Another week, another round of new releases, and this one ended up being especially heavy on songs that caught me by surprise. From hearing Mac Miller’s voice again to Remi Wolf making her second appearance in this column to a Nessa Barrett song I nearly dismissed before it completely grew on me, these are the three tracks I had On Repeat this week.
Mac Miller – “Butterflies”
Who is the greatest white boy of all time?
It was a question I saw in a TikTok earlier this week, and predictably, the comments did not disappoint. Steve Irwin was a remarkably popular choice. So were Tony Hawk, Mister Rogers, Bob Ross and Justin Bieber. Somebody even said Stevie Nicks, which technically disregards the assignment but spiritually makes enough sense that I’ll allow it.
Then somebody said Mac Miller.
The comment had thousands of likes, and I thought, yeah. That’s a very difficult argument to counter.
It’s hard to believe Mac Miller has been gone for eight years. There are certain artists whose catalogs eventually begin to feel complete after they die, and then there are artists like Mac, or Amy Winehouse, where whatever they left us will simply never feel like enough. There was too much creative movement happening when they died. You can hear all the places the music might have gone.
Circles arrived in 2020 at a particularly difficult time in my own life. I had recently lost someone I cared about to a drug overdose, and that album found me at exactly the moment I needed it. I listened to it constantly. I still think it’s about as close to a perfect album as you can get.
So imagine my surprise when I was going through this week’s releases and suddenly heard that voice again.
“Butterflies” is a previously unreleased song from The Divine Feminine sessions, now officially released ahead of the album’s 10th anniversary edition. Produced by Taylor Graves with Thundercat on bass, it’s one of three previously unreleased songs being added to the expanded record, which arrives October 2.
Everything I want from a Mac Miller song is here. The jazz and soul underneath the production, the hopeless romanticism, the conversational ease of his delivery, and that very particular combination of devotion and nonchalance that he could make coexist in the same song. There’s a warmth to Mac’s music that remains difficult to replicate because so much of it came from him rather than the production surrounding him.
That’s especially true of The Divine Feminine. Released in 2016, the album was built around love, intimacy and relationships, and marked an important point in Mac’s transition toward the increasingly melodic, genre-fluid musician we would hear on Swimming and Circles. “Butterflies” fits naturally into that world. It doesn’t sound like something pulled out of storage and dusted off for an anniversary release. It sounds like Mac.
There’s also something strange about hearing genuinely new music from somebody whose voice you know that well. Eight years is a long time. The world has changed considerably since Mac Miller was in it, yet within seconds of “Butterflies” starting, there he is again. That was enough to make this one personal for me.
I’ve listened to Circles more times than I could possibly count. I’ve gone back through the catalog. None of that is quite the same as pressing play on a Mac Miller song you’ve never heard before and having absolutely no idea what he’s about to say.
So, if Mac Miller isn’t officially the greatest white boy of all time, he’s certainly in contention. More importantly, “Butterflies” gave me three minutes and thirteen seconds with an artist I didn’t realize how much I missed hearing something new from.
That makes it my number one song on On Repeat this week.
Remi Wolf – “Bottle”
Coming in at number two this week is Remi Wolf with “Bottle,” and if this is the direction her music is going in, I’m all ears.
Remi was just on On Repeat a couple of weeks ago with “Twiggy,” and the fact that she’s back again this quickly says a lot. Both songs show tremendous growth from an artist I’ve followed for years, but what’s really impressing me lately is the construction of these records. The production is phenomenal, but they’re also engineered to actually go somewhere.
“Bottle” has a beginning, middle and end in a way that a surprising amount of contemporary pop doesn’t. It starts slowly and hooks you almost immediately, settles into this ridiculously catchy middle, and then somewhere around the bridge, it pivots. Not for the sake of throwing in a production trick, either. The shift actually advances the song and changes the way the final stretch feels.
I can already imagine what this will be like live. “Bottle” feels physical. It’s the kind of song you experience with your whole body, and I would put money on there being a point where everybody in the room ends up clapping their hands over their heads.
It’s also a perfect late-summer record. There’s something about it that makes me picture one of those lesbian coming-of-age movies where you’re driving down some deserted highway in an old vintage truck with the windows down and your girlfriend beside you. Sunshine, open road, nowhere particularly urgent to be. The whole thing has this sense of movement and freedom with a very distinct fuck-it streak running through it.
Lyrically, there’s a similar willingness to take the chance because you might as well. You miss every shot you don’t take, and “Bottle” has that energy without turning it into some inspirational slogan.
Musically, I could easily hear G Flip somewhere in its orbit. There are also moments that remind me of the guitar-driven alternative singer-songwriter tradition of Michelle Branch, and even Taylor Swift at her most organic. But Remi has enough personality that those references remain exactly that. The song still sounds unmistakably like her.
And I’m no longer particularly surprised that she’s back here so soon.
Between “Twiggy” and now “Bottle,” this is starting to feel like a genuine new chapter for Remi Wolf. The songwriting is sharper, the production is more ambitious, and she seems increasingly interested in making songs that are experiences rather than simply collections of hooks.
If she keeps putting out records at this level, she belongs in the big leagues. And as a fellow Bay Area native, I’m particularly happy to see her out there hustling, fighting and continuing to get better.
Two appearances on On Repeat within a few weeks. At this rate, I have a feeling it won’t be the last.
Nessa Barrett – “Bad Girls Never Die”
Rounding out On Repeat this week is “Bad Girls Never Die” by Nessa Barrett, a song I went back and forth on before it eventually won me over.
I actually didn’t realize it was Nessa when I first heard it. I know her primarily as an electropop artist, but what caught my attention here was what she’s doing vocally. Everything is dreamier, softer and more romantic, and the production gives her voice considerably more room to work.
My immediate reaction was also impossible to ignore: this sounds like Born to Die and Paradise-era Lana Del Rey.
And, in my opinion, that was pretty much the golden era of Lana Del Rey. After that, there were stretches where the writing started sounding to me like someone threw cherry pie, Cadillacs, Malibu, palm trees, cigarettes and a millionaire into a blender and called it a song. But I digress.
At first, the Lana comparison actually worked against “Bad Girls Never Die” for me. I wondered whether it was simply too familiar. Then I kept hearing it, and it grew on me.
Sometimes I think music listeners, and critics especially, can be a little too precious about influence. If something reminds you of a record you loved, that doesn’t automatically make it derivative. Enough time has passed since that particular strain of early-2010s cinematic pop dominated the culture that hearing somebody revisit it can actually feel nostalgic. Fashion works the same way. Bell-bottoms disappear and come back every 15 or 20 years. Music eventually starts cycling through its own recent history, too.
There have certainly been artists working in neighboring territory since then. Melanie Martinez has played with some of that heightened cinematic nostalgia, while Kali Uchis has explored her own version of old-Hollywood glamour and lowrider romanticism. But there’s something very specifically Born to Die, Paradise, even “National Anthem” about the atmosphere of “Bad Girls Never Die.”
And you know what? I like it.
It’s dreamy. It’s sexy. It’s romantic and yearning without becoming completely overwrought, and the style really suits Nessa’s voice. In fact, it made me wonder what would happen if she leaned further into this direction. She already has the performance ability and the audience. If she took this kind of cinematic pop, developed her own language around it and pushed it somewhere more distinctly hers, I could see it becoming a very interesting lane for her.
Does all of Nessa Barrett’s music sound like this? No. Will everything she makes from here sound like this? Probably not. But “Bad Girls Never Die” made me interested in hearing what would happen if she explored it further.
And yes, you can absolutely be nostalgic for something from a decade ago. It doesn’t have to be vintage to remind you of a very specific moment in music.
So, for anyone who still has a particular attachment to that pre-Ultraviolence Lana Del Rey era, “Bad Girls Never Die” is worth a listen. I almost brushed it off the first time around. Then it kept coming back on, I kept liking it more, and eventually I had to concede the point.
Which is, quite literally, how a song ends up on On Repeat.
Three very different songs made the cut this week, but all three gave me a reason to go back for another listen, whether it was an artist I’ve missed, one I’m watching evolve in real time, or a song that simply had to win me over first. I’ll be back next Wednesday with three more. Until then, happy listening.
Featured image credit: punk rock journalist
