Uncut's Top 75 Albums of 2015

Bold experimentalism is key for Californian Julia Holter. Her third album is a melange of thoughtful, alternative approaches to pop. “Feel You”’s harpsichord jauntiness and skittish drums provide the idea platform for the album’s textual tapestry. Syncopated jazz (“Vazquez”), hypnotic shanties (“Sea Calls Me Home”) and aching torch songs (“How Long?” and “Night Song”) all follow, but the tone—while opulent, rich and dramatic—never feels false. “Silhouette” is a gorgeously off-kilter, while “Betsy on the Roof” builds from barely a whisper.

Have You In My Wilderness is Julia Holter’s most intimate album yet, a collection of radiant ballads. Her follow-up to 2013’s widely celebrated Loud City Song explores love, trust, and power in human relationships. While love songs are familiar fodder in pop music, Holter manages to stay fascinatingly oblique and enigmatic on her new album. Have You in My Wilderness is also Holter’s most sonically intimate album. Here, she and producer Cole Marsden Greif-Neill lift her voice out of the layers of smeared, hazy effects, putting her vocals front and center in the mix. The result is striking—it sounds as if Holter is singing right in your ear. It sounds clear and vivid, but also disarmingly personal. The focused warm sound and instrumentation — dense strings, subtle synth pads — adds to the effect. Like Holter’s previous albums, Have You in My Wilderness is multi-layered and texturally rich, featuring an array of electronic and acoustic instruments played by an ensemble of gifted Los Angeles musicians. Have You In My Wilderness deals with dark themes, but it also features some of the most sublime and transcendent music Holter has ever written. The ten songs on the album are shimmering and dreamlike, wandering the liminal space between the conscious and the subconscious.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Tame Impala may have been forged in the familiar fires of guitar-driven psych-rock, but Kevin Parker began expanding that brief almost immediately, shifting from dank, distorted solos to widescreen, synth-swept fantasias. By the time *Currents* arrived in 2015, the Fremantle home-studio whiz had made his grandest leap yet, offering his particular take on outsized, club-ready pop. That meant mostly sidelining guitars and ramping up the lead role of those synths. Parker had always made Tame Impala records as a solo endeavor, using a proper band primarily to realize songs in a live setting. Yet this third album saw him applying more painstaking control than ever before, not just playing and writing every single part but recording and mixing the entire thing as well. Even fans who had noticed Parker’s increasing pop sensibilities across 2012’s *Lonerism* were somewhat taken aback by *Currents*’ bravura opening statement, “Let It Happen,” an ambitious dance-floor epic that foregrounded glitter-bomb synths and alternately dipping and peaking rhythms. The band’s trajectory changed over the course of a single track, which stretches out over nearly eight minutes and indulges in remix-style record-skipping and lengthy stretches without vocals. Between the disco grooves, Parker still finds time for Tame Impala’s sonic signatures—floaty vocals, soul-searching lyrics, fleeting interludes. As lush as the production is (which you can hear in the joyous vocal layering and panning on “The Moment”), the increased scope of these songs is matched by the same rich emotional content, making it feel like Parker is sharing his most private moments. From the vulnerability displayed on “Yes I’m Changing,” which muses on growing older against unironic soft-rock motifs, to his interrogations of masculinity and romance on “\'Cause I’m a Man,” Parker is still committed to airing intimate, almost diary-like sentiments. Meditative album closer “New Person, Same Old Mistakes” says it all. Still, Parker doesn’t have to distance himself from formative heroes like Todd Rundgren and The Flaming Lips in the name of artistic growth. Evoking the mirror-ball dazzle of roller rinks and discos, here he continues to cherry-pick from the past in order to imagine a sophisticated musical future that’s appealing across multiple fronts but still strikes directly at the heart. And the risky decision to shelve guitars clearly paid off: *Currents* took Tame Impala to the big leagues, where he could now collaborate with Lady Gaga, get covered by Rihanna (a version of “New Person, Same Old Mistakes” appeared as “Same Ol’ Mistakes” on 2016’s *ANTI*), and headline Coachella. It also provided a natural progression to 2020’s *The Slow Rush*, an even more immersive and personal synth-funk odyssey.

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.

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.

Dance music has undergone a seismic shift in the last decade. So how do synth-pop pioneers New Order respond on their first LP since 2005? For \"Restless,\" they go straight back to their roots. It\'s a shimmering pop opus of ringing guitars, a \'60s radio chorus, and those familiar atmospheric synths from original keyboardist Gillian Gilbert, who returns on *Music Complete*. But she\'s not the only old friend here: keep an ear out for vocals from Iggy Pop and some production tricks from The Chemical Brothers\' Tom Rowlands.

The long awaited album will be New Order’s first full studio release since 2005’s Waiting For The Siren’s Call, and their debut for Mute. Music Complete finds the group revitalised, and where the group has previously pushed toward electronics or guitars, here the two are in balance. Music Complete also marks a return to the studio for Gillian Gilbert, this is her first album with New Order since 2001’s Get Ready.

“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.”

Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s third album filters the warped, psychedelic strangeness of 2011’s *Unknown Mortal Orchestra* and 2013’s *II* through the novelistic side of soul artists like Prince and Stevie Wonder. Named in part after multi-instrumentalist mastermind Ruban Nielson’s difficult foray into polyamory, *Multi-Love* explores huge themes (trust, love, family) with vintage synthesizers and analog haze, flirting with disco (“Can’t Keep Checking My Phone”), funk (“Necessary Evil”), and soft rock along the way.

The threads of our past never unravel, they hover like invisible webs, occasionally glistening due to a sly angle of the sun. On 'Multi-Love', Unknown Mortal Orchestra frontman and multi-instrumentalist Ruban Nielson reflects on relationships: airy, humid longing, loss, the geometry of desire that occurs when three people align. Where Nielson addressed the pain of being alone on II, 'Multi-Love' takes on the complications of being together. 'Multi-Love' adds dimensions to the band's already kaleidoscopic approach, with Nielson exploring a newfound appreciation for synthesizers. The new songs channel the spirit of psych innovators without ignoring the last 40 years of music, forming a flowing, cohesive whole that reflects restless creativity. Cosmic escapes and disco rhythms speak to developing new vocabulary, while Nielson's vocals reach powerful new heights. "It felt good to be rebelling against the typical view of what an artist is today, a curator," he says. "It's more about being someone who makes things happen in concrete ways. Building old synthesizers and bringing them back to life, creating sounds that aren't quite like anyone else's. I think that’s much more subversive." While legions of artists show fidelity to the roots of psychedelia, Unknown Mortal Orchestra shares the rare quality that makes the genre's touchstones so vital: constant exploration.

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!

The former Drive-By Trucker delivers his most diverse album yet in *Something More Than Free*, a beautifully observed and finely conceived collection of windswept rock that finds the singer/songwriter exploring questions of place and identity. While “Speed Trap Town” perfectly captures the feeling of growing up in rural America, “24 Frames” ponders faith and family—all with the lyrical acuity of Townes Van Zandt and the melodic aplomb of Tom Petty.

"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.

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.

This thrilling Congolese band mixes old, new, and spacey.

Holly Herndon's second album Platform proposes new fantasies and rejuvenates old optimism. Herndon has become a leading light in contemporary music by experimenting within the outer reaches of dance music and pop songwriting possibilities. A galvanising statement, Platform signals Herndon's transformation as an electronic musician to a singular voice. For More Info: shop.igetrvng.com/collections/all/products/rvngnl29

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

As epitomised by a title track referencing his haemorrhoids, the former Czars frontman has lost none of his candor or humor on this third solo album. His melodic skill remains intact too and, after the electro-pop of 2013’s *Pale Green Ghosts*, Grant investigates robotic funk (“Snug Slacks”), taut techno (“Disappointing”) and sumptuous FM rock (“Down Here”) while skewering ex-lovers and contemplating personal crises. Even on his most upbeat record yet, it’s an ability to amuse, shock and discomfit–sometimes in just one verse–that makes Grant such a compelling songwriter.

It’s been the most spectacular of journeys, from a place in time when John Grant feared he’d never make music again, to winning awards, accolades and Top 20 chart positions, and collaborating with Sinead O’Connor, Goldfrapp, Elton John and Hercules & Love Affair. The fact he subsequently won a Best International Male Solo Artist nomination at the 2014 BRITS alongside Justin Timberlake, Eminem, Bruno Mars and Drake, seemed like some fantasy dreamt up in a moment of outrageous hubris. Just months later, the BBC’s request for a session with a symphony orchestra followed by Grant taking the Royal Northern Sinfonia on a UK tour, confirmed that it was simply the latest spectacular chapter in his personal and artistic renaissance. Now comes Grant’s third album, the invitingly titled Grey Tickles, Black Pressure, a veritable tour de force that further refines and entwines his two principal strands of musical DNA, namely the sumptuous tempered ballad and the taut, fizzing electronic pop song. There are newer musical accomplishments across its panoply of towering sound, like the title track’s new steely demeanour, while the ominous drama of “Black Blizzard” echoes both John Carpenter and Bernard ‘Black Devil Disco Club’ Fevre’s beautiful and icy synthscapes. The contagious, gleeful “You And Him” marries buzzing rock with a squelchy electronic undertow, while orchestral drama swathes the bad-dreamy “Global Warming” and the album’s gorgeously aching widescreen finale “Geraldine”. Grey Tickles, Black Pressure was recorded in Dallas with producer John Congleton (St Vincent, Franz Ferdinand, Swans) - coincidentally the same state of Texas where Grant nailed his 2010 solo debut Queen Of Denmark in the company of Denton’s wondrous Midlake. After that landmark return, which MOJO made its album of 2010, 2013’s Pale Green Ghosts was made in Icelandic capital Reykjavik (where Grant, a native of Buchanan, Michigan, later raised in Parker, Colorado, has lived ever since), which entered the UK Top 20 in its first week and ended up as Rough Trade Shop’s Album of the Year 2013, The Guardian’s No.2 and in MOJO and Uncut’s Top Five). Such recognition, iced by years of sell-out shows across Europe and a recent US tour as special invited guest of the legendary Pixies, should allow the notoriously self-critical and insecure Grant the passing thought that Grey Tickles, Black Pressure will deservedly cement his reputation as the most disarmingly honest, caustic, profound and funny diarist of the human condition in the persistently testing, even tragic, era that is the 21st century. “I do think the album’s great, and I’m really proud of it,” he says. “I wanted to get moodier and angrier on this record, but I probably had a lot more fun making it.” He cites “amazing” session keyboardist Bobby Sparks, “who really funked things up,” as part of that fun; likewise a month of Dallas sunshine “after a brutal dark winter in Iceland. And there was a lot of laughter.” That said, fun isn’t the first ingredient you’d expect when you know the root of the album title. “‘Grey tickles’ is the literal translation from Icelandic for ‘mid-life crisis’, while ‘black pressure’ is the direct translation from Turkish for ‘nightmare’,” Grant explains, an unusually gifted linguist (he’s fluent in German, Russian and now tackling Icelandic). Nevertheless, there are plenty of positive streaks in Grey Tickles, Black Pressure. Grant is in fabulous voice throughout and has moved on from the specific subject matter that shaped both previous albums (though the concept of love always figures into the mix) “Disappointing” – featuring vocal guest Tracey Thorn – is an exuberant tribute to new love, against which Grant’s favourite Saturday Night Live comediennes, Russian artists and “ballet dancers with or without tights” pale in comparison. The album’s other two guests are vocalist Amanda Palmer and former Banshee’s drummer Budgie. Petur Hallgrimsson (guitar) and Jakob Smari Magnusson (bass) from Grant’s live band, and returning arranger Fiona Brice, complete what was a particularly happy studio family. Even the album’s creative process was a triumph against adversity. Having had to include new material for the orchestral tour, John Congleton then asked that Grant turn up in Dallas with all the new material written. In spite of being exceedingly untalented in the art of time management AND the dark, brutal Icelandic winter which always takes a toll, “I got everything written in time,” he says, “and then it was all recorded and mixed in a month - which for me is insane, because I always want more time and I’m such an over-thinker. I intentionally put myself into that situation because I wanted to challenge myself, as I’ve done with every album.” But the end result is indeed a moody, angry record, laced with levering humour and wounded pathos, yet as dark as Reykjavik in February. It starts and ends with spoken word snippets called, simply, “Intro” and “Outro”, both taken from the same Biblical quote (from 1 Corinthians 13) regarding the divinity of love that young John was taught in church. In between are 12 songs that document the reality of love on planet Earth, corrupted by “pain, misunderstandings, jealousy, objectification and expectations,” as Grant puts it. Love corrupted is explored by the likes of the dreamy AOR-gasm “Down Here”, with its “oceans of longing, guessing games and no guarantees”, according to Grant. The funky Crisco-disco of “Snug Slacks” rails against those beautiful people – “the modern celebrity” he says - who so unnerve him, forcing him “to have developed such a very high tolerance for inappropriate behaviour” of the lyric. But there is hatred too. “You And Him” rails against those who’d crush all before them, from the profiteering US food and tobacco industries to property developers and those thugs who perpetuate prejudice and bigotry. The title track posits that “children who have cancer” means we mustn’t indulge in self-pity. However, he notes, we must grin and bare it while waiting for death to take everything we’ve fought so hard to gain. The twisting electro-rhythmic “Voodoo Doll” is a counterbalance, “for a friend who is far away in the throes of depression, I make a voodoo doll and do good things to it, even though things invariably gets messy!” If only Grant had such a benefactor when young, blushing uncontrollably with shame, an awful memory brought to life in the simmering cauldron of “Magma Arrives”. The album’s last two songs are among its finest. “No More Tangles” fights against co-dependency “with narcissistic queers,” he sings, through the metaphor of hair care products. “It’s about not apologizing for who you are and not putting up with unnecessary bullshit from people who do not care about you”. “Although my story is no more or less important than anyone else’s, at least at this point I can admit to being a human who deserves to be happy no more or less than anyone else.” But in “Geraldine” (as in the late Geraldine Paige, “one of freakiest, strongest, coolest actresses I’ve come across”), Grant’s latest actor-inspired song (following “Sigourney Weaver” and “Ernest Borgine”) is Grant’s chance to ask her if she too had to “put up with this shit” that life dishes out. Ongoing health issues (not least of which is handling his HIV Positive status), still processing, “decades of brainwashing,” he says from a traumatic childhood, Grant still manages to keep fighting the good fight, and writing his way out of trouble with another fantastic record. “I want to continue to challenge myself,” he says. “To keep collaborating, to get the sound or the direction that will take me where I need to go. To keep taking the bull by the horns.”

Harpist and singer/songwriter Joanna Newsom’s idiosyncratic take on folk and Americana has always been a powerful—if polarizing—experience. Her fourth album strikes a balance between the ornate orchestral explorations of 2006’s *Ys* and the more stripped-down confessions of 2010’s *Have One on Me*. She blends labyrinthine wordplay (“Bleach a collar/Leach a dollar/From our cents/The longer you live, the higher the rent”) and obscure subject matter (the names of Lenape villages on what is now New York City) into songs that are passionate, sincere, and surprisingly immediate.

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.

The most ambitious jazz album to arrive in ages, Los Angeles saxophonist/composer Kamasi Washington\'s debut clocks in at 174 minutes—with never a dull moment. While his flawless 10-piece band already packs a wallop, thanks to their doubled basses and drums, Washington embellishes them with a string section and angelic choir. Like his luminous playing on Kendrick Lamar’s *To Pimp a Butterfly*, Washington solos with power and grace here. Versions of \"Cherokee\" and Terence Blanchard\'s \"Malcolm\'s Theme\" nod to jazz tradition, but it\'s originals like \"Change of the Guard\" that signal his truly epic aspirations.

The story begins with a man on high. He is an old man, a warrior, and the guardian to the gates of a city. Two miles below his mountainous perch, he observes a dojo, where a group of young men train night and day. Eventually, the old man expects a challenger to emerge. He hopes for the day of his destruction, for this is the cycle of life. Finally the doors fly open and three young men burst forth to challenge the old master. The first man is quick, but not strong enough. The second is quick, and strong, but not wise enough. The third stands tall, and overtakes the master. The Changing of the Guard has at long last been achieved. But then the old man wakes up. He looks down at the dojo and realizes he’s been daydreaming. The dojo below exists, but everyone in training is yet a child. By the time they grow old enough to challenge the old man, he has disappeared. This is, in essence, both a true story and a carefully constructed musical daydream, one that will further unfold in May of 2015, in a brazen release from young Los Angeles jazz giant, composer, and bandleader Kamasi Washington. The Epic is unlike anything jazz has seen, and not just because it emanates from the... more credits released October 2, 2015 Recorded at King Size Sound Labs. Engineered by Tony Austin, Chris Constable and Brian Rosemeyer. Mixed by Benjamin Tierney. Mastered by Stephen Marcussen at Marcussen Mastering.

The London experimental producer crafts ethereal dancefloor sounds for any time of day.

These ten songs of Fresh Blood are guides for times of joy, agony and the middle distance where we most often linger. It is a bracing, beguiling record and a bold advance for White - a record that feels like the brilliant bloom to the striking bud of 2012's Big Inner.

Long: This hook-up between Franz Ferdinand and Sparks plays to their shared strengths: artful pop, wry sophistication and killer choruses. Franz’s spiky guitar thrills and Sparks’ synth-theatre make good bedfellows on songs about pale and interesting strangers, a dictator’s wayward offspring and Hello Kitty machine guns. For all the arch humor, a measure of pathos means FFS never sound *too* pleased with themselves–not even on the operatic, titled-with-a-wink “Collaborations Don’t Work”.

“Don’t run away… don’t hesitate for a second”. Let’s get that title out of the way first: White Men Are Black men Too. Please read the accompanying words, straight from Alloysious’ mouth. And then the sticker on the vinyl and CD: ‘file under Rock and Pop’. You probably want to know what that’s doing there, right? Well… (breathes) when everything is post post post post something older and better where do the exceptions go? (Exhale). When the sci-fi 20’s ‘Urban’ might as well be the atomic 50’s ‘Race’, when R&B has no blues and hiphop is a boom bip with a shorty, a hoe, it’s off to the street corner we go… where does a group like Young Fathers, who ‘picknmix from the popular music sweety shop and fly no flags and swear allegiance to no country’ (© - 100 interviews with the group in 2014) - where do they go? They have to go to the place where Beck makes a sandwich with The Beach Boys and Captain Beefheart, where Faust and The Fall tango. In Rock and Pop you are allowed to pretty much be yourself. If you are a blue and green eyed boy from Brixton with the sallowest of white skin you can become the epitome of crystalised soul, itself. It swings both ways. So… Young Fathers are breaking out of the ghetto. Fuck these constrictive selling boxes. For the purposes of this mission, this album, this White Men Are Black Men Too, is rock and pop. And hiphop, too. (Woops, slipped out). No, you don’t box in the R&B Hits 2003 generation that easily. This sticker is only for the business. The listeners can decide for themselves. Microphone technique: orders from the sound engineer: “do NOT cup the mic!”. The sounds are closer on this album, closer to your ears. It sounds as if you are in the room during the recording, possibly experiencing a little existential trauma, but not enough that you don’t notice an earworm hook when you hear one. These hooks, they stay with you. ‘Is that what they mean by pop’? you ask yourself. Could be, Madonna, could be. There are less words than before. Why, for fuck’s sake? Where is the hiphop? It slides in, like a reverse version, a negative, of the hiphop blueprint of eight verses and a sweet, female wail of a hook (while comedy rapper number 6 mutters ‘uh huh, uh huh’, you know, keeping it real). But YFs lob raps into songs that morph into sung verses then back into the tune, with no respect, none! for the law. There’s nothing to lose. Don’t be afraid. 2014 was an interesting year for the group. Yep, awards etc and they played around 130 shows, from Paris to Sydney, via both Portlands and Paisley, too. The album found itself being recorded in a hotel room in Illinois, a rehearsal room in Melbourne, a freezing cellar in Berlin, a photographic studio in London and their normal hole in the ground basement in Edinburgh. It was easy - it’s always easy. You can hear the smiling. ‘Passionate pranksters, always entertaining’. These are grown men, battle fit and in their prime. There are no celebrations of dole queue theatre, no fake politics - there’s no need. YFs are right there in the middle of the question: what is your I.D.? Why claim to speak for a dispossessed white or black class or group or generation? When you can only ever speak for yourself. Someone buys a record - they’re not voting for you. A record isn’t a vote. A free download isn’t a spoilt ballot paper. Keep it real. When they chant ‘nigger nigger nigger’ the group are singing their enemy’s song (and you can all sing along) - it’s not a war cry, it’s the off switch, the left hand turn in the ignition, the pop-hiss of deflation. No more war, motherfucker. The tension is sexual, tuneful, it’s only fun about to kick off. Synesthesiastically, it’s a hue of a reddy blue with a touch of yellow, like most things. Which is, of course, the colour of the future. White Men Are Black Men Too. -------------------------------------------- The album title explained (sort of). This is an extract from an email exchange between members of the group and management. In this extract Alloysious passionately explains his reasoning against worries that the title of the album could be seen as offensive to black people and/or could be seen as negative or pretentious. 19 Jan 2015 “I still prefer the first title by far and stand by it. I'm aware of the points we've discussed but all that sounds like to me is, we are trying to cater to what other people might think, as if it's a negative thing, which it's not. We came at it from a different angle, a positive angle. it's got issues of race and so what? Why should alarm bells start ringing, even though in general conversations race, politics, sex and religion are always the subject matter? Why should it be discussed behind closed doors and never confronted head on? How do we help tackle one of the biggest hinderances in people's lives and the world… by not putting the question forward and not letting people debate positively or negatively about the statement? Motown music helped change the world, made it expectable for blacks to be on radio and seen on tv, MJ did it too. Martin Luther King wanted equality and achieved it to some degree. But, after all that, are things equal in this world? FUCK NO. I still want to ask for it (equality) backed with the best music we've ever recorded. A pop album, our interpretation of what a pop album should be. Weight with words, which is the title plus the pop sensibility of the songs (respectively). I wanna stand for something which I helped make. Folk will complain about absolutely anything… Even it's it from the purest of intentions you just can't win. We don't make music to please other people or write certain lyrics to do so, either. Why start now? When the title was first put forward everybody was excited and 100% there was no fear. That same commitment needs be carried on to make it work despite worries after it's been digested.” Ends.

Don\'t be put off by sad-voiced crooner Dan Bejar\'s stage name: the only thing this enigmatically evocative Canadian songwriter is guaranteed to destroy is your preconceptions. The erstwhile New Pornographer\'s 11th album makes a sharp right turn following *Kaputt*\'s \'80s-jazz soft-pop. His dramatic fusion of rich, string-driven balladry (\"The River,\" \"Girl in a Sling\") and the saxophone-fueled rock fury of Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band (\"Times Square,\" \"Midnight Meet the Rain\") transform New York bohemian despair into glorious rock epiphanies.

“In our 20+ years of writing songs, I’ve learned that no matter how escapist, divergent, or even transcendent the creative process feels, the result is more beholden to what is going on at the moment. It’s hard to admit that one is so influenced by what is in front of us. Doesn’t it come from something magical and far away? No, it comes from here. It comes from now. I’m not going to tell you what this record is about because I have too much respect for that moment when you come to know it for yourself.” — Alan Sparhawk, Low

Bob Dylan’s decision to record an album of standards, all recorded previously by Frank Sinatra at some point, excited faithful fans who heard the advance tracks “Full Moon and Empty Arms” and “Stay With Me.” All 10 songs were cut live in Capitol Records’ legendary Studio B, with Dylan’s five-piece band and a small orchestra working together without piano to create an aura of late-night mystery. On “I’m a Fool to Want You,” Dylan’s voice conveys the weariness that none other than Billie Holiday tackled late in her career, and he brings hard-won nuance to classic songs as wise as “What’ll I Do.”

The second album by California-based singer/songwriter Jessica Pratt is also her first conceived as an actual album. Her 2012 self-titled debut fell together by happenstance, as enough songs were completed for a full release, while 2015’s *On Your Own Love Again* was deliberately written and recorded at home, in Los Angeles and San Francisco, over the previous two years. Though it’s tempting to refer to these gorgeous, gentle songs as reminiscent of the Laurel Canyon sound, only Judee Sill in the early ‘70s came close to this level of exquisite reflection and musical sophistication, as well as a few of Pratt\'s peers like Mia Doi Todd.

Seeing the world through a Pratt's eyes is a surpassingly beautiful thing. But subtly, oh so subtly, and with such sweet flakes of humor falling. Tunes and vibe to the max.

JD McPherson does more than a credible job paying tribute to vintage rock ’n’ roll sounds while still sounding refreshingly cool and modern. The album’s title track nods to songs by Louis Jordan and The Cars while feeling very 2015. Producer Mark Neill (Los Straitjackets, The Black Keys) keeps a tight grip on the sound, carving out room for electric guitars, tinkling pianos, and crisp beats in a carefully manipulated space. “You Must Have Met Little Caroline?,” the Dan Auerbach cowrite “Bridgebuilder,” and the James Sutton cowrite “Precious” are timeless songs that highlight McPherson’s remarkably soulful vocals. 

After a run of four increasingly ambitious albums in just half a decade you’d perhaps forgive English singer/songwriter Laura Marling a dip in scope and upward trajectory on her fifth record. Not a bit of it. If anything *Short Movie* pushes further, with Marling unafraid to add blockbusting production to her exquisite bare-bones folk (witness the countryfied sass of “Strange” and the rumbling, stadium-ready thunder of “False Hope”). It’s the title track however—an existential epiphany reconfigured as a thrillingly profane call to arms—that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with her best work.

When Panda Bear met the Grim Reaper, they jammed. Noah Lennox, a.k.a. Panda Bear, a.k.a. one-fourth of the founding members of Animal Collective, has had a far-from-quiet few years since the release of his fourth solo record, 2011’s Tomboy. Since the breakout success of 2007’s universally-adored Person Pitch, each new Panda Bear release is a highly anticipated event, and with a high-profile Daft Punk collaboration later, that’s more the case than ever. But if the title of his fifth solo album as Panda Bear seems to portend certain doom, think again. Taking his inspiration from ‘70s dub duo albums like King Tubbys Meets Rockers Uptown and Augustus Pablo Meets Lee Perry & the Wailers Band, Panda Bear prefers to frame his latest work as less of a battle and more a collaboration. “I see it [as] more comic-booky, a little more lighthearted,” he says. “Like Alien Vs. Predator.” Panda Bear Meets The Grim Reaper finds our hero leaving the airy minimalism of Tomboy and unpacking his sonic toolbox again, rearranging the multitude of his disparate influences into the ever-morphing concoction he refers to as “the soup.” Old school hip-hop textures and production techniques meld with the intuitive, cyclical melodies he has become known for, for a sound that is at once dense and playful. The slithering beat of “Boys Latin” is topped with a campfire-ready chant that wouldn’t be out of place on an early Animal Collective record; on album centerpiece “Mr. Noah”, a pulsing swamp of buzzes and squeals blossoms into a rousing, immediately infectious chorus. “Tropic of Cancer” punctuates the album with a head-turning horn intro and an ethereal harp sample taken from, of all places, Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker Suite. He experiments with balladry even further on “Lonely Wanderer,” a dreamy piano haze laced with a foreboding synth growl. Noah has taken the effortless pop sensibilities he showed the world he was uniquely adept with last year’s Daft Punk collaboration, and gone back to the laboratory with them, twisting them into something darker and more tactile. It’s a layered, at times wholly unidentifiable soundscape, and so it may come as a surprise that Panda Bear utilized readymade sample packs throughout almost the entire record. “I got into the idea of taking something that felt kind of common — the opposite of unique — and trying to translate that into something that felt impossible,” he says. Breaking with his previous practice of largely creating each album in a fixed environment, Noah says the recording process was “really disparate, I was all over the place.” The textures for the album came together everywhere from El Paso, Texas, to a garage by the beach near his home in Lisbon, Portugal, where he has lived with his family since 2004. In a relationship that already proved fruitful on Tomboy, Panda Bear partnered again with Pete “Sonic Boom” Kember, this time in a more top-to-bottom production role. “He brings stuff to the table that I wouldn’t think of,” says Noah. “You not only go to [new] places, but you figure out things about yourself that you wouldn’t have otherwise.” Ultimately its dynamism, not death, Panda Bear is tackling. “Some of the songs address a big change, or a big transformation,” he says. “Meeting the Grim Reaper in that context I liked a whole lot.” Panda Bear Meets The Grim Reaper signifies a pivotal point for an artist who has proven he can continue to evolve while remaining at the top of his game. “It’s sort of marking change — not necessarily an absolute death, but the ending of something, and hopefully the beginning of something else.” Over the last year, Panda Bear has been touring with what is his most developed live show yet, featuring eye-popping, candy-colored visuals by frequent Animal Collective collaborator Danny Perez, ever complimenting his vivid sonic palette. Panda Bear Meets The Grim Reaper comes to hyper-real life in this live context, melding the emotional melodicism of the album with the dizzyingly affective light and video show, creating a deeply connective fan experience. Panda Bear meets the Grim Reaper in these live shows, and we are all witness.

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”).