From London
Recommended if you like Nettspend, Bladee, Crystal Castles
Up next New album coming early 2026Twenty-year-old London rapper Vincenzo Camille, better known as Fakemink, makes disorienting sugar-high electroclash rap, delivered with a voice that sounds like it’s barely broken. On paper, it sounds as if he should be of a piece with the 2020s class of overstimulating Gen Z internet rappers such as Nettspend and OsamaSon. But although he is, in some sense, part of that scene, his music is also far more linear and melodic, and more indebted to the past. His best songs, many of which were produced by the American electronic duo Suzy Sheer, utilise beats that sound like fast, euphoric flips of songs from the Skins soundtrack; the viral hit Easter Pink could pass for a mid-2000s indie dance hit if not for Fakemink’s fast, very 2020s rapping, while Makka, a collab with Mechatok and Ecco2k, contains echoes of Bloc Party’s Intimacy, thanks to an insistent, extremely melodic guitar line.
Drake recently brought him on stage at Wireless in London, and he’s beginning to play more headline shows, but not much is known about Fakemink. He seems like a true character, making his music in a blacked-out bedroom decorated with candles and stuffed toys; he is Muslim and doesn’t drink, but songs like Makka would suggest he’s partial to cough syrup and cocaine; he is deeply inspired by the creative philosophy of Alexander McQueen. It’s this combination of adrenaline-rush pop and outsized quirkiness that’s behind Fakemink’s rise. Shaad D’Souza
This week’s best new tracks
KeiyaA – Stupid Prizes
Her album Forever, Ya Girl got us through the first Covid lockdown with its liberated take on R&B, and this return single has the same freedom and jazz sensibility as KeiyaA longs to thrive, not merely survive.
Glaive – Appalachia
One of the doyens of hyperpop picks up an old recording of American folk standard The House Carpenter then crashes it through the walls of a warehouse nightclub, resulting in a heavy, distorted trance rager.
Makaya McCraven – Imafan
Of the four new tracks this week from the jazz drummer and bandleader, each taken from four upcoming EPs, Imafan is the most plainly gorgeous, with supple bass and joyous vibraphone soloing.
Been Stellar – Always On My Mind
No, not that Always On My Mind, but rather a grunge ballad from the New Yorkers with a burnt-sugar coating of shoegaze haze. Catch them at Reading and Leeds this weekend.
Jae Stephens – Afterbody
Tinashe-worthy dance-pop here from the American singer. The high tempo, and lyrics about a raunchy meeting in a packed nightclub, demand your most expertly drilled dance moves.
Flock of Dimes – Afraid
Jenn Wasner is a collaborator with Bon Iver and co-wrote last week’s playlist topper, Higher! by Dijon. The latest from her own project is a simple, stirring ballad about not being cowed by one’s past.
Cut Worms – Evil Twin
Produced by Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy and featuring him and Wilco bandmate Glenn Kotche in the backing band, this jangling pop-Americana number feels like it has evening sunlight filtering through it.
Ben Beaumont-Thomas
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