I first discovered Hannah Marcus’ music nearly ten years back. Hearing the opening strains of “Laos”, a track off her last album, Desert Farmers, I was nearly frozen in place. I wasn’t sure how or why, but something in the song called to me on a deeper, more private level than any other song I had heard. It seemed to invade such a personal space within me where I held deeper, undisclosed emotions and, yet, it wholly belonged in that space. After half an hour’s worth of hearing the song on repeat, it found a home in me and it has since never left.

What especially caught my attention was Marcus’ utterly strange and distressing way of turning a phrase, sounding out a word with an inflection so alien, it startled and seduced in equal measure. Her songs were like doors to other worlds that explored the ideas of situational love and lives configured by loss and abandonment. In Marcus’ songs, people struggle not to survive but to simply exist; survival and the pain endured is merely an afterthought. To be able to encapsulate the heady and emotional complexities of human drama in the span of a pop song is an achievement in itself. To pen an indelible melody to accompany her striking visionary world is leaps and bounds over the moons of many songwriters.

First he was alone. Then he was crowded out by the ant-marching of city life. Now, our narrator is somewhere else, a place that’s near-indescribable. From the sound of “The City in a Hundred Ways”, the only instrumental track on Together We’re Stranger, he is in a sort of fugue or comatose state. Viewed in context—specifically as the precursor to “Things I Want to Tell You”—this seems like the intention of Tim Bowness and Steven Wilson in crafting this piece. The latter song is about awakening to a world of pain; correspondingly, the former is a hazy depiction of a mind clouded by unprocessed thoughts, rising emotions, and better-forgotten memories. The narrator’s plight is now similar to that of Leonard Shelby’s in Christopher Nolan’s reverse-narrative masterpiece Memento: “I can’t remember to forget you”. It’s a fitting parallel for more reasons than one: this little song is cinematic in how it mentally evokes a dreamlike montage of blurry remembrances of a love not so long lost.

In the grand scheme of Together We’re Stranger, “The City in a Hundred Ways” seems like a throwaway initially. At 2:23, it’s the shortest thing here (barely beating the vinyl-exclusive “Bluecoda” by 13 seconds), and its instrumentation is comprised of nothing more than slowly played horns and electronics—the latter provided by guest contributor David Picking. Compositionally it bears a noticeable likeness to the act of an orchestra tuning up, trying to find that perfect pitch. But in the case of this piece, it doesn’t quite get to that perfection. As a piece it sounds almost floating; whereas cuts like “All the Blue Changes”—while undoubtedly interpretive—make a fairly clear point, “The City in a Hundred Ways” is the most ethereal part of this LP, no small feat considering the myriad meanings one can draw from Bowness’ lyrics. Considering the plight of the narrator, this foggy quality is best described as the result of the transition shock from being left all alone to being thrust back into the ever-shuffling world of the city. As the listener follows along in this man’s plunge into the world of heartbreak, they becomes just as disoriented as he is.

Klinger: Gram Parsons. There are few words in the English language that conjure up as much critical saliva as those two right there. Gram Parsons. From a critic’s perspective, this was a guy who had it all: the perfect backstory, the right look, the impeccable taste, the ability to blend in easily with rock royalty, and of course the tragic demise at a crucial juncture in his career. And as we see here on Grievous Angel, his first appearance on the Great List, he had an astonishing talent for songwriting and interpretation.

Of course, if you’re stumbling across Grievous Angel based mainly on its critical reputation, you might well be taken aback by the high levels of honky-tonkery found here. Parsons was steeped in country traditions like one of those jars of tea people leave out in their backyard all day. (Pro-tip: those jars are not for passers-by to wet their whistles. Trust me.) And I could see where that might be daunting. So Mendelsohn, as someone whose belt buckle is just regular sized, how did you enjoy Parsons’ final burst of Cosmic American Music?

Last year, the Brooklyn band Red Baraat was ranked #8 amongst the Top 50 Coolest Desis by Desiclub. The dhol ‘n’ brass band has seen a rapid rise in their success and repute, having performed this year at an inaugural ball in Washington D.C., during Mardi Gras in New Orleans and then several shows at South by Southwest in Austin. The festive season doesn’t end there, however. Red Baraat is holding a celebration for the Hindu holiday of Holi with two Festival of Colors shows, one in Philly on March 28th and another the following night in New York City. While the throwing of rang (colored powders) may not go over so well with the management of an indoor club, the energy from the band won’t need to be toned down.

Desert space fades away with the first sign of city lights. Wandering into the city, our narrator finds its rhythm and pulse foreign; he has become defamiliarized to the way of life he once knew. Loss begins to seep into every aspect of his life, and change—which, as Heraclitus taught the world so long ago, is the only constant—has now set in. The sparse, aching moment of heartbreak that opened Together We’re Stranger shined a spotlight on the realities of solitude that start to set in the aftermath of a breakup; it’s with city life that open wounds transform into tender scars.

“All the Blue Changes”, compositionally speaking, is as close to an antithesis No-Man could have written to “Together We’re Stranger”, the poetic ambient opener to their masterwork album. Especially in a live setting, “All the Blue Changes” is all about the crescendo; its gradual build is a wonderful display of this duo’s control of dynamics. But most importantly, this cut introduces the mini-narrative that is contained within Together We’re Stranger‘s first five tracks. (On the CD version of the album, there are only seven tracks; however, for this Between the Grooves series, an eighth, vinyl exclusive track, “Bluecoda”, will be included.) While the title cut is a masterful first chapter to this narrative, in its stark nakedness it could stand by itself. It manages to say almost everything the collective eight tracks of the LP do in its eight-minute length, but it undoubtedly works best within the context of the five-song suite opener.