Welcome to Songs You Need to Know, our weekly rundown of the best music right now. The Rolling Stone Philippines team is constantly sharing things to listen to, and each week, we compile a ragtag playlist of songs that we believe every music fan today needs to know. Whether it’s the hottest new single or an old track that captures the state of the present, our hope is that you discover something for your musical canon.
This week, Chezka’s midtempo folk in “Gently” shines bright. while Burial’s comeback ambient single envelopes the dance floor in “Comafields.” Rapper Jim Legxacy keeps things off-kilter with “new david bowie,” a restless, genre-shifting track that never settles. Electronic producer underscores follow-up with the tongue-in-cheek “Music.” Tyler, The Creator’s Don’t Tap The Glass hits such as “Sugar on My Tongue” grooves with swagger, JoJo’s “Too Little, Too Late” still punches with clarity 19 years later, plus music from Mid-Air Thief, underscores, Reverie Sound Revue. Each pick moves differently, but they all hit right in the gut.
This month’s release “Gently” is built on quiet foundations where fingerpicked guitars, drum machines roll, and ambient textures exist, but Manila-based singer-songwriter Chezka’s voice doesn’t melt into the background of one of her debut singles. It holds firm, full of shape and presence, pushing through the mix without oversinging. She draws focus by knowing when to lean in or stand still. The result is a track that feels grounded even as it floats. It’s a fusion of electronica and folk at the core, sharpened by a vocal delivery that knows exactly what it wants to say. No affectations and or any of that gloss either. It’s a masterful approach of control that cuts through on its own terms.
English dubstep producer Burial’s latest track pushes further into the ambient beatless territory for 12 whole minutes. He has been carving this ambient lore for over a decade as one of the most enigmatic producers in the U.K. electronic music scene. “Comafields,” released August 1, folds uneasy textures into a drifting, cinematic sprawl that resists rhythm but clings to mood, where you hear Jens Lenkman’s pitched up sample vocals echo across its dark crevices. It plays like a memory slowly disintegrating where it’s sharp in some corners, foggy in others. This is Burial doubling down on atmosphere over form, letting static voice samples and reverb do most of the talking. For longtime fans, it’s another step into his signature world building. For newcomers, it’s an acquired but rewarding spiral.
“new david bowie,” released in June this year, is a genre-dodging cut that captures British rapper Jim Legxacy’s instinct for chaos and clarity in the world of alternative hip-hop. The track fuses punk edge with pop melody, building around a hook that sounds both tossed-off and surgically placed. He’s not trying to imitate David Bowie unfortunately, but there’s a similar hunger here, such as the need for reinvention, escape, and clashing sounds to click. There’s grit in the delivery, but the production’s layered enough to open up on repeated listens. It’s a song about identity, but it avoids clichés. Instead, it hits hard, then twists into something smarter and more raw the longer it lingers.
With “Music,” hyperpop electronic music producer underscores simply enjoys the art form. Released in June, The song swerves through glitchy hyperpop, soft indie melodies, and blunt appreciations of “music” without pausing to explain itself. It’s bratty and sincere, like the internet built it from scratch and left no manual behind. The vocals feel close and unfiltered, even when the production goes full chaos. But there’s a spine to it: some kind of emotional arc that holds all the wreckage together with tongue-in-cheek lyrics that mimic the select screen of Dance Dance Revolution. “Music” might feel like a mess on first listen, but it sticks because it’s fearless in being too much.
“Sugar on My Tongue,” from Tyler, The Creator’s latest album DON’T TAP THE GLASS, shows the rapper letting his guard down. It’s brief but sweet, leaning more into falsetto crooning than dense rapping. The production stays bombastic, with synths gliding across a laid-back rhythm section. Even at under three minutes, the song feels complete, like a sketch that never needed more detail. Tyler sounds fully in control — not flexing, just vibing and letting the melody lead. It’s not trying to be deep. He literally just wants you to dance your butt off.
“Rip the Universe,” released in 2009, is the kind of indie track that deserved more attention than it initially got. Reverie Sound Revue — featuring a pre-Broken Social Scene Lisa Lobsinger — delivers this with tight precision and just enough shimmer. The guitars chime, the drums stay locked in, and the vocals float clean over everything. There’s a cool distance to the track, like it’s more interested in groove than catharsis. But underneath that calm surface is a sharpness that reveals itself in the corners. It’s a perfect example of indie pop that trusted its instincts and became the catchiest song to ever exist in Canada’s pop scene.
“Para Sa Streets” sits comfortably in its grit, quiet like the corners hanging out in the afterhours. At the start of this 2022 track, a lover phones Hev and warns him about staying in Tomas Morato. Hev Abi then raps like he’s posting up on the corner, but with one eye watching the scene shift around him. The beat is cold and steady, giving his delivery room to breathe. He moves between bravado and vulnerability without breaking rhythm, never overplaying either hand. It’s a song about knowing your space and holding it. There’s weight in the words, but no heavy-handed messaging. “Para Sa Streets” went above and beyond by masterfully highlighting the power of storytelling, singing a catchy hook, and a voice that sounds like it’s always had something to say, now finally getting heard.
South Korean artist Mid-Air Thief builds a world out of acoustic textures and electronic pulses, letting the two blur until they feel like they belong together. “These Chains,” released in 2018, is layered, fluttery, and full of contrast to beauty and chaos. The track doesn’t move in a straight line, but it folds in on itself; it drifts, then bursts forward in unexpected places. The vocals are soft and buried, almost ghostly, but they still tug the song forward. Mid-Air Thief’s breakout track from their astonishing 2018 sophomore album Crumbling slowly unravels with glitchy production techniques that range from balloon-piercing effects to an atomic bomb. In every listen, there are new details every time you lean in. “These Chains” creates the sonic equivalent of a time bomb setting off in slow motion.
