Despite the success of their debut, it’s still a hard-knock life for these Annies, who smartly chronicle the joys and trials of being a woman in the 2010s. On “Being Pretty Ain’t Pretty,” they spend a lot of time and money applying make-up and even more time and money taking it off, but they never play it off as a joke. Instead, they sympathize with the woman in the mirror and their close harmonies invest the song with a deep melancholy. Songs like “Trading One Heartbreak for Another” and “Dear Sobriety” are quietly devastating, but the Annies’ sass and smarts remain.

Talib Kweli, Prisoner of Conscious: On his latest, Talib Kweli sounds liberated and awake. Says Christina Lee:

While 2011′s Gutter Rainbows updated the neo-soul sound of Kweli’s onetime label Rawkus, Prisoner of Conscious reaches back to even older genres. Samba revivalist Seu Jorge adds wistfulness to “Favela Love,” a song about wandering abroad. On “Come Here,” R&B singer Miguel does his best Marvin Gaye while Kweli composes a valentine made of hip-hop references: “We can do it like Common and Mary and ‘Come Closer’/ We can do it like Barack and Michelle, give me a fist bump.”

Patty Griffin, American Kid: The Americana songwriter’s first collection of new songs in six years. Stephen Deusner says:

American Kid is a meditation on wanderlust of all kinds — emotional, physical and musical — and it may be Griffin’s most adventurous and diverse effort yet. Rather than record again in Austin or Nashville, Griffin decamped to Memphis, where she absorbed the Bluff City’s deep, rich history and recruited Luther and Cody Dickinson of the North Mississippi All-Stars as her backing band. Fortunately, this is no kneejerk approximation of local blues or soul. No musical tourist, Griffin is not interested in re-creating that Sun or Stax sound; instead, she hits the crossroads and goes in all directions at once.

Still Corners, Strange Pleasures: Still Corners try to rid themselves of the “ethereal” and “dreamy” sound they’re associated with. Alex Naidus says:

Greg Hughes smartly juxtaposes the more traditionally “dreamy” elements of Still Corners’ sound with some crisper textures and more insistent rhythms. His songwriting and production style still skews sweeping and epic: On single “Fireflies,” the synths stack — pillowy pads, twinkling upper-octave melody lines and punchy synth-bass — and are buoyed by Tessa Murray’s vampish vocals. With Strange Pleasures, Hughes has carefully crafted a set with songs that inspire grandeur while remaining taut and gripping — an impressive feat.

Natalie Maines, Mother: Dixie Chick Natalie Maines returns scarred, but smarter, on her first real rock ‘n’ roll record. Stephen Deusner says:

Mother is not merely a shift in musical direction or a crossover attempt; instead, it’s the sound of a woman fighting defiantly to redefine herself with a harder, steelier sound. Fortunately, Maines’s commanding voice remains intact. She nimbly navigates the slow build from soft melody to full gospel finale on “Free Life,” while “Trained” binds a torrid sex metaphor to a rowdy blues-rock groove courtesy of co-producer Ben Harper.

Little Boots, Nocturnes: The long-awaited second LP from synth-pop chanteuse Little Boots. Barry Walters says:

Nocturnes isn’t a total break from her buzzy beginnings. For “Broken Record,” Hesketh writes with veteran songsmith Rick Nowels, spinning the same obsessive love angle as her attention-grabbing first single, “Stuck on Repeat.” But here and elsewhere, she downplays the ’80s vibe in favor of more eclectic synth sounds largely overseen by former Mo’ Wax/DFA honcho Tim Goldsworthy.

Joshua Redman, Walking Shadows: A diverse mix of American songbook standards, pop hits and originals. Says Britt Robson:

Redman plays with gorgeous aplomb on Kern and Hammerstein’s “The Folks Who Live on the Hill” and Hoagy Carmichael’s “Stardust” (the latter also features Mehldau’s best solo). He teases out the familiar melodies of The Beatles’ “Let It Be” and “Stop That Train” by John Mayer before taking transformative liberties with them via deft improvisations. The most arresting of the originals is Redman’s atmospheric “Final Hour,” in which his tenor has the low-toned plangency of a bass clarinet.

The Child of Lov, S/T – 25-year-old Netherlands musician, with the blessing of Damon Albarn (who guests here), turns out self-produced record that sounds like late-period Outkast in a bonfire, or a robot with a dying battery singing Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy.”

Astrid Engberg, Poetry is Gone – This seemed intriguing. Cool, Erykah Badu-ish vocals over smoky exhalations of Dilla-esque dusty loops. “Alright” is a jam.

Bajram Bili, Sequenced Fog – Minimal techno mazes built of tiny synthesizer parts. Rudimentary in an intriguing, mysterious way. Sounded interesting.

Shannon Wright, In Film Sound – Pretty brutal, gunky riffing plus Wright’s sneering voice. Basically sounds like the kind of record Steve Albini would have recorded for Touch & Go in the late ’90s. Take a sample, I think it’s pretty boss.

The Hussy, Pagan Hiss – Tinny garage-rock with some Judas Priest-chug guitars, vocals a thousand miles in the mix. One number also seems to be enhanced with a free-recorder solo. Pretty good, bratty-primitive stuff.

Sam Sanders, Mirror Mirror – Pretty sweet, SUPER rare R&B/Soul/Funk record (apparently, this new cover art had to be created from scratch, the original is that obscure). Kind of a nice, digging-in-the-crates type find.

The Uncluded, Hokey Fright – Not the world’s biggest fan of Kimya Dawson over here, but Aesop Rock is good, and this collaboration, while blood-draining on paper, yields a pleasantly quirky (as opposed to unbearably so), finely observed and pleasant listen. If you are even marginally a fan of either of these guys, I feel pretty comfortable recommending this to you.

James Cotton, Cotton Mouth Man – Latest offering of viscerally traditionalist harmonica blues from modern classic bluesman James Cotton.

Spirit of the Garden – Gorgeous chamber art-folk band led by the adventurous contemporary-classical cellist Jody Redhage. Shades of Dead Can Dance…

Lady Antebellum, Golden – Latest studio LP from the pop-country juggernaut.

Michael Hersch, The Vanishing Pavilions Suite – Shuddering, darkly portentous suite for solo piano by the American composer and pianist Michael Hersch. This was a landmark work in the contemporary classical community when it premiered in 2007, and while casually recommending a recording of this monumental work is a little bit like casually recommending that someone read Proust, I still heartily recommend it. (N.B.: I have never read Proust; I just use him as a handy-dandy reference point for “daunting commitment,” because that is essentially what that row of grey books on my shelf represents to me.)

Original Concept, Straight From the Basement of Kooley High! – I do not know what made this come around the New Arrivals turnpike this morning, but there’s no good reason for a self-respecting hip-hop fan not to have heard it. This is the loose, fun, funny and impressive debut LP from Dr. Dre—Andre Brown, that is, of “Ed Lover and,” not the Good Doctor out West. It came out in the earlier days of the major-labels and hip-hop (this was before Yo! MTV Raps) and didn’t sell much, but it’s stuck around because it’s witty and great.

Rod Stewart, Time – Hoo boy, look at that cover. And when there was only one set of footprints, that is when Rod carried you. Do you want to hear 2013-era Rod Stewart sing a song called “Sexual Religion?” Ask yourself that, preferably while looking into a well-lit mirror, and decide what the answer reveals to you about your soul. (NB: I love the first four Rod Stewart solo LPs almost as much as I love anything.)

Various Artists, Music From The Great Gatsby, OST – Here it is – the very expensive soundtrack to The Thing That Baz Luhrmann did to The Great Gatsby. Curated by Jay-Z; featuring Jay-Z, Lana Del Rey, and others.

Courtney Jaye, Love and Forgiveness – Latest from Nashville country singer/songwriter, whose bell-like voice will have sympathetic vibrations with Neko Case and Jenny Lewis Fans. Real Laurel Canyon, Mellow Gold vibes here. Produced by Mike Wrucke, who is known for his work with Miranda Lambert among others.

They clearly know the blues masters well, but their most obvious inspiration is the Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band that in 1972 released Spotlight Kid and Clear Spot, the two “accessible” albums that preceded Beefheart’s hapless attempt to “go commercial” with Unconditionally Guaranteed. But despite some of the sprung rhythms, clanking guitar and singer Joe Doerr’s voice, this band doesn’t really sound that much like Beefheart; the biggest thing they took from him is the understanding that the only way most white kids can play blues credibly and keep ‘em sounding fresh is by using blues only as a taking-off point — and that having done that, you’d damn well better have something to say or you’re just wanking in the wind. Doerr was a founding member of Austin’s Leroi Brothers, a harder-than-hard-edged roots band that played every song like it was trying to stay one step ahead of the police. Churchwood has much the same approach: You can practically feel the sweat pouring out of your speakers, except it’s much thicker — swampier — than real sweat. Doerr rides it like some weird water-park attraction. His voice has Beefheart’s power and gruffness, with a little Tom Waits mixed in there too, and when he breaks into one of his versions of Howlin Wolf’s nonverbal semi-yodeling articulations he is without affectation. He sounds really cool.

Doerr quit music in the ’80s for nearly two decades to go back to college, ultimately winning his doctorate from Notre Dame and then returning to Austin to teach writing and literature at a local private college. The lyrics he writes for Churchwood are a sort of gutter poetry in which French symbolism meets American beats’ free verse, stirred up by a bit of a Screaming Jay Hawkins gross-out. He is not the type who wakes up in the morning and looks around for his shoes because he has those mean ol’ blues. On “Keels Be Damned,” he bellows, “I’m coughing bullshit through my fists/ Crossing fables off my list.” Those lines are more like the bellows of Muddy Waters in “Mannish Boy” and “Seventh Son,” Bo Diddley in “Who Do You Love.” Plus, they’ve got terrific rhythm. Don’t always rhyme, but that’s okay.

Slide guitarist Billysteve Korpi is perhaps better known for his work with the Crack Pipes, arguably Austin’s top garage band. Guitarist Bill Anderson first made his name with the local post-punk roots band Poison 13. There’s no apparent reason why they should sound as stirring as they do, because they don’t really play off each other the way you’d expect; usually it’s more like they’re both soloing at the same time but both soloes work together sublimely. Check out this interplay on the likes of the swampy “Weedeye” or the vehement “Fake This One.”

The other thing the band does to keep things interesting is change tempo several times in one song. The rhythm section doesn’t lay down a blues groove in the conventional sense; they maraud through three or so grooves in one song. That can’t help but keep things from becoming too predictable in that white blooz way. You’re never quite sure what’s coming next, but you know it’s worth sticking around to find out. Until he joined Churchwood, drummer Julien Peterson had been a bass player. But he had the notion that the drummer of this band had to be able to play just behind the behind. Not coincidentally, that’s where you’ll find all the great blues band rhythm sections, and it allows the other players to slide in and out of the groove like Chuck Berry’s cool breeze. In the case of Churchwood, it gives the other players the opening they need to take the sound wherever they wish to while still remaining anchored. And that’s what they do on this album, much more than on their first. This one marks a significant growth over their debut, while leaving plenty of room for further growth on (what will presumably be) Churchwood 3.

Nothing will ever replace the great old bluesmen, and nothing should try. Because this band in fact doesn’t try, it sounds and feels pretty good alongside them. Similar, but different, it occupies its own little niche. Most listeners will describe them as a rock band rather than a blues band, but there’s nothing saying you have to believe that.

As clarinetist, Herman’s timbre was drier than Goodman’s or Shaw’s, but his piping bent-note sound could really drive a band. Herman sang too, in an unassuming boy-next-door way, as if stepping in last-minute to replace the band’s real singer, who was stuck in traffic. He had to cultivate that casual air. In songwriter Isham Jones’s band in 1936, Herman sang “No Greater Love” like a ’20s crooner — through the nose, throwing himself at the lyric. Jones had been at it since 1920, and had his old-school mannerisms. But he also featured a lot of blues; “Blue Prelude” showed how much his men dug Duke Ellington.

When Jones broke the band up in 1936, the jazzier members continued as a co-op fronted by Herman. They kept “Blue Prelude” as their first theme, and kept playing the blues. The ensemble drive (like Woody’s singing) quickly got modernized and streamlined. They played opposite Count Basie at New York’s Roseland. Basie said later, “The only band that ever cut my band was that Woody Herman band.”

Herman’s idol was Ellington, and even Duke was struck by how much Woody could sound like his own suave Johnny Hodges on alto sax. Hodges also showed Herman how to make an entrance; his breakthrough “Woodsheddin’ with Woody” just plays possum, swinging in a light Basie groove, until his clarinet barges in. The compilation Blues on Parade charts the band’s progress from 1937-42, albeit in scrambled order. The earliest item is a swinging update of Jelly Roll Morton’s “Doctor Jazz,” the latest an early Dizzy Gillespie chart with boppish touches, “Down Under.”

Dizzy said in his autobiography that when bebop hit in the early ’40s, all the bands wanted a bop number in the book, but only Herman’s caught the new rhythms without coaching: “All the trumpet players in that band wanted to sound like me.” He hired a couple of women musicians during the War, trumpeter Billie Rogers and vibraphonist Margie Hyams.

Bebop’s influence is all over Herman’s First Herd, founded in 1944, a band with an Ellingtonian array of diverse soloists: vibist Red Norvo, short-lived Dizophile trumpet spitfire Sonny Berman, tenor sax sparkplug Flip Phillips, bassist Chubby Jackson (who played fast and had an extra high string, making his playing sound speeded up), and Bill Harris, a broad toned trombonist of the old school somehow perfect for the new material. (Hear “Bijou,” with an improvised Harris solo that sounds carefully worked out.) The Herd featured hot arrangements by Ralph Burns and Neal Hefti. Igor Stravinsky wrote them his harmonically modern (if rhythmically starchy) “Ebony Concerto.”

Maybe because his band had started as a co-op, Herman was always open to his musicians’ enthusiasms and ideas; the players embroidered Burns’s and Hefti’s charts in rehearsal. In a little over three minutes, the dadaistic “Your Father’s Mustache” crams in scorching trumpet and tenor solos, a quote from Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, a mock-gleeclub vocal, false endings and prime Herman clarinet. They play it tongue-in-cheek with enviable precision. Drummer Buddy Rich, subbing, learned it by ear, and nailed it.

In 1946 they broke up — everyone was doing it. A year later, the business totally tanking, Herman formed his Second Herd, with Stan Getz and Zoot Sims on tenor, that one that recorded Jimmy Giuffre’s classic “Four Brothers,” with its cushy close-harmony saxes pointing the way toward cool jazz.

The standard anthology of the First Herd, and the Second Herd’s first batch, is Columbia’s Blowin’ Up A Storm. The Second Herd’s lesser known final sides were for Capitol, Herman’s next home till 1950. There’s more Getz in his early glory as rapturous tenor balladeer (“Early Autumn”) just before he goes out on his own. But by mid-’49 things start to get weird: cheeky dixieland with harrumphing tuba, and a mocking “Mule Train” sung with Nat King Cole.

In the ’50s Herman had his dips like other swing survivors, but he bounced back once more. In 1964, he recorded the Beatles’ “Things We Said Today,” a feature for his slithery Hodges-style alto, and a sign of things to come. A few years later, his increasingly young, shaggy and amplified crew was playing tunes by Frank Zappa (“America Drinks and Goes Home”), Traffic (“Smiling Phases”), the Temptations (“I Can’t Get Next to You”), Steely Dan (“Kid Charlemagne”) — and “Proud Mary,” “Light My Fire,” “Ma Cherie Amour” and more. If music can be kitsch in a good way, these the-kids-will-dig-it sides qualify.

In those later years Herman also revisited oldies, and kept turning up new talent, like saxophonists Joe Lovano and Scott Hamilton, bassists Marc Johnson and pianist Lyle Mays. Another way Woody Herman stood out from his rivals: He was a pleasure to work for. He rarely lost his temper in public, was married to the same woman forever, and loaned money to acquaintances in need.

It all should have ended better. Late in life the IRS hounded him over back taxes, owing to dubious management by a trusted aide. In 1985 the feds auctioned off the house he’d lived in 40 years — never mind all the money he’d raised for the War effort back when — to a landlord who later tried to evict him over tardy rent. A battery of pro bono lawyers staved that off; donations flowed in from all over. That was in 1987, the year Herman played his last gig, and the year he died. He’d led a big band for 50 years.

Iggy & the Stooges, Ready to Die: The first Iggy & the Stooges release in 40 (!) years is as defiant as ever. (Read our interview here, and see guitarist James Williamson’s album picks here.) Holly George-Warren says:

Few albums are so misleadingly titled as Ready to Die. The first release in 40 years under the “Iggy & the Stooges” banner sounds nothing like resignation; its taut 10 songs — clocking in at an old-school 34 minutes — constitute a genuine rebirth of a sneering, vital band, defiant as ever. Iggy Pop’s voice retains its feral power on searing opener “Burn” and lower-middle class anthem “Job,” while his deep croon conveys poignancy on the woebegone closer “The Departed.”

!!!, Thr!!!ler: Dance-punk pioneers return with another batch of jittery floor-fillers. Andrew Parks says:

Considering all the factors working against !!! over the past 15 years — major lineup changes, members who live on opposite coasts, the questionable expiration date of “dance punk” — you’d think they’d be a part-time prospect by now. But no, here they are, delivering a filler-free album that feels like a carefully-curated DJ set, including the disco inferno diatribes of “Get That Rhythm Right,” the convulsive funk of “Station (Meet Me At the)” and the peak house-party hooks of “Slyd.”

Akron/Family, Sub Verses: Akron/Family’s latest finds them working with an adventurous set of influences. Ashley Melzer says:

The tracks skid from one time signature or influence to another, but feel of a whole — like some take on American roots by way of a post-industrial Africa invaded by Eastern shamans. On paper, it sounds haphazard, incomplete. But Akron/Family build these disparate parts into something explosive or holy or both, time and again on Sub Verses. There’s no mythic volcano to stamp the narrative; there’s only a radical harmony, divergent strands threading together.

Daughter, If You Leave: The lovely full-length Recommended debut from this London indiepop trio. Annie Zaleski says:

Daughter’s full-length debut, If You Leave uses chilly atmospheric effects, lyrics haunted by romantic angst and rebirth, and Elena Tonra’s low-lit voice, which is as hazy and tortured as Chan Marshall sounded on early Cat Power records. The results are often hushed and delicate; “Smother” is lovely slow-core, both “Amsterdam” and “Winter” resemble Bat for Lashes, and the relatively upbeat “Human” echoes the whimsy of Sigur Ros’s folkier moments.

Colin Stetson, New History Warfare Vol. 3: To See More Light: Indie rock’s favorite sax man releases the Highly Recommended third installment of his New History Warfare series. Andy Battaglia says:

Colin Stetson’s most formidable and impressive on his own, with just a metal horn and a pair of heaving lungs to help push air through its twisty, peculiar channels. Stetson’s expansive style finds fine form in “Hunted,” an unusual instrumental track that matches ghostly, wordless cries to a sax treatise in which Stetson taps on keys percussively while blowing out sounds as if summoning some strange prehistoric beast. He’s credited for playing alto, tenor and bass saxophones (the latter a burly monster of an instrument), but the presence of each, in all cases, conforms to the whole of his unique sound-world.

Adventure, Weird Work: Some bright, whirring synth-based music on the always-excellent Carpark records. Adventure mainman Benny Boeldt displays an affinity with the kind of gentle, blinking music that used to score early ’80s video games. The music here feels alluringly retro-futurist, blinking blue bands of synth fit to score some interplanetary horror movie. Recommended

Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society, Brooklyn Babylon: The Highly Recommended latest from “steampunk-jazz” composer-bandleader Darcy James Argue. Seth Colter-Walls says:

Some of the pieces feature wooden flutes, others Afro-Peruvian percussion. Ingrid Jensen’s electric trumpet solo in “Building” calls to mind Miles’s best fusion bands. That all these sounds work together so elegantly is evidence of expert execution, not just singular vision; the entire program flows in a way that many modern-classical composers ought to envy. Argue’s curiosity and skill at integrating all his fascinations represent the humanism of the narrative capably on its own. Both florid with moment-to-moment intrigue and a fine document of an artist with a lot to say (and the ambition to match), Brooklyn Babylon is essential listening for all sorts of musical communities.

Howl, Bloodlines: The sophomore release from Howl is a little less bleak, but still as ugly as ever. Says Jon Wiederhorn:

Howl can still stomp and drone, but they’ve added new tricks to their arsenal, including southern power-groove riffs, twin-guitar harmonies and unexpected shifts in rhythm; the tempos range from mid-paced (“Embrace Your Nerve”) to double-time (“Your Hell Begins”). Clearly, Howl worked exhaustively to overhaul their sound (captured expertly by producer Zeuss and they’ve done so without sounding like a completely different band than the one that recorded Full of Hell.

Brooklyn Rider, A Walking Fire: Rightly-lauded Brooklyn string quartet returns with vibrant, lively takes on Eastern European music (their version of Bartok’s Strink Quartet No. 2 is the centerpiece) and moody avant-gardism. This is the rare album that is both adventurous and playful: the group balances forays into the outer edges of classical music with jubilant gypsy waltzes. Recommended

Coliseum, Sister Faith: Since their last album, Coliseum have evolved from a storming, metallic hardcore powerhouse to a more musically refined post-punk band. Says Jon Wiederhorn:

As much as the music seems driven by the members’ collective record collections, Ryan Patterson’s lyrics seem to stem from an inability and unwillingness to fit into the mainstream and the toll it has taken. “All my life, failure, All I see, failure/ All my dreams, failure,” he barks in “Last/Lost” before concluding, “See clearly from failure, live freely from failure.” And on “Fuzzbang,” he rails, “Gotta get away, wish we could close our eyes and dream it all away.” Patterson’s resigned discontent shines through Coliseum’s tunes, which steamroll without obliterating and cut without leaving scars regardless of tempo or intensity.

Charlie Poole, the Complete Paramount & Brunswick Recordings, 1929: The title lays it out in plain english: these are the sides banjo player Poole recorded for the Paramount and Brunswick labels in 1929. That relatively straightforward title, though, betrays the loose-limbed joy lurking in these tracks. There’s gamboling piano, swinging violin and Poole’s pinched-but-earnest vocalizing, making this a sunny and essential slice of American music. Recommended

Denison Witmer, Denison Witmer: Personal bias: Denison is an old friend of mine, but even if he wasn’t I’d still describe the tender, melancholy music on this album as ‘hard to resist.’ Fans of Mark Kozelek and early Iron & Wine will find lots to love here. Witmer’s voice is gentle and feathery, and the music leaves plenty of space for it to drift down slowly between the bars. The perfect music for a warm spring night.

Mark Kozelek & Jimmy Lavalle, Perils from the Sea: Speaking of Mark Kozelek. On this collaboration with Jimmy Lavelle from the Album Leaf, MK roams way beyond his comfort zone, laying his cracked tenor over blipping electronics. Here’s the thing: it works pretty well! It’s nice to hear Kozelek try something new, and Lavalle’s productions are simple enough that they complement, rather than distract.

R.A. the Rugged Man, Legends Never Die: Do yourself a favor sometime and Google R.A. old stories about R.A. the Rugged Man. He’s been notorious for years now, but all of his late ’90s antics distract from the fact that he’s still a really good rapper, with a distinctive voice and a nimble flow. Despite its somewhat pro forma title, Legends is a slab of solid throwback hip-hop that lets R.A. go barrel-chested over great, dusty production.

Altar of Plagues, Teethed Glory and Injury: Anyone who knows anything about heavy music knows that Profound Lore has become the go-to destination for boundary-pushing metal. The latest from Ireland’s Altar of Plagues is just further proof. Existing at the intersection of black metal and the harsher strains of electronic music, Teethed Glory is a roiling, riveting listen. Recommended

Human Eye, Into Unknown: Some pretty terrific, scuzzed-out UFO-rock from Tim Vulgar, also of Timmy’s Organism. Human Eye are more direct than that project (though just barely), and are still dripping with gunk and smeared with Vulgar’s beery vocals. God bless ‘em forever.

Amorphis, Circle: Grand, sweeping 11th record from this Finnish metal band is broader and more epic in scope than Altar of Plagues. Like all Amorphis records, this one is based around a central narrative — this one about an outsider who taps into his deep spiritual core. The music is appropriately theatrical.

Arsis, Unwelcome: And for those who like their metal a little more straightforward, the new record from technical death metallers Arsis. This one is the full grisly: heart attack drumming, corkscrewing guitars and ragged-larynx vocals.

The Heliocentrics, 13 Degrees of Reality: Playing out like a lost jazz soundtrack to some mid ’70s NY-centric crime film, 13 Degrees of Reality is loaded with tense, queasy greatness. Strings bow, drums stumble and stomp and the bass thumps and rattles like an elevated train. Recommended

Hanni El Khatib, Head in the Dirt: On his second LP, Hanni El Khatib grows as a songwriter, with an ass-kicking band behind him. Bill Murphy says:

Head in the Dirt is loaded with raw, scuzzy, no-nonsense blues-rock, its lyrics telling of misfit isolation, relationship angst and hardscrabble street life. Plenty has already been said about the garage revival spearheaded by the likes of Ty Segall, JEFF the Brotherhood and Mikal Cronin, but what sets El Khatib apart is his fascination with the rootsier end of rock ‘n’ roll — think Bo Diddley and Ballin’ Jack.

David Lang, Death Speaks: The latest from David Lang, with an impressive list of indie-rock pals: My Brightest Diamond’s Shara Worden, Owen Pallett, The National’s Bryce Dessner, and Nico Muhly. John Schaefer says:

Lang has assembled a text in which Death is addressing us, with a message that is ultimately reassuring, and comforting. The text is built around the many and varied instances in the songs of Franz Schubert in which the figure of Death speaks. The music, as in the other death-themed works named above, has a transparent texture that sets off and subtly colors those texts, and the voice delivering it. That voice belongs to Shara Worden, one of the current breed of musicians who move fluidly between the worlds of classical music and indie rock.

Various Artists, Rough Guide to African Disco: This is as great as you suspect it is. Leaping, jumping rhythms and disco wah-wah get cross-wired with highlife and juju and Afrobeat for irresistible results. Your summer dance party starts here. Recommended

The Melvins, Everybody Loves Sausages: A covers album with cuts from Throbbing Gristle, John Waters, The Jam and more. David Raposa says:

The group (joined by a handful of friends, including Neurosis’s Scott Kelly, Foetus’s JG Thirwell and Mudhoney’s Mark Arm) tears through obscurities from nearly forgotten California punk groups like Pop-O-Pies and Tales of Terror with the same eagerness and fervor that’s bestowed upon faithful renditions of Venom’s “Warhead” and David Bowie’s “Station To Station.” That said, it’s when The Kinks’ fuddy-duddy late-era track “Attitude” is turned into a great Buzzcocks outtake, or The Fugs’ “Carpe Diem” becomes a long-lost Nuggets track, that the adventurous spirit of Everybody Loves Sausages, and The Melvins’ sincere love of music of all kinds, really shines through.

Arrington De Dionyso’s Malaikat Dan Slnga, Open the Crown: Man, I used to love Old Time Relijun. They haven’t been a going concern for a while now, but frontman Arrington De Dionyso has been carrying on their tradition of scuzzy, avant post-punk. This one sounds like another winner, De Dionyso’s demonic preacher delivery yipping and wailing against rusty bars of guitar and what sounds like broke-down dancehall on the second track.

The Backhomes, Only Friend: Nice, light, springtimey indie pop from this Canadian group, this one moves from slow, sparkly, moody numbers like the hazy “Going Home” to the shoegaze groan of “Stay.” Vocals plunged in echo and gently bobbing melodies make this one a sure winner for fans of late period Yo La Tengo or newer bands like Real Estate and Ducktails.

The Body, Master, We Perish: I am pretty into these weird dudes. Maybe you will be, too. A loose definition of The Body would have to include the word “extreme,” but not “extreme” as in speed and distortion and riffery — “extreme” as in mood and tone. This two-man group excels at creating moments of sheer unholy terror — shrieking guitars, panicked vocals, wails, feedback, sludge and apocalyptic droning. Those who like a good scare should look up their video for “The Ebb and Flow of Tides in a Sea of Ash,” which may or may not contain actual footage of a cult mass suicide.

Bach was generous with musical invention, but reticent with information about how to perform his scores. Accustomed to directing the players he worked with, he didn’t specify how soft or loud any given passage should be, how sharp the accents, or how colorful the sound. The players knew these things, and if they didn’t he would tell them. Only now, they don’t.

The lack of detail is part of the Mass’s magnetism, because it allows performers to project onto it whatever they imagine it contains. That’s one reason there are so many recordings, ranging from syrupy orchestrations (with whipped cream on top) to the first original-instruments performances so thin and jerky they sound like a wheezing squeezebox. Search carefully through the bin, and you emerge with a map of changing tastes inscribed in Bach’s tough and pliant music.

The B minor Mass crept gradually into the repertoire over the course of the 19th century, so that by the turn of the 20th, orchestras had inherited it bundled with a repertoire of vast romantic symphonies. That’s the way things remained for decades. Orchestras that had expanded to cover the huge sonic expanses of Mahler and Bruckner symphonies lavished resources on composers who could never have imagined gathering such immense musical armies. In a 1959 recording with the Vienna State Opera Orchestra and Chorus, Hermann Scherchen opens the Kyrie Eleison with a vast, sunlit chord that seems to burst from an ocean of silence, a chord sung by a great gathering of souls. The numbers matter, and not just because a bigger ensemble produces a thicker sound, but also because it amplifies the distance between the loudest loud and the most reverent soft, between the group shout and the solo plea. Scherchen uses that acoustic fact to produce operatic extremes of intensity. The “Crucifixus” is terribly poignant music almost no matter how you play it, and in Scherchen’s sublimely mournful version, you can practically see the lights dim, and a procession of burlap-clad mourners tread slowly across the stage. The “Et resurrexit” follows in a flash of brass and drums, Christ’s resurrection heralded by outbursts of collective ecstasy.

The goes-to-11 treatment could easily turn into caricature, which is where Herbert Von Karajan took it in 1974, with the Berlin Philharmonic. His “Kyrie” is so intent on achieving instant glory, it’s practically hysterical. His “Crucifixus” is a juggernaut’s tread. The authentic performance practice movement was born partly in reaction to such excesses. Soon Karajan and his cohort were defending against a small but dedicated band of scholar-musicians who thought they knew exactly what instructions the composer gave and to whom. Joshua Rifkin declared symphonic Bach an abomination and insisted on one singer per part in lieu of massed choirs. In 1982 Rifkin produced a version that, in accordance with the new orthodoxy, was slender to the point of scratchiness. Still, he made his point: that the B Minor Mass is a work of vocal music and so the singers are the stars. He recruited agile, light-voiced singers like Julianne Baird, who skips through the “Laudamus Te” with an ingénue’s charm. Rifkin had launched a paradox: What is the authentic way to execute a work that had no place in Bach’s time? If the most historically accurate way to interpret the piece would be not to do it at all, then the only question is not how he did perform it but how he might have.

The next 20 years brought a flood of versions that were both scrupulous and musical, faithful to the evidence that Bach counted his musicians by the handful and not by the hundred, but also to the cosmic drama of the score. I have kept Philippe Herreweghe’s supple recording in rotation for many years, sometimes supplanted by John Eliot Gardiner’s more caffeinated version. Lately, though, I’ve been entranced by another finely tooled recording featuring the Bach Collegium Japan, conducted by Maasaki Suzuki. Instead of stunning revelations and volcanic upwellings of the spirit, Suzuki offers the Mass as an intimate, contemplative experience.

The wheel may be turning once again. The New York Philharmonic recently reclaimed the B Minor Mass from the early music specialists, performing it as part of the orchestra’s Bach Variations festival. That concert was recorded for future release, perhaps opening the door for a new generation of orchestral versions that are once large and light, baroque in spirit and modern in execution.

Their new one picks up where 2009′s mainstream breakthrough Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix left off, maintaining that album’s crowd-pleasing formula while accentuating the group’s gentle waywardness. Mostly, there’s pleasure on top of pleasure, sweat mixed with digital mathematics, both equally generous.

Laura Stevenson, Wheel: One of our editors’ favorite records of the year, Laura Stevenson’s Wheel is the New York singer-songwriter’s most focused and self-assured release. Rachael Maddux says:

Rather than make the choice between draping the record in heartstring-plucking orchestral folk or loading it with unstoppered rock ‘n’ roll sass, Stevenson and producer Kevin McMahon (Titus Andronicus, Swans) went with all of the above, and it’s for the best; the songs plot themselves out one by one, each as connected and disconnected from what comes before and what comes next as the endless numbered days they taunt and lament. They bloom unexpectedly, then wither away; they blindside, linger and end before you’re ready.

Craig Taborn Trio, Chants : Craig Taborn, Gerald Cleaver and Thomas Morgan are not your grandfather’s piano trio. Of Taborn and co.’s latest, Britt Robson says:

Craig Taborn set a daunting standard with his two previous outings as a leader: 2004′s Junk Magic is a jazz-electronica masterwork that updated Miles Davis’s Bitches Brew for the 21st century; while 2011′s Avenging Angel has been hailed for expanding the language of solo piano improvisation. Chants doesn’t detract from the luster of that legacy. It scrolls out like a seamless series of surprises, with interplay that is earthy and organic, yet whirring with intimate, nuanced colors, like a pastel kaleidoscope.

Junip, Junip: On Junip’s latest, Jose Gonzalez and co. withdraw further into their comfortable cocoon of airy melancholy and spacey synths. Marc Hogan says:

Throughout, Junip is unassumingly elegant, particularly on bleary-eyed dancefloor pick-me-up “Your Life Your Call,” jagged psych excursion “Villain” and tranquil epiphany “After All Is Said and Done.” Over African-style rhythms, “Baton” finds a way to make even whistling sound subtle. As suggested in the lyrics of patiently propulsive first single “Line of Fire,” sometimes it’s best to beat a graceful retreat. There’s more than one way to deconstruct the mechanisms of consumer culture.

Luke Winslow-King, The Coming Tide: a long-ago eMusic Selects artist maters the art of revival folk on his latest. Hilary Saunders says:

The 29-year-old singer/songwriter, slide guitarist Luke Winslow-King is from Michigan, but he has called The Big Easy home since 2001. On his third full-length, you can hear that the city has made its way into his bones. On The Coming Tide, Winslow-King masters the art of revivalist folk, seamlessly blending New Orleans jazz, Delta blues and ragtime into an album as sweet and satisfying as devouring plate of beignets and sipping a café au lait on the banks of the Mississippi.

Slava, Raw Solutions: The debut from this Moscow-born, Chicago-raised, Brooklyn-based DJ/producer. Andy Battaglia says:

Many of the tracks on Raw Solutions take a snippet of a vocal sample and circle around it until it’s been spied from every conceivable angle. Apart from his love for spin-cycle sampling, Slava showcases a nimble production style that favors house music-derived rhythmic syncopation and infusions of pan-electronic elements like rave sirens (“Heartbroken”) and quasi-jungle “rinse-outs” (“Girls on Dick”). It’s all clenched and economical and tight, and it never lets up.

Lilacs & Champagne, Danish & Blue – Grails members continue their dusky, loop-soul side project with another album of album of pastiche-sampling you can smell the used-record bin on. Nate Patrin writes:

Grails members Alex Hall and Emil Amos struck beat-geek paydirt in 2012 with their self-titled debut as Lilacs & Champagne, a musty, scraped-up soak in sample-based psychedelia that played like the lost score to a 1972 Italo-American giallo set in a desert. To continue that cinematic analogy, Danish & Blue is the soundtrack to the best stoner-rap neo-noir never made. It’s the kind of album where RZA-eerie piano loops pair up with heatstruck AOR guitar riffs and decaying fragments of Gary Wright’s synthesizer, before everything is soaked in whiskey, and set on fire at 4 in the morning.

Amy Dickson, Dusk & Dawn  - I know, I know – another classical saxophonist performing Faure. How crowded can one niche get? Jokes, obviously. This is a tastefully and beautifully played selection of light classics that steer well clear of Muzak; Dickson has a wonderfully pure, even tone, and she interprets “I Only Have Eyes For You” as elegantly as she does Faure’s Pavane.  An unusual treat.

Bill Ryder-Jones, A Bad Wind Blows In My Heart – The former Coral guitarist continues his solo career with a wonderful collection of sad-eyed, gently warped ballads, in the vein of XO-era Elliott Smith.

Black Milk, Synth or Soul – Black Milk is a phenomenally talented hip-hop producer from Detroit, and this beat tape reaffirms that. I want him to make more music with Danny Brown soon.

No Joy, Wait For Pleasure -  No Joy’s second record sends them diving further into Lush/Swervedriver territory, and they turn up with sharper songwriter and bigger hooks this time around.

Frank Turner, Tape Deck Heart – Hmm, a “tape deck heart.” Does that mean…it eats whatever goes into it? Curious. Frank Turner’s punky folk rock is pretty meat-and-potatoes, and it sounds like Frank Turner fans are getting what they want here.

Har Mar Superstar, Bye Bye 17 – The swarthy soul man’s latest is a sort of tribute to Sam Cooke, apparently. Lead singer “Lady You Shot Me” (the last words Sam Cooke is ever said to have spoken), however, has a distinctly ’70s Rod Stewart meets the Daptones vibe. Makes sense, as Rod was initially a white guy trying to sound like Sam Cooke.

Snoop Lion, Reincarnated – Snoop Dogg went to Jamaica for the first time. Snoop Dogg is now Snoop Lion. He has made a reggae album. Careful, folks: visiting Jamaica can be very dangerous. Featuring Drake, Mavado, Mr. Vegas, Akon, and others.

The Thermals, Desperate Ground Demos – Some demo versions of Thermals balled-fists triumphal new one.

Tom Jones, Spirit in the Room – Tom Jones attempts his geezer-stares-down-mortality, Johnny-Cash-on-The-Man-Comes-Around moment, covering Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Odetta, Bob Dylan, and more.

Lana Del Rey, Young and Beautiful – LDR sings another version of her exact same song. This time for the up-and-coming Thing Baz Lurhmann Is About To Do To The Great Gatsby.

The Flaming Lips, The Terror: Darker things lurk in the cheery public persona the Flaming Lips have offered in the last decade. Dan Hyman says of their latest:

While the Oklahoma-based psych rockers have been moving aggressively in a bleaker direction since 2009′s trippy Embryonic, The Terror may well be their most dour and disturbing display to date. It’s a challenging listen, but an undeniably cohesive one, with each track fusing onto the next.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Mosquito: Karen O and co.’s fourth LP is sparse, jagged and impressionistic. Says Ryan Reed:

Mosquito, unlike the band’s first three albums, takes some time to simmer before it eventually clicks. But it does, eventually, click: “Under the Earth” is a clear standout — twitchy electro-pop with bass tones that boom like elephant cries; “Always” is saturated with sensual tension, Karen O’s voice wandering nimbly through ethereal synth mist. But the real breakthrough is “Wedding Song,” which harkens back to the emotional grandeur of early gem “Maps,” referencing the singer’s recent marriage and closing the album with a blissful serenade.

Shuggie Otis, Inspiration Information/Wings of Love: A lengthy collection of dusted-off recordings from a shoulda-been soul superstar. Jim Farber says:

Shuggie Otis enjoyed his widest exposure in 1977 for writing the funky, Top 5 Brothers Johnson hit “Strawberry Letter 23.” Though the indie label Luaka Bop re-released Inspiration Information 12 years ago, Otis couldn’t convince any label to put out the amazing recordings he’d created since. As these dusted-off — and belatedly introduced — recordings prove, Otis’s solo approach to funk utterly rethought the genre. He made it float instead of stomp, abstracting the sound through the kaleidoscope of psychedelia.

Iron & Wine, Ghost on Ghost: Sam Beam’s new LP goes into jazz-fusion, Bee Gees-y territory. Rachael Maddux on why that’s not too terrible of a thing:

Tracing the genealogy of Ghost on Ghost, its plaid polyester vibe even begins to seem a little bit inevitable. Beam’s layering up of anything besides tickled guitar and hushed vocals began two releases in, on 2004′s Our Endless Numbered Days, with some pitter-pat drums; The Shepherd’s Dog, in 2007, introduced a reinforced backbone of percussion, strings and layered vocals not always his own; in 2011 Kiss Each Other Clean brought both noodlier song structures and more distorted instrumentals while aiming not only for radio-friendliness but a certain early ’70s rock/pop pedigree.

Major Lazer, Free The Universe: Without Switch gone, Diplo called on some friends to help make the new Major Lazer record. Bill Brewster says:

On Free The Universe something strange has happened. What seemed like an off-the-wall dancehall collaboration in 2009 has turned into something far poppier, featuring an unlikely line-up of guests including Shaggy, Wyclef, Peaches, Ezra Koening of Vampire Weekend and even Bruno Mars. Yet it still has that oddball edge that follows Diplo’s productions around like a lost puppy.

Ghostface Killah & Adrian Younge, Twelve Reasons to Die: Ghostface teams up with the killer funk-soul revue live band Nate Patrin says:

Though his persona draws from comics, true crime and 42nd Street double features, it can still be pretty easy to see Ghostface Killah as simply a skilled amplification of an actual person. That’s why Twelve Reasons to Die, his collaboration with soundtrack composer and psychedelic-soul maestro Adrian Younge, is such a unique addition to his catalog: It’s an elaborate, conceptual attempt to give the Tony Starks-turned-Ghostface identity a fantastical origin story, set two years before his birth and drenched in a sound that uncannily evokes both Ghost’s fictional and real-life come-up years.

Fall Out Boy, Save Rock and Roll: The pop-punk superstars reunite, but this isn’t back to basics. Says Barry Walters:

It starts out with an orchestral flourish on the galloping and flat-out fantastic “Phoenix,” and on the way to its piano-lead and even more symphonic finale, there’s white-knuckled relentlessness: Buzzsaw guitars blare while the zinger-packed songs — now credited to the entire band — pile on the hooks. A proven master at bridging the pop/rock gap, producer Butch Walker pumps even the most delicate filigree to stadium-sized proportions. Fall Out Boy has always been dramatic, but here they sometimes lapse into desperation, as if what they’re truly intent on saving is their fanbase.

The Thermals, Desperate Ground: The Thermals’ Saddle Creek debut is their most rousing and most animated. Stephen Deusner says:

This is the sound of a band girding for a hard fight: “The sword at my side will allow me to be the last thing my enemies see,” sings frontman Hutch Harris on the punk-triumphal standout “The Sword at My Side.” The Thermals have strategized and streamlined their attack, pummeling through these songs as a three-person rhythm section: Harris playing furious rhythm guitar, Kathy Foster adding dexterous melodies on bass, and drummer Westin Glass pounding away like they’ll face the firing squad if any song exceeds three-and-a-half-minute mark. The Thermals sound reinvigorated, but rather than smite their enemies, they rally to remind themselves why they keep waging their own personal battle of the band.

Steve Earle & The Dukes (& Duchesses), The Low Highway: This set could almost be a retrospective of Steve Earle’s three-decades-and-counting career. Holly George-Warren says:

Earle’s oeuvre encompasses country, folk, rock, bluegrass and protest music, and his superb new album represents all these facets with a loose-limbed assurance. Back in the saddle is Earle’s road band, the Dukes, amended to include “the Duchesses,” featuring vocalist Allison Moorer (a solo artist and Earle’s wife) and violinist/vocalist Eleanor Whitmore (comprising half of recording artists the Mastersons, along with Dukes guitarist Chris Masterson). This family affair also boasts Earle’s co-producer Ray Kennedy, for the first time since 2004′s Grammy-winning The Revolution Starts Now.

Various Artists, Way To Blue – The Songs Of Nick Drake:Way To Blue isn’t your typical tribute album, with a few well-known acts and plenty of new names. Peter Blackstock says:

Exquisite arrangements and recording techniques result in a live album that doesn’t sound like a live album; it doesn’t sound like a tribute album either, since the tracks weren’t gathered from disparate studio sessions. It also differs from typical tributes in that the big names aren’t the primary draw. There are a few well-known acts — Lisa Hannigan takes “Black-Eyed Dog” into uncharted territory with eerie harmonium tones, Robyn Hitchcock is well-suited to the lyrically offbeat “Parasite,” and Teddy Thompson approaches the hypnotic lure of Drake’s voice on “River Man” — but newer names make the most memorable impressions.

Born Ruffians, Birthmarks: Canadian indie rockers sound like a whole new band on their latest LP. Ryan Reed says:

Birthmarks is an effusive U-turn: radiating confidence and chemistry where 2010′s Say It so often sagged. “Needle” opens with a startling statement of purpose: Gleaming choral harmonies give way to a springy bass/kick-drum pulse, as frontman Luke Lalonde wraps his chipper croon over shards of staccato guitar. Instead of relying on clumsy lyrical metaphors, as they often did on Say It (see: the awkward puns of “Sole Brother”), Lalonde’s words now pack an emotional sting.

Ghost B.C., Infestissumam: Too Satanic for commercial radio, Jon Wiederhorn says Ghost B.C.’s Infestissumam is “more illuminating than 100 burning Bibles:

Despite its bleak atmosphere and epic structures, the album is ultimately more classic rock (think Blue Oyster Cult and Jethro Tull) and proggy pop (early Genesis and Marillion) than metal. There’s no question it’s far more accessible than Opus Eponymous, featuring only a few riffs that could really quality as headbanger-worthy. That said, there’s plenty here that’s thoughtful, provocative and heavy, and the way Ghost B.C. combine influences throughout Infestissumam is uncanny.

The Haxan Cloak, Excavation: The Haxan Cloak’s Bobby Krlic dwells on the dark side, but Sharon O’Connell argues that his dark and chilly aesthetic goes deeper. She says:

There are echoes of Burial’s cavernous dub and Demdike Stare’s haunted techno in Excavation, but its magnificently maleficent, post-dubstep soundscapes have more in common with musique concrete, Expressionist cinema soundtracks and medieval monastic cantos than so-called witch house or drone metal. Krlic’s sounds are again rooted in acoustics (cello, violin, guitar, vocals) and field recordings, but this time they’ve been heavily processed — magnified, stretched, dissembled, reconstituted and rearranged — to produce nine micro-symphonies of stark beauty and extraordinary menace.

Houses, A Quiet Darkness  - An incredible concept to this one; this concept record tells the story of a husband and wife attempting to reunite in the wake of a nuclear apocalypse. Dream-pop with nothing but bad dreams.

The Aluminum  Group, Plano – Low-key lovely, late-80s-to-early-90s indie-pop from Chicago on Minty Fresh. Will remind you of The Clientele, who they predate.

Art Brut, Top of the Pops – Compilation of B-sides, unreleased and best-of by the some of the best stand-up-comedy indie rock that the early ’00s saw.

Barn Owl, V – Pitch-dark doom-dub – enveloping clouds of ambient synths and acres of implied space. A good companion, sonically and spiritually, to that Haxan Cloak record.

Dead  Can Dance, In Concert – Live album from the beloved, and recently returned, classical/indie folk outfit.

John Parish, Screenplay – Frequent PJ Harvey collaborator brings together all of his soundtrack work.

Major Lazer, Free The Universe – Features-heavy part from Diplo’s Major Lazer alias, featuring Amber Coffman, Ezra Koenig, Beenie Man, Shaggy, Bruno Mars, Tyga, and many many more.

Elvis Depressedly, Holo Pleasures – Elliott Smith melodies, tin-can synth-pop casios, and dream-pop haze.

Various Artists, The Cumbia Beat Vol. 2 – The always-great Vampisoul returns with another platter of shrewdly sourced cumbia, this time from Peru. Grooves for days here.

Zomes, Time Was – Zoning, meditative drone-rock, based on organ, guitar fuzz, and cooing vocals.

The Shouting Matches, Grownass Man – This is Justin Vernon (aka Bon Iver)’s latest side project, and it is straight-ahead blues rock.

A bunch of Daniel Barenboim recordings showed up today from Warner Classics – The world-famous pianist and conductor’s shrewd and expansive takes on a treasure trove of repertoire. Here are a few highlights.

Brahms : Symphony n° 2 / Tragic Overture Op.81

Mozart : Piano Concertos Nos 11, 14 & 15

Brahms : 4 Ballades op.10 & Piano Sonata op.5 in F minor – Elatus

Bach, JS : Goldberg Variations & Beethoven: Diabelli Variations

SINGLES/EPs

Cannibal Ox, Gotham – The legendary New York duo return after untold years with that classic sharp, druggy haze they do so well.

The Blank Tapes, Holy Roller – Strummy, jangling garage-pop single.

Egyptian Hip-Hop, Tobago – Warm, sensual Balearic synth-pop, shades of Cut Copy.

Guided By Voices, Noble Insect – Three-song morsel from the reunited GBV. Title track here sounds pretty good.

Jimmy Eat World, I Will Steal You Back – Emo has been in the slow process of coming back/not coming back for the last three or four years; if it ever does have its moment in the spotlight again, I want these guys to get a little more shine. New single.

The night before we spoke, I had watched transfixed as the Wailers played Max’s Kansas City, opening for Bruce Springsteen. Not that it was an unusual billing for Max’s: A week later Iggy Pop would headline three midnight performances; in mid-August Tim Buckley was scheduled; coming attractions included the New York Dolls and Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee.

The Wailers fit right into this spatial mix. It was their first time in New York, and they brought with them the harbingers of a reggae poised to become a world music, breaking out of its West Indian shantytown stylee. After years of transmuting American pop songs into the characteristic loping rhythms of Caribbean music, a beat off-centered and on-kiltered, the cultural exchange was beginning to flow upriver: Desmond Dekker’s “Israelites,” Johnny Nash’s version of Bob’s “Stir It Up,” Paul Simon’s “Mother and Child Reunion,” the soundtrack to The Harder They Come. Infused with a sense of destiny, preaching the apocalyptic tenants of Rastafarian poetics, the sacrament of ganja amid lofty Biblical invocations, this was music ready to ignite.

Catch A Fire was the Wailers’ calling card. They were no strangers to recording, with a lengthy career dating back to 1963, when they made their debut under Leslie Kong’s aegis, and then worked with ska-master Clement Dodds, and through to the inimitable Lee Perry. If there is anyone responsible for turning the group from a harmony trio (Bob, Bunny Livingstone and Peter Tosh) into a more expansive mode, it’s Perry. “Scratch” was on the verge of losing himself in the welter of effect and reverberation that made his later dub-work so hallucinatory. But he administered tuff-love to the Wailers by tightening their rhythm section, a turnabout that became fair play when the Wailers hired the backbone of Perry’s Upsetters rhythm section, the brothers Barrett, Aston and Carlton, masters of the one-drop bass drum.

Chris Blackwell, who ran Island Records, had lived a hybrid life. He grew in Jamaica in wealthy circumstances (his family was in the rum business), and was aware of the bubbling-under sounds emanating from Jamaica. He founded his record label in 1962, and had leased early Wailers singles. Though his label was primarily known for its rock acts, from Traffic to Roxy Music, he had broad tastes (Millie Small’s “My Boy Lollipop” was one of his early hits in Britain and America), and instinctively understood the global possibilities of the infectious riddim of Jamaica. He was an investor in the movie The Harder They Come, had partnered with Trojan Records at one point, and saw in Bob’s songwriting ability and forward-looking acumen and charisma the only performer who might take the music to another, more international level. He even leased the early Wailers singles. His opportunity came when the Wailers found themselves stranded in London after a proposed European tour had fallen apart. He paid for their air fare home, and advanced the capital to record in Kingston. Then the group returned to England to complete the masters.

As co-producer on Catch A Fire, Blackwell suggested touches to make the album more appealing to non-reggae ears and seductive to non-reggae radio programmers. He enlisted studio musicians — Wayne Perkins, a Muscle Shoals regular, whose lead guitar lines bring a taste of southern-rock to the album opener “Concrete Jungle” and the long-form “Stir It Up,” which also features “Rabbit” Bundrick adding synthesizer and keyboard touches — and overdubbed them on the tapes Bob had recorded in Jamaica. Released in April of 1973, the album was acclaimed in the rock press, scraping the bottom of the Top 200 in America, serving its purpose to alert the world of reggae’s approaching firestorm.

Catch A Fire also marked a turning point in the evolution of the Wailers. The album is credited to the group, but Marley’s increasing preeminence in their stage show and his dominance as the group’s chief songwriter inevitably led to more emphasis being placed on his leadership role. Bunny would leave the original trio soon after, preferring to return to Jamaica and not tour, and though Peter Tosh writes two of the album’s best songs — “400 Years” and “Stop That Train” — his own solo career would soon inevitably be underway. Bob might have been increasingly drawn to the mystic groundations of Rastafarianism, but the album still offers such pop-ish material as “Baby We’ve Got A Date (Rock It Baby)” and “Kinky Reggae.”

When I spoke to him at the Chelsea, he was already shifting into the rhetoric of revolution and salvation that would, as the ’70s progressed, make him a spokesman for unity and spiritual transcendence and cultural brotherhood. Drawing deeply on a spliff, he preached the word to me, an eager congregant. “Take off your face, and strip down y’old self, and see who you is, that is who you really is. Rasta. We can’t pretend. I a Rasta. I live…”

And so he does, his message resounding, in this future prophesized by the burning bush that is Catch A Fire.

What is clear is the Knife’s gift for crafting some of the most forward-thinking electronic music around — Shaking the Habitual is an exhilarating, what-the-fuck-is-going-on-here listen. It’s definitely their freakiest set yet — maybe the freakiest record this year. Cuts like “Full of Fire” and “Raging Lung” are packed with synth earworms and djembe drums and storm-the-floor electronic beats and flutes and recorders and art-damaged acoustic guitars and feedback drones. In a time when pop stars and television personalities offer up every mundane detail of their personal lives for the sake of a retweet, sometimes it’s nice to have an artist who remains shrouded in nothing but mystery.

James Blake, Overgrown: James Blake might sound like blue-eyed soul to some, but if you think he sounds like Jamie Lidell, you should get your ears checked. eMusic’s Andrew Parks says:

James Blake revisits the profoundly weird stomping grounds of his self-titled debut on Overgrown. Free of Feist or Joni Mitchell covers, the only creative voice that’s tortured or tweaked this time around is Blake’s own, whether that means something as live and direct as “DLM” or the patience-rewarding returns of, well, everything else.

Paramore, Paramore: Paramore stray from safe, simple hooks on their super-long self-titled LP. Says Ryan Reed:

“No one’s the same as they used to be,” sings Hayley Williams at the outset of her band’s boldly catchy fourth album, her lightning-rod yelp ricocheting off new-wave synths and tense punk-pop riffage. For Paramore, it’s a prophetic lyric: On this expansive self-titled set, they’ve all but ditched the emo stiffness of their early Warped Tour days, plunging head-first into the slick, arena-friendly stylings of modern pop.

Villagers, {Awayland}: The second LP from Irish troubadour Conor O’Brien, aka Villagers. Dan Hyman says:

Villagers, the musical outlet for troubadour Conor O’Brien, is a folk act at its core. But on 2010′s Becoming a Jackal, O’Brien drew justifiable comparisons to fellow Irishman Glen Hansard and Bright Eyes for his ability to expand outside the genre’s steel-stringed framework. With {Awayland}, O’Brien pushes these experiments further and expands this experimental bent, dabbling in lush orchestration and electronic textures.

Dawes, Stories Don’t End: Dawes embrace their folk-rock strengths on their latest LP. Hillary Saunders says:

Full of irresistible harmonies, clear-ringing guitar solos and astute lyrical self-awareness, Stories Don’t End serves as a graceful evolution from 2009′s debut North Hills and 2011′s Nothing Is Wrong. The album offers a more optimistic, or at least hopeful, tenor that you can hear most clearly in “Someone Will” and “Most People,” as well as the Blake Mills cover “Hey Lover.

Numbers And Letters, Guns Under Water: The debut full-length from Austin’s Numbers And Letters. Stephen Deusner says:

Austin alt-country outfit Numbers And Letters open their full-length debut with a brash declaration: “The fire’s been lit,” sings frontwoman Katie Hasty on “Ghost.” “I hope you still love this house, ’cause I just burned it down.” She’d rather torch the place than share it with ghosts who lurk but don’t pay rent. It’s a memorable introduction to an album littered with memories of doomed loves and populated by lovers pushed to emotional extremes.

The Postal Service, Give Up -  The side project that swallowed the career of everyone involved. For something so unassuming and wispy, this record changed a lot of lives, straight up. I do not have much to say about this album that you all don’t already  know/feel, but “The District Sleeps Alone Tonight” remains one of the  greatest songs of the last decade, and will be around for a long while.

Various Artists, Fania Records 1964-1984, The Incendiary Sounds of New York – Tito Puente, Ralfi Pagan, Celia Cruz, and more on this dazzling and true-to-its-name (INCENDIARY!) compilation of NY salsa, as presented by the legendary Fania records. Hear a city boiling.

Jaimeo Brown, Transcendence -  A stunning statement from the “drummer/conceptualist” Jaimeo Brown, as Britt Robson calls him. In his rave review, he observes:

Jaimeo Brown’s Transcendence is “essential” music, in the sense that the essence of the black church, the blues, and the emotional gutbucket that marks the best jazz improvisation help distinguish its identity. And yet this is almost the opposite of a “roots” album; Brown, a drummer-conceptualist in his mid-30s, has fostered a species of music that incorporates the scalding blues-rock guitar and hip-hop sonics of Chris Sholar (probably best known for his Grammy-winning work with Kanye and Jay-Z on “No Church In the Wild”); extended samples from the rural Alabama gospel group the Gee’s Bend Quilters from their recordings in 1941 and 2002; the sinuous, Carnatic-styled East Indian vocals of Falu; the resonant, ductile jazz tenor sax of J.D. Allen and piano of Geri Allen; and Brown’s own polyrhythmic, African-bush-to-NYC-club assaults on the drum kit. After a couple of straight-through listens, the entire package soaks into your soul.

Dave Douglas, Time Travel – The celebrated trumpeter brings his new quintet back to the clean-lined basics for his latest offering.

Julieta Venegas, Los Momentos – Airy, off-kilter Spanish-speaking indie/folk pop from the Mexican singer-songwriter Julieta Venegas.

Joey Bada$$,  “Unorthodox” – Talented, throwback-NY rapper, not yet twenty years old, links up with DJ Premier.

Vondelpark, “California Analog Dream” – Lovely, smooth, Arthur Russell-influenced watery dance-pop.

Sinkane, “Warm Spell” – Jittery, light-stepping rock/pop single given a number of bouncy, buzzy remixes.

The Juan MacLean, “You Are My Destiny” – Fluidly propulsive new one from DFA faves The Juan MacLean.

Kid CuDi, “Girls” – New single from Kid CuDi.

Kids on A Crime Spree, “Creep The Creeps” – This song sounds great; The Cure in a tin can,  just wonderful pop songwriting.

Those three blues artists are the Mississippi Sheiks, Blind Willie McTell and Charley Patton. The first two have a lighter, simpler and more melodic approach than Patton, but all three are exemplary entertainers. Across the whole spectrum of blues, which is much more diverse than it’s ever given credit for, some artists are just like that, no matter how harsh the sound of their music — Robert Johnson, for example, put out deeply emotional music with an undeniably rough sound, but he also wrote irresistible hooks and formalized the verse-chorus pattern of American popular music in the blues. He went that distance to make his music, however searing, more accessible to more people; that’s (along with mystique) a big part of the reason he’s by far the most popular early artist of the blues revival that been off and on since the 1950s. With that in mind, let’s look at the three new Third Man reissues.

The Mississippi Sheiks: The Complete Recorded Works Presented in Chronological Order, Volume 1 documents the Delta string band built around members of the Chatmon Family, most prominently Armenter Chatmon, known professionally as Bo Carter. Drawing on white as well as black rural traditions including blues, pop, hokum, country and folk, their guitar-fiddle sound made them one of the most popular acts of the 1930s, even though they only recorded for the first half of that decade. The interplay between Carter’s oily voice and Lonnie Chatmon’s scratchy fiddle is as otherworldly when sweet as when severe. Their 1930 “Sitting on Top of the World,” written by Sheiks guitarist Lonnie Chatmon the morning after a triumphant gig at a white dance, was a crossover even back then — it’s since been revived by Bob Wills, Bill Monroe, Ray Charles, Howlin’ Wolf, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan, Les Paul, White and countless others — and the group’s influence on American music is everywhere. You can hear it in the stateliness of “The Sheik Waltz,” the skittering heat of “The Jazz Fiddler,” the carefree country of “We Are Both Feeling Good Right Now,” the hoodoo of “Stop and Listen Blues,” the down-and-out moan of “Winter Time Blues” or the wit of “Grinding Old Fool.”

As an Atlanta bluesman, Blind Willie McTell also made music lighter, bouncier and less dark than the most tortured Delta blues; this ragtimey sound is usually called Piedmont blues and McTell was perhaps its greatest master, picking his 12-string guitar with both agility and elegance. His nasal warble had a touch of country in it, and his repertoire included blues and ragtime, spirituals, ballads, pop, folk, hillbilly and story-songs that sometimes had vaudeville and/or medicine show overtones. Like the Sheiks, Willie cut his calling-card number, the brilliantly-constructed “Statesboro Blues,” which the Allman Brothers popularized more than four decades later, at his first sessions (in ’27). But he never ran out of melodies, licks or ideas. Listen on his Volume 1 to the way his guitar fills alternate between high and low strings on “Mamma ‘Taint Long Fo’ Day,” or his carousing slide on “Three Women Blues,” for a display of his nimbleness as a picker; it’s as if there were two different guitarists on these songs. Or to the stunning lyrics of “Dark Night Blues” (“Drink so much whiskey/ I’m stagger when I sleep/ My brains are dark and cloudy/ My mind’s gone to my feet”). Or the happy-go-lucky way he acts out “Atlanta Strut” with his guitar and the percussive effects he gets from it on “Drive Away Blues.” McTell’s reach was arguably the broadest of anyone of his era who called himself a bluesman, and he presumably seduced a wide range of listeners on the street corners where he did most of his singing.

You might think the whole entertainer analogy among these three breaks down with Charley Patton. After all, his growling, gravelly voice is forceful enough to unnerve a Howlin’ Wolf fan, and his layered, impossibly intricate rhythms effortlessly conjure up West Africa. It’s the kind of stuff people are talking about when they refer to “authentic” blues. Yet “intricate” shouldn’t be confused with “driving” or “aggressive.” On “Screamin’ and Hollerin’ the Blues,” his playing exploits hesitations, shifting accents and rhythmic variations to garrote what is generally a laid-back piece with relaxed vocals. On the astonishing “Down the Dirt Road Blues,” he gets three rhythms going simultaneously — one with his voice, one with his guitar lines and one by tapping his guitar.

So yes, Charley Patton was a ferocious Delta bluesman, perhaps the form’s true father. But only about half his 50-plus sides are even blues; as the oldest Delta bluesman to record, he worked in all the other forms that his audience would expect of a pre-blues rural entertainer. His Volume 1 embraces religious songs (“Lord I’m Discouraged”) and folk ballads (“Mississippi Boweavil Blues”), ragtime novelties (“Shake It and Break It”) and familiar slide guitar standards (“Spoonful”), even “composed folk” topical songs like “Tom Rushen Blues” (or his opus “High Water Everywhere” about the 1927 Mississippi River flood, which will appear on a subsequent album). So when Patton turns out something like “Pony Blues,” doubtless his most influential blues, he’s showing just a fraction of what he can do. Plus, live he was unabashedly show biz, playing guitar behind his head or between his legs, peppering songs with vaudevillian asides and the like. Fellow Delta bluesmen who only saw him live considered him a clown; they were then shocked to hear his records in all their fierceness and complexity.

Ultimately, the “performer” designation unites these three artists when their sounds are so different. At a segregated time when record companies confined “race music” to a particular market these guys worked hard to get around the limitations being imposed on them. Today, they face a different kind of segregation, that imposed by the “purist.” But they all, each in his own way, rise above it…again.

Charles Bradley is not the kind of guy to sing of love in fantastical terms; he’s much too real for that. Bearing a voice streaked with the ravages of inner torment, this nomadic 64-year-old soul shouter — now based in a Brooklyn very different to the one in which he grew up — instead captures the pains and pleasures of love in sobering but unrestrained tones: He screams, shouts, pleads and moans of desire and disappointment so extreme that words alone cannot suffice. Not merely singing, he testifies of love and social injustice: This former James Brown impersonator does not hold back.

Bleached, Ride Your Heart: Sisters Jennifer and Jessie Clavin left their old band Mika Miko behind, but now they’re back as Bleached. Alex Naidus says:

Bleached’s motto might be “Sisters just wanna have fun.” The L.A. four-piece orbits around Jennifer and Jessie Clavin, the two primary songwriters and sisters who specialize in exuberant garage-punk. After the dissolution of the Clavins’ previous band — the locally-beloved, yelpier Mika Miko — the pair took joyous refuge in writing sweet, revved-up three-chord songs together. Ride Your Heart comes down a bit from the wide-eyed, sugar rush-ed bubblegum punk of early singles, mixing in some slower tempos and minor-key melodies, but Bleached’s primary m.o. is still the simple, sunshine-y, chunky-chorded Ramones-esque jam.

Rilo Kiley, rkives: An odds-and-ends comp from Jenny Lewis & co. Says Patrick Rapa:

Mostly unreleased or barely released, these tracks span the band’s career to create a lovely and peculiar listening experience. The antsy, lo-fi demo of the Sennett-sung “Rest of My Life” from 2001′s Take Offs and Landings can’t be from the same planet as this clubby remix of the Lewis-sung “Dejalo” from 2007′s Under the Blacklight — and, hey, Too $hort just popped up for a verse about tapping asses, just in case you weren’t confused.

Milk Music, Cruise Your Illusion: The first proper LP from Olympia, Washington’s Milk Music. eMusic’s Ilya Zinger says:

On Cruise Your Illusion, the first proper full-length from Olympia, Washington’s Milk Music, the quartet wedges itself somewhere within the SST Records-Neil Young-Wipers universe, pitting sweat-stained, heavy hardcore punk against indelible melodies and endless sincerity. Since their early output, a 2009 demo cassette and a 12-inch in 2010, the band has turned their DIY determination into full-fledged ambition, and the songs on Cruise are as honest and spiritual as they are messy and loud.

 

Mudhoney, Vanishing Point: David Raposa argues that being eligible for AARP hasn’t done much to make Mudhoney soft. He says:

The so-over-it cynicism and exhaustion that’s been the group’s m.o. all these years is a much better look on them as distinguished gentlemen. Granted, it’s hard to imagine a younger Mark Arm taking the time to write a song about white wine. But the 96-second scorched-earth screed that is “Chardonnay” shows that no subject is safe from Mudhoney’s indomitable anger and ennui. There’s no rose-colored nostalgia trip happening here, though: As Mudhoney enters their 25th year, still wrestling with whatever crawled up their backside and died way back then, they’re arguably at the height of their powers.

The Besnard Lakes, Until In Excess, Imperceptible UFO: On their third LP, The Besnard Lakes perfect their blend of dreamy indie rock. Arye Dworken says:

On their fourth album, Until In Excess, Imperceptible UFO, they hit a new, blissful peak. Frontman Jace Lasek, bassist (and Lasek’s wife) Olga Goreas, along with drummer Kevin Laing and guitarist Richard White, once again ply their elongated, swooning harmonies, like The Beach Boys at half-speed, over majestic, glacially moving rock suites.

Tyler, The Creator, Wolf: The face of Odd Future takes a page from Eminem on his third LP. Says Nick Murray:

In the past, Tyler, the Creator has made it clear that his favorite album by Eminem, the man he once referred to as his atheist God, is Relapse, the dark, dense comeback record that preceded the chart-topping Recovery. Wolf, the producer/rapper/clothing designer/cockroach-munching troublemaker’s third full-length, inherits the Shady influence that marked its predecessors, but it also looks back past Relapse to earlier entries in the older rapper’s discography, The Marshall Mathers LP in particular.

A Hawk & A Hacksaw, You Have Already Gone To The Other World: A Hawk & A Hacksaw’s sixth release is loosely based on a score written to accompany Sergei Parajanov’s 1965 documentary film Shadows Of Forgotten Ancestors, and Luke Turner says it’s their finest work yet:

Over the past decade, the New Mexican duo of Jeremy Barnes and Heather Trost, aka A Hawk & A Hacksaw, have taken a fascinating journey through the music of Eastern Europe, the Balkans, Turkey and beyond. They also have a long-standing connection with cinema: Their first release was the soundtrack to a documentary about Slovenian thinker Slavoj Žižek. This album, their sixth, is loosely based on a score written to accompany Sergei Parajanov’s 1965 documentary film Shadows Of Forgotten Ancestors, about the Slavic Hutsul people in the Carpathian mountains that run through Central and Easter Europe. Clearly, there’s magic in those hills, and it’s richly mined here, as the pair put some fierce twists on the music of the Ukraine, Hungary and Romania.

Generationals, Heza: Jangly indie-rockers expand their sonic palette with their third LP. Ryan Reed says:

The New Orleans duo have completely expanded their sonic palette, branching into some fascinating new directions: “Say When,” with its tongue-tied percussion and sputtering sequenced synths, sounds like New Order on a beach vacation; “Put a Light On” is adult-contemporary funk, bolstered by electronic loops and digital handclaps; “Kemal” is the biggest head-scratcher (and maybe their best song ever) — a barrage of stabbing reggae guitar, sweaty hand drums, and twinkling glockenspiel.

Cold War Kids, Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: Cold War Kids make a bold move that puts emphasis on frontman Nathan Willett’s blaring, soulful voice. Ryan Reed says:

Lead single “Miracle Mile” is the most hard-hitting track they’ve ever penned, Willett warbling over a surge of bar-room piano and Matt Aveiro’s primal pound. It’s the sole moment of familiarity on an album of colorful new twists: The creeping “Lost that Easy” buzzes with electronic hi-hats and new-wave synth-bass; “Bottled Affection” marries hip-hop programming to drizzled guitar noise and a monster chorus falsetto; the closing “Bitter Poem” is a slow-building ballad, laced with melancholy keys and grizzled sax.

Merchandise, Totale Night – The incendiary Tampa trio Merchandise continue to push outward on their sound. Here, they deliver five sprawling, anthemic, passionate rockers over thirty-four epic minutes. Watch these guys: They are building towards a Statement, and if they’re not yet all the way “there,” they’ve hit upon something.

The Black Angels, Indigo Meadow – Blown smoke rings of psych-rock revival from The Black Angels’ latest. Killer guitar tones on this.

Burger Records! Burger Records! Burger Records! – One of our favorite labels. Just go and play here for awhile! Burger Records is one of the best purveyors of lo-fi home-taped indie-rock and indie-pop around these days. Just clicking around on random titles will give you joy, I promise; I just bopped in my seat to Garbo’s Daughter’s recorded-in-a-trash-can surf-pop ditties, the warped campfire-rock of Burnt Ones, and the thrillingly cruddy home-piercing punk of The Cosmonauts. You can also find CLASSIC jangle-pop from groups like Cleaners From Venus. Trust us on this one, guys; there is something for you here!

The Gates of Slumber, The Wretch – Balefully lumbering down-tuned stoner metal, heavy on riffs. Satisfying.

Martin Hall, Phasewide Exit Signs – The Danish singer/songwriter/composer/multi-instrumentalist/author’s latest batch of heady, forbiddingly beautiful art songs, on his own Panoptikon label. RIYL: Solo Nico, Scott Walker.

Fairport Convention, Live in 87 – As the title says, a live set from the legendary folk-rockers.

Gun Outfit, Hard Coming Down – This band has been around for awhile, wallowing sexily around in bad vibes and barely-tuned guitars. This is their strongest-sounding release yet, their dual male/female vocals and dirty guitars hitting a new groove.

Mad Season, Above (Deluxe Edition) – The one-album side project featuring members of Pearl Jam (Mike McCready), Screaming Trees (Barrett Martin), and, of course, Layne Staley of Alice in Chains. These guys weren’t exactly the highest artistic peak of grunge, but this is still an interesting moment in music history, and this is a definitive reissue of their project.

Anne Sofie Van Otter/Thomas Quasthoff, Schubert: Lieder With Orchestra -  Schuber lieder, sung with mellow late-afternoon-sun glory by Van Otter Quasthoff, two of the greatest lieder singers on the planet, backed by the Berlin Philharmonic. A-list stuff.

Olafur Arnalds, For Now I Am Winter – Lovely, subdued neoclassical miniatures.

Various Artists, The Music is You: A Tribute to John Denver – An indie-world tribute to good old John Denver, whose music could use to be rescued from its thick layer of accumulated cultural cheese. Here, J Mascis, Lucinda Williams, Josh Ritter, Edward Sharpe, and others pitch in with covers of their favorites.

The Baptist Generals, “Dog That Bit You” – Ornery Crazy Horse homage going on here, right down to pinched, hollering Neil Young-style vocal.

Guided By Voices, “Xeno Pariah” – New single from band that just won’t stop releasing music. It sounds like classic GBV, which you know by now is something you want in your life or not.

50 Cent, “We Up” - New track from 50 Cent, featuring Kendrick Lamar.

Any artist we ask to take over eMusic gets control over our editorial for that week: They assign interviews with artists they like and they handpick albums to run as Reviews of the Day that week. Past eMusic Takeovers have been conducted by Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Jens Lekman, Edwyn Collins, John Lydon and Bjork. We are thrilled to add Charles Bradley to that esteemed list.

We’re always on the lookout for artists to add to this roster. So we turn the question to you: Which artist would you most like to see take over eMusic in the future?

The Strokes, Comedown Machine – The former avatars of NYC-rock cool dig deeper into their synth gew-gaws and endearingly geeky starched-stiff Cars imitations. Who would have thought these guys would hang around long enough to feel like America’s answer to Sloan? Not me, that is for damn sure. Barry Walters had this to say:

The world — the indie rock one, at least — divides into two camps; those who believe the Strokes should stick to infinitesimal variations on Is This It, and those who’d rather have them do anything other than that. Comedown Machine has the goods to satisfy — and piss off — both camps, and that’s exactly as it should be. As suggested by the album’s pre-release tracks “All the Time” and “One Way Trigger,” the quintet’s fifth album is both classic Strokes and the furthest thing from it yet. “50/50″ offers a heavier variant on the distorted vocals and nervous guitars that drove the kids crazy on “Last Night,” while “Partners in Crime” borrows that song’s caffeinated Motown beat even if it sneaks in a crazed, nearly Van Halen-esque guitar solo at the end.

Wax Idols, Discipline and Desire – Dramatic, menacing post-punk exploring the darker side of devotion. Hether Fortune, the leading force behind the group Wax Idols, has one of the world’s most berserker-entertaining Twitter feeds, and in general seems to be a kind of impossibly charismatic person; on this record, some of that primal intellectual and physical heat translates directly into her music.

Wavves, Afraid of Heights – Nathan starts to gesture winsomely at entertaining the possibility of starting to consider the possible ramifications of maybe thinking about growing up. Eventually. Andrew Parks has the review:

The self-proclaimed “king of the beach” doesn’t relinquish his crown on Afraid of Heights, but he does seem in serious danger of losing his mind. Not that you’d notice immediately, what with the way Nathan Williams masks his melancholy with sunstroked hooks and hummable melodies. It’s when you listen to what he’s saying that dude’s dark side emerges. We’re not talking simple woe-is-me love songs, either. More like an unhealthy obsession with death and demons — personal and otherwise — coupled with bummertown references to just how hopeless the Wavves generation is

Kleenex Girl Wonder, Migration Scripts: If Kleenex Girl Wonder had put out Ponyoak like 5 years ago, they would have been adored, Best New Music-receiving indiepop darlings. It’s the perfect realization of a very particular aesthetic, nestling sugary hooks inside no-fi production. Unfortunately, KGW was way ahead of the curve, and released the album in 1999 instead. Let It Buffer should be their move to reclaim the grubby crown that’s theirs, but on this one they’ve cleaned up and are playing nice, writing polite power-pop that blows the dust from the corners but still focuses on catchy refrains.

Milk Carton Kids, The Ash & Clay – Softly quavering and sweet indie-folk. Jim Farber reviewed it for us, saying this:

You can’t get far into writing a review of The Milk Carton Kids without mentioning Simon & Garfunkel. (I managed to make it just 14 words). Like S&G, they’re an acoustic duo that sings pristine ballads in tightly entwined voices of velvet and lace. But so facile a comparison sells these “Kids” short: Kenneth Pettengale and Joey Ryan have delicate, distinctive timbres, and the lyrics on this California duo’s second studio CD aren’t nearly as effete as they first seem.

Georgiana Starlington, Paper Moon: Hip-Hip-Hooray for HoZac Records! Georgiana Starlington are Jack and Julie Hines from the K-Holes, but this doesn’t sound anything like the snarling, menacing music they cook up in that group. This is spooky and dusty and sinister — kinda maybe like the HoZac version of Neko Case? Some twang, some sway, some Mazzy Star-ish crooning and, like everything HoZac does, it’s Recommended.

Black Bug, Reflecting the Light: What’s that you say? You want more HoZac? FEAR NOT. This is another new one — it’s nastier that Georgiana, with a sort of primitive-industrial grind. Lots of synths and static, doomy, droney vocals and danse macabre rhythms for you to twitch and shake to.

Julian Lynch, Lines: Umpteenth new one from Julian Lynch, which sounds like a dis, but the music here is so lovely and engaging that it’s, in fact, a blessing. This is more rickety soundtracky type stuff; to call it art rock played on children’s instruments doesn’t really get at it. There’s some lovely, layered, helium-filled vocals, plinking nylon-stringed guitars, wheezing mellotrons… This is the kind of music you get lost inside.

Steve Coleman & Five Elements, Functional Arrhythmias – Jazz that draws funk and friction from the competing pulses in our bodies. Peter Margasak writes:

On his latest effort with his ever-shifting, adaptable Five Elements, veteran innovator and alto saxophonist Steve Coleman draws inspiration from overlapping rhythmic patterns found in the human body: nervous, respiratory, and circulatory systems. In the liner notes he credits the drummer Milford Graves, who’s devoted himself to studying those internal human rhythms, and Coleman’s latest batch of compositions were created by superimposing these various pulses on top of one another. Still, for most listeners digging all of the conceptual underpinnings isn’t necessary to enjoy the propulsive, funky sounds.

Kvelertak, Meir: Kvelertak are a Norweigian band who pull off a pretty unlikely hybrid, counteracting throat-shredding vocals with sweet-as-candy choruses for a final product that’s visceral and irresistible. It doesn’t seem like it should work, but man, does it ever. It’s like if Skeletonwitch had Andrew WK’s choruses or something. Kinda motorcycle rocky, but way more hardcore than that. Recommended

Dido, Girl Who Got Away – The former superstar gracefully retreats. Barry Walters writes:
As suggested by its title, Dido’s fourth album is almost entirely about escape — from bad relationships, the pressure of fame, back-stabbing business associates, even quotidian responsibilities. Like Madonna at her world-weariest, it’s the kind of album that only someone who experienced unexpected monumental popularity could make.

Papoose, The Nacirema Dream: This album was supposed to come out forever ago! When I first moved back to NYC 9 years ago, they were talking about it then. That’s when Papoose was supposed to save NY hip-hop. That didn’t really happen! So here’s The Nacirema Dream. Papoose has a tough flow vaguely reminiscent of Golden Age hip-hop, and the production mostly aims to replicate the same. I have a theory that I cannot prove and is based on no fact that says that this has been held up for so long that they lost the rights to the actual original production tracks so they had to replace them with facsimiles. Again, I have no facts to support that assertion. It’s just one of my weird theories.

CHVRCHES, Recover: First EP from one of the buzziest bands at SXSW. This is spooky electropop, with pouty, dramatic vocals and billowing sheets of electronics. Imagine a poppier version of The Knife, maybe, or a spookier Robyn and you’re on the right track. For those of you keeping track: this band is probably going to be a thing.

The Black Lillies, Runaway Freeway Blues: Splitting the difference between the old-timey music that’s been en vogue (for better and for worse) lately and contemporary country, Black Lillies kick up a rollicking ruckus, delivering stomping country built to move boots.

Little Green Cars, Absolute Zero: This is really lovely, sunny, guitar-based indie pop with a few moments of epic grandeur thrown in for good measure. Slightly timid vocals counteract any bravado that generally accompanies that.

Phosphorescent, Muchacho – One of the greatest records of the year.  Jayson Greene interviewed Matthew Houck for us, and Ashley Melzer wrote the review:

Two takes on the sun’s ascent bookend Muchacho with yogic serenity. They’re a primer to the fuzzy emotional place where Houck finds himself. His trademark warble starts out shrouded in soft electronic beats and yearning violins (“Song for Zula”). Then he plays to old strengths, letting lonesome lap steel cozy up to the piano and make room for a swells of horns (“Terror in the Canyons (The Wounded Master)”). There’s a hint of that old spiritual hunger, “so holy and wasted like a prayer in the wind” (“A New Anhedonia”). But even when our ragged guide is facing up to mistakes, the music meets him with tenderness (“Down to Go”).

Low, The Invisible Way –  The beloved, long-running trio’s latest is “their most sanguine in over a decade,” according to Sam Adams:

The measured tempos and fragile harmonies of the Duluth, Minnesota, trio Low — core couple Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker plus bassist Steve Garrington, who joined in 2008 — have often concealed turmoil beneath their placid surface. But their 10th album, The Invisible Way, is their most sanguine in more than a decade, less tempestuous than 2005′s The Great Destroyer and resolving the marital tensions of 2011′s C’mon. Decamping from their own recording studio for producer Jeff Tweedy’s digs, they’ve made an album that feels more suited to the inside of a church than those they’ve actually recorded in one.

Marnie Stern, The Chronicles of Marnia – The unconventionally brilliant/brilliantly unconventional indie-rock guitar virtuoso crafts the statement of her career. Our own J. Edward Keyes writes:

The first song on the fourth record from Marnie Stern is called “Year of the Glad” — a nod to Infinite Jest as well as a declaration of its theme — and crests with Stern yelling, “Everything’s starting now.” For a second it feels likeThe Chronicles of Marnia is going to be an album about rejuvenation — about letting go of the things that trouble you and kicking open the door of the dark house to let the sunshine pour in. And then the next song starts, and before long Stern is shouting, “The fear creeping in, and I am losing hope in my body.” So it goes throughout Chronicles, a breathtaking spiral of sound that fizzes and pops like a pinwheel of fireworks. It’s not only Stern’s best record, but one of the best of the year to date.

Justin Timberlake, The 20/20 Experience - Pop’s reigning do-no-wrong boy wonder returns from his long hiatus. Barry Walters writes:

“He’s so talented he can do anything!” That’s the gist of what’s typically said about Justin Timberlake, and for the most part it’s absolutely true. He’s an exceptionally nimble and unfettered singer/dancer, an extraordinary mimic with a drummer’s sense of timing. These gifts have helped him tremendously in comedy as well as drama, and despite the increasing maturity of his music and acting pursuits, he hasn’t let go of his ample boyish charm: This ex-Mouseketeer, ex-’N Sync-er still radiates mischievous yet all-American fun … These are the stats that have empowered Timberlake to make a supremely — and, at times, foolishly — confident 20/20 Experience.

 Anais Mitchell, Child Ballads – “One of today’s most creative and authentic rising songwriters,” as our own Laura Leebove calls her, returns with a collaboration with Jefferson Hamer to “interpret and modernize seven of the 305 English and Scottish ballads collected by Francis James Child in the late 1800s.” Leebove writes:

Their collection is short, sweet and intimate, with little more than acoustic guitars and vocals telling the tales of an ill-fated sailor, a quick-witted sister, and disapproving parents. (If you thought your in-laws were trouble, listen to “Willie of Winsbury” and “Willie’s Lady,” where you’ll meet a king who orders her daughter’s lover to be hanged, and a witch mother who casts a spell on her son’s pregnant wife.) Mitchell and Hamer have recorded accessible, American-folk renditions of these centuries-old songs, a fitting addition to the countless modern artists — among them Joan Baez, Nickel Creek, even Fleet Foxes — who have who have passed them on throughout the years.

Suede, Bloodsports: There is no way I’m ever calling this band “The London” Suede, so you can all go straight to hell right now. Suede are back! This one is more triumphant-sounding than they’ve been in the past — huge choruses and Brett Anderson’s fantastic, keening voice. I saw this band in the UK on one of their 2010 reunion shows and they were spectacular.

Conquering Animal Sound, On Floating Bodies: ALRIGHT!! Man, do I love this band. Their last record, Kammerspiel, was one of my favorite surprises. I didn’t even know a new record was on the way but, man, am I glad it’s here. This one sounds a little nastier than the last one — the vocals a bit sharper and tougher, the electronic production a bit more stammering and stuttery and arty — fewer soft curves, more sharp angles. I am excited to spend more time with this.

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Specter at the Feast: Former merchants of gloom return with a record of crisp, bright rock music. Most notable is their cover of The Call’s bright-eyed “Let the Day Begin”; Robert Levon Been is the son of Call frontman Michael Been, who passed away two years ago at a BRMC show.

Alice Smith, She: A pretty radical reinvention for Alice Smith. The onetime smoky, jazzy R&B singer gets glossier and poppier without sacrificing any of her trademark warmth and emotion. The result is a confident soul record with gilded edges.

  Simone Dinnerstein & Tift Merritt, Night – The singer/songwriter and beloved classical pianist come together on record  for an unlikely but fruitful collaboration. Peter Margasak writes:

 Self-taught Americana singer-songwriter Tift Merritt and Julliard-trained classical pianist Simone Dinnerstein would hardly seem likely collaborators, but the rapport and cross-hatching of styles they achieve on Night sure makes it seem like they were destined to work together. The album’s stark beauty and seamless flow owes part of its success to the decision of Merritt and Dinnerstein to keep the work modest in scale and free of conceptual baggage. There’s a feel to the collection that harkens back to the sheet music era, when folks entertained themselves in their parlor room and playing songs rather than listening to records or the radio. Together they make transitions between some of Merritt’s most translucent balladry: Billie Holiday’s “Don’t Explain,” Bach’s “Prelude in B minor” and Johnny Nash’s indelible “I Can See Clearly Now” seem not only effortless, but also logical.

 KEN Mode, Entrench – Brutal, sharp and zero-fat hardcore/noise rock from long-running Canadian trio. Jon Wiederhorn writes:

Over the past decade, Winnipeg, Canada’s KEN Mode — who took their name from Henry Rollins’s acronym for Kill Everyone Now (as detailed in his book Get in the Van) — have evolved from a bracing hardcore metal band into something more experimental and complex. The band’s fifth album, Entrench, is their most inventive yet, matching raw musical gristle and asymmetrical acrobatics with unexpected sonic flourishes, from the scribbling violins of the opening cut “Counter Culture Complex” to the undistorted arpeggios and pensive piano of the closer “Monomyth.”

Call of the Void, Dragged Down a Dead End Path: New, nasty, grindy stuff on Relapse. This Colorado group is adept at all the things that make grind great — the larynx-wrecking vocals, the avalanche of percussion, the oil-drill riffs. Perfect loud music for warm weather.

Dur-Dur Band, Vol. 5: Another home run from Awesome Tapes from Africa. This one is from Somalia’s Dur-Dur band, who land somewhere between highlife and what we’ve all come to (incorrectly!) term Afrobeat. There are popcorn rhythms and tangled-up guitars and beaming, jubilant vocals, and the whole damn thing is RECOMMENDED

And So I Watch You From Afar, All Hail Bright Futures: Irish art rock band return with another knotty, tumultuous effort. Complicated song structures, full-body rythms and plenty of prog-like lurch for those who like their music dense and tricky.

Batillus, Concrete Sustain – Doom metal with a groove. Jon Wiederhorn says:

The 2011 debut full-length from New York’s Batillus, Furnace was crushing, oppressive, bleak and morose, one of the top dark horse doom metal albums of the year. Not content to remain within those parameters, the band has undergone a facelift for its new album Concrete Sustain. In addition to an abundance of trudging, mid-paced riffs played on densely distorted guitar and bass, Batillus have built a framework of counterpoint rhythms that provide tension and contrast: Grinding, whirring industrial samples abound, as do textural washes of feedback that border on the post-rock nihilism of Neurosis.

Thalia Zedek  Band, Via – Zedek returns with another one of her signature knotty, pleasing, and distinctive solo records.

Colleen Green, Sock it To Me: I’m a pretty big Colleen Green fan, I have to admit. Her latest doesn’t stray too far from all of the things she does best: the Casio still sounds like it was nicked from a garage sale, the guitars are tinny and fizzy and her voice is soulful and searching. Her knack for sugary hooks is what pulls the whole project together — if you are charmed by rickety indiepop as much as I am, this one’s for you.

Inter Arma, Sky Burial: Thick, murky, ashen and doomy, this is the sound of the walls closing in and hell coming to claim its sons. It’s got plenty of long, hammering passages, but also incredible moments of beauty — acoustic guitars and moody synths — making for a fascinating record that grips from beginning to end.

Tomasz Stanko, Wislawa – Excellent new record from Polish jazz eminence. Peter Margasak writes:

The veteran Polish trumpeter Tomasz Stanko has long been a reliable and rewarding source for jazz of smoldering intensity. He’s a deeply lyrical, probing player whose investment in free jazz is real, but he’s consistently couched his most “out” explorations in a brooding elegance. Over the last decade or so he’s made a series of gorgeously meditative and quietly scalding albums for ECM with rhythm sections half his age. While he continues to keep a residence in Warsaw, for the last five years he’s also kept an apartment in New York, fostering relationships with younger American players. The magnificent double album Wislawa is the first fruit of those new collaborations.

That program gave me a frame in which to place the avant-garde weirdness of the ’60s and ’70s: It had all begun 150 years earlier with Beethoven, that rude churl of Hapsburg Vienna, whose urgent dissonances and angry rhythms could still rattle the establishment. The fact that the apparatus of concert music — the purpose-built halls, the genius-worship, the cult of quiet listeners — was created to honor his music made Beethoven’s ferocity all the more vital. Long after he had died and been deified, he was still throwing the moneylenders out of the temple.

It took me a while to understand that the composers who dominated musical life when I was growing up spent a lot of time trying to wriggle free of Beethoven. Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen, György Ligeti, Jacob Druckman — these erudite revolutionaries wanted nothing to do with the massed melodic panting of an orchestra, or the triumph of a heroic theme. Theirs was music of fragmentation, of society’s doubts laid bare and left unreconciled. Composers have always been torn between convention and radicalism, but this generation felt the tension more desperately than most. The symphony orchestra was an especially fearsome bugaboo. The Vietnam War and the student strikes that spread all over Europe in 1968 had made it perfectly clear: Institutions were suspect and ranks of identically dressed men moving in lockstep constituted a form of oppression, even if they wielded violin bows rather than riot clubs.

It wasn’t just the orchestra that seemed antique; so did the old tools and genres. How could you write for violin in the nuclear age, or blow an oboe after the Holocaust? How could anyone just pen a tune? This kind of thinking could have led to a period of musical nihilism, a highbrow form of punk. Instead, composers dismantled the very tradition that had produced them, then got to work on the fascinating pile of springs and bits of wire. Rather than abandoning the previous century’s instruments, Luciano Berio methodically picked apart their techniques in a multi-year series of solos he called Sequenze. By the time he was done with an oboe, it sounded like a completely different creature. In the third “Sequenza,” he reassembled human song into a psychotic soliloquy of toneless consonants, phonemes, squeaks, giggles, pitches and assorted other forms of expression.

In the ’60s and ’70s, composers found themselves mirroring the period’s violent extremes. They exploded traditional genres, reinvented rules from scratch, rejected the orchestra or amped it up with electronics. Many were entranced by the challenge of wringing maximum complexity out of minimal means. Stockhausen was fired by the trancelike experiences he’d had in Mexico. “I’d spent a month walking through the ruins, visiting Oaxaca, Merida, and Chichenitza, and becoming a Maya, a Toltec, a Zatopec, an Aztec or a Spaniard — I became the people,” he recalled. He recreated that exaltation in Stimmung, for six amplified singers who pass around the five notes of a B flat ninth chord for more than an hour, producing an effect like shimmering heat.

But the orchestra wasn’t dead yet. In his 1961 Atmosphères, György Ligeti had a symphonic ensemble pour out a churning bath of sound, a sound so infinite, weightless and dark that Stanley Kubrick used it to give his 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey its apocalyptic mood. Ligeti had scraped away virtually all the traditional ingredients of music — just try to find a pulse, a key, or a tune in that! — and was left with a great sonic mural. That search for tone-pictures, for great glowing landscapes of sonority, replaced habitual kinds of beauty. This naturally unsettled audiences.

The traditional concerto, too, refused to be killed off, partly because the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich strong-armed every composer he admired into writing him one. Henri Dutilleux complied with Tout un monde lointain.The title (meaning “a whole distant world”) refers to a poem by Charles Baudelaire, in which a woman’s “black ocean” of hair evokes a geyser of exotic fantasies. The score, too, moves from languor to heat. It’s a Technicolor work, amplifying the subtle orchestral hues that Dutilleux learned from Ravel and Debusssy into an ever-changing polychrome vista.

Rostropovich also tapped Witold Lutoslawski, who took the opportunity to rewrite the roles that a soloist and orchestra play. His concerto (from 1970) opens with a single note on the cello, repeated slowly, an irritating number of times. Think of it: All those people sitting there on stage, representing a long tradition of complexity and drama, and what does the virtuoso do? Play a beginner’s exercise. The ordinariness doesn’t last, of course. The cello begins to argue with itself, sigh, mutter, and return to its fixed idea, while the orchestra stands by, as if the planet had stopped spinning, waiting for the conclusion of a single meandering thought. The world finally arrives in the form of a single trumpet blast, and then it’s the orchestra that goes giddily berserk while the cello keeps plodding along on the same damn note. What follows is a series of bleakly colorful episodes, crafted bursts of insanity: the cello emoting soulfully while percussionists tap madly in another part of the stage; angry fusillades of brass, the black-on-midnight-blue nocturne of a low cello against a growl of strings. Like Beethoven before him, Lutoslawski understood that the old established order didn’t need to be destroyed for a revolution to occur.

Now, with the release of Robert Randolph Presents The Slide Brothers, co-produced by Randolph and John McDermott and featuring steel players Calvin Cooke, Aubrey Ghent and Chuck and Darick Campbell, the style gets its best shot yet at a wider audience. The album’s made up mostly of pop and rock songs with a spiritual bent (George Harrison’s “My Sweet Lord”) and spirituals with established crossover appeal (“Wade in the Water”), but also includes secular tunes (The Allman Brothers’ “Don’t Keep Me Wonderin’”). The musicians — unfortunately, not a single track features all five — show off their funk, blues, country, rock, pop and jazz licks while staying true to their faith. “It’s always sorta been my vision to get everybody together and do this the right way, in a good studio, using songs non-church people could relate to,” Randolph says.

There’s a price for taking their music outside the House of God. After that first wave of Arhoolie albums, the Campbells began playing occasional festivals and venues (like coffeehouses) where alcohol wasn’t served. Although they still performed only religious material, they were banned from playing in the church. Randolph left the church by hitting the road to play his secular material, and never tried to return; Cooke, the patriarch of current musicians after playing services for 57 years, was dismissed for touring with Randolph. Ghent likewise was banished from his Florida church after doing sacred material at secular gigs, but was taken in at a Nashville House of God; because he’s now its pastor, he participates here only on songs that have a spiritual grounding. Most of them still worship in the House of God; they just don’t play services anymore, and they’re okay with the tradeout. “I enjoy exploring my music more,” Cooke explains. “I wanted to venture out.”

This music differs from their church music in more than one way. In 1999, I joined Ghent one Sunday at his church in Fort Pierce, Florida. He played nonstop through the entire service — improvising behind the pastor as she built her sermon to a climax, at which point she’d ease off as he either burned his improv to a crescendo or broke into a recognizable song the congregation began singing; then he laid back and she retook control. They passed the lead back and forth between music and preaching, amping it up and then softening it, congregation members speaking in tongues or shaking and writhing in the pews and aisles, for about three straight hours. Ghent played lines that emulated the tones and cadences of the preacher’s voice with a seemingly calm intensity that left his face and suit soaked in sweat. Even the best sacred steel albums, great as several of them are, can’t duplicate that — and similarly, The Slide Brothers can’t match those CDs.

In short, it’s likely to disappoint those who’ve heard any of the sacred albums. “Basically,” Ghent admits, “Here we simply play the songs. In church it’s different: We’re helping the preacher.” Still, there’s much here to love, especially if you’ve never heard any sacred steel. That’s apparent from the opening track, the Allmans’ “Don’t Keep Me Wonderin’,” with Chuck Campbell’s sharp, knifing pedal steel and Darick’s fat lap steel swirling out sheets of sound while bro Phil lays down jagged funk and rock lines on guitar. Factor in Cooke’s equally driving vocals and the fiery outro jam and it’s a thrilling cut by any standards. Fronted by different guest vocalists, the Campbells likewise recast “My Sweet Lord,” Fatboy Slim’s “Praise You” and the churning, traditional “Motherless Children,” while starting their instrumental “Wade in the Water” with shimmers and ending it with screams. Cooke brings deep, urgent empathy with both voice and lap steel to his revivals of slide guitar blues king Elmore James’s “The Sky Is Crying” and “It Hurts Me Too,” effectively obliterating distinctions between blues and gospel, and also contributes his original, secular/sacred “Help Me Make It Through.” Ghent, who I hadn’t remembered as much of a singer, proves me wrong on Mylon Lefevre’s “Sunday School Blues” and concludes the album with a bit of levity on “No Cheap Seats in Heaven.”

All five steel men are adamant that despite House of God’s rigorous insularity, the sound has a strong future both inside and outside the church. Cooke notes that there are more teenagers within the HoG taking up the instrument than ever before, while Randolph adds that Jack White, Kid Rock, Luther Dickinson and current and former Black Crowes Chris Robinson and Jeff Cease are now playing gospel-based lap steel styles; Chuck Campbell has a Finnish student. “It’s an ongoing thing that everyone wants to do, now that they’re getting to understand the story behind the music,” Randolph insists. I just hope they do it right.

His every note bears a hand-stamp of tone and bend, Marshall amps shuddering to keep up with his sonic overload. Snapshots of work-in-progress are mingled with the sheer joy of playing. Despite the fact that Hendrix owns the spotlight, the hook of the album is collaboration — his readying to take a step into his next music, the one that we can only tantalizingly hear in these tracks. The sounds he would have made for the next 40 years, and then some.

He entwines easily with his rhythm section, whether it be the straightforward and propulsive Buddy Miles, whose mighty whack on the snare goes with his insistent right foot; or Mitch Mitchell, always the most airy and spatial of drummers, skittering around the kit. Hendrix mostly relies on his old army buddy Billy Cox to underpin the bass, when he’s not assuming the low frequencies himself. Others who drop by are Steven Stills, saxophonist Lonnie Youngblood and members of assemblages that he is exploring new textures with, especially his percussive Woodstock “band,” Gypsy Sun and Rainbows. The level of commitment in the studio is high, and no matter whom he’s interacting with, Jimi doesn’t change so much as usher the chosen players into his spatial universe.

Some of it is remarkably straightforward, caught before the afterthoughts of overdubbing. “Earth Blues,” which leads off the album, can be heard in more fleshed-out form on Rainbow Bridge, with Mitch Mitchell replacing Miles on drums, but I prefer this no-frills alternate take where the psychic interplay between the Band of Gypsies can be felt as they prepare for their Fillmore East New Year’s Eve extravaganza. The trio had been recording since the previous May (1969), and two blues-drenched cuts — “Hear My Train A-Coming” and Elmore James’s “Bleeding Heart” — show Jimi’s vision of what might be done with blues’ traditional formalisms. As always, the focus is on his truly inspired guitar playing, and his solos range free, filled with quick-draw tangents and asides, losing themselves in the passion of the moment.

Sometimes the seams show. “Let Me Move You” is a showcase for Lonnie Youngblood, but the results are somewhat perfunctory, especially given what someone like Sly Stone was doing with the concept of funkification. Hendrix, however, plays through with rhythmic confidence and grits-and-cheese chop-chording. “Izabella,” with the Gypsy Sun ensemble, is more assured, a stepping-stone to the Band of Gypsys version that would be captured a year later. “Crash Landing,” another early idea-in-the-making (later to provide the dominant riff of “Freedom,”) was previously heard only in a severely post-overdubbed version; but here, with original instrumentalists Rocky Isaac (of the Cherry People) on drums, an unknown organist, and the ever-reliable and underrated Cox on bass, comes as close as any of Hendrix’s compositions to crossing the funkadelic line. The well-developed “Inside Out” — with Jimi’s guitar lines doubled and himself on bass — is an instrumental overlaid with the whirligig sound of a Leslie speaker in full rotation. Add the contemplative “Villanova Junction Blues” for Hendrix at his most serene, and, yes, People, Hell and Angels is a listenable and fascinating tour of Jimi’s thought processes in the last years of his life.

There will always be debate on how these tracks would have been finalized had Hendrix lived, and the worthiness of what, in the end, were takes that were discarded for one reason or another, or posthumously embellished. But as the years recede, even Hendrix’s toss-aways take on added significance, and in truth, sometimes more polished productions are not as revealing of his magic as these moments when he is at his most vulnerable, stepping out from his persona into his great unknown, to see what might be revealed.

David Bowie, The Next Day — The return! Barry Walters, who wrote the review for us, seems to have right measure on this one:

As confirmed by “The Stars (Are Out Tonight),” the album’s second single, Bowie hasn’t entirely abandoned his post-heyday habit of leaving his vocal melodies frustratingly underdeveloped. Sometimes when the groove is tight and he pours on the vocal razzle-dazzle, that matters little: The opening title track comes on like gangbusters and — befitting the album’s self-reflexive and iconoclastic artwork — recalls Heroes‘ kick-starter “Beauty and the Beast. “The Next Day ultimately proves itself too musically self-referential to be groundbreaking, but it does capitalize better than the singer has in decades on his own assets: This is Bowie doing Bowie.

Devendra Banhart, Mala — Banhart’s latest finds him musing on the peculiarities of love in his own inimitable way. Dan Hyman writes:

Emerging in the early-aughts as the focal point of the then-burgeoning freak-folk movement, the Texas-born Venezuelan fought restriction with each successive album: Meander alongside him, he offered, down patchouli-scented paths strewn with jazzy asides, sitar-slathered daydreams, acoustic-flecked British folk and Brazilian Tropicália. Mala, Banhart’s seventh album and first for Nonesuch, is, on the surface, no less diverse than its predecessors. Throughout, Banhart sizes up his favorite topic — love’s cruel ways — often in less time than it takes to create an online dating profile.

Carmen Villain, Sleeper — The debut recording by a former model, Carmen Hillestadt, who makes darkly evocative, Sonic Youth-inspired post-punk. Dan Hyman writes:

A former cover model, Carmen Villain’s longtime gig was to effortlessly exude beauty. Things haven’t changed too much: Now a musician, on her remarkably engaging, dark and oftentimes abrasive debut album, Sleeper, the singer and multi-instrumentalist simply expresses her loveliness in a more nuanced shade. Heavy on reverb and made for headphones, the decidedly lo-fi album, its tracks washing up onto another, calls to mind Sonic Youth and Royal Trux.

Adrian Younge Presents the Delfonics — A loving tribute to one of the greatest Philly soul groups of all time. Nate Patrin writes:

The original Delfonics lineup split up decades ago, but their legacy has lingered. The hip-hop generation saw to that, using Thom Bell’s velvety arrangements and the achingly sweet falsetto of lead singer William Hart to striking effect. Enter Adrian Younge, the Black Dynamite soundtrack mastermind who’s also collaborated with avowed Delfonics fanatic Ghostface Killah (Pretty Toney highlight “Holla” famously paid homage to “La-La – Means I Love You”). Adrian Younge Presents the Delfonics is an unusual type of throwback: Younge’s muddy, lo-fi atmospherics recall low-budget early ’70s local-label 45s more than they do Bell’s vintage lushness.

Various Artists, Sound City: Real To Reel — To hear Ken Micallef tell it, this all-star tribute to a famous L.A. sound studio, masterminded by Dave Grohl, is the best kind of rock-star vanity project:

Writing and performing alongside Paul McCartney, Stevie Nicks, Rick Springfield, Trent Reznor, Josh Homme, Rick Nielsen, Lee Ving of Fear, Corey Taylor, Brad Wilk and Tim Commerford of Rage Against The Machine, and the Foos, Dave Grohl’s Real to Reel is a nostalgic tribute to L.A.’s closed Sound City studio, the birthplace to Rumours, Damn the Torpedoes, Rage Against The Machine and Nevermind. Sound City – Real to Reel is high on energetic hits, worthwhile rock-star vanity pieces, and one extremely nasty miss. The album was recorded on Sound City’s original analog Neve console, now safely ensconced in Grohl’s 606 recording studio.

Nadia Sirota, Baroque — The violist and leading force in NYC contemporary classical’s second album. Seth Colter-Walls writes:

Nadia Sirota is the violist of choice for the New York contemporary-classical scene, and on Baroque, she follows up here her astoundingly assured debut, First Things First, with fresh works from many of the composers who contributed to that recording.But there are new composers this time as well, even if they are generally familiar to the New Amsterdam coterie. Shara Worden’s “From the Invisible to the Visible” is a brief, attractive offering that introduces keyboards and organs into the mix to considered effect. While more tricked-out electronically than Sirota’s first offering, Baroque retains her aesthetic imprint.

Brandt Brauer Frick, Miami — a new one from this classical-electro trio. Says Ben Beaumont-Thomas:

Classical music and club culture aren’t easy bedfellows, which is one reason why Brandt Bauer Frick are such an intriguing proposition. The Berlin trio plays minimalist techno on classical instruments: Their 2011 album Mr Machine was a clubbing soundtrack re-imagined by a 10-piece orchestra. Miami is another album of groove-led chamber music, although this time, it has a more supple, spontaneous feel, enhanced with guest vocalists.

The Virgins, Strike Gently — sophomore release from the New York quartet.

The Mary Onettes, Hit the Waves — dreamy, summer-ready indiepop from Sweden.

Wild Belle, Isles — the soulful, genre-hopping debut from the buzzy brother-sister duo Wild Belle.

The Men, New Moon – Brooklyn’s most dynamic young rock band of the moment returns with its third expectations-raising/confounding record in as many years. Austin L. Ray writes:

Each of the last three years has produced a new album from Brooklyn’s The Men, and each of those albums has only increased the cultish glow of adoration for the fervent rock band, which has proven itself both capable and uncompromising. Like the subjects of Michael Azerrad’s ’80s-underground bible, Our Band Could Be Your Life — a book The Men would’ve been featured in had they been making music 30 years ago — this is a band that believes in the saving grace of a sweaty, anthemic rock song … New Moon is exciting transition, an anticipatory vision of how we’ll describe whatever’s next.

Waxahatchee, Cerulean Salt – This record. We are in love. A record that could have come out in 2003 on Saddle Creek and changed my life. Here’s Carrie Battan with more:

American Weekend, Katie Crutchfield first under the name Waxahatchee, felt like a whispered sacred document of youthful discontent and loneliness, the kind you could curl up and live inside for days. On the follow-up, Cerulean Salt, Crutchfield has plugged in the amplifiers and slightly glossed up the production. That might initially disappoint American Weekend fans, but the decision not to attempt to reproduce the holy rawness of her debut ultimately serves Crutchfield well. Her subtle gut-punches translate just as powerfully once the volume’s been dialed up.

Youth Lagoon, Wondrous Bughouse – Trevor Powers’ second full-length as Youth Lagoon expands outward from the internal Year of Hibernation to explore the big, bad, beautiful outside world. Shades of Sparklehorse, Mercury Rev, the Flaming Lips and Built to Spill abound in this colorful and textured guitar-rock suite. Ryan Reed says:

If The Year of Hiberation, Trevor Powers’s debut album under the name Youth Lagoon, felt like riding a slow-moving, psychedelic county-fair carousel, then his sophomore effort, Wondrous Bughouse, is like being strapped into the spinning teacups at Disney World while on psychotropic drugs. This woozy, slightly out-of-focus aesthetic is a sharp U-turn, arriving after the pixie-dust electro-pop of Hibernation — it’s as if Powers grew disinterested in idyllic prettiness and purposely decided to uglify and intensify his trademark sound.

The Replacements, Songs for Slim: A benefit EP for former Replacements guitarist Slim Dunlop, who was hospitalized for a massive brain stroke last month, Songs for Slim reunites Paul Westerberg and Tommy Stinson under the Replacements name. The results are loose and kinda bar-rocky, perfectly unpolished and surprisingly toothy.

Rhye, Woman­ – Quietly gorgeous, Sade-influenced chamber pop. Our own Jayson Greene wrote the review on this one, and here’s a sample:

You will discern the primary influence behind Rhye roughly 0.00002 seconds after singer/producer Mike Milosh opens his mouth: in his creamy, untroubled contralto, edged with lingering hurt, you will hear Sade materialize in front of you. Like Sade, Rhye seeks higher energies in the intermingling of the masculine and feminine. The full-length debut, tellingly titled Woman, it follows through on the fusion proposed by those early songs – chamber pop and Lovers Rock, poised with their mouths inches apart, whispering.

Olof Arnalds, Sudden Elevation –Our favorite Icelandic folk singer’s first English-language album. This is as light and pretty as we’ve come to expect from Olof, her voice curling around the notes like smoke from an incense stick. RECOMMENDED

Jimi Hendrix, People, Hell, & Angels - eMusic’s own Lenny Kaye wrote a beautiful, elegiac piece about the latest to be unearthed from the Jimi vault. It will be up and live a little bit later today, but here is a taste:

Out of a foreshortened lifeline and a relatively small body of work, it seems there is no end to the many miracles wrought by Jimi Hendrix to feed our insatiable hunger to hear every lick he played. For someone who did his fair share of burning the candle at both ends, as well as in the middle, he never lost sight of his work ethic and fascination with music’s byways — ceaselessly experimenting, recording and jamming with his peers. The level of commitment in the studio is high, and really, no matter whom he’s interacting with, Jimi doesn’t change so much as usher the chosen players into his spatial universe.

Josh Ritter, The Beast in Its Tracks – A wry, rueful divorce record from the country-folk singer Josh Ritter. Annie Zaleski writes:

In the artist notes for The Beast In Its Tracks, Josh Ritter wastes no time establishing the premise of his sixth album: “My marriage ended on November 1, 2010. It was a cold, blustery morning in Calgary, Alberta, and I was on tour. I hung up the phone and looked around me.” But while the impact of his divorce certainly hovers over The Beast In Its Tracks — the longing and regret coursing through the whispery acoustic opener “Third Arm” is breathtaking — the record smartly frames the breakup through the lens of optimism, not bitterness.

Caitlin Rose, The Stand-In – Confident, powerful pop-country voice comes into her own. Here’s Stephen Deusner with more:

Given her avowed love of old Hollywood glamour (just check out that album cover), the title of Caitlin Rose’s sophomore full-length likely refers to the 1937 backlot comedy The Stand-In, about a love triangle between the title character, a hapless number cruncher and a hopeless film producer. While Rose does write about similar romantic confusions, the film reference nevertheless comes across as false modesty: On these dozen songs, she emerges as a confident, distinctive pop-country artist with a biting lyrical style and a smart way with a hook. Perhaps A Star Is Born sounded too cocky?

Young Dreams, Between Places – Yearning, dramatic, fresh-faced indie rock, somewhere between Fleet Foxes and Vampire Weekend. Laura Studarus writes:

On their debut Between Places, the Norwegian collective Young Dreams rounds out a subgenre in your music collection you didn’t even know existed: well-adjusted coming-of-age anthems. As evidenced by the driving album opener “Footprints,” Young Dreams isn’t lacking for scrappy enthusiasm, and Between Placesbrims with youthful vigor and energy. Like Vampire Weekend of Fleet Foxes, they work in a light, retro-pop style that came to prominence that came to prominence years before they were born, updating it with lyrical signifiers of modern life: cell phone chargers, drinking games, and the otherworldly quality of summer vacation.

How To Destroy Angels, welcome oblivion – First full-length from new Trent Reznor project. Jon Wiederhorn says:

Welcome oblivion, the first full-length album with Trent Reznor’s new band How to Destroy Angels, is both totally familiar and unlike anything Reznor has ever done. It’s dark, brooding and filled with angst, but the anger that drives Nine Inch Nails is mostly absent, replaced with a sense of urgent desperation, as if Reznor knows time is passing and he wants to explore new, challenging sonic avenues, much like his idol David Bowie.

Rotting Christ, Kata Ton Aaimona Eaytoy – Athens, Greece-based black metal outfit continue to push hard at their chosen genre’s boundaries. Jon Wiederhorn writes:

After 25 years together, many metal bands settle into a comfort zone and stick with a sound they’ve developed over the decades. Not Athens, Greece’s Rotting Christ, who continue to discover new approaches to sonic blasphemy. The band’s 11th full-length, Kata Ton Daimona Eaytoy (which translates to the Aleister Crowley motto “Do what thou wilt”), takes its title seriously, not just from a lyrical perspective but also from a creative standpoint … A natural evolution from the band’s last two releases, 2007′s Theogonia and 2010′s Aealo, Kata Ton Daimona Eaytoy should be a welcome addition to the collections of those that have enjoyed listening to the band develop over the past half-decade.

Autechre, Exai – The electronic act, entering its third decade, continues to find way to blow synapses. Andy Battaglia wrote the review:

One way for a long-running electronic-music act to ensure their listeners stay freaked out and confounded — two emotional qualities that have been Autechre’s specialties since their dawning IDM days — is to release a double-album that clocks in at a little over two hours. Melodies snake and swerve through almost every track, taking their time to develop and resolve, when they resolve at all. And the beats — well, they bristle, bray, lean back, zoom forward, break up, and beam out toward the outer edges of the cosmos, where music so serious and austere might provide a suitable soundtrack.

Stubborn Heart, Stubborn Heart – Today is the US release of this indie Brit-pop/soul hybrid, about which Barry Walters writes:

One could be forgiven for at first believing there’s little about Stubborn Heart that sets this pair apart from their London EDM contemporaries. There are aching vocals from Luca Santucci, electronic backings from Ben Fitzgerald, and a sleek noir sensibility shared with James Blake, Jessie Ware and the xx. Eschewing sunlight, the duo favors shadows no longer radical. Their distinction is a frisson that aligns them with a highly specific offshoot of ’80s Brit-soul — the smooth-but-tortured AOR of the Blue Nile, Black and Danny Wilson.

Son Volt, Honky Tonk – The latest from Jay Farrar continues down his well-traveled road. Richard Gehr writes:

“There’s a reckless side of tradition, a push of the tide having its way,” sings Jay Farrar above a guitar, harmonica and accordion wailing plaintively in the background of “Livin’ On,” the centerpiece of Son Volt’s ambivalent seventh album. Farrar’s sense of tradition is hardly reckless as he celebrates both the wild and down sides of honky-tonk life — and its resident angels — through alternating midtempo waltzes and shuffles played by a stately country sextet.

Kate Nash, Girl Talk – In which Kate Nash gets impressively, spitting mad. Annie Zaleski writes:

When British singer-songwriter Kate Nash said that Girl Talk consists of her “blood, sweat, emotional puke and tears,” she wasn’t just being dramatic. Her third full-length is a messy chronicle of post-breakup grief that veers between relief (“Fri-end?”), soul-searching (“Conventional Girl”), wistfulness (“Are You There Sweetheart?”), sadness (“Lullaby For An Insomniac,” “O My God”) and anger (“All Talk”). Appropriately, Girl Talk‘s music is also all over the place; styles covered include wobbly, girl group-inspired indie-pop, brash punk, stormy post-punk, grimy new wave, sparkling Britpop and vulnerable acoustic pop.

Helado Negro, Invisible Life – Bewitching, endearing multiculti pop. Richard Gehr writes:

According to Invisible Life‘s credits, Helado Negro, the stage name of Ecuador-born Roberto Lange, “played the computer synthesizer to make this music.” That sounds about right. Invisible Life may be the most coherent of Helado Negro’s three albums of electronics con vocals, but it still has a distant, abstract quality to it even though it features, for the first time, four English-language tracks.

Daniel Amos, Kalhoun, BibleLand and Songs of the Heart: A trio of ’90s albums from this underrated California alt-rock band. Of the three, Kalhoun is not only the strongest, but arguably one of the best of the band’s career, a collection of finely-wrought rock with razor-sharp lyrics that are, by turns, scathingly satirical and startlingly sensitive. It’s start-to-finish perfect. The rest are a mixed bag: BibleLand was the group’s response to grunge that was polarizing when it came out (I was always a defender). Songs of the Heart was a well-intentioned misfire.

Jamaican Queens, Wormfood: Coy little band from Detroit proffers buzzy, nerdy indie rock with yelping vocals, sputtering drum machines and electronic crackle and fog.

Lady, Lady: Lady is a duo comprised of Terri Walker from London and Nicole Wray from Atlanta, but their combined effort recalls the slinky, high-gloss R&B of the late ’70s. There are big, bright horn charts, limber grooves and assured vocals. They’re balanced right on the precipice where R&B started to give way to funk; there’s been a deluge of retro-soul lately, but by shifting their reference point up a decade or so, Lady manage to give some shine to a part of soul history that has been heretofore ignored.

The Cave Singers, Naomi – The raw, intimate backwoods rock of The Cave Singers grows a little bigger. Ryan Reed writes:

On their sprawling fourth studio album Naomi, Seattle’s Cave Singers continue to expand their brand of rootsy, psychedelic rock. Now officially a quartet (with the addition of former Blood Brothers bassist Morgan Henderson), they sound more like a legitimate “band” than ever before: Henderson brings a funky virtuoso edge to these groove-heavy anthems, punching up the high-octane soul of “Early Moon” and anchoring the jittery, two-chord pulse of “Have to Pretend” with deep-pocket propulsion.

SUUNS, S/T – Grooving, hypnotic, Clinic-style rock.

Things May Come And Things May Go But The Art School Dance Goes On Forever. So runs the title of a 1970 album by prog-rockers Pete Brown & Piblokto!, a title that I referenced for my third solo album. Trouble was, my own art-school dance was coshed with an early curfew. Off My Rocker At The Art School Bop was originally released in November 2006, but by early 2007 was pretty much unavailable, due to the ebbs and flows of the industry (the distributor went bust, if you must know), thus depriving future generations of the chance to meditate on its merits, or otherwise. But, friends, dry your eyes, for the wise people at Fantastic Plastic Records have made this essential bit of glam clatter available again, and the re-release gives me the chance to reflect on the all-too-brief life of this album.

Off My Rocker was not exactly conceived within earshot of the trumpet fanfare of confidence. In 2004, I was writing a musical for the National Theatre, and the songs that make up Off My Rocker were probably written as some sort of antidote to being prodded and interfered with (in the creative sense) by the Lance Corporals of the NT. (All this is recounted in my second book, Post Everything — Outsider Rock and Roll. If you like sledgehammer sarcasm being dumped on the hapless heads of arts administrators, this is the book for you.)

The original idea was that Off My Rocker should be a non-conceptual album, with a garage-band feel. My initial thought was to record with Steve Albini again, the only drawback being that I didn’t have a band, garage or otherwise, and the last time I had recorded with Steve, I did have a band. So I abandoned Plan Albini, and went with Plan Haines.

I bashed out all the instruments myself, bar a bit of cello. Half the album was recorded over Easter weekend 2004, and the other half was recorded almost a year later. The album was finished, a few labels were interested, a deal was done and a plan was concocted to release it early in 2006. But as the old saying goes, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.” When it became clear that the label were not going to be paying me the agreed advance, I extricated the album from the floppy halfwits, and went looking for a new record label.

Off My Rocker was finally released by the tiny imprint Degenerate Music in late 2006. It had been a while since I’d had an album out, enough time to be forgotten, but not long enough away to be welcomed back with enthusiasm. I wasn’t that surprised, as I stood in WHSmith reading Mojo and Uncut (carefully hidden inside a copy of Asian Babes to cover my shame) to be greeted with postage stamp-sized, half-assed three-star reviews. Possibly because there was a song called “The Heritage Rock Revolution” mocking the monthly rock mags and their mouldy old prose. It wasn’t until The Guardian gave the album a great big review that anyone noticed that it was pretty good. But by then you couldn’t buy it.

If there is a theme (not a concept) to Off My Rocker it is folk devils. All the English devils. The idea of the folk devil crops up first in ‘Leeds United’, a song I wrote after reading Gordon Burns’s book about the Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe, Somebody’s Husband, Somebody’s Son. “The devil came to Yorkshire in the Silver Jubilee…” There are folk devils in the track “The Walton Hop” [about the teenage disco in Surrey frequented by convicted sex offenders including Jonathan King], and there’s a really nasty one in “Bad Reputation (The Glitter Band).” Prescient? Nah. That’s the thing about folk devils, just when you’ve convinced yourself that there’s nothing there…Boo! Up jumps the devil.

The title track of the album was the last to be recorded, and it was almost an afterthought. In my cocoon of the National Theatre throughout 2003-04, I hadn’t paid much attention to what was going on in the rock ‘n’ roll world, and was only dimly aware that there was a new wave of art school-aping apes on the rise. If “Going Off My Rocker at the Art School Bop” has got anything to say, it’s that there’s a difference between being arty and being artistic. For fun, I re-recorded the song with my pal Richard X, not because I wanted a hit, but because as much as I admired Richard’s work with Liberty X and Rachel Stevens (and I do), I wanted his sound on a song that referenced both the Vorticist Blast manifesto and László Moholy-Nagy.

I took off around the country to promote OMRATASB, mainly as a favor to Degenerate Music. The tour was a drag and by the end I’d had enough. I had been approached by a few publishers who suggested I could turn my hand to writing a book. So that’s what I did: In early 2007 I knuckled under and started writing Bad Vibes. I recorded a few more tracks for the Leeds United EP, all of which would have sounded good on Off My Rocker, but in my mind, that was me done. It wasn’t, although I didn’t really write any more songs until early 2009 for what would become my album, 21st Century Man album. Things may come and things may go but the art school dance really does goes on forever.

So while Anxiety features more than its fair share of Timbaland-vis-Timberlake tropes and unironic Top 40 nods, the shuffle and sheen of the singer/producer’s muscular studio mix can’t hide the confessionals that are exorcised across 10 mildly creepy tracks. It’s as if we were all invited to Ashin’s American Idol audition, only to watch in horror as he writhes around the floor to a rubberized Rihanna beat like a freshly-killed eel.

Sally Shapiro, Somewhere Else: The third set from the mysterious Sally Shapiro and producer Johan Agebjörn. Laura Studarus says:

An unabashedly romantic head rush, the third effort by the Swedish duo (consisting of Shapiro and producer Johan Agebjörn) contains a world of candy heart-worthy sweet nothings, rendered irresistible by Shapiro’s coquettish whisper. No longer simply contented to fall lockstep with Italo Disco, Somewhere Else lets elements of acid house, dance and good ol’ fashioned electro pop bleed around the edges of each track.

Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell, Old Yellow Moon: A long-awaited collaboration between country greats. Holly George-Warren says:

Old Yellow Moon, with its rough-hewn, live-in-a-room ambience, offers what Harris refers to as “living room music.” “This project — like Rodney’s and my relationship — started with sitting around on the floor with two acoustic guitars and finding songs that we love,” according to Harris. “This record represents that.”

The Mavericks, In Time: A triumphant turn after a decade-long hiatus. Says Peter Blackstock:

In Time is awash in Latin rhythms and horn flourishes that suggest The Mavericks would be a better fit for the Buena Vista Social Club, and that’s as it should be: Leader Raul Malo’s powerful, distinctive voice is at its best when freed from boundaries of market or genre.

Charles Lloyd & Jason Moran, Hagar’s Song: These two are generations apart but make a perfect musical pair. Peter Margasak says:

Jason Moran, one of the most visionary composers, improvisers and conceptualists of his generation, has appeared on three of Charles Lloyd’s albums since 2008, and with Hagar’s Song, they not only share equal billing for the first time, but they demonstrate that their artistic partnership has never been more simpatico and sublime.

Various Artists, Change the Beat: The Celluloid Records Story 1979-1987 - Stunning  compilation highlighting Celluloid Records, an imprint that can boast post-punk bands like Killing Time as well as the earliest hip-hop releases. An overview of some of the most fertile of late-1970s to 1980s downtown NYC cross-genre experiments.

Doldrums, Lesser Evil – Maxed-out, overload electronic pop from a mischievous experimenter. Stevie Chick says:

Montreal-based fractured-pop auteur Airick Woodhead is a sonic collagist who clearly isn’t happy until he’s saturated his track with untold layers of noise and fragmented melody. “She Is The Wave,” a collaboration with Canadian electronic artist Guy Dallas, is a case in point. It’s a cyclone of elements that, at first, seems random, but on closer inspection, has a beautifully choreographed tunefulness deep in the chaos. On “Egypt,” Woodhead weaves industrial noises, blips and crashes into ever-changing, sweetly discombobulated pop — it could be Art Of Noise for the GarageBand generation.

Johnny Marr, The Messenger – Marr’s back, this time not as a sideman but with a breezy, agreeable solo record.

Nadia Sirota, Baroque  - The violist Nadia Sirota’s follow-up to her vital disc of new classical works First Things First. New works by Judd Greenstein, Missy Mazzoli (of former eMusic Selects alums Victoire), Nico Muhly, and more.

Olafur Arnalds, The Winter EP - Patient, glowing miniatures from this composer who works in a soundtrack-friendly ambient-classical mode.

Bilal, A Love Surreal - Liquid, languorous and understatedly funky and weird neo-soul record from Bilal, whose career has never been paid the attention of his contemporaries. This record is excellent, shades of Shuggie and Frank Ocean.

Mogwai, Les Revenants – New EP from post-punk legends is a soundtrack to a French television show, and it sounds like it suits their alluringly dour mood just fine.

Ed Harcourt, Back In The Woods - Latest effort from the singer/songwriter finds him in fine, dependable, apple-wry form.

Kutt Calhoun, Black Gold – Hard-bitten raps from the Midwest rapper Kutt Calhoun, from Tech-9 Strange Music imprint.

Ill Bill, The Grimy Awards  - Former Non Phixion member releases another brutal, hardcore testament to his roots.

Gensu Dean, Abrasions - Low-key street erudition, shades of GZA, from Gensu Dean, who makes crisp, cold DJ Premier-style classic rap out of Texas.

10,000 Maniacs, Music From the Motion Picture - The return of 10,000 Maniacs! The band’s first studio LP in 13 years.

Darkthrone, The Underground Resistance - The black metal progenitors continue blazing down their late-period operatic path, confounding early fans and discovering new territory along the way.

Kavinsky, OutRun – The debut from the French house artist, out today.

Girls Names, The New Life - Indie-poppers from Belfast go darker and more cinematic on their excellent-sounding Slumberland second LP.

Popstrangers, Antipodes -Britpop-influenced New Zealanders ready their first missive.

Golden Grrls, Golden Grrls - More cuddly indie-pop, with guitar tones fuzzier than a baby chick and boy/girl vocals. Great songwriting and perfect production help this one stand out.

Vietnam, an A.merican D.ream - New record on Mexican Summer, slightly bent and drunk-sounding jangle-pop.

Various Artists, FatCat Records Winter Sampler 2013 – FREE SAMPLER, everyone, with new material by Frightened Rabbit, Twilight Sad, U.S. Girls, Mice Parade, and many more flagship Fatcat acts! Your “no reason not to click this button” of the day. 

SINGLES

David Bowie, The Stars (Are Out Tonight) - The second inkling of what to expect from David Bowie’s new record A New Day,. This one snarls and scrapes where “Where Are We Now” sighed and moaned. This record is going to be interesting.

Ducktails, Letter of Intent - Latest single!

The past, or more specifically its absence, comes up a lot on Push the Sky Away. Warren Ellis’s skittering loops, which recall the atmospheric spread of the soundtrack albums he and Cave have made in recent years, have no beginning and no end, like the woman on “Jubilee Street” who “had a history but she had no past.” Myth and reality jumble in an eternal present, with Robert Johnson on one end and Miley Cyrus on the other … It’s certainly not as self-consciously weighty as Abattoir Blues/The Lyre of Orpheus, or as primal as Cave’s Grinderman albums, but Push the Sky Away‘s free-associative trawl exerts a strange fascination, like a dream you’re not quite sure you had.

Matmos, The Marriage of True Minds: The fearlessly experimental electronic duo tend to follow their own inquisitive minds wherever they lead, and on their ninth record, they have lead Matmos into the exploration of telepathy. Andy Battaglia has more:

For those who thought the endearingly eggheaded conceptualists in Matmos could not get more cerebral — this is a duo, after all, whose music has been sourced from the sounds of surgery, digitally deconstructed 19th-century battlefield hymns and readings of the serpentine philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein — consider The Marriage of True Minds. The concept intriguing: Willing test subjects submitted to sensory-deprivation techniques, then “listened” as Matmos member Drew Daniel tried to telepathically communicate the concept for the new Matmos album to them. Recordings of the resulting interactions (the spoken ones, of course, but who knows if that’s all?) figure into each of the songs on The Marriage of True Minds, which covers all kinds of strange ground.

Beach Fossils, Clash the Truth: Brooklyn’s premiere indie-pop janglers return with their follow-up to their 2009 self-titled breakthrough. Matt Fritch writes:

Beach Fossils singer/songwriter Dustin Payseur is talking about his generation; he just sounds like a relic from 1980s post-punk England doing it. His friends are doing it, too, to the point where you can argue that a mostly Brooklyn-centric cadre of bands — including Wild Nothing, Frankie Rose and DIIV, among others — has come to own the busy-yet-bare aesthetic borne on heavily reverbed guitars, brittle drums and washed-out vocals. Beneath the surface, however, Payseur doesn’t seem very interested in the past. The disaffection or apathy we associate with vocalists like Payseur — Ride’s Mark Gardener comes to mind — does not apply here. Beach Fossils’ shimmering guitars can seem similarly cool to the touch, but the album is more inclined toward dense, three-minute blasts of melody and rhythm than dreamy splendor.

The Relatives, The Electric Word: Long-disbanded gospel-funk group from the 1970s reunites, rains down undimmed righteous funk on the populace fury forty years later, on Yep Roc Records. Mike McGonigal spoke with the Rev. Gean West of the group, and Richard Gehr wrote the review:

Gospel singer Rev. Gean West and his brother Rev. Tommie formed The Relatives in the early ’70s and disbanded by 1980, but their electrifying, innovative gospel-soul hybrid finally saw the light of day when their early singles and unreleased sessions were compiled on 2009′s Don’t Let Me Fall. The lo-fi glory of those recordings is now utterly fulfilled on this very long-time-coming full-on debut, The Electric Word, which augments the Relatives’ familial voices with members of Black Joe Lewis & the Honeybears. The added members powerfully facilitate the Relatives’ remarkable ability to blend the Temptations’, Four Tops’ and Isley Brothers’ gnarliest acid-soul experiments with traditional gospel.

Jamie Lidell, Jamie Lidell: Warp’s crown prince of blue-eyed glitch-soul returns with a record that merges the two halves of his recording persona. Andy Battaglia writes:

Jamie Lidell has made a career-long habit of swerving, with periods devoted to out-there electronic futurism and then, by surprise, vintage throwback soul. His self-titled album makes good on the prospects of both, with an expansive, prismatic sound and a heartrending voice that proves decidedly human. More digital than recent Lidell albums, which paid explicit tribute to ’60s soul, it sounds more in line with the ’80s, when the influence of New Wave brought swelling psychodrama into R&B.”

Lady Lamb The Beekeeper, Ripely Pine: Lovely, arresting, left-field folk-rock, with the gnarled edges left exposed. Rachael Maddux gives us more:

On Lady Lamb the Beekeeper’s first record cut in a proper studio, nothing is quite as it seems … songs tend start in one place, end in another, and cycle through sometimes a dozen imaginings of themselves on the way — like “You Are The Apple” which, over seven minutes, slides from a nervous acoustic twitch to a swampy low-slung romp to a billowing, spiking orchestral swoon. The album’s lyrical turf is both elemental and surreal, like a funhouse mirror turned on a dream of an anatomy lab; hearts are eaten like strawberry cake, blood is canned like jam, love is handled like a newborn’s skull.

Samantha Crain, Kid Face: A beautiful folk album from an in-house eMusic fave. Annie Zaleski writes:

Singer-songwriter Samantha Crain has always sounded like an old soul, her dusty alto worn down by restless thoughts and free-floating anxiety. On the autobiographical Kid Face, the Oklahoma native sounds even more wizened as she explores loneliness, wanderlust and emotional disruption. Produced by John Vanderslice, Kid Face is a sparse record, laced with stark folk and Americana signifiers: acoustic guitar, wobbly piano, curled pedal steel and keening violin.

Campfires, Tomorrow, Tomorrow: Shambling, lo-fi taped-together indie pop is generally my favorite kind of music, so it’s no surprise that this Portland band has caught my attention. Lots of fuzz and creaky vocals, pretty primitive instrumentation — recalls the early days of indie rock before people cared about boring details like staying in tune or hiring professional stylists.

Concrete Knives, Be Your Own King: Tense guitar-based indie rock with the right amount of reach and flourish. eMusic’s Andrew Mueller says:

Concrete Knives rigorously observe one of the cardinal rules of the post-punk genre: terseness. The 10 tracks on Be Your Own King are rattled out in a squeak over 34 minutes. Concrete Knives are not, however, humorless minimalists; at heart, they’re a commendably unabashed pop group. Witness the giddy shout-along chorus of “Brand New Start,” which recalls The B-52s, the surging Joy Division bassline that carries “Happy Mondays,” and the raggedly triumphant opening track “Bornholmer,” which boldly posits that Nena’s “99 Luftballoons” is territory worth mining.

Eat Skull, III: Grotty lo-fi stalwarts get a little less lo-fi. Marc Hogan has the review:

III is still garage pop, and no one will mistake Eat Skull for Phoenix anytime soon, but the album’s synth-wielding, psychedelic turn succeeds at moving beyond shoddy recording quality as end in itself. Taking on space-rock anthems and ramshackle dance-punk with equal aplomb, Eat Skull are still perverse enough to punctuate the grotesque “taxidermy eyes” imagery of “Dead Horses” with a swooning “Crimson and Clover”-style breakdown. A pair of campfire-psych tracks mid-album also pays unexpected dividends. It all coheres in the fuzzy drone of the closing track, which offers a choice — between burning bridges and buying “brand new ones” — that’s really no choice at all.

Black Twig Pickers, Rough Carpenters: I really do not have a ton of positive things for the “old-timey” music that’s been making sudden inroads into mainstream culture lately. Suspenders and off-mic shouting do not a hootenanny make, my friends. Would that any fraction of the people who have been going gaga over [REDACTED] would instead discover The Black Twig Pickers. Sawing violins, bristling banjos and loose, swinging tempos, this is the good-time wheat-chewin’ music you’ve been looking for. Recommended

Maxmillion Dunbar, House of Woo: Cerebral dance music, tugging at your brain at your hips at the same time. Andy Battaglia writes:

Maxmillion Dunbar, a DJ/producer from Washington, D.C., makes sleek, spacious electronic music pitched between the current vogues for the rhythmic action of vintage Chicago house and the heady contemplation of cosmic synthesizer jams. About half of House of Woo plays as certifiable dance music, with upright rhythms that assert themselves with force, while the other half has nary a beat to speak for.

Mark Kozelek, Like Rats and Live at Phoenix Public House: Pair of new albums from the erstwhile Red House Painters/Sun Kil Moon frontman. The former takes a pretty dicey concept — acoustic versions of classic metal and punk songs — and manages to execute it without a trace of irony. The latter is simply a Kozelek live performance that’s graceful and tender.

Baptists, Bushcraft: YES. Thoroughly hammering speed metal album from this Vancouver group is full-bore panic attack music, nail-gun guitars and hardcore howling. Almost wolflike in its ferocity. Recommended

Puscifer, Donkey Punch The Night: The goofy side project of Maynard James Keenan gets a little less goofy, but not so serious that they can’t name their album Donkey Punch the Night. Here’s Jon Wiederhorn with more:

Unlike Puscifer’s sillier output, Donkey Punch seems like a concerted effort to demonstrate that the group is as gifted, sincere and intoxicating as Tool, A Perfect Circle or Keenan’s Caduceus brand wine. The only tongue-in-cheek moment on Donkey Punch is a cover of metal band Accept’s 1983 anthem “Balls to the Wall,” which converts the forceful, testosterone-pumped original into a vulnerable, ethereal number that replaces manly chants of “God bless you!” and “Hey!” into wispy tendrils of female vocals … With Donkey Punch the Night, Keenan continues to push boundaries of what Puscifer are capable of — which at this point includes just about anything.

Various Artists, The Crying Princess: 78 Records from Burma and Scattered Melodies: Korean Kayagum Sanjo: GREAT new pair of comps from the fine folks at Sublime Frequencies. Both of these gather up ancient, obscure music from far-flung parts of the world. The music on The Crying Princess dates back as far as 1909, and much of the music is fascinating and melodically unpredictable — almost avant-garde in its reach and approach. The latter is a compilation of “Kayagum Sanjo” music from Korea. “Kayagum Sanjo” translates to mean “Scattered Melodies,” and the music here backs that up. Lots of wobbly, faltering guitar-like melodies and erratic, thumping rhythms. Totally absorbing. Both are Recommended

Country Mice, Hour of the Wolf: Brooklyn band play moderate, moody indie rock. Despite what they name says, there’s not much “country” about this — think an airier Buffalo Tom and you’re on the right track.

EULA, “I Collapse”: New single from eMusic Selects alum EULA is their strongest work yet, a wild tiger of a song that starts rangy and dissonant and explodes during the chorus. Recommended

Botanist, IV: The award for world’s craziest concept album this week doesn’t even go to Matmos. No, that honor is reserved for the black metal weirdo The Botanist; here’s our metal expert Jon Wiederhorn, breaking it down:

IV Mandragora is a concept album about a scientist (the Botanist) who cultivates an army of mandrakes to wage war against mankind. Throughout, The Botanist seems several seeds short of a full garden: A textbook misanthrope, he dwells in his private sanctuary, The Verdant Realm, in the land of Veltheimia and talks to his plants about the day when greenery will again conquer the earth. In keeping with the dark green theme, five of the songs are named after actual flowers, giving The Botanist extra credibility for those who thrall to the work of Carl Linnaeus and Norman Borlaugh. For open-minded black metal fans, IV Mandragora isn’t just different, it’s just about essentially, expressing old themes in an entirely new way.

My Gold Mask, Leave Me Midnight: I really, really, really love this record. Sleek, spooky, pouty, gothy music from this Chicago duo is full of chilly songs and roaring tempos — this is some great, blue-back nightmare pop, alluring and addictive. Recommended

Atlas Genius, When It Was Now: Australian band blends a U2-like flair for grandeur with twitchy guitars and the steady thump of dance music for an album that feels spit-shined and easy to absorb.

Lusine, The Waiting Room: Tranquil synth songs that pair deliberately minimal instrumentation — surges of synth, blipping rhythms — with mannered, laconic vocals.

Godflesh, Hymns Special Edition: Sixth and final Godflesh album gets the reissue treatment. Less industrial than earlier outings, more clawing and feral and nasty.

Endless Boogie, Long Island: They’re back! The latest greasy groover from Endless Boogie is full of everything you’ve come to expect from these dudes: whiskey bar riffs, motorcycle vocals and a general spirit of anarchy. They’re like a lo-fi Steppenwolf, these guys.

LA Phil and Gustavo Dudamel, Mahler 9­: America’s most closely watched conductor and the charismatic new music director of the LA Phil, Gustavo Dudamel, continues to prove himself even in the face of astronomic, unreasonable expectations. Here, a sorrowfully expressive and emotionally immediate reading of Mahler’s unearthly, drawn-out goodbye of a final symphony:

Been wondering whether the hotshot young Venezuelan conductor lives up to the hype? Wonder no more, for to be this distinctive in warhorse repertoire, mostly without resorting to willful exaggerations, is impressive. There’s a languorous fervor in this caught-in-concert reading that recalls Bernstein. This reading is so compelling that it’s easy to hear why the 32-year-old is the newest superstar conductor.

Portal, Vexovoid: New album from these metal weirdos whose lead vocalist looks like this. This is very good — churning and bleak and apocalyptic, amazingly suffocating and Recommended

Pyschic Ills, One Track Mind: Latest from spooky psych folkers continues their pattern of drowsy vocals and free-spirited, open-ended jamming. The results usually end up some place dark and foreboding.

Disperse, Living Mirrors: Typically arty and expansive metal on the Season of Mist label. This Polish group pulls off an unlikely marriage of insistently melodic vocals with truly chaotic, intricate arrangements. Lots of fleet-fingered fretwork and percussive heart attacks while the vocals maintain a steady, keening melodicism.

Useless Eaters, Hypertension: Brash, bratty music from these apostles of Jay Reatard. The Eaters are weirder and less high octane than Jay was, and their songs have the same snarl and bark as vintage Oh Sees. Recommended

Devourment, Conceived in Sewage: Latest flesh-scarrer from these death metal stalwarts, this one is the sound of being buried in a coffin only three feet underground and then having the devil’s horses stampede above you for all eternity. It’s pretty good.

January 22, 2013: Sendai, Japan

I am sitting in Gas Panic, just off Shibuya Square in Tokyo, having an Asahi and toasting my return to Japan. The basement bar is loud with American hip-hop. I can feel the disorienting cross-cultural currents from the 14-hour plane journey, plus the time it takes to get from Nagoya Airport, and the five minutes walk from our nearby hotel. But here I be, at the beginning of a two-week Japanese tour for Patti Smith and Her Band, with a bonus beat of Seoul to cap our Asian adventure.

I was last here in 2009, when we journeyed to the summer festival that is Fujirock, and before that in 2003, when our band circuited the island. There were previous visits — a solo show in Tokyo in 1989 backed by guitarist Go Ohgami, whose album I produced in the mid ’80s; a record release by Feed, another Japanese band who availed themselves of my studio encouragement in 2001; our debut Patti tour in 1997; and more Fujirocking in 2001 and 2005 — but the fascination that this country holds for me is deep and abiding. My father worked for the Japanese megacorporation Mitsui in the 1960s, and early on I became intrigued by the artistic sensibility of this fascinating country, from the manga and anime that takes “cartoon” storytelling to new heights, to the ritualistic ceremonials of tea and sake, to the spirituality of Zen’s sense of oneness with the universe.

After a day of acclimatization, we take the train north to Sendai. In March of 2011, the epicenter of the Great East Japan Earthquake, the most powerful in Japanese seismographic history (9.0!), and the resulting tsunami devastated the eastern shoreline on an imaginable scale. A half hour’s drive from Sendai shows a bleak landscape devoid of, well, anything. This closest metropolis has had to show remarkable resiliency in the face of catastrophe. The disaster inspired our song “Fuji-San,” and by starting our tour here, not a usual stopover for visiting American musicians, we hope to pay tribute to the indomitable spirit of those faced with the task of rebuilding and commemorating. Yuki, the wife of our tour manager Andrew, sets up a booth to accept donations and raffle off a band drum-head, and we donate our show’s proceeds to benefit a local orphanage. A small gesture, perhaps, but one that encompasses the Japanese bow of respect and honor, as the rising sun begins a day anew.

January 23-24, 2013: Tokyo, Japan

Two nights, two shows, two very different venues. Though one doesn’t want to stretch an obvious touristic parallel, this is very much like the capital itself. Tokyo is a dizzying metropolis, pretty much newly constructed after the Earthquake of 1923 and the cataclysm that was the Second World War, brimming with population and chaotic motion and flashing signage and loudspeakers urging commerce; and yet, there is an underlying sense of tradition and calming order. No one jaywalks, patiently waiting until a light turns green even if no traffic is in sight, and ritual courtesies are adhered to with decorum and politeness.

So it is in our performance spaces. Shibuya Ax, on Tuesday, proffers a rowdy stand-up audience that crowd-surfs and jostles each other in time to the music; Wednesday’s Orchard Hall is seated, and though the attendees attentively stand in place through most of the show, there is little stage-rushing or mayhem. As a special bonus, as much for us as the crowd, we’re joined by Noguzo, a ceremonial taiko drummer, accentuating the sonic booms of “Fuji-San.” Afterward, our backstage is graced with Sheena and the Rokkets, one of the longest-lived bands in Japan. I must say Sheena and lead guitarist Makoto don’t look a day older than when they first appeared on the scene in 1978, full of a belief in rock ‘n’ roll’s transformative power. Seeing them reaffirms my own kneel at the shrine of feedback.

And then a day at liberty. I wonder where to start my roam, debating between the gizmo-tron and gadgetorium that is the “Electric City” of the Akihabara district; or Harajuku’s pop-culturati shopping labyrinths. I choose the latter, and soon find myself wandering the lanes of Takeshita Street, marveling at the many niches of fashion on display — here’s a punk store delivered whole from 1977, alongside a shop where Victorian meets Goth meets X-Rated fairy tale. On the four floors of Kiddyland, there are trinkets galore, amid displays devoted to favorite cartoon characters. Speaking of which, I note the disappearance of the Beatles-only emporium that was here the last time I visited, and its replacement by many devoted to K-pop and J-pop idol singers of the moment.

But that doesn’t mean music’s charm is entirely transitory, beholden to the short attention span of generational allegiance. That evening, I am graciously invited to visit the home of our promoter rep in Japan, Shinichi “Chris” Kurisawa. We had been talking about old ska records on the train, and now — a true connoisseur — he is ready to spin some of his rarities for our mutual delectation. He drops the needle on one of his two turntables, sends it through a vintage Ampex tube amplifier to a single mono 15″ speaker; and let the sound system begin. Our journey takes us through Jamaican masters like virtuoso guitarist Ernest Ranglin and the horned geniuses of Roland Alphonso and Don Drummond, moving us effortlessly into soul and blues (here comes Fenton Robinson!). Enhanced by copious cups of shochu, the potato-based distillation that seems to split the difference between sake and vodka, a good time is had by all.

January 26-27, 2013: Nagoya/Kanazawa, Japan

The bullet train takes us west from Tokyo. Out the window, Mt. Fuji gazes majestically upon us. There is progressively more snow on the ground. We are heading into Japan’s hinterlands. Nagoya is the fourth largest city here on the main island, home to one of the most impressive castles I’ve ever seen; and Kanazawa, on the west coast bordering the sea, has a similarly ancient feudal feel, though the main building has had to be painstakingly restored time and again following devastating fires in the 18th and 19th centuries.

But we don’t have much time on this trip to explore ancient Japan, since almost upon arrival in each town it’s showtime. The weekend means our concert starts early in the evening. We’re onstage by 6 p.m., off by 7:30, and at dinner in a nearby restaurant having chicken wings (Nagoya’s specialty) or slices of the freshest sashimi (Kanazawa) by 8. The early performance and the fact that Club Quattro in Nagoya is on the 8th floor of a department store only adds to our sense of dislocation. Not that the audience seems to mind. These are some of our most responsive crowds, only too willing to call-and-response the refrain of “Fuji-san” back at us as we scale that immortal mount in song.

January 28, 2013: Osaka, Japan

Entering the world of Japanese popular music is like opening the gateway to an alternative universe. I wander the overflowing aisles of Tower Records (still the major outlet here, with branches in many cities) and gaze at the myriad of singers, bands, idols and anti-idols. Every genre and moment in time seems to be represented. The sheer quantity and variety humbles not only my own inclination to figure out who’s who and where’s-the-hits, but makes me again rue the one-way street that is our cross-talk with other musical cultures. Everywhere I go in Japan, I hear English-speaking hits of many eras: I am listening to Fleetwood Mac in a sukiyaki restaurant at breakfast, shopping to disco familiars in a mall, or entering a collector’s store which specializes in American oldies (I find a copy of Jim Bakus’s “Delicious,” and because it’s one of my all-time favorite records I can’t resist buying it in such an exotic locale) knowing that except for the occasional “novelty,” none of the bands on display here could be touring America in the same manner that we are in Japan.

I don’t have to wonder, for instance, what Yeti vs. Cromagnon sounds like, since they resemble the Heartbreakers circa 1977 in their black leather jackets and guitarist’s yellow Les Paul Junior, just like the one Johnny Thunders played. Or the Neatbeats, who release vintage “mono” recordings that echo classic Brit Invasion groups. There’s lots of punk and home-grown reggae, and a ’90s revival underway with bands like Guitar Wolf, the Blue Hearts, Thee Michelle Gun Elephant, Number Girl and Bloodthirsty Butchers the subject of catalog highlights. Two groups that pique my interest are Blankey Jet City, who broke up in 2000 only to recently reform; and the more mod-ish Bawdies, whose 2012 hit single “Rock Me Baby” about says it all in the Japanese resurrection of classic retro sound.

But even these traditional guitar-wielding bands pale in the overwhelming multitudinous that is J-pop, which presents a vast array of girl/boy groups that dance, sing and partake of the latest fashion and digital technology to create hits that are viral, colorful and transitory in the most ingratiating way. The textures are futuristic, the production techniques state-of-the-art (the sound is future-now), and despite the lack of deeper meanings, they present a riot of motion and beguiling come-hither.

Of the girl groups, AKB48 is the largest, both in size (there are 48 members on stage, and another 39 “trainees”) and popularity. Conceived in the Akihabara electronics district of Tokyo, as much cheerleading squad as dance troupe, their intricate choreography and chant-along singles have spawned many sound-alikes in other cities: there are similar assemblages in Nagoya (SKE48), Osaka (NMB48), Fukuoka (HKT48), and even outside Japan, in Jakarta (JKT48), Taipei (TPE48), Shanghai (SNH48). One has to love pop’s ability to procreate. There is heated discussion in the newspapers about whether the chastity clause in the girl’s contracts that prohibits them from dating is legal, but this is hardly scandalous or even revolutionary in the world of manufactured teen appeal.

In the midst of all this, I find my own mash-up of idolatry. BABYMETAL are three ‘tween girls who perform in front of a skeleton-costumed band, doling out slabs of metallic genre signifiers: slashing guitars and crunching riffs and rat-a-tat bass drumming, skull-crushing readymades lightened by bridges that sing-song and dance routines that spin at a dizzying pace. Yeah, I know: I’m being manipulated by someone’s idea of savvy marketing. But hey, isn’t that the point?

January 30, 2013: Hiroshima, Japan

How can you imagine? And then you’re here.

There is the river, one of six that course through this city. As we walk solemnly over its bridge toward the Peace Museum, staring at the skeletal remains of what is now called the Atomic Dome in the distance, a sense of déjà vu permeates the air. The horrific scenes and their shock waves have been seared into collective memory. To know that this city was the first to witness warfare at its most destructive, to think of the poor souls caught in the inferno and ash, jumping into this river that flows so gently now, to understand that this entire vista was once reduced to rubble and ruin, is to once again shudder at mankind’s penchant for annihilation. In war, there is no moral absolution. No matter the cause, it is the innocents who suffer.

There in the museum are the scorched remains of a schoolgirl’s uniform. A watch stopped at 8:15 a.m. on an August morning. A little boy’s transit card, scorched and torn. The happenstance of weather, knowing that had there been cloud cover over Hiroshima on that sixth day of the eighth month in 1945, the target might have been nearby Kokura. Not that it matters. The Earth was about to enter the Atomic Age, wherever the chosen spot.

That night, as we play, the ghosts are dancing.

I wake early the next morning. Looking out my hotel window, off to the left, I can see where Ground Zero — directly over Shima Hospital, now rebuilt — was and ever will be. But if I look to my right, there is the soccer field of Fukuromachi Elementary School, where children are kicking a ball, surrounded by a city that has been grown from scratch over the ruins, an archeological layer of generational rebirth and remembrance.

January 31-February 2, 2013: Fukuoka, Japan/Seoul, Korea

The body of water that takes us from one country to another is called the Sea of Japan on one side, and the East Sea on the other. Crossing it changes the channel of pop from J to K, and these days that does imply a difference. Has the balance of power in hit-making shifted? With the success of PSY’s “Gangnam Style” has come an interest in all things Korean, and I’m about to see its neighborhood up close — or, as close as you can over a visit that lasts less than 48 hours.

The last show in Japan is in Fukuoka, on the shore of Kyushu, the most southerly of Japan’s islands. We’ve been here before, and perhaps will again, with a sold-out crowd at Drum Logos, and a final toast to our Japanese promoters.

The flight to Seoul takes about an hour and a half, the same time it takes to drive from the airport to our hotel on the outskirts of Gangnam. The neighborhood, once you get off the large eight-lane avenues replete with all your well-known western chains, contains a plethora of restaurants and bars on its back streets. Since it’s pouring rain on arrival, I take refuge in a nearby mall, which could be a shopping plaza anywhere in the world. Fleeing in haste, I find the small barbeque restaurant on a side street in the shadow of the massive Seven Luck casino that initiated me into the local grilling customs the last time we visited.

I get my indoctrination into K-Pop much as the rest of Korea’s inhabitants, through glittery television shows which feature the acts cavorting in rapid succession. On this night, Music Bank provides a confectioner’s dreamworld, beginning with the current number one chart song, “Shower of Tears,” performed by Bae Chi Gi featuring Ailee. From its guitar introduction, which paraphrases “St. James Infirmary,” Bae Chi Gi’s rapping (“I should have known in the end that your selfish heart wanted a different fluttering”) and Ailee’s plaintive vocal chorus, I am intrigued by the mélange of influence and its easy translation to my own western ears. In fact, discerning any hints of traditional Korean modes and scales is impossible. Welcome to the world.

Crayon Pop sing-songs “Bing Bing,” 2Yoon hoe-downs with “24-7,” the Dolls (not the New York) count their “9 Muses,” and Sistar 19 channel their inner J-Lo with “Gone Not Around Any Longer.” These are girl groups; the boy groups are similarly coiffed and bust-a-move energetic, rotating singers and personas: Boyfriend’s “I Yah,” Infinite H’s “Special Girl,” while Jeong Hyung Don’s “GangBuk Dandy” bears some passing resemblance in vocal register and approach to PSY.

It’s hard to say how K-Pop will play outside of the Asian market. In some ways, its lightweight gossamer (there are no references to hard clubbing or coital hi-jinx) and language barrier will mean it will have to adapt, and perhaps change its very nature, to succeed. PSY himself might be another here-today, gone-the-way-of-the-Pony tomorrow (there are similarities in the dance step). That said, these songs are appealing. Fighting it out for the top spot on Music Bank is Girls’ Generation, with the theatrical “Paparazzi,” whose video references “Singing In The Rain,” of all things; they hold the current number two song in Korea, the addictive “I Got A Boy.” They have signed a U.S. deal with Interscope, and if the Pussycat Dolls can have a chart hit, why not this KoreAmerican dance squad?

But for my musical mojo, the triumph of CN Blue, a four-piece guitar band that — shock horror! — is playing their instruments and singing live on this television countdown, and whose “I’m Sorry” wins the night’s competition hands-down. It’s perhaps a pointer that the K-Pop phenomenon won’t be as cookie-cutter as might be intimated. And when Kevin Shields and My Bloody Valentine come visit backstage at our show, themselves beginning a far-east tour and celebrating the release of their much-anticipated new album, I begin to fantasize what this sort of cross-pollination might do for Korea’s embrace and assimilation of UnPop.

On the way home, I have my own cultural potpourri courtesy of inflight entertainment. I watch a Chinese language detective film called The Bullet Vanishes set in the 1920s; a black-and-white documentary of Arthur Rubinstein playing a concert in Moscow in 1964 that leans heavily on Chopin; and The Master.

So many forms of human expression; so little time.

Veronica Falls, Waiting For Something To Happen: The second charming, surprisingly durable record from this wonderful jangle-pop band subtly deepens their sound. Annie Zaleski writes:

Veronica Falls set the bar high with their 2011 self-titled debut, an exemplary collection of foggy indie-pop with rambunctious guitars, cartoonishly gothic sentiments and a restless heart. On their charming second album, Waiting For Something To Happen, the U.K. quartet stands up even straighter and smooth out any lingering wrinkles. Produced by Rory Attwell (The Vaccines, Male Bonding), the record is a confident and clear-eyed throwback to a time when strummy ’80s college rock ruled the underground.

Pissed Jeans, Honeys: Not the nicest or happiest record you’ll hear this week, but maybe one of the most potent: The sneering, baleful, confessional purge-punk of Pissed Jeans is back. Austin L. Ray reviewed it for us, and he had this to say:

Snarling and spitting, growling and kicking, Honeys won’t surprise those who love Pissed Jeans, nor is it likely to attract those that deplore the band. “Write what you know,” as they say, and Pissed Jeans knows pummeling, antisocial punk.

Adam Again, Perfecta: True story, no joke. I woke up this morning thinking about this record, for no clear reason. It stuck with me so much through the morning that I googled a bunch of information on it just to see what the internet had uncovered in the 18 years since its release. I even, on the way in, thought, “Weird that I thought about this record for the first time since it came out. Wouldn’t it be even weirder if it showed up in Freshly Ripped today?” Friends, this is definitive proof: I am a psychic. Adam Again were a California group who operated from the late ’80s until 2000, when alarmingly gifted frontman Gene Eugene died of a heart attack. They started out making synthy, passable New Wave, but took a huge step forward on 1987′s Homeboys, which chronicled Eugene’s childhood in South Central Los Angeles, and then another massive step forward with 1992′s dark and churning Dig. Perfecta, the record that followed it, was another shift in direction. It was groaning and grim and moody, full of slashing guitars and big, wall-of-sound distortion freakouts. A chronicle of his divorce from bandmate Riki Michele and the subsequent emotional aftermath, Perfecta is an unflinching look at imperfection, loud, clawing and feral. “Strobe,” the one concession to the band’s funk-rock roots, hasn’t aged well. The rest is still cold terror. RECOMMENDED

Fear of Men, Early Fragments: The Brighton group Fear of Men began the way many great groups began: when its founding members began swapping mixtapes of favorite songs. You can hear some of those influences, like the Chills and the Byrds, in their debut, a light and lovely collection of guitar-pop topped with light-as-air melodies.

Kelly Willis & Bruce Robison, Cheater’s Game: A lovely duets record from this husband-and-wife team that has, until now, done very little recording together. Peter Blackstock surveys the results and asks, What too so long?
Married for 17 years, Kelly Willis and Bruce Robison have kept their recording careers separate, aside from a low-profile Christmas album. HearingCheater’s Game, it’s hard to fathom why, because their talents are so perfectly matched. Robison, writer of country chart-toppers for the likes of George Strait, the Dixie Chicks, and Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, would be hard pressed to find a more sympathetic duet partner for his lyrics than Willis, who earned acclaim in the ’90s as an exquisite singer with a keen appreciation for left-of-center material.

Lisa Germano, No Elephants: I love Lisa Germano. This is a weird, spooky, chilling record, lots of strange arrangements and Germano’s oddball ghostly voice fluttering and floating above and between. If you ever had any love for Chelsea Wolfe or super early Kristen Hersh, you really need to hear this. RECOMMENDED

The Deer Tracks, The Archer Trilogy Pt. 3: The third volume of otherworldly, affecting experimental pop. Laura Studarus wrote the review, and it is one of my favorites, as it contains the phrases “arsonists” and “oversized Yule goat” in its first sentence:

The Deer Tracks (David Lehnberg and Elin Lindfors) hail from Gävle, Sweden, where arsonists regularly celebrate Christmas by burning down the city’s oversized Yule goat. Every year, the goat is rebuilt with the knowledge that, like its forefathers, it too will end up in ashes. It’s that same casual acceptance of the surreal that permeates the experimental pop of The Archer Trilogy Pt. 3 … Like Sigur Rós coated with the debris of an extended pub-crawl, The Archer Trilogy Pt. 3 is anchored by a layer of grit — be it electronics that echo the sinister undertones of Fever Ray or Karin Park, lyrics that revel in sweat and frequently break into glossolalia, or Lindfors’s quirky vocal phrasing.

Foals, Holy Fire: Foals specialize in sweeping, melodramatic British guitar rock, washed in starlit reverb and sent heavenward by Yannis Philippakis, a singer with a neon exclamation point of a tenor voice. On Holy Fire, they score their rafters-aiming anthems with itchy, pinprick guitars provide the music’s caffeinated heartbeat.

Psychic Friend, My Rocks Are Dreams: New outing from Will from Imperial Teen (featuring Patty Schemel of Hole on drums), this bright and bounding pop music, with just a hint of the theatrical. If you want to like fun., but feel that they lay it on a bit thick, this is the record you’ve been waiting for.

Various Artists, Cajun Honky Tonk: The Khoury Recordings, Vol. 2: I mean, this is great. You don’t even need me to say it. Amazing Texas Honky Tonk recorded from 1947 – 1957 that’s full of stomp and twang and bravado, sawing violins, boot-stomping rhythms and bristling banjos. I mean, it’s just super good. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Ulrich Schnauss, A Long Way To Fall: The long-running producer steps delicately away from his longstanding Loveless fixation to let a grit onto the canvas. Andy Beta has more:

Schnauss’s previous two albums, 2003′s A Strangely Isolated Place and 2006′s Faraway Passing Trains drew heavily from My Bloody Valentine’s glorious smeared mascara sound, but aside from it taking him six years to follow up Trains(rather than 22), there’s little in common with that old template of his … Schnauss favors clarity on A Long Way to Fall, which you can tell from the opening coruscations of “Her and the Sea,” the vocal haze he previously favored (and at times got lost in) has evaporated. The synth pads are clearly defined, the modular synth lines contrast against the ambient washes.

The Weather Station, Duets 1, 2 and 3: We are super huge fans of Tamara Lindeman, who records as The Weather Station, on eMusic. These are a trio of singles she recorded — one with Daniel Romano, one with Marine Dreams and one with Baby Eagle, all of them firmly within her time-tested weathered Americana, and all of them RECOMMENDED

The Flowers of Hell, Odes: Here’s a weird one. The Flowers of Hell are a UK/Canada group (naturally) consisting of about a dozen and a half members (naturally) who play lush orchestral music (as you might expect). This is an album of covers of everyone from Joy Division to Bob Dylan, all of them treated to swirling, swelling orchestral reads.

Ivy Dye, Continuations: Chicago group brings on the doomy electro-goth (sorta), blending thumping rhythms with buzzy synths and sub-basement vocals for an intoxicatingly moody final product.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, In Cambridge: Still alone! Umpteenth Casio record continues his time-tested blend of moody vocal melodies and charmingly shambolic arrangements.