The Weekly Rewind: Mumford and Sons returns, Madonna revisits an old fave and more

Welcome back to The Weekly Rewind, our regular rundown of the biggest music news stories out there. Here’s what caught our ear this week.

Mumford and Sons is back with “Malibu”

British folk rock group Mumford and Sons will release their new album RUSHMERE on March 28th. To roll out the news, the band shared “Malibu” this week, a spirited song full of emotions and enjoyment. (And a great singalong, too.) In a press release, frontperson Marcus Mumford stated that “Malibu was “the first song we wrote when we got back together in Los Angeles of 2023. The song just felt like us…the process of recording it with Dave [Cobb] captured it on record in a way that made us feel it had to open RUSHMERE. We love it.”
The band’s warm-up tour will get started March 5th in Amsterdam, rolling through a small run of major worlwide cities before wrapping March 26th in Brooklyn at the Paramount. (Read more via Consequence)

Madonna teases new music, revisits her past

After a successful global tour last year, veteran pop icon Madonna has teased her next chapter, “Confessions Part 2,” presumably a sequel to her 2005 album Confessions on a Dance Floor. She’s also coming out with a vinyl re-release of her sixth studio album, 1994’s terrific Bedtime Stories — the banger-filled record that included “Take A Bow,” “Secret,” “Human Nature,” and the ravey Bjork-assisted “Bedtime Story.” (Read more at The Fader.)

McKinley Dixon preps his fifth LP

Visionary Richmond rapper McKinley Dixon has been a favorite on team XPN since we caught him opening for Lucy Dacus’ New Year’s 2019 shows at Johnny Brenda’s; his inventive album Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!? earned him a World Cafe interview last year. Now Dixon is back with his fifth LP Magic, Alive! — out June 6th and featuring an array of exciting collaborators, including rising Philly star Ghais Guevara. Watch the music video for lead single “Sugar Water” below. (Read more via Paste)

Kim Deal’s “Big Ben Beat” comes alive

Richard Ayoade of The IT Crowd and more directs and stars in a new short film of a music video for Kim Deal’s “Big Bang Beat” from last year’s Nobody Loves You More; the cast also includes Savages’ Fay Milton. The Breeders’ frontperson is on tour this year, coming to the Philly area next month for a March 14 gig at The Keswick. (Read more via Pitchfork)

New Fontaines alert!

Dublin favorites Fontaines D.C. wrapped their grueling North American tour in support of last year’s outstanding Romance with a concert at The Fillmore Philly; after some recharge and reset time, they’re back with a new song, “It’s Amazing To Be Young,” written in the presence of multi-instrumentalist Carlos O’Connell’s newborn child. “It sounded more like a lullaby or a music box then,” says the band in a statement, “but with the same lyric- ‘it’s amazing to be young.’ The feeling of hope a child can give is profound and moving, especially for young men like us. That sense of wanting to create a world for them to grow up in happily. It’s a feeling that fights against the cynicism that can often overtake us in the modern world.” (Read more at Brooklyn Vegan)

M.J. Lenderman steps back from Wednesday

XPN Artist to Watch M.J. Lenderman first came on our radar playing guitar and singing in XPN Artist to Watch Wednesday, though in a GQ interview he’s revealed that he is stepping back from that band in the midst of an all-consuming promo run for his terrific solo album Manning Fireworks (and in the wake of his romantic split with Wednesday frontperson Karly Hartzman). He will still appear on the band’s next album, though, due out this year. Lenderman’s next wave of touring with his solo backing band The Wind comes to Philly this May for a Franklin Music Hall show. (Read more at GQ)

R.I.P. Jerry Butler

Veteran soul singer Jerry Butler has sadly passed away this week at age 85. The Chicago native worked with Curtis Mayfield, fronted The Impressions, and collaborated with Philly legends Gamble and Huff before going on to be a county commissioner in his home state of Illinois. (Read more via Pitchfork)