To celebrate Grizzly Bear’s first album in five years, the solid-if-not-revelatory Painted Ruins, Ed Droste assembled his favorite “under the radar” tracks for Entertainment Weekly. Unlike some artist-curated playlists—which are often cobbled together by the star’s handlers and/or is stacked with their own tracks—Droste truly digs in the digital crates. Good luck finding any information on Guise, a mysterious singer-songwriter whose “Weekend Relationship” is included here. Then there’s serpentwithfeet with the soulfully baroque “four ethers,” and rapper Thed Jewel, who calls himself “Fuschia.” Not every track dazzles: “Tremble,” a single by LPX of MS MR, is a fairly bland slice of electronic pop. But overall, this 10-track collection is an intriguing dive into the netherworld of Internet-mediated indie-pop. And this wouldn’t be an artist-curated list without at least one selection featuring Droste. He’s clever enough to avoid Grizzly Bear material, though, and instead includes “Faultline,” a new single by dream-pop duo Dede featuring himself alongside Los Angeles producer Kingdom.
