The Radar: This Week's Tunes You Need To Know – August 18

Every Friday in The Radar, The Music breaks down the week’s top performers and the breaking new music you need to be across. 

Hear the big new tunes of the week now on The Music Hit List.
For the hottest rock, punk and metal jams, check out Kill Your Stereo’s Heavy Hitlist.
And for the latest in hip-hop and EDM, get your ears around Purple Sneakers’ Best New Music.

DSPs

Today sees Genesis Owusu drop his hotly anticipated second album, STRUGGLER, and Spotify have it showed it some love by slapping the Canberran trailblazer on the cover of their New Music Daily playlist. His song Stay Blessed is ranked #3 on the list itself, though, following 1975 by Tash Sultana (which name-drops the controversial band its titled for) and Guy Sebastian’s first original song in three years, I Choose Good. Also worth noting is the #4 spot on Spotify’s list, an up-and-coming Eora/Sydney artist called KAHUKX with his new tune STARGAZING.

Over on Apple Music’s New Music Daily playlist, Mike WiLL Made-It tops the spread with the Lil Uzi Vert-assisted Blood Moon (which doesn’t seem to be on Spotify’s radar at all), followed by MAY-A’s ifyoulikeitlikethat and Madison Beer’s Spinnin. Owusu narrowly misses the Top Three with Stay Blessed at #4, and Sebastian slips in behind him here at #5. Also ranked highly for Apple are the new songs by Andy Golledge (Country Band), The Grogans (I Cannot Read Your Mind), Youngn Lipz (Celine, a collaborative effort with wewantwraiths and Ay Huncho) and Gretta Ray (Upgraded). It’s a great day for Aussie releases!

Spotify and Apple also seem to clash on the most spotlight-worthy song from Hozier’s (incredible) new album, Unreal Unearth – the former playlisted Damage Gets Done (featuring Brandi Carlile), while the latter swung for First Light. Both are very solid, though, and while the album itself might not have any Take Me To Church-sized hits on it, there is plenty of gold to unearth on it… No pun intended. We personally swung for Damage Gets Done on our proprietary Hit List, mostly because Carlile’s guest spot adds a gripping wallop of additional colour.

RADIO

Jessica Mauboy’s recent team-up with Jason Derulo, Give You Love, has been spotlit by NOVA this week, marking the network’s only new across-the-board (ATB) addition. Those who tuned in to Smallzy’s Surgery this week would’ve heard plenty of Doja Cat’s Paint The Town Red, too, and those who stuck around for the late-night slot should now be well acquainted with Gretta Ray’s Don’t Date The Teenager and Liam Ferrari’s In Your Eyes.

Meanwhile, on the Hit Network, Mauboy and Doja made it onto this week’s national nighttime rotation, as did Good Enough by G Flip (who recently graced the cover of The Music), One In A Million by Bebe Rexha and David Guetta, and (It Goes Like) Nanana by Peggy Gou. Mauboy was added ATB in Brisbane via B105, joining Post Malone (with Enough Is Enough) and Jung Kook (with the Latto-assisted Seven). And in Melbourne, FOX added just one new song – Flip’s Good Enough – to its ATB rotation.

Flip also caught some big love from triple j, with their hit-studded second LP DRUMMER being this week’s feature album. Jungle’s Volcano was also lauded by the national youth broadcaster as a spotlight album. Local ATB adds for this week include Skin by Jada Weazel, Float by SAFIA, Under The Light by San Cisco, and Candy Apple by Teenage Joans. Internationally, the J’s threw their support behind Cordae (Make Up Your Mind), Jai Wolf (Don’t Look Down, featuring BANKS), Olivia Rodrigo (bad idea right?) and Travis Scott (FE!N, featuring Playboi Carti).

triple j’s spot adds for this week were given to BIRDEE 王煒 (Best Mistake I Never Made), Fredo (Quarter Past 3, featuring Eric IV), The Linda Lindas (Resolution/Revolution), Motez (Make Way, featuring Elsy Wameyo) and Rum Jungle (Dash Of Speed).

Taking a peek at the Radio Monitor Hot 50, this week we see Doja Cat and Post Malone swap places, with the former’s Dance The Night at #1 and the latter’s Chemical at #2. Taylor Swift’s Cruel Summer also jumped back up a spot to #3, followed at #4 by the Top Five-returning Karma. With that, Swift has knocked Luke Combs down a notch, leaving Fast Car just holding on to its Top Five reign at #5. This week’s chart re-entries include I’m Good (Blue) by David Guetta and Bebe Rexha (#42), Ghost by Justin Bieber (#51) and In A Perfect World by Dean Lewis and Julia Michaels (#50). And this week we’ve got just one new entry, being Mauboy and Derulo’s Give You Love at #30.

COUNTRY

Hear the big new country tunes of the week on the Countrytown Hot Country Hits Playlist.

Apple Music was, once again, country music’s saviour on the DSP front. Alana Springsteen’s new album TWENTY SOMETHING has its own tile on their Apple Music Country hub, while the Aussie Country playlist was just updated with new tunes from Brad Butcher (People Get Old), Jade Gibson (Heavens Know), Natalie Pearson (Is He Happy), Matt Ward (Red And Blue), Allan Caswell (Things I Should’ve Told You) and Sammi Palinkas (You’ve Lived).

This week’s Countrytown Hot 50 chart has Luke Combs back in the top spot with Fast Car – last week it slumped down to #2 – surely reflective of his ongoing tour across the country (see here for Countrytown’s review of the first show in Brisbane, where he also helped a fan out with their baby’s gender reveal). Meanwhile, Casey Barnes’ Boys Like Me has leapt up from #6 to #2, while Jelly Roll’s Need A Favour has slumped from #1 to #3. Sarah Berki also re-entered the Top Ten with A Boy That’s Into Trucks at #6 (#11 last week), as did James Johnston with WE GREW UP ON at #10 (#12 last week). Johnson announced his debut album, Raised Like That, just this morning.

We’ve got two re-entries in this week’s chart – Bailey Zimmerman’s Fall In Love at #39 and Ella & Sienna’s It’s Not Me It’s You at #43 – as well as debuting cuts from Busby Marou (Conversation at #37), Amy Sheppard (Sometimes You Learn at #42), Noah Kahan (Dial Drunk at #44), Morgan Wallen (Everything I Love at #46) and Luke Bryan (But I Got A Beer In My Hand at #49).