logo
M4TR Drop New Album Love Is The Revolution and a 10-Year Retrospective: 'If Love's the Last Thing Left, Let's Use It'

M4TR Drop New Album Love Is The Revolution and a 10-Year Retrospective: 'If Love's the Last Thing Left, Let's Use It'

Globe and Mail24-06-2025
AJ Solaris isn't here to save the world — but he is going to soundtrack its collapse. His shape-shifting, genre-blurring music project M4TR (aka Music 4 The Revolution) is back with Love Is The Revolution, a shimmering, unflinching, synth-drenched third studio album landing June 23. Alongside it comes a 10-year retrospective and digital box set, charting M4TR's journey from protest anthems to emotionally layered, end-times dancefloor epics.
And yeah — it absolutely slaps.
The new record is M4TR's most ambitious yet. Across 12 tracks, Love Is The Revolution tears into the wild chaos of love — not just the dreamy kind, but the obsessive, communal, grieving, and even destructive kinds. Solaris isn't afraid to get messy with it. Think heartbreak on the dancefloor, tears in the glitter, neon-soaked breakdowns — a multiverse of romance and ruin.
'We're living in a time when everything feels like it could collapse at any moment,' Solaris says. 'But if love is the one thing that can pull us back from the brink, then what choice do we have but to keep reaching for it?'
Before the full release drops, M4TR has already given us a taste with three singles:
'Hooks' – a glossy, Ibiza-glow electro groove with hooks to spare (no pun intended).
'Siren Song' – seductive and shadowy, this one slinks into trip-hop territory with a cold heartbeat.
'Life Without Her' – disco for the broken-hearted, and a total standout. Imagine Robyn slow-dancing with Peter Gabriel in a dream where everything is ending, but the beat won't stop.
These aren't just tracks — they're emotional gut-punches you can move to.
M4TR has long played with the sounds of the past to talk about the future. Solaris' retrofuturist palette pulls from the likes of Duran Duran, Depeche Mode, Beck, Scissor Sisters, Coldplay, Talking Heads, and even flashes of Phil Collins. But the vibe is never purely nostalgic — it's always haunted by what's coming next.
And now, with Love Is The Revolution, the message turns inward. Tracks like 'Kill The Self,' which confronts the loss of a childhood friend, signal a shift toward more personal, raw terrain. These songs have evolved into something deeper — more intimate, more dangerous. It's revolution through vulnerability — the kind that doesn't just make a statement, but makes you feel something real.
To mark 10 years of M4TR, fans can also grab a massive digital box set on Bandcamp, collecting all three studio albums, EPs, live sets, and rare cuts for $60. It's a decade of rebellion and reinvention in one tight package. Whether you've been here since the early protest days or are just discovering the 'retrofuture,' now's the time to dive in.
Over the last decade, M4TR has racked up 2M+ streams, landed on 4K+ playlists, and built a cult-like following across 153 countries. In the heart of D.C.'s live music scene, Solaris has brought their sound to some of the city's most iconic venues — including Jammin Java, DC Pie Shop, and Pearl Street Warehouse — performing with two different live bands and a rotating cast of talented collaborators. 'I've always been lucky to play alongside incredibly gifted musicians,' Solaris says. The second live band, featured on several tracks from the new album, includes Laura Cook, Mark Davenport, Rich Andrews, and Owen Williams — each adding their own distinct energy to Solaris' ever-evolving sound, driven by a relentless passion to create music that matters, even when the world feels like it's burning down.
Love Is The Revolution lands June 23 on all major platforms. The 10-Year Box Set is out the same day on Bandcamp.
So if you're ready to dance your heart out while the world teeters on the edge — M4TR's got the soundtrack queued up.
Website: https://www.m4tr.music/
Spotify Profile: https://spoti.fi/3F5IurR
Life Without Her (Single): https://spoti.fi/4dv8QQF
Video: https://youtu.be/BYW1a5ffnHE
Media Contact
Company Name: M4TR (Music 4 The Revolution)
Contact Person: Davin AJ Hutchins
Email: Send Email
Country: United States
Website: https://www.m4tr.music
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Bob Dylan couldn't have written Ada Lea's new single
Bob Dylan couldn't have written Ada Lea's new single

CBC

timean hour ago

  • CBC

Bob Dylan couldn't have written Ada Lea's new single

Singer-songwriter Ada Lea needed a break from music: she was physically exhausted from touring, and she was mentally stuck in a circle of over-criticizing her own songs. But after taking some time off, she's found a multitude of paths to rekindle her creativity. Ada Lea tells guest host Gill Deacon about her new single Bob Dylan's 115th Haircut, her songwriting community, and why she feels like the goal of the music industry is at odds with the goal of the artist. WATCH | Official audio for Bob Dylan's 115th Haircut: The full interview with Ada Lea is

Why is there no Song of the Summer for 2025?
Why is there no Song of the Summer for 2025?

Globe and Mail

time2 hours ago

  • Globe and Mail

Why is there no Song of the Summer for 2025?

In April, Charli XCX took to the stage in Indio, California to perform at Coachella. The mainstage performance served as a capstone on a breakthrough year that included Charli's first solo U.S. arena tour, her first platinum album in Canada and her first Saturday Night Live parody. In 2024 she also launched a phrase into the cultural lexicon: 'brat summer.' Named after the cheeky ethos of Charli's sixth studio album, Brat, the phrase spawned more than one million TikTok videos, inspired a Kate Spade shopping edit and even made its way into politics, earning nods from Kamala Harris and Barack Obama. It became such a phenomenon that, despite Charli having declared it 'over' last fall, brat summer still loomed large over Coachella almost a year after her album's release. Blue Rodeo's Lost Together is always the song of summer Brat summer brought forth not one single song of the summer, but a season's worth of hits: the Guess remix featuring Billie Eilish marked Charli's first top 10 on the Canadian Billboard Hot 100 since 2014, but there was also Apple, which spawned a viral dance on TikTok, and Sympathy Is a Knife, a top 40 hit that courted attention for its probable subject, Taylor Swift. In total the album produced seven entries on that chart. Toward the end of her set, Charli flashed a series of slogans signalling she was ready to pass the seasonal baton: 'Addison Rae summer,' 'Lorde summer' and 'Haim summer' flickered across the screen as part of a laundry list of Charli-approved artists ready for the summer 2025 spotlight. But four months later, as Halloween candy appears on grocery store shelves, it's clear none of those 'summers' materialized. Rae's singles remain niche – her highest-charting song on Billboard's Canadian Hot 100 this summer, the menacing Fame is a Gun, peaked at 59. Lorde cracked Canadian top 40 with What Was That, but its success paled in comparison to her 2013 hit Royals. And despite catchy singles like Relationships, Haim only flirted with cultural saturation this summer. There are certainly other contenders, but few artists have captivated the collective imagination at scale this summer. The lack of an obvious, ubiquitous hit blaring out of car windows raises the question: Does 2025 not have a Song of the Summer? The data powering Billboard's official Songs of the Summer chart, which tracks popular songs from May through September, provides an obvious answer: Alex Warren's sweeping, saccharine ballad Ordinary, which has been perched atop the chart every single week since spring. And north of the border, the song is actually even more popular, according to Richard Trapunski, national editor for Billboard Canada, who points out that Ordinary actually appeared on the Canadian Hot 100 before cracking the U.S. chart. Ordinary is the only song in contention to be crowned this summer's most popular, according to chart analyst, pop critic and Hit Parade podcast host Chris Molanphy. 'There's nothing that stands any chance whatsoever of taking it away. We're now into August,' Molanphy says. 'Stick a fork in it, it's done.' The data, however, don't tell the whole story. The annual debate over the song of the summer is as much a cultural conversation as it is a chart race. Molanphy, who unpacks chart hits in his 'Why Is This Song No. 1?' column in Slate, explains that some years the song that dominates the charts all summer is also the crowd favourite, like in 2019, when Lil Nas X's Old Town Road was inescapable. This year, Molanphy says the lack of another galvanizing hit has allowed Ordinary to float to the top of the charts despite disdain from critics. 'Will anybody fondly remember 2025 as the summer of Ordinary?' Molanphy asks. 'I doubt it.' Part of the resistance to Ordinary is sonic. The song, inspired by the 24-year-old singer's wife, is not the type to blast from a boom box at the beach. 'There's something very serious and very earnest and very heavy handedly persuasive about that song,' says NPR music critic and correspondent Ann Powers, whose 1999 column about that year's summer songs in The New York Times helped popularize the modern debate about the song of the summer. 'It doesn't effervesce,' she says. 'There's no bubbles in that song.' Scanning the charts reveals other contenders peeking through a sludge of dated hits. Songs are currently sticking around on the charts longer than they have in the past; a global phenomenon that's especially defined in Canada, according to Billboard Canada's Trapunski, who cites Shaboozey's A Bar Song (Tipsy) as one recent example. The 2024 hit broke a record as the longest-charting No. 1 in the history of the Canadian Hot 100. It remains in the top 10 on the chart dated Aug. 9, alongside Chappell Roan's Pink Pony Club, a song originally released in 2020. A few songs have, however, been able to break through. Golden by HUNTR/X, a fictional girl group from the Netflix animated film KPop Demon Hunters, is a top-five song in Canada and challenging for No. 1 on the U.S. Hot 100 as of publication time. Then there's Tate McRae, whose singles Sports Car and Revolving Door were two of the 10 most-streamed songs globally in the first half of 2025 on Spotify, according to the streamer's Global Impact List. McRae's recent feature on Morgan Wallen's single What I Want is currently a Canadian top 10, and No. 2 on the Songs of the Summer chart. Though Wallen's song is a success, it feels less omnipresent than past summer songs, or even McRae's own breakout, Greedy, one of the defining songs of 2023. If anything actually does feel inescapable this summer, it's sounds, not songs. Take, for example, a viral clip from PinkPantheress's excellent but commercially overlooked mixtape Fancy That. The song, Illegal, has been used in more than one million TikTok videos and 300,000 Instagram reels, meaning anyone who's spent the summer mindlessly scrolling is as likely to have heard it as anything on the pop charts. Likewise, a clip from the British airline Jet2 in which a voice-over enthusiastically announces 'Nothing beats a Jet2 holiday' has soundtracked a staggering 2.2 million TikTok videos and was recently sampled by Lizzo. While it may stand to reason that memes have turned musical tastes into collective aural brainrot, a theory worth considering about why this year's slate of summer songs is so slight is that 2024 was over-stuffed with great songs and compelling musical narratives. It was easily pop's most exciting year of the decade thus far: Taylor Swift had dual blockbuster projects in The Tortured Poets Department and the Eras Tour, Beyoncé's Cowboy Carter prompted a necessary conversation about race and genre, and Kendrick Lamar and Drake had a rap beef for the ages. Chappell Roan and Sabrina Carpenter also broke out with sparkling singalongs, the Pride anthem Pink Pony Club and last year's frothy song of the summer contender Espresso. Then there was Brat, which invited its listeners to party until they turned slime green. It was a lot. In 2024, pop had a big year and a brat summer. This year feels more like a hangover. The remnants of a megayear for music are everywhere; 2024 hits clutter the top 10 like bottles of beer with a few sips left strewn all over a home the day after a great house party. Now the charts need a glass of water and a nap – an Ordinary year before we're ready to party again next summer.

YouTube for kids: 10 channels you can turn on without worrying
YouTube for kids: 10 channels you can turn on without worrying

Globe and Mail

time3 hours ago

  • Globe and Mail

YouTube for kids: 10 channels you can turn on without worrying

There's only a few weeks left in summer vacation, and if your house is anything like mine at the moment, you're ready to let the kids have at their screens so you can have some peace. However, how much Ryan's World, Cocomelon, Mr. Beast, Mikey and JJ or Jordan Matter can a person take? Letting your kids watch YouTube can be tricky. While kids love the bright colours, quick scenes and short episodes, experts caution that a lot of the content contains hidden and disturbing images that are inappropriate for kids. Recommendations include limiting screen time, encouraging other activities and curating content. If you're at the point where you're ready to give your kids a little extra screen time but want to avoid brain-rot content, here are 10 channels that you can feel good about your kids browsing while you take a breather. Cosmic Kids Yoga Mindfulness and YouTube don't sound complementary, but Jaime Amor makes it possible with her channel. On it, the registered children's yoga teacher combines her love of movement and storytelling into story-based kids yoga. In each episode she sports a blue onesie and presents an adventure with poses that kids can easily mimic. Some of the stories are geared at younger kids, but Amor also targets older grade schoolers with characters from Nintendo, Disney, Trolls and more. National Geographic Kids Whether your kid is into sharks, bugs, baby animals, space or weird but true facts, they can find it all on this popular channel. NatGeo drops a new video every week and often leverages its parent company to bring in Disney guest stars. Magic tricks, Greek mythology, popular travel destinations and a look at how everyday objects work are also all on the menu, making for a diverse but fun learning channel for kids of all ages. Art For Kids Hub Anyone can be an artist when you follow Rob Jensen's easy tutorials. Art For Kids Hub is a one-stop shop for anyone who wants to create realistic sketches of popular characters, items and animals, whether you're into video games or Disney. These simple drawing lessons encourage kids to be creative and make their drawings their own. The best part is that Jensen and his guest drawers give kids the confidence to draw and colour recognizable pictures and cards, proving that anyone can be an artist. TheDadLab Have you ever invested in a science kit for the kids only to realize the box is full of half-baked experiments that require a ton of adult supervision and extra materials? Save your money and check out TheDadLab instead. Sergei Urban's YouTube Channel is full of easy but fun experiments kids will love, such as frozen dinosaur eggs, balloon experiments and a gravity-explaining paint pendulum. These DIY science activities are all easy to do at home and engaging for youngsters. TED-Ed Do your kids love learning weird but random things? The animated shorts at TED-Ed are bound to grab their attention. Each short tackles a single topic, such as what your poop says about your health or the history of popcorn. The lessons promote learning whether your child is into bugs, science, riddles, history or video games. There's also a vault of everyday originals for older kids who want to learn more about topics such as anxiety, giving a presentation or equality. In short, it's a rabbit hole of shorts you don't mind your kids actually falling into. Brave Wilderness Many kids are obsessed with exotic, dangerous or wild animals, which makes this wilderness channel the ultimate YouTube destination. Hosts Coyote Peterson and Mark Vins lead viewers on adventures across the world to explore venomous creatures, cool critters and furry friends. The duo often get up close with their subjects, and brands the videos with attention-grabbing titles kids love, including 'Pinched by a lobster,' 'Wolverine face-off' and 'Stung by the meanest scorpion in Thailand.' PBS Kids If you have younger kids at home you're probably over watching Blippi and Super Simple Songs on repeat. So, try PBS Kids instead, where educational videos are designed to help kids aged 2 to 8 learn various diverse life lessons. The YouTube channel is an extension of the children's programming featured on the network, and includes diverse characters and positive role models that reflect kids in a real but wholesome way. Mark Rober This former NASA engineer makes extreme science look cool with his 20-minute videos that also prompt creativity, learning and problem-solving. Some of his personal favourites include the time he built a roller coaster in his lab, faced off against the world's smartest crow and tested what happens if you actually jump on a moving train. The scenarios are extreme enough to pique kids' interest, and buzzy enough that they'll want to share with their friends. AntsCanada Mikey Bustos's YouTube channel is certainly one of the most niche on this list, but it's fascinating and fun for kids (and kids-at-heart) who love insects and want to learn more about their tiny habitats. The videos explore the microworlds around us, different species of ants, things that threaten them and how they respond to various other species. Some of the more popular videos include fire ants taste-testing different flavours and one where ants and maggots square off. Mathantics At a certain age, most kids become obsessed with numbers and what they actually mean. Instead of giving them more math, gamify the situation with this YouTube channel created by Rob Cozzens. The videos explain a variety of concepts such as Roman numerals, percentages and geometry by delivering ideas in quick snippets with easy-to-understand language and fun graphics. The videos span all ages depending on what you watch, and even serve as a good refresher for some parents out there who are bracing themselves to help with homework come fall.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store