The Smartest Man in the World began as the solo songwriting project of Memphis-based Dead Soldiers vocalist and rhythm guitar player Michael Jasud. It features eclectic songwriting propelled by Jasud’s unconventional arrangements and unique melodic sensibility, with songs crafted by Jasud and shaped by some of Memphis’s most talented gigging and session musicians. With this latest group of songs he continues to explore relationships, pop culture, technology, and trauma through a millennial lens of postmodern existential dread.
Anika — the project of Berlin-based musician Annika Henderson, who is also a founding member of Exploded View — announces Change, her first new album in over a decade. Her video for “Change” was directed by Sven Gutjahr, who also directed the video for her recent single, “Finger Pies.” The follow-up to cult favorite Anika (2010), Change is beautifully fraught. The intimacy of its creation and a palpable sense of global anxiety are seemingly baked into the album’s DNA. Spread across nine tracks, the central feeling of the record is one of heightened frustration buoyed by guarded optimism. The songs offer skittering, austere electronic backdrops reminiscent of classic Broadcast records or Hi Scores-era Boards of Canada, playing them against Anika’s remarkable voice — Nico-esque, beautifully plaintive, and — in regard to the record’s subject matter — totally resolute.
