Billboard’s Friday Music Guide serves as a handy guide to New Music Friday’s most essential releases each week — the key music that everyone will be talking about today, and that will be dominating playlists this weekend and beyond.
Last week, we featured LISA, Miley, Kacey Musgraves & John Mayer.
This week, Dominic Fike drops his first LP as a minted hitmaker; Mariah Carey takes another glance at her polarizing Glitter project and Queens of the Stone Age turns down the amps for its ninth album… plus much more.
Check out all of this week’s picks below:
Dominic Fike, How to Quit Smoking
It feels like one of 2026’s most-anticipated LPs, given how this was the year that mainstream-adjacent singer-songwriter Dominic Fike belatedly proved himself as a pop hitmaker, with the long-running Hot 100 hits “Babydoll” and “White Keys.” But while How to Quit Smoking is one of the autumn’s most satisfying arrivals, its relatively lo-fi, genre-agnostic vibes show how unlikely Fike’s top 40 dalliances were in the first place — including with “White Keys,” present here as something of an album centerpiece — and how another such hit is far from required for the album to be deemable as a success. Its charms are mostly gentle and acoustic, but with at least a toe kept in hip-hop, leading to winningly unpredictable moments like the Danny Brown guest verse on “Not the Spirit,” an ODB interpolation on “Not the Spirit” and a thoroughly disarming Tay-K appearance (via phone) that closes the album.
Gracie Abrams, “Here You Come, There You Go”
As Cher Horowitz once said about report card grades, it appears that album releases are just a jumping-off point to start negotiations for Gracie Abrams. After scoring the biggest hit of her The Secret of Us era in 2024 with the deluxe edition cut “That’s So True,” it feels like she could be on track for a second straight bonus high-water mark with “Here You Come, There You Go,” lead track from her upcoming Daughter From Hell deluxe edition. While that album could sometimes drift through a little unobtrusively, “Here You Come” demands your attention from its opening bass rumble and arresting opening line (“Hell froze in my bedroom”), displaying the extra bite and musical development many pop fans have long hoped to hear from her.
BigXThaPlug, Better Over Time
After hosting a hip-hop rodeo on 2025’s country-infused I Hope You’re Happy, BigXThaPlug is back in his rap bag with Better Over Time. Stacked with a starry line-up of guest artists, including Leon Thomas, Belly Gang Kushington, Lil Yachty, Glorilla, Loe Shimmy and Ava Max, BigX’s latest LP recounts the pricklier moments of remaining independent amid his mainstream surge, while also showcasing his ear for radio-minded hooks. — KYLE DENIS
Mariah Carey, Glitter (Digital Deluxe Edition)
Whether you believe Glitter to be a lost classic in the Mariah Carey catalog or a frivolous misstep, it certainly at least deserves to be given a second look, one removed from both the historic tragedies that surrounded the movie’s September 2001 release and the personal drama that took its serious toll on Carey’s career and mental health around the time. This week’s deluxe edition of the much-maligned soundtrack (to the much-more-maligned starring vehicle) may earn some reconsideration for its second disc of bonus-cut rarities — including the fragile Irene Cara cover “Out Here on My Own” and the “Firecracker”-lifting original version of lead single “Loverboy” — but just as importantly, it’ll just inspire fans to give its original 12 tracks another spin, capturing Mimi in a fun and sporadically revealing ’80s throwback moment that remains worth revisiting.
Queens of the Stone Age, Perfecth
Good news for Josh Homme’s neighbors: The volume of the ninth Queens of the Stone Age album has been kept at a relatively manageable level, with the searing riffs and punishing drums that once characterized the band now somewhat mellowed. Which is not to say Perfecth doesn’t rock, but it largely does so via groovier jams like the ’70s AM boogie of “Insginificant Other” or the acoustic shuffle of “Easy Street” — while still finding room to kick out the jams on heavier cuts like southern-fried advance single “Where the Goth Girls At?” and KISS-via-Bowie strutter “Sunday.”
Gigi Perez, “Favor”
The runtime is the first thing you notice about Gigi Perez’s contribution to the soundtrack to the latest Hunger Games movie — an epic 5:35, practically symphonic territory by TikTok generation standards. But “Favor” earns its runtime, developing patiently, swelling to a thunderous climax and even bringing it back down again, as Perez’s high-drama stylings proves a perfect match for the film series’ rousing-but-unsettling musical brand. It might get you excited for Sunrise on the Reaping, but it’ll definitely get you pumped for Perez’s hopefully imminent sophomore album.
TEEKS, Lovers Comet
Five years after sharing his 2021 debut full-length, Something to Feel, New Zealand soul artist TEEKS is back with his luscious sophomore offering, Lovers Comet. Featuring the scintillating “My Boy” and the Song of Achilles-inspired “Overdose,” Lovers Comet finds the Aotearoa singer-songwriter exploring the vast expanse of love across space, time and sexuality. This is the perfect record to usher in the cozy season. — K.D.
