Stereogum's 50 Best Albums of 2015 So Far

Sufjan Stevens has taken creative detours into textured electro-pop, orchestral suites, and holiday music, but *Carrie & Lowell* returns to the feathery indie folk of his quietly brilliant early-’00s albums, like *Michigan* and *Seven Swans*. Using delicate fingerpicking and breathy vocals, songs like “Eugene,” “The Only Thing,” and the Simon & Garfunkel-influenced “No Shade in the Shadow of The Cross” are gorgeous reflections on childhood. When Stevens whispers in multi-tracked harmony over the album’s title track—an impressionistic portrait of his mother and stepfather that glows with nostalgic details—he delivers a haunting centerpiece.

Thanks to multiple hit singles—and no shortage of critical acclaim—2012’s *good kid, m.A.A.d city* propelled Kendrick Lamar into the hip-hop mainstream. His 2015 follow-up, *To Pimp a Butterfly*, served as a raised-fist rebuke to anyone who thought they had this Compton-born rapper figured out. Intertwining Afrocentric and Afrofuturist motifs with poetically personal themes and jazz-funk aesthetics, *To Pimp A Butterfly* expands beyond the gangsta rap preconceptions foisted upon Lamar’s earlier works. Even from the album’s first few seconds—which feature the sound of crackling vinyl and a faded Boris Gardiner soul sample—it’s clear *To Pimp a Butterfly* operates on an altogether different cosmic plane than its decidedly more commercial predecessor. The album’s Flying Lotus-produced opening track, “Wesley’s Theory,” includes a spoken-word invocation from musician Josef Leimberg and an appearance by Parliament-Funkadelic legend George Clinton—names that give *To Pimp a Butterfly* added atomic weight. Yet Lamar’s lustful and fantastical verses, which are as audacious as the squirmy Thundercat basslines underneath, never get lost in an album packed with huge names. Throughout *To Pimp a Butterfly*, Lamar goes beyond hip-hop success tropes: On “King Kunta,” he explores his newfound fame, alternating between anxiety and big-stepping braggadocio. On “The Blacker the Berry,” meanwhile, Lamar pointedly explores and expounds upon identity and racial dynamics, all the while reaching for a reckoning. And while “Alright” would become one of the rapper’s best-known tracks, it’s couched in harsh realities, and features an anthemic refrain delivered in a knowing, weary rasp that belies Lamar’s young age. He’s only 27, and yet he’s already seen too much. The cast assembled for this massive effort demonstrates not only Lamar’s reach, but also his vast vision. Producers Terrace Martin and Sounwave, both veterans of *good kid, m.A.A.d city*, are among the many names to work behind-the-boards here. But the album also includes turns from everyone from Snoop Dogg to SZA to Ambrose Akinmusire to Kamasi Washington—an intergenerational reunion of a musical diaspora. Their contributions—as well as the contributions of more than a dozen other players—give *To Pimp a Butterfly* a remarkable range: The contemplations of “Institutionalized” benefit greatly from guest vocalists Bilal and Anna Wise, as do the hood parables of “How Much A Dollar Cost,” which features James Fauntleroy and Ronald Isley. Meanwhile, Robert Glasper’s frenetic piano on “For Free? (Interlude)” and Pete Rock’s nimble scratches on “Complexion (A Zulu Love)” give *To Pimp a Butterfly* added energy.

I Want to Grow Up, the latest collection of songs from LA songstress Colleen Green, follows a newly 30-year-old Green as she carefully navigates a minefield of emotion. Her firm belief in true love is challenged by the inner turmoil caused by entering modern adulthood, but that doesn't mean that her faith is defeated. This time, she's got a little help from her friends: the full band heard here includes JEFF the Brotherhood's Jake Orrall and Diarrhea Planet's Casey Weissbuch, who collaborated with Green over ten days at Sputnik Sound in Nashville, TN. First press of LPs available on clear wax with a blue/pink swirl. All LPs include a download code.

*Surf* is the long-awaited collaboration between the unbilled Chance the Rapper, his band The Social Experiment, and musical ally Donnie Trumpet (a.k.a. Nico Segal). Chance gets his time to shine, spitting acrobatic rhymes throughout, but clearly this is a team effort focused on moving minds and butts. Flecks of big-band instrumentation lend sparkle, while folks like Erykah Badu, Busta Rhymes, Janelle Monáe, and Big Sean provide cameos. The vibe is reminiscent of Native Tongues or Soulquarians, a positive space to submit to creative freedom and unpredictable flow, just like the ocean itself.

A wondrous debut from the house producer of indie-pop romantics The xx, *In Colour* is the sound of dance music heard at helicopter height: beautiful, distant, and surprising at every turn. Whether summoning old-school drum ’n’ bass (“Gosh”) or dancehall-inflected pop (the Young Thug and Popcaan double feature “I Know There’s Gonna Be (Good Times)”), the mood here is consummately relaxed, more like a spring morning than a busy night. Laced throughout the thump and sparkle are fragments of recorded conversation and the ambience of city streets—details that make the music feel as though it has a life of its own.

Following his scintillating debut under the Father John Misty moniker—2012’s *Fear Fun*—journeyman singer/songwriter Josh Tillman delivers his most inspired and candid album yet. Filled with gorgeous melodies and grandiose production, *I Love You, Honeybear* finds Tillman applying his immense lyrical gifts to questions of love and intimacy. “Chateau Lobby 4 (In C for Two Virgins)” is a radiant folk tune, burnished by gilded string arrangements and mariachi horn flourishes. Elsewhere, Tillman pushes his remarkable singing voice to new heights on the album’s powerful centerpiece, “When You’re Smiling and Astride Me,” a soulful serenade of epic proportions. “I’d never try to change you,” he sings, clearly moved. “As if I could, and if I were to, what’s the part that I’d miss most?”

*A word about the refurbished deluxe edition 2xLP* With the new repressing of the deluxe, tri-colored vinyl that is now available again for purchase, we ask just one favor that will also serve as your only and final warning: The deluxe, pop-up-art-displaying jacket WILL warp the new vinyl if said vinyl is inserted back into the jacket sleeves and inserted into your record shelf. To prevent this, we ask that you keep the new LPs outside the deluxe jacket, in the separate white jackets that they ship in. Think of these 2 parts of the same deluxe package as “neighbors, not roommates” on your shelf, and your records will remain unwarped for many years to come (assuming you don’t leave them out in extreme temperatures or expose them to other forces of nature that would normally cause a record to warp…)! *The LP is cut at 45 rpm. Please adjust your turntable speed accordingly!* “I Love You, Honeybear is a concept album about a guy named Josh Tillman who spends quite a bit of time banging his head against walls, cultivating weak ties with strangers and generally avoiding intimacy at all costs. This all serves to fuel a version of himself that his self-loathing narcissism can deal with. We see him engaging in all manner of regrettable behavior. “In a parking lot somewhere he meets Emma, who inspires in him a vision of a life wherein being truly seen is not synonymous with shame, but possibly true liberation and sublime, unfettered creativity. These ambitions are initially thwarted as jealousy, self-destruction and other charming human character traits emerge. Josh Tillman confesses as much all throughout. “The album progresses, sometimes chronologically, sometimes not, between two polarities: the first of which is the belief that the best love can be is finding someone who is miserable in the same way you are and the end point being that love isn’t for anyone who isn’t interested in finding a companion to undertake total transformation with. I won’t give away the ending, but sex, violence, profanity and excavations of the male psyche abound. “My ambition, aside from making an indulgent, soulful, and epic sound worthy of the subject matter, was to address the sensuality of fear, the terrifying force of love, the unutterable pleasures of true intimacy, and the destruction of emotional and intellectual prisons in my own voice. Blammo. “This material demanded a new way of being made, and it took a lot of time before the process revealed itself. The massive, deranged shmaltz I heard in my head, and knew had to be the sound of this record, originated a few years ago while Emma and I were hallucinating in Joshua Tree; the same week I wrote the title track. I chased that sound for the entire year and half we were recording. The means by which it was achieved bore a striking resemblance to the travails, abandon and transformation of learning how to love and be loved; see and be seen. There: I said it. Blammo.” -Josh Tillman (A.K.A. Father John Misty) All LP versions are 45 rpm. All purchases come with digital downloads.

group for her debut album on the highly credible indie Merge Records and her third under the name Waxahatchee. Bred in Alabama and currently living in Philly to avoid the distracting rents of Brooklyn, Crutchfield sings with the unselfconscious joy that comes with succeeding on your own terms, even when she’s confessing to feelings of worthlessness (“The Dirt,” “<“). She’s part indie pop and part concise troubadour, with a band that supports and never gets in the way. Lyrics feel dreamlike and other times quite sincere and concerned, but the minimalist approach feels freeing.

There ARE no simple songs — only simple people. And since guns don't kill people, "Simple Songs" will have to do. Super-sweet terrorism from our very own latter-day Spector!

Courtney Barnett\'s 2015 full-length debut established her immediately as a force in independent rock—although she\'d bristle at any sort of hype, as she sneers on the noise-pop gem \"Pedestrian at Best\": \"Put me on a pedestal and I\'ll only disappoint you/Tell me I\'m exceptional, I promise to exploit you.\" Warnings aside, her brittle riffing and deadpan lyrics—not to mention indelible hooks and nagging sense of unease with the world—helped put *Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit* into the upper echelon of 2010s indie rock. The Melbourne-based singer-songwriter stares at stained ceilings and checks out open houses as she reflects on love, death, and the quality of supermarket produce, making *Sometimes* a crowd-pleaser almost in spite of itself. Propulsive tracks like the hip-shaking \"Elevator Operator\" and the squalling \"Dead Fox\" pair Barnett\'s talked-sung delivery with grungy, hooky rave-ups that sound beamed in from a college radio station\'s 1995 top-ten list. Her singing style isn\'t conversational as much as it is like a one-sided phone call from a friend who spends a lot of time in her own head, figuring out the meaning of life in real time while trying to answer the question \"How are you?\"—and sounding captivating every step of the way. But Barnett can also command blissed-out songs that bury pithy social commentary beneath their distorted guitars—\"Small Poppies\" hides notes about power and cruelty within its wobbly chords, while the marvelous \"Depreston\" rolls thoughts on twentysomething thriftiness, half-glimpsed lives, and shifting ideas of \"home\" across its sun-bleached landscape. While the topics of conversation can be heavy, Barnett\'s keen ear for what makes a potent pop song and her inability to be satisfied with herself make *Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit* a fierce opening salvo.

The peerless indie trio’s first LP in a decade is 33 minutes of pure, lean, honest-to-goodness rock. Corin Tucker is in full command of her howitzer of a voice on standouts like “Surface Envy.” Carrie Brownstein’s haughty punk sneer leads the glorious “A New Wave.” Janet Weiss’ masterful drumming navigates the songwriting’s hairpin tonal shifts, from the glittering “Hey Darling” to the turbulent album closer, “Fade.\" *No Cities to Love* is an electrifying step forward for one of the great American rock bands.

“We sound possessed on these songs,” says guitarist/vocalist Carrie Brownstein about Sleater-Kinney’s eighth studio album, No Cities to Love. “Willing it all–the entire weight of the band and what it means to us–back into existence.” The new record is the first in 10 years from the acclaimed trio–Brownstein, vocalist/guitarist Corin Tucker, and drummer Janet Weiss–who came crashing out of the ’90s Pacific Northwest riot grrrl scene, setting a new bar for punk’s political insight and emotional impact. Formed in Olympia, WA in 1994, Sleater-Kinney were hailed as “America’s best rock band” by Greil Marcus in Time Magazine, and put out seven searing albums in 10 years before going on indefinite hiatus in 2006. But the new album isn’t about reminiscing, it’s about reinvention–the ignition of an unparalleled chemistry to create new sounds and tell new stories. “I always considered Corin and Carrie to be musical soulmates in the tradition of the greats,” says Weiss, whose drums fuel the fire of Tucker and Brownstein’s vocal and guitar interplay. “Something about taking a break brought them closer, desperate to reach together again for their true expression.” The result is a record that grapples with love, power and redemption without restraint. “The three of us want the same thing,” says Weiss. “We want the songs to be daunting.” Produced by long-time Sleater-Kinney collaborator John Goodmanson, who helmed many of the band’s earlier albums including 1997 breakout set Dig Me Out, No Cities to Love is indeed formidable from the first beat. Lead track “Price Tag” is a pounding anthem about greed and the human cost of capitalism, establishing both the album’s melodic drive and its themes of power and powerlessness–giving voice, as Tucker says, to those who “struggle to be heard against the dominant culture or status quo.” “Bury Our Friends” has Tucker and Brownstein joining vocal forces, locking arms to defeat a pressing fear of insignificance. It’s also emblematic of the band’s give and take, and commitment to working and reworking each song until it’s as strong as it can be. “‘Bury Our Friends’ was written in the 11th hour,” says Tucker. “Carrie had her great chime-y guitar riff, but we had gone around in circles with how to make that part into a cohesive song. I think Carrie finally cracked the chorus idea and yelled, ‘Sing with me!’” “A New Wave” similarly went through many iterations during the writing process, with five or six potential choruses, before crystallizing. It enters with an insistent guitar riff, and a battle between acceptance and defiance–“Every day I throw a little party,” howls Brownstein, “but a fit would be more fitting.” The album’s meditative title track was inspired by the trend of atomic tourism and its function as a metaphor for someone enthralled and impressed by power. “That form of power, that presence, is not only destructive it’s also hollowed-out, past its prime,” says Brownstein. “The character in that song has made a ritual out of seeking structures and people in which to find strength, yet they keep coming up empty.” Sleater-Kinney’s decade apart made room for family and other fruitful collaborations, as well as an understanding of what the band’s singular chemistry demands. “Creativity is about where you want your blood to flow, because in order to do something meaningful and powerful there has to be life inside of it,” says Brownstein. “Sleater-Kinney isn’t something you can do half-assed or half-heartedly. We have to really want it. This band requires a certain desperation, a direness. We have to be willing to push because the entity that is this band will push right back.” “The core of this record is our relationship to each other, to the music, and how all of us still felt strongly enough about those to sweat it out in the basement and to try and reinvent our band,” adds Tucker. With No Cities to Love, “we went for the jugular.” –Evie Nagy

Even as a 20-track double album, this is one of the most cohesive and engaging hip-hop debuts you’ll hear. Against dank, ambitious production overseen by storied beat-smith No I.D., the Long Beach rapper documents a life spent learning the power of fear in a gang quarter with vivid wordplay and uncompromising imagery. “Jump Off the Roof”’s paranoid gospel and the woozy soul thump of “C.N.B.” embody a thrilling opus that values darkness and anxiety over radio-baiting hooks.

By their third album, Tribulation had completed their transition from a brilliantly talented Swedish death-metal band into something less easily classifiable. *The Children of the Night* saw the band fully embracing the gothic tendencies that began emerging on 2013’s *The Formulas of Death* while threading black metal and darkly infectious rock. Sinister and elegant, the album’s dazzling guitar acrobatics, eerie piano melodies, and mystical atmosphere—contrasted by the sepulchral vocals of bassist Johannes Andersson —helped the young Swedes become a unique entity.

Drake surprised everyone at the beginning of 2015 when he dropped *If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late*, an impressive 17-track release that combines the contemplative and confrontational with plenty of cavernous production from longtime collaborator Noah “40” Shebib. While Drizzy joins mentor Lil Wayne in questioning the loyalty of old friends on the woozy, Wondagurl-produced “Used To,” “Energy” is the cold-blooded highlight—on which he snarls, “I got enemies.” Later, amid the electrifying barbs of “6PM in New York,” Drake considers his own mortality and legacy: “28 at midnight. I wonder what’s next for me.”

Hop Along has had multiple lives. First conceptualized as a freak-folk solo act by Frances Quinlan, it progressed towards a fuller sound with the addition of Mark Quinlan on drums, Tyler Long on bass and Joe Reinhart (Algernon Cadwallader, Dogs on Acid) on guitar. Emerging as one of music’s most unique songwriters, the captivating vignettes Frances has weaved tell vivid stories of desperation and weary awakening. Their powerful voice is a spellbinding entity all it’s own, celebratory and raw, and one that can’t be shaken away. Like their debut (2012’s Get Disowned), Painted Shut is a series of accounts, a procession of fleeting and repeating characters. However, it diverges from its predecessor in its close-up, controlled approach (most of the album features the band recording live), and more focused portraiture. Whereas Get Disowned calls forth a dreamy collage of protagonists in a tone that’s often anthemic and surreal, Painted Shut is a grounded, less merciful image of many struggling adults (and children) in a severe landscape. Often depicted in Painted Shut are the two lives of legendary (though generally unknown) musicians, Buddy Bolden and Jackson C. Frank, who were plagued with mental illness until their penniless deaths. Included are accounts of more everyday poverty, abuse, greed; and banal, sub-par behavior. Society is unveiled as a structure that, in reality, was most certainly not built with everyone in mind. Clearly this is difficult subject matter. Yet the songs themselves move unencumbered and easily, forming angular pop anti-anthems, at times jubilant as well as irreverent. Somehow, they are not sad songs. There is joy, in the abandon of Frances’ unforgettable voice, in the exulting choruses. One wakes to a sky that is a bright, ageless blue. It’s morning and so clear outside that multitudes of lives can be seen, in focus despite the distance. All of this is viewed through a window sealed with cracked paint that cannot be opened on either side. That is how we must often view the lives of others, especially when it comes to people who have lived and gone from this world. That’s another story. Painted Shut was co-produced, recorded and mixed by John Agnello (Kurt Vile, Dinosaur Jr., Sonic Youth, etc.) in the great cities of Philadelphia and Brooklyn, and incidentally finished in the shortest span of time the band has ever made anything.

Lore is the third full-length album by Elder and a watershed moment in the band's history. Joining the interplay of heaviness and melody which has become the hallmark Elder sound are a host of new meanderings through uncharted kosmische territory; krautrock, prog as well as classic heavy rock and doom can all be heard unfolding throughout the record's five songs. By giving equal credence to riffs and atmosphere, Lore bypasses genre constraints, the group's penchant for progressive songwriting and melody shining more brightly than ever. ------ US buyers can preorder the vinyl and CD here: www.armageddonshop.com/search.php?artist=ELDER European buyers can preorder the vinyl and CD here: www.stickman-records.de

Nashville’s one-man hit factory presses pause on the production line for a soulful solo debut. 13 years in the writing, the tracks on *Traveller* possess choruses as effortlessly infectious as anything Stapleton has gifted to high profile clients like Adele and Luke Bryan but there’s a fascinating desperation to the themes here. From the wild, sleepless delirium at the heart of “Parachute” to the bandit bluegrass on “Outlaw State of Mind”, this is country rock that’s unafraid to explore drink, drugs, and a very dark underbelly.

Mark Ronson reaches new collaborative heights on the wonderfully funky *Uptown Special*. In addition to writing lyrics alongside Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Michael Chabon, the multi-instrumentalist DJ/producer enlists musical genius of all stripes, from Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker to Mystikal to Jeff Bhasker. While Stevie Wonder lends his touch to the astral melodies of the album’s opening and closing cuts, Bruno Mars pays brilliant homage to Prince on the propulsive “Uptown Funk.” Get ready to move.

Simmering with slow-burning soul, Natalie Prass’ debut features sophisticated arrangements supported by strings and a horn section. Gorgeous melodies and memorable hooks grace its nine songs and give the album a cohesive mood. Standout tracks like “Bird of Prey” and “Your Fool” play like a cross between Dusty Springfield and classic Philly soul without sounding overtly retro. Her understated, intimate voice is both delicate and darkly sly, a perfect pairing to the sensibilities of producer Matthew E. White and the Spacebomb Records house band. The result is an impressive and assured debut that deserves close attention.

For their sixth album, Screaming Females work with producer Matt Bayles (Mastodon, Pearl Jam) in place of Steve Albini, who’d produced their previous two albums. The change means a fuller sound without a slick neutering of the band. “Broken Neck,” “Hopeless,” and the title track benefit from a powerful guitar tone and having Marissa Paternoster’s vocals securely in the mix. The harmonies, in particular, take on dramatic color. The New Jersey–based power trio succeed by never overdoing their parts, leaving just enough room for the sound to resonate beyond its initial station. *Rose Mountain* refines the trio’s attack to keep things interesting. 

Drilling down on the extremes of the *Cassette* EP, the first full-length from Viet Cong (later to be known as Preoccupations) is an inspired mix of gritty and beautiful, pairing fractured blasts of noise with plush synths (“Newspaper Spoons”) and deadpan vocals with striking lattices of guitar (“Bunker Buster”)—a sound that shouldn’t make as much sense as it does. Best of all is “March of Progress,” which opens with nearly three minutes of industrial wheezing before ascending to a breathless (and surprisingly catchy) rave-up—a high point on an album full of them.

Recorded in a barn-turned-studio in rural Ontario, the seven songs that make up 'Viet Cong' were born largely on the road, when Flegel and bandmates Mike Wallace, Scott Munro and Daniel Christiansen embarked on a 50-date tour that stretched virtually every limit imaginable. Close quarters hastened their exhaustion but also honed them as a group. You can designate records as seasonal, and you can feel Preoccupations's bleakness and declare it wintry. But the only way you get a frost is when there's something warmer to freeze up. So yes, 'Viet Cong' is a winter album, but only until it is a spring record, then a summer scorcher, then an autumn burner, then it ices over again.

“Don’t remove my pain / It is my chance to heal.” Delivered in a wounded cry of desperation, this lyric—from standout track “Notget”—is emblematic of Björk’s profoundly vulnerable ninth studio album. Given sonic texture by her lush string arrangements and the skittering beats of co-producer Arca, *Vulnicura* was written in response to the dissolution of Björk’s longtime relationship with artist Matthew Barney. Following the cosmically conceptual *Biophilia* (2011), it’s disarming yet reassuring to hear the Icelandic icon’s stratospheric voice wailing bluntly about recognizable human emotions. In the vibrant album closer “Quicksand,” she sings of finding new life through heartache: “The steam from this pit / Will form a cloud / For her to live on.”

Like Prince, André 3000, and Marvin Gaye before him, R&B pinup Miguel treats carnal love as a spiritual journey. His third album is a humid mix of new wave, psychedelia, and electro-pop whose moods flip from tender to funny to gloriously X-rated, often in the same song. Foul-mouthed, yes, but he’s also surprisingly well mannered—the rare male R&B singer who compares his private moments to porn one minute (“the valley”) and offers to bring you coffee the next (“Coffee”).

Godspeed You! Black Emperor (GYBE) returns with its first single LP-length release since the group's earliest days in 1997-99. 'Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress' clocks in at a succinct 40:23 and is arguably the most focused and best-sounding recording of the band's career. Working with sound engineer Greg Norman (Electrical Audio) at studios in North Carolina and Montreal, GYBE slowly and steadily put the new album together through late 2013 and 2014, emerging with a mighty slab of superlative sonics, shot through with all the band's inimitable signposts and touchstones: huge unison riffage, savage noise/drone, oscillating overtones, guitar vs. string counterpoint, inexorable crescendos and scorched-earth transitions. Following Godspeed's return from a long hiatus at the end of 2010 to begin playing live shows again, and with the hugely acclaimed 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! release in 2012 marking their first new release in a decade, the group continued to perform regularly on their own headlining tours (and as headliners at many leading festivals), often including a new multi-movement piece in concert over the past couple of years. Known to fans and through live show recordings by the sobriquet "Behemoth", GYBE has gradually distilled this new work down to a fastidious and uncompromising essence in the studio, with the swing-time swagger of the opening unison riff in "Peasantry or 'Light! Inside of Light!'" giving way to increasing microtonal divergences and an exhilarating immersion in the harmonic power of massed amplified instruments, before collapsing into some of the most visceral and unalloyed noise/drone the band has yet committed to tape on "Lambs' Breath" and "’Asunder, Sweet'”. The album closes with "Piss Crowns Are Trebled", a classic 14-minute piece of vintage Godspeed, where ascending and descending guitar and violin melodies intertwine over gut-rattling distorted bass in 3/4 time, segueing into a pummeling four-on-the-floor series of sparkling, soaring crescendos 'Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress' finds Godspeed in top form; a sterling celebration of the band's awesome dialectic, where composition, emotion and 'note-choice' is inextricable from an exacting focus on tone, timbre, resonance and the sheer materiality of sound. The album is available on 180 gram vinyl in a gatefold jacket with printed inner sleeve and insert poster, on CD in a 100% recycled custom paperboard jacket, and on all manner of formats in our fractured digital marketplace. Thanks for listening.

After a 12-year break between studio albums, Blur remain as intrepid and inventive as they’ve ever been. *The Magic Whip* finds the Britpop icons reuniting with a collection that\' s both wonderfully familiar and endlessly surprising. “Lonesome Street” kicks off with the ecstatic crunch of guitar and then takes on new colors and textures, with psychedelic synth flourishes and kooky harmonies. While the gleefully distorted “I Broadcast” buzzes and roars, the melancholy sway of “New World Towers” and the serpentine soul of “My Terracotta Heart” leave a haunting afterglow.

Hailed as the post-Internet savior of New York rap, A$AP Rocky fully embraces the weight of those lofty expectations on his ambitious sophomore full-length. *AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP* finds the unflappable Harlem native marveling at his own meteoric success through an expertly curated set of beats—with production that corrals toothsome rock and soul samples, atmospheric pop menace, and trunk-rattling traditionalism. While “Wavybone” is a simple yet deeply satisfying highlight that also features sterling performances from two of Rocky’s most audible influences, Juicy J and UGK, “L$D” combines woozy low end and a glittering tangle of xx-like guitar lines for a psychedelic love song that’s sung but not rapped. “Everyday” turns a soulful Rod Stewart vocal sample (from the 1970 Python Lee Jackson cut “In a Broken Dream”) into a massive, Miguel and Mark Ronson–assisted meditation on fame and happiness.

Following on the heels of *Dr. Lecter* and *Saaab Stories*, Queens rapper Action Bronson releases his sprawling major-label debut. Featuring glittering, stoned-soul productions from vets like The Alchemist and newcomers like Party Supplies, *Mr. Wonderful* careens through tall tales of global travel and gourmet food with style, imagination, and a dizzying sense of humor. “All I do is eat oysters/And I speak six languages in three voices,\" Bronson raps on “Actin’ Crazy,” a testament to both talent and appetite.

Ryley Walker is the reincarnation of the true American guitar player. That’s as much a testament to his roving, rambling ways, or the fact that his Guild D-35 guitar has endured a few stints in the pawnshop. Swap out rural juke joints for rotted DIY spaces and the archetype is solidly intact. His personal life might be tumultuous and his residential status in question, but his bedrock is disciplined daily rehearsal and an inexhaustible wellspring of songcraft. Raised on the banks of the ol’ Rock River in northern Illinois, Ryley’s early life doesn’t give us much more than Midwestern mundanity to speak of. Things start to pick up for young Walker when he moves to Chicago in 2007 and briefly attempts a collegiate lifestyle as he storms the always fecund local noise scene with his Jasmine-brand electric guitar; just a cheap knock-off from which he could coax unearthly sound hallucinations. A few years of wasted finger-bleeding basement shows variably under the names Heatdeath and Wyoming (with requisite cassette-only releases) firmly established his name locally, if not always positively. Ryley transitioned slowly into the finger-style artist we know today in 2008 and 2009, still opening for synth nerds in basement venues, but growing by leaps and bounds in virtuosity. He perfunctorily maintained day jobs with frequently amusing results, famously getting fired from Jimmy John’s for practicing in the walk-in freezer. By 2011, at age 21, he finally began issuing recordings from his already impressive catalog of compositions. 'Evidence of Things Unseen' and 'Of Deathly Premonitions' (with Daniel Bachman) appeared briefly as limited cassette releases. Both efforts were impressive displays of fingerpicking prowess though not fully elaborated documents. It was a 2012 bike accident that set Ryley on his current path. He quit his day job to recuperate but instead of returning to the grind he duked it out on the rock club circuit. Practice became more diligent; he began lacquering his fingertips at cheap salons, permanently giving his playing aggression and tone difficult to achieve with naked fingertips or finger picks. Though seen as part of the fraternity of young guitar masters like William Tyler and Daniel Bachman, his voice defied that stereotype. He was finding a new path refracting the British traditional spectrum, from Bert Jansch to Nick Drake, and defying all the limitations of the genre. His 2013 recordings, that resulted in The West Wind EP and All Kinds of You LP, fully express these Anglophilic tendencies to the point of nearly exhausting their possibilities. This brings us to the present. The board was barely reset from the All Kinds of You sessions before Ryley was corralling his by-then-rejiggered band back into Minbal studios in Chicago to solidify a totally new direction in his creative vision. Primrose Green couldn’t be restrained. It begins near where All Kinds of You leaves off but quickly pushes far afield. The title sounds pastoral and quaint, but the titular green has dark hallucinogenic qualities, as does much of the LP. The band is a mixture of new and old Chicago talent, blending both jaded veterans of the post-rock and jazz mini-circuits together with a few eager, open-eared youths. Fred Lonberg-Holm, cellist, is as of now a member of Chicago’s old guard of jazz musicians, having played numerously alongside luminaries Peter Brotzmann and Joe McPhee, to name just two lines on a very long list. Frank Rosaly, drums, is approaching the same longevity and padded resume, managing long stints with Josh Abrams, David Boykins, and Doug McCombs. Jason Adasiewicz, vibraphone, gigs with Exploding Star Orchestra and Jagjaguwar alums Manishevitz and anyone else in town who needs vibes. Anton Hatwich, double bass, has been playing live with Ryley’s band for almost a year now, while still holding it down with various trios and quartets. (It’s worth stating at this point that this is not a jazz record. Chicago has blurred these lines since forever.) The core of Ryley’s band continues to be Brian Sulpizio, guitar, and Ben Boye, piano or harmonium. The telepathic intuition between them took root with their Health & Beauty project under which they’ve issued a handful of cassettes, particularly Chicago’s best kept secret masterpiece from the ‘teens, Guns. Ben Boye is perhaps best known as a member of The Cairo Gang, Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s recording and touring band for a few years (before he retreated to personal and spiritual isolation in New Mexico). Today he shares his time as well with Joshua Abrams’ expansive ensemble Natural Information Society. Brian spends his non-guitar playing time as a recording engineer, including the final stereo mix heard on this very record, or in a liminal state beyond consciousness. Last but certainly not least amongst the musicians is Whitney Johnson on viola and intermittent background vocals. Besides being the go-to violist in the tri-state-area, she also plays with the experimental quintet Verma (Trouble In Mind) and helms her own even-more-experimental solo project, the fragiley beautiful Matchess (also on Trouble in Mind). Cooper Crain, recording engineer and de facto producer, is known as member of contemporary Krautrock act Cave (Drag City) and founder of new age secularists Bitchin’ Bajas who have risen to the top of the synth-drone mountain with their last few Drag City releases. Though his musicianship isn’t heard here, his undefined creative energies are uncontainable and splashed across this LP. Ryley didn’t have much time to write this LP, so some of it he didn’t… bits of lyrics were improvised into full-blown songs in the studio on the fly more often than not. However, the ratty bits of handwritten words that make up the balance of the record were largely pieced together while on an ill-fated 2013 tour with Irish guitar whiz Cian Nugent. The title track “Primrose Green” was nearly discarded after its incarnation on a bleak St. Patrick’s Day spent in Oxford, Mississippi. “Primrose Green” is a colloquial term for a cocktail of whiskey and morning glory seeds that has a murky, dreamy, absinthian quality when imbibed, and a spirit-crushing aftereffect the morning after. It is the moment before departure from Ryley’s All Kinds Of You mindstate. “Summer Dress” is liftoff… seizing the mantle from Tim Buckley’s Starsailor and perfecting its frantic jazz-induced fits. It was written in a dressing room in upstate New York, but perfected in rehearsal, veering between a six and ten minute epic. Contained here is the flawless conclusion, but reference the live set to experience the full possibilities of this anarchic work. A forgotten roadside hotel in Tennessee yielded one song, “Same Minds”, with just a hint of self-loathing. It was kicked around in rehearsal until taking its shape as a drifting bit of dreamy jazz. A 5-day stretch in Austin, mostly staying on Lechuguillas’ Jason Camacho’s tile floor with no blanket in a room barely large enough for one yielded most of the rest of the lyrics. “Griffiths Bucks Blues” was almost jettisoned but a thumbs-up from Jason kept it in the repertoire. Griffith Buck was a local artist and eccentric botanist in Ryley’s hometown of Rockford, Illinois who has likely had few other songs named for him. “Love Can Be Cruel” spends almost two minutes “out” before becoming the song it was originally intended to be. Drummer Frank Rosaly pushes the song further and further until it borders on a cathartic meltdown to close out Side A. Side B sets off with a shot of Americana, “On The Banks Of The Old Kishwaukee”. It’s an ode to the immersion baptisms Ryley’s witnessed while walking along the banks. Unlike the idyllic memories of christenings under the weeping willows while a crowd looks on happily in their Sunday’s best at the healthy young catechumens; the river was brown and polluted and the participants dirty and tired and disinterested. “Sweet Satisfaction” presents some of Ryley’s most intricate and ecstatic fingerpicking. It’s hard not to recall John Martyn’s early 1970s work, though Ben Boye’s piano work is particularly revelatory here. “The High Road” was written while the trio of Ben, Ryley, and Brian Sulpizio (guitar) were on tour, opening for Cloud Nothings. Stuck crashing in a busted, unheated old house in New Orleans Ben sunk into a depression, Brian drank and Ryley drank, but also managed to turn out this ode to the rambling life. “All Kinds Of You” is the oldest song included here. The title should seem familiar… it was written after his first LP, All Kinds of You, was finished, but the name seemed to fit that collection of songs better than anything else. By now, the song has seen many transformations and now sits more comfortably amongst Primrose Green’s cosmic transmissions. Lyrically, it copes with Ryley’s roadworn identity crises, the need to be so many people in so many cities, trying to fit in however possible in different hemispheres or different languages. Side B closes with a bit of tossback: “Hide In The Roses”, the only solo jam included herein. Cooper Crain (Cave, Bitchin’ Bajas), de-facto producer of the record, encouraged Ryley to use the extra studio time to bang something out, and this brilliant piece of Anglophilia emerged as the album’s closer. No one knows what the future holds for young Ryley Walker. Hardship and setbacks and dilapidated housing only seem to spur him on creatively. Here, with this record, we risk limiting his access to personal disaster by flirting with success. A short lifetime of interminable practice and discipline have resulted in a masterpiece of an album, an album of a sort we haven’t seen since the 1970s. If the world catches on, the Ryley that follows up this album may be a different sort of person, one who knows the taste of better liquor and comfortable bedding and isn’t nearly as driven. I think he will be just as visionary, though less hungry, but either way... this is the time to get on the Ryley Walker bandwagon.

This debut from brothers Swae Lee and Slim Jimmy, a.k.a. Rae Sremmurd, proves that Southern hip-hop is as bumping and irreverent as ever. This is the soundtrack to delinquency; its roiling low end and chopped-up beats foreground the antics of the devil-may-care protagonists. Whether it\'s praising the local gentlemen\'s club on the Minaj feature \"Throw Sum Mo\" or comparing themselves to Donald Trump, these boys just wanna have fun.

Produced & mixed by Nicolas Vernhes & Speedy Ortiz Engineered by Gabe Wax at Rare Book Room, Brooklyn, NY Mastered by Emily Lazar & assisted by Chris Allgood at The Lodge, New York, NY Art by Sadie Dupuis Art photography & craft support by Caitlin Bechtel All songs by Sadie Dupuis/ July Was Hot (BMI) ©2015 Carpark Records CAK 103 Buy this IRL: store.carparkrecords.com/products/543382-cak103-speedy-ortiz-foil-deer

"The Best Folk Album Of The Year" – FADER Magazine "She’s a singer with an unmistakable and communicative voice, able to convey hope and hurt with equal clarity" – Pitchfork The Weather Station, the musical project of Toronto artist Tamara Lindeman, has announced a new album, entitled Loyalty. The project's first release on the Outside Music label in Canada wrestles with knotty notions of faithfulness and faithlessness to our idealism, our constructs of character, our memories, and to our family, friends, and lovers representing a bold step forward into new sonic and psychological inscapes. It's a natural progression for Lindeman's acclaimed songwriting practice. Recorded at La Frette Studios just outside Paris in the winter of 2014, in close collaboration with Afie Jurvanen (Bahamas) and Robbie Lackritz (Feist), Loyalty crystallizes her lapidary songcraft into eleven emotionally charged vignettes and intimate portraits, redolent of fellow Canadians Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, and David Wiffen, but utterly her own. Loyalty brings a freshly unflinching self-examining gaze and emotional & musical control to The Weather Station's songs. Sonically, the record is a quietly radical statement, with certain passages achieving an eerie harmonic and rhythmic tension new to The Weather Station. An extraordinary singer and instrumentalist on Loyalty she plays guitar, banjo, keys, and vibes but Lindeman has always been a songwriter's songwriter, recognized for her intricate, carefully worded verse, filled with double meanings, ambiguities, and complex metaphors. Though more moving than ever, her writing here is almost clinical in its discipline, its deliberate wording and exacting delivery, evoking similarly idiosyncratic songsters from Linda Perhacs to Bill Callahan. Lyrically, Loyalty inverts and involutes the language of confession, of regret, of our most private and muddled mental feelings, by externalizing those anxieties through exquisite observation of the things and people we accumulate, the modest meanings accreted during even our most ostensibly mundane domestic moments.

Rapper Earl Sweatshirt’s third album is a dark, fascinating trip to the bottom of the self. Lyrically, Earl is a singular talent, capable of dense, expressive lines that flip back and forth between humor and pain, despair and resolve. “My days numbered, I’m focused heavy on making the most of ’em/I feel like I’m the only one pressin’ to grow upwards,” he raps on “Faucet,” over beats as hazy and fragmented as the words themselves.

Producer Ben Brodin has clearly listened to Steve Albini’s recordings of The Jesus Lizard, and New England’s Pile must also be fans. “The World Is Your Motel” begins practically in mid-sentence, with drums pounding away in the back of the warehouse while the guitars discover riffs. The nasty assault returns in variations throughout the album, one of the better postpunk efforts to mine this territory. Singer Rick Maguire turns existence into a joke, and he’s not nearly as interested in hitting the proper notes that a more “conscientious” singer might. That’s what makes “Tin Foil Hat,” “Hot Breath,” and “Touched by Comfort” so endearing. Pile do what they want.

Recorded and mixed in October of 2014 by Ben Brodin in Studio B of Another Recording Company in Omaha, Nebraska. Mastered by Bob Weston at Chicago Mastering Service. Artwork by Adric Giles and Ethan Long. Released by Exploding in Sound Records in March of 2015.

*Barter 6* was billed first as Young Thug’s debut album, then a retail mixtape; either way, the 2015 release was the sharpest, clearest statement yet from Atlanta’s most enigmatic rapper. From the gently rippling intro, “Constantly Hating,” to the swirling, cathartic haze of “Just Might Be,” Thug contorts his voice into endless shapes and pulls previously unheard harmonies out of his back pocket. “Check” is a giddy celebration of success, and “Halftime” is rap as high-wire routine: a technical performance as reckless as it is graceful.

Warren’s urgent lyricism and spare orchestration carry echoes of Elliott Smith.

Released on Team Love Records. This album is dedicated to The Moon: by honoring her phases, I am restoring balance to my body and spirit; and to the divine feminine: by collectively cultivating her, may we restore balance to our world.

Using black metal as nihilistic cement to hold all sorts of other nasty styles together, Jef Whitehead takes his one-man project in a multitude of directions on this 2015 album. “The Smoke of Their Torment” and “Dawn Vibration” tear you limb from limb with death metal, but they’re linked by a biblical passage and punctuated by phantom screams. Droning doom, industrial noise, and avant-garde effects seep in elsewhere. Especially in the morose 10-minute title cut, the landscape shifts nonstop.