The Lead Sheet ~ 7/8/25

The Lead Sheet is your guide to this week’s new music - taking a look at newly released albums, who made them, and how listeners are responding. 

Pop artist Kesha released her sixth studio album, Period, this week. The new album marks the first official release under her new label, Kesha Records. Fans and critics are scoring the album highly – seeing it as a fantastic celebration of her new independence and featuring many of the elements that made the pop star famous – catchy choruses, clever, irreverent lyrics, and a general boldness that together form her voice, which has sweeping range across several tessiture. An immediate example of Kesha’s musical diversity can be found on the track “Joyride,” which features a tongue-in-cheek dramatic up-tempo dance number that borders on silly. “Freedom” starts as a slow, haunting, deliberately cinematic experiment that flips into a funky confident groove. 

Dropkick Murphys released their new album, For the People, on July fourth. The Celtic punk rock band’s new work is getting great reviews thus far, and has no shortage of headbangable bagpipes. For the People is the thirteenth studio album from the band, and is aptly titled: the group has a long history of supporting unions, veterans, and charity organizations across their multi-decade career, most recently with lead singer and frontman Ken Casey donating all proceeds from t-shirt sales to humanitarian aid in Ukraine. 

Rapper, poet, playwright and visionary Kae Tempest released Self Titled, his seventh studio album to date. Known for his imagery-dense and prolific wordsmithing, Tempest’s newest album in no way fails to deliver. Self Titled is rife with poetry, reflecting on the musician’s recent transition, and the ongoing pressure he feels. It’s an incredibly creative project; for example, on “Know Yourself” the artist mixes and uses old vocals from before he transitioned, and sometimes sings and harmonizes with a previous vocal timbre that has since changed. Tempest’s new voice is deeper and grittier, which suits the tone of the album beautifully. Tempest sums up some of the album’s attitude with the lyrics; “Normal’s not normal, it’s a construction designed to stifle the inner life and increase production”. 

Jesse Welles is a generational talent – many are comparing the rising star to legend Bob Dylan, whose name is seldom thrown around lightly when it comes to musicians. The artist has exploded in popularity in recent years, creating viral reels, tiktoks and videos of his original folk music. Often telling a story, or summarizing political landscapes, the singer has a way of getting to the point of an issue and pointing out hypocrisy while singing and playing guitar, and not just strumming, but difficult fingerpicking too. Previously known under the stage name “Jeh Sea Welles,” the artist has rebranded as “Jesse Welles,” and his new album Pilgrim, (his fifth under the new name,) is being praised for its clever lyrics, storytelling, and political awareness, typical bread-and-butter for the self-made artist. 

A cool little musical spinoff project, Shelly, just released Shelly2, their second EP on July first. Shelly is a collaborative effort by musicians Clairo and Claud. The musicians teamed up with a couple friends to form Shelly, which released a short EP in 2020 of the same name. Shelly (the album) immediately received praise, with some calling it “tragically short.” Shelly (again the album) features a dreamy, indie-pop sound that is also present on Shelly2. Shelly2 is being celebrated for its surprising launch out of nowhere. Tracks like “Cross Your Mind” and “Hartwell” are both extremely catchy, but also mellow – great additions to a studying playlist. Seeing as the group has only made two brief EP’s in five years, it's impressive how much of an impact they’ve made. We’ll see if maybe we get graced with another couple tracks in 2030.

Kesha - Period

Kesha Records

Released July 4, 2025

Dropkick Murphys- For the People

Dummy Luck Music

Released July 4, 2025

Kai Tempest - Self Titled

Universal Music Operations

Released July 4, 2025

Jesse Welles - Pilgrim

-No Music Label- 

Released July 4, 2025

Shelly - Shelly 2

Orange Hill Records

Released July 1, 2025