New Releases Radar: September 11–18, 2026

The September 11–18 window ends on one of the heaviest Fridays of the year. Beck returns with his first album in seven years, beabadoobee and Carly Rae Jepsen each put out the biggest records of their careers so far, and the week's rap release is a summit meeting of three veterans. NPR's New Music Friday opened its list with Beck, beabadoobee, Carly Rae Jepsen and Rhiannon Giddens. 1

Release-day listening decisions rest on what can be checked today: editorial selections, published reviews, release-day threads, and playlist placements on the album pages themselves. First-week streaming totals and chart debuts surface after release morning, on their own weekly cycle, so positions are left out here rather than estimated.

Quick scan

Genre	Artist — album	Release date	Label	Signal	First listen / route
Indie / alternative	Beck — Ride Lonesome	September 18, 2026	Iliad / Capitol	NPR Starting 5 lead pick; The Guardian calls it a worthy end to the Sea Change / Morning Phase line 1 2	Apple Music album · “Ride Lonesome”
Indie / alternative	beabadoobee — Pylon	September 18, 2026	Dirty Hit / Interscope	NPR Starting 5; Pitchfork reviewed it on release day 1 3	Apple Music album · “Switchblade”
Indie / alternative	Carly Rae Jepsen — Day and Night	September 18, 2026	School Boy / Interscope	NPR Starting 5; first double album of her career, reviewed by Pitchfork 1 4	Apple Music album · “Don’t Leave Me on the Dance Floor”
Indie / alternative	Slow Pulp — Melodie	September 18, 2026	ANTI-	Stereogum's Album of the Week 5	Apple Music album · “Better Man”
Hip-hop / R&B	Rakim, Kurupt & Masta Killa — The Godbody LP	September 18, 2026	Holy Toledo / DMG / Compound Interest	Release-day thread on r/hiphopheads; Apple Music Hip-Hop playlist placements 6 7	Apple Music album · “A Different Kind”
Hip-hop / R&B	AZ Chike — No Rest for The Wicked	September 18, 2026	Warner Records	Busiest hip-hop release thread of the day on r/hiphopheads; Apple Music Rap Life placement 8 9	Apple Music album · “Look Like My Mama”
Electronic	Actress — Radical Frame	September 18, 2026	Ninja Tune	Label release page frames it as the sum of an 18-year catalogue 10	Ninja Tune release page · “Overchord”
Electronic	Boy Harsher — GET MEAN	September 18, 2026	Atlantic	First studio album since 2019; reviewed 7/10 on release week 11	Apple Music album · “Hard Beat”
Classical	András Schiff — Johannes Brahms: Klavierstücke	September 18, 2026	ECM	Gramophone Editor's Choice, October 2026 12	Presto stream · Klavierstücke, Op. 118 No. 2
Classical	Christophe Dumaux, Louise Alder, The English Concert, Harry Bicket — Handel: Giulio Cesare	September 18, 2026	Linn	Gramophone Recording of the Month, October 2026 13	Presto stream · “Piangerò la sorte mia”
Country / roots	Rhiannon Giddens — Hope Is the Thing with Feathers	September 18, 2026	Nonesuch	NPR Starting 5; Pitchfork review; Apple Music New in Americana 1 14 15	Apple Music album · “Carolina Rain”
Country / roots	Jake Xerxes Fussell — The Old Beloved Path	September 18, 2026	Fat Possum	NPR lightning-round pick; sixth album, cut live in North Carolina 1 16	Apple Music album · “Rock Island Line”
Country / roots	Neil Young and the Chrome Hearts — Second Song	September 18, 2026	Reprise	Mojo calls it a late-career classic 17	Apple Music album · “Second Song”

Indie / alternative

Beck — Ride Lonesome

Artist: Beck
Album: Ride Lonesome
Label: Iliad Records / Capitol Records
Genre: Singer-songwriter folk, country-rock, soft rock
Release date: September 18, 2026 18
Signal: NPR led its Starting 5 with the album on September 18, and The Guardian's September 14 review calls it "a sequel to a sequel that's every bit as good as its predecessors." Its release-day thread on r/indieheads drew 182 upvotes and 47 comments by Friday afternoon. 1 2 19
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Beck's first album in seven years reassembles the team behind Sea Change and Morning Phase: producer Nigel Godrich, the same backing players, and orchestrations by his father David Campbell. The Guardian traces those records' fingerprints across the tracklist — the pedal steel and Julie London reference in the title track, the small-hours drive of "Run Away," the string writing of "Bleed," the sparse country-rock of "Slow Canyon." Its 12 songs run 47 minutes. 2 18
First listen: “Ride Lonesome.” The opening track sets the album's frame — softly strummed acoustic guitar, pedal steel, and Beck's voice before anything else arrives. 2

Pick Ride Lonesome if you have been waiting for Beck to make another record in the Sea Change register.

beabadoobee — Pylon

Artist: beabadoobee
Album: Pylon
Label: Dirty Hit / Interscope
Genre: Alt-rock, grunge-pop, Midwest emo
Release date: September 18, 2026 20
Signal: NPR placed it in the Starting 5 on release day, and Pitchfork published a same-day review that describes her fourth album as a decisive move toward heavier guitars. Its r/indieheads release thread had 121 upvotes and 18 comments within the morning. 1 3 21
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Bea Kristi traded the horns and piano of 2024's This Is How Tomorrow Moves for tapped harmonics, sludgy riffs and feedback. The guest list follows the same turn: Hayley Williams on "Nothing to Prove," Turnstile's Brendan Yates on "Powerlines," Deftones' Chino Moreno on the closer, plus guitar and writing contributions from Title Fight's Shane Moran and Pinegrove's Evan Stephens Hall, and production from The 1975's Matty Healy and George Daniel on "Write Me a Letter." Fourteen songs, 41 minutes. 3 20
First listen: “Switchblade.” Pitchfork singles it out as the album's strongest track, with off-kilter guitars and lazy drumming that land somewhere between mid-'90s alt-rock and post-anger exhaustion. 3

Choose Pylon for the week's most direct guitar record.

Carly Rae Jepsen — Day and Night

Artist: Carly Rae Jepsen
Album: Day and Night
Label: School Boy / Interscope
Genre: Pop, synth-pop, disco
Release date: September 18, 2026 22
Signal: NPR put it in the Starting 5, and Pitchfork's release-day review treats the double album as the broadest record of her career, with praise for its left-field detours alongside criticism of its length. 1 4
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Jepsen's eighth album is her first as a double, 25 tracks and 85 minutes split by mood: a Day side of '60s folk and '70s psychedelia in live-instrument arrangements, and a Night side of French house, Italo disco and ABBA. She wrote and recorded it through her marriage to producer Cole M.G.N. and her first pregnancy, and Pitchfork notes the record's unusual range for her — bossa nova, a sitar-like solo on "Soft," discordant synth stabs on "Near or Far." 4 22
First listen: “Don't Leave Me on the Dance Floor.” Apple Music calls it an instant crying-in-the-club song and the clearest ABBA homage Jepsen has recorded. 4 22

Take Day and Night if you want the pop record of the week and have 85 minutes to give it.

Slow Pulp — Melodie

Artist: Slow Pulp
Album: Melodie
Label: ANTI-
Genre: Indie rock, dream pop
Release date: September 18, 2026 23
Signal: Stereogum named it Album of the Week on September 15, three days before release; the r/indieheads release thread held 152 upvotes and 19 comments by Friday afternoon. 5 24
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: The Chicago band's third album is its shortest full-length yet, 11 songs in 32 minutes, and it arrives on Apple Music's New in Alternative and All Indie playlists the week of release. Two songs carried the run-up, "Better Man" and "Not for Nothing." 23
First listen: “Better Man.” The advance single and the album's clearest statement of the band's guitar tone and vocal blend. 23

Pick Melodie if the week's bigger records feel too loud and you want something quieter with the same guitars.

Hip-hop / R&B

Rakim, Kurupt & Masta Killa — The Godbody LP

Artist: Rakim, Kurupt & Masta Killa
Album: The Godbody LP
Label: Holy Toledo Productions / DMG Publishing / Compound Interest
Genre: East Coast hip-hop, hardcore rap
Release date: September 18, 2026 7
Signal: Apple Music put it on New in Hip-Hop, BARS, Rap Heavy Hitters and Flowetry at release; the r/hiphopheads release thread opened on Friday morning. 6 7
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Three rappers in their fifties — Rakim, Death Row-era Kurupt and Wu-Tang's Masta Killa — share a 16-track, 53-minute album co-produced by Rakim and Nick Wiz. The supporting cast reaches across coasts and generations: KRS-One, Kool G Rap, Ghostface Killah, Raekwon, Snoop Dogg, Daz Dillinger and Buckshot all appear, and the "God Speak" interlude pairs Eminem with Jay-Z for their first track together in 25 years. 7 25
First listen: “A Different Kind.” The Rakim solo cut, released ahead of the album with a video, shows the record's working method: his voice over a track built to leave it room. 7

Go to The Godbody LP for bar-for-bar rapping and the Eminem–Jay-Z interlude sitting at track six.

AZ Chike — No Rest for The Wicked

Artist: AZ Chike
Album: No Rest for The Wicked
Label: Warner Records
Genre: West Coast rap
Release date: September 18, 2026 9
Signal: The album drew the day's busiest hip-hop release thread on r/hiphopheads — 766 upvotes and 203 comments by Friday afternoon — and landed on Apple Music's Rap Life, New in Hip-Hop and #OnRepeat playlists. 8 9
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: The Los Angeles rapper's Warner debut runs 14 tracks in 40 minutes, and its marquee guest is Tyler, The Creator on "Look Like My Mama," which also has a video. HotNewHipHop flagged the record in its Friday preview, noting speculation about an unlisted Kendrick Lamar feature — worth treating as speculation, since the tracklist does not carry it. 9 26
First listen: “Look Like My Mama (feat. Tyler, The Creator).” The single that leads the album's promotion, and the fastest way to hear how Chike's delivery sits against a guest of that scale. 9

Take No Rest for The Wicked if you want the week's street-level LA record rather than a veteran summit.

Electronic

Actress — Radical Frame

Artist: Actress (Darren Cunningham)
Album: Radical Frame
Label: Ninja Tune
Genre: Experimental electronic, techno
Release date: September 18, 2026 10
Signal: Ninja Tune's release page presents the album as the culmination of Cunningham's catalogue, arriving 18 years after his debut Hazyville. 10
Listening route: Ninja Tune release page
Why spend time: Eight tracks, built from the short bursts and zoomed-in sketches that have marked his work, and framed by the label around Fred Moten's argument that the avant-garde is a Black thing. Two guests appear: CASISDEAD on "Live By You" and Rainy Miller. The album's centre, "Overchord," arrived with a video by Anna van der Velde. 10
First listen: “Overchord.” The album's midpoint, paired with its precursor "Live By You" as the advance release. 10

Choose Radical Frame if you want this week's electronic record with the longest view and the sharpest edges.

Boy Harsher — GET MEAN

Artist: Boy Harsher
Album: GET MEAN
Label: Atlantic Records
Genre: Darkwave, electro-pop, EBM
Release date: September 18, 2026 11
Signal: Northern Transmissions reviewed it at 7/10 in release week, calling it a cohesive record that widens the duo's palette; it is their first studio album on Atlantic and their first conventional full-length since 2019's Careful. 11
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Jae Matthews and Augustus Muller made the album after ending their relationship in 2024, and the record turns on loss and moving on without abandoning the pulsing synths and drum machines they are known for. New textures enter: softer electronics, guitar and pedal steel on some tracks, and "Ivy's Spiral," where Matthews delivers a spoken monologue instead of a vocal. 11
First listen: “Hard Beat.” The single holds the duo's driving rhythm while letting the newer guitar and pedal-steel elements into the mix. 11

Pick GET MEAN for a dark electronic record with a real emotional argument under it.

Classical

András Schiff — Johannes Brahms: Klavierstücke

Artist: András Schiff (piano)
Album: Johannes Brahms: Klavierstücke
Label: ECM
Genre: Solo piano, late Romantic
Release date: September 18, 2026 27
Signal: Gramophone made it an Editor's Choice in its October 2026 issue, writing that Schiff's "timbral distinction between registers yields a telling variety of colours." 12
Listening route: Presto stream
Why spend time: Schiff gathers Brahms's late piano music — the Klavierstücke Op. 76 and Opp. 118 and 119, the Fantasien Op. 116 and the Intermezzi Op. 117 — alongside the Albumblatt in A minor, a piece rediscovered in 2012 and given its modern premiere by Schiff. He recorded it in March 2021 in the Kammermusiksaal Hermann J. Abs in Bonn on a Blüthner piano from the 1850s, and the two discs run 1 hour 40 minutes. 12
First listen: “Klavierstücke, Op. 118: No. 2, Intermezzo in A Major.” Four and a half minutes of the inward, song-like writing that defines this repertoire. 12

Take the Schiff recital if you want one late-Brahms album rather than a shelf of them.

Christophe Dumaux, Louise Alder, The English Concert, Harry Bicket — Handel: Giulio Cesare

Album: Handel: Giulio Cesare
Label: Linn (CKD792)
Genre: Baroque opera
Release date: September 18, 2026 27
Signal: Gramophone's October 2026 Recording of the Month. Its review says Louise Alder's Cleopatra "charts one of Handel's most satisfying dramatic journeys" and that the set "surely captures Dumaux at the top of his game." 13
Listening route: Presto stream
Why spend time: Harry Bicket and The English Concert continue their Handel series on Linn with a complete, unabridged Giulio Cesare, an opera written in 1724 for the castrato Senesino and rarely recorded whole. Christophe Dumaux sings Caesar and Louise Alder sings Cleopatra, with Paula Murrihy, Beth Taylor, John Holiday and Morgan Pearse in the supporting roles. The recording closes an international tour and runs 3 hours 51 minutes across three discs — Carnegie Hall's verdict, quoted by the label, was that the ensemble "sets a standard for Handel performance." 13
First listen: “Piangerò la sorte mia.” Cleopatra's Act III aria, six minutes of the part Alder is singled out for; the complete recording also includes the overture and both sinfonias. 13

Go to this Giulio Cesare if you want the week's most consequential classical release, and set aside an evening.

Country / roots

Rhiannon Giddens — Hope Is the Thing with Feathers

Artist: Rhiannon Giddens
Album: Hope Is the Thing with Feathers
Label: Nonesuch
Genre: Folk, old-time, Americana
Release date: September 18, 2026 15
Signal: NPR's Starting 5 on release day, a Pitchfork review on September 17, and placement on Apple Music's New in Americana and Pickers playlists. 1 14 15
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Giddens returns to the string-band music of the Carolinas that she started with in the Carolina Chocolate Drops, cutting ten songs live in the studio with collaborators from across her career — Dirk Powell, Jason Sypher, Congolese guitarist Niwel Tsumbu, and fiddler Justin Robinson. Four songs are originals written with Powell; the rest reach into the tradition, including Elizabeth Cotten's "Freight Train" and Ola Belle Reed's "High on a Mountain," both reworked rather than re-created. "Wish in Vain" addresses the refugee crisis, and "Walk with Me" is a gospel duet with her sister, Lalenja Harrington. 14 15
First listen: “Carolina Rain.” The lead single and the album's broadest tune, a homecoming marker before the record works back into older material. 14

Pick this record if you want the week's folk album built from American sources rather than about them.

Jake Xerxes Fussell — The Old Beloved Path

Artist: Jake Xerxes Fussell
Album: The Old Beloved Path
Label: Fat Possum
Genre: Contemporary folk, traditional song
Release date: September 18, 2026 28
Signal: NPR named it among the lightning-round picks it could not fit into the podcast; the label bills it as a raw, close-miked record. 1 16
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Fussell's sixth album sets nine songs — 32 minutes — in stripped arrangements made with producer Ben Whiteley in North Carolina. The material is traditional and mostly borrowed, which is the point: he takes on "Rock Island Line" and bends it to his own fingerpicking rather than reproducing a known version. 16 28
First listen: “Rock Island Line.” The advance single and the clearest sample of what Fussell does to a song everyone has heard. 16

Take The Old Beloved Path if you want a quiet, guitar-first record and a singer who treats old songs as live material.

Neil Young and the Chrome Hearts — Second Song

Artist: Neil Young and the Chrome Hearts
Album: Second Song
Label: Reprise
Genre: Folk-rock, roots rock
Release date: September 18, 2026 29
Signal: Mojo's review calls it a late-career classic, and it followed the harder Talkin' to the Trees from 2025 with the same band. 17
Listening route: Apple Music album page
Why spend time: Seven songs in 42 minutes, with the title track running 11 of them. Apple Music hears the record returning to the warmer end of Young's catalogue, and points to "The Foggy Edge of Time" as a survey of his own life and to "Soon I Might Be Going" as its elegiac counterpart. 29
First listen: “Second Song.” The long title track sets the album's pace, and everything after it is shorter. 29