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São Paulo's Céu Returns with a Fresh Perspective on 'APKÁ!'
On Céu's APKÁ!, blissful interpretations of late-night dance music styles and high-heat MPB make for a multidimensional album of soulful energy, replete with her effortless sophistication.
26 Jun 2020
Music
Mourning [A] BLKstar's 'The Cycle' Is Secular Gospel for Healing a Damaged Nation
Mourning [A] BLKstar's The Cycle is necessary, secular gospel for the healing of a truly damaged nation. Their music somehow sounds like salvation.
26 Jun 2020
Music
Nana Grizol Reckon with US' Racist Past and Present on 'South Somewhere Else'
The Elephant 6-related, new Nana Grizol album, South Somewhere Else, finds the band attempting to reckon with the racist past and present of the US South.
26 Jun 2020
Music
On Bob Dylan's 'Rough and Rowdy Ways' Everything Old Is New Again, Again
Bob Dylan's first album of original material since 2012, Rough and Rowdy Ways, is a suitably grim, brilliant collection of ten songs for our dark times.
25 Jun 2020
Music
Pianist Gabriel Ólafs Champions Brevity Over Showmanship on 'Piano Works'
Gabriel Ólafs' Piano Works is a testament to the power of melody and mood. The music is both concise yet brimming with beauty.
25 Jun 2020
Music
Threadbare Elevate Rock and Jazz on the Complex 'Silver Dollar'
Atonal free jazz trio Threadbare use unique instrumentation and a love of multiple musical styles on their fascinating new album, Silver Dollar.
25 Jun 2020
Music
Walter Smith III and Matthew Stevens Make New Jazz So Easy to Love on 'In Common 2'
Two of the top players in modern jazz make the second in a sequence of quintet recordings that presents jazz as unusually easy to love even as it maintains modern complexity.
24 Jun 2020
Music
Lee Jones' 'Down Into Light' Is a Minutiae-Scanning Beauty of Minimal Techno
Down Into Light feels like the album Lee Jones was always born to make. He's always had a lightness of touch, but here, his touch is more delicate than ever.
24 Jun 2020
Music
Wetware Ratchet Up the Intensity to a Nightmarish Degree on 'Flail'
Brooklyn's Wetware have created a wild collection of industrial noise on Flail that sounds more like an intense fever dream than anything else.
24 Jun 2020
Music
Nathalie Bruno Embraces Isolation on Drift's 'Symbiosis'
Symbiosis shows Nathalie Bruno (Drift.) wiping the mascara, leaving the dance floor, and striking out for solitude, occasionally dragging a few beats with her.
23 Jun 2020
Music
Cavern of Anti-Matter's First Film Score Is a Rare Delight
Stereolab spin-off project, Cavern of Anti-Matter thrive in alchemizing varied and abstruse influences to elicit transfixing moments of frazzled disquiet and dread on In Fabric.
23 Jun 2020
Music
Avant-Rockers Aksak Maboul Continue to Innovate in the 21st Century
Belgian avant-rockers Aksak Maboul bring their stylized shapeshifting to the 21st century with the new album Figures.
23 Jun 2020
Music
John Scofield Renews the Jazz Guitar Trio on 'Swallow Tales'
The jazz guitar trio is a classic format, and John Scofield, Steve Swallow, and Bill Stewart are as well-equipped to venerate it and renew it a bit on Swallow Tales.
23 Jun 2020
Music
Flying Lotus Goes Purely Instrumental on New Version of 'Flamagra'
On the instrumental version of last year's Flamagra, Flying Lotus makes conspicuous variety feel coherent and ordered.
22 Jun 2020
Music
Braids' 'Shadow Offering' Is a Shining Success But Has Dark Moments
Shadow Offering has glimmers of Braids' former album but with a new direction and an attempt to adopt a new maturity and sensibility.
22 Jun 2020
Music
Bob Dylan Says It All on 'Rough and Rowdy Ways'
Bob Dylan returns as prophet, historian, and joker on his latest album, Rough and Rowdy Ways, an unending puzzle with rich content.
22 Jun 2020
Music
Taiwan's Mong Tong Concoct a Darkly Psychedelic 'Mystery'
Experimental Taiwanese group Mong Tong draw on mysticism and arcade games for their darkly psychedelic debut album Mystery.
19 Jun 2020
Music
The Bird and the Bee's Inara George and 'The Youth of Angst'
Inara George's The Youth of Angst is a three-song bundle that looks back as a way of moving forward during troubled times.
19 Jun 2020
Music
Brilliant Memphis Soulman Don Bryant Says 'You Make Me Feel'
Legendary Memphis soulman and songwriter, Don Bryant returns with a vengeance to spread a much-needed message of love. You Make Me Feel is vital soul music for these times.
19 Jun 2020
Music
Chromeo Brings Back Fun with 'Quarantine Casanova'
Chromeo's Quarantine Casanova is the light-hearted silver lining we all need in the dark cloud that we are all facing together.
18 Jun 2020
Music
Malian Legend Oumou Sangaré Glows in Stripped-down Arrangements on 'Acoustic'
On Acoustic, Oumou Sangaré's inner world shines through with particular clarity as the Songbird of Wassoulou performs stripped-down arrangements of some of the most powerful tracks she's recorded over the last 30 years.
18 Jun 2020
Music
Phoebe Bridgers Sublimely Documents the Surreal Present on 'Punisher'
At 25, Phoebe Bridgers is, by all metrics, an artist at the beginning of her career, though Punisher sounds more like the work of a time-tested veteran perfecting a style she's been honing for years.
18 Jun 2020
Music
Jason Mraz Emphasizes Reggae and Positivity on 'Look for the Good'
There's nothing inherently off about his Jason Mraz's new album, but a glance at his past records makes Look for the Good feel a bit lackluster.
18 Jun 2020
Reviews
Judie Tzuke's 'The Chrysalis Recordings' Highlights Her Early ‘80s Transition to Synthpop
One day, perhaps, the collected works of Judie Tzuke, one of the United Kingdom's most prolific, long-serving, and interesting singer-songwriters, may be seriously reappraised. Until then, dive into The Chrysalis Recordings.
17 Jun 2020
Music
Wire's '10:20' Is Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts
On 10:20, Wire retain the sound they've been cultivating for the last few albums and use it to reinvigorate and reinterpret tracks from their various periods.
17 Jun 2020
Music
Folk's Jeb Loy Nichols Says We Are in 'Season of Decline'
Jeb Loy Nichols finds humor in ambiguity, and real sadness in the joy of being in the current moment on his new EP, Season of Decline.
17 Jun 2020
Music
Sweden's Freja the Dragon Creates Compelling Art Pop on 'Long Gone Girl'
Sweden's Freja the Dragon has toured with Peter Björn and John, and on Long Gone Girl, she partners Björn Yttlin to craft her exemplary debut showcasing her mesmerizing brand of art pop.
17 Jun 2020
Music
Wares Have Indie Rock Intensity But Need More Hooks on 'Survival'
Canadian indie rockers Wares offer up their first LP for a label. Survival demonstrates that combining indie rock and synthpop can be pretty difficult to get right.
16 Jun 2020
Music
Ambrose Akinmusire Muses 'on the tender spot of every calloused moment'
The most notable trumpet player in jazz today, Ambrose Akinmusire, creates a major recording focusing on his quartet leaping from mode to mode.
16 Jun 2020
Music
The Soft Pink Truth's Entrancing New Album Is a Stellar Change of Pace
Matmos' Drew Daniels rebrands his solo work to meet the trying times, offering up an ambient techno classic for the ages under his Soft Pink Truth moniker.
16 Jun 2020
Music
From Punk Fury to Mariachi Cries, the Bronx Make Mexican Style Their Own
Los Angeles punk rockers the Bronx morph into Mariachi El Bronx for Musica Muerta, which is a whole world of fun and well made too.
15 Jun 2020
Music
Indie Pop-Rocker Liza Anne Takes Us on a 'Bad Vacation'
On Bad Vacation, Liza Anne has found a way to be strong and survive. She's not drowning but waving.
15 Jun 2020
Music
Blanco White Yearns for Home on Debut 'On the Other Side'
British singer-songwriter Blanco White's debut full-length On The Other Side seeks to translate Spanish and Latin influences into a dreamy pop sound, for better and for worse.
15 Jun 2020
Music
Maurice Fulton's New LP is a Worthy Addition to the BOOF Canon
Maurice Fulton (BOOF) is a maestro of production value, adept at so many different sub-genres, and he's been at it for so long that he seems guaranteed not to fail. Almost 30 years since "Gypsy Woman", Rebirth of Gerberdaisy affirms all his gifts.
15 Jun 2020
Music
Run the Jewels Return with 'RTJ4' When We Need Them Most
Run the Jewels have always had a taste for action-movie hyperbole, but as they've powered through their careers, the lines between slapstick and real have almost ceased to exist.
15 Jun 2020
Music
Savages' Jehnny Beth Creates One of the Most Compelling Albums of 2020 with 'To Love Is to Live'
Jehnny Beth's (Savages) solo debut To Love Is to Live feels like a really good book. Each track gives you a deeper dive into a complex and multifaceted, destructive character.
12 Jun 2020
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