Cherry Pie' sees Murray at her best, combing a vaguely miasmic atmosphere with astute pop excellence, resulting in something truly special.

For fans of: Clairo, Phoebe Bridgers, The Cure

• Dan Condon