Album Reviews

In 2019, New York-based multi-instrumentalist Cochemea set out on a trilogy of albums. The first, All My Relations, proved to be an eclectic collection of free-form jazz, whose tropes crumbled under the pressure of the musician’s ambitions. With Vol. 2: Baca Sewa, Cochemea focused on deep percussion swings, adding streaks of wind instruments to produce […]

The well-decorated Christone “Kingfish” Ingram, with only three albums to his name, makes a bold move to control his artistic direction while providing a home for the next generation of artists on his Red Zero Records. The native son of Clarksdale, MS, still in his mid-twenties, is a global star who has quickly moved past […]

Last year, Marcus King deviated from his norm with the Rick Rubin-produced Mood Swings. He scaled back his vaunted guitar and valiantly focused on his vocals, experimenting with soul. Now he follows that up by returning to his roots, reuniting with his longtime live band for their first album since 2018’s Carolina Confessions. The new release, Darling Blue, […]

Not since the halcyon days of the Pure Jerry archival series of the early 2000s has there been a release so expansive as the six-CD box of Jerry Garcia Band: Live at the Warfield – February 28, March 1st & 2nd, 1991.  It is a special pleasure indeed to hear the titular leader of the […]

Mason Lindahl has always been an artist who thrives in spaces between clarity and abstraction. His 2009 release Serrated Man Sound introduced his austere, fingerpicked style, while 2021’s Kissing Rosy in the Rain brought his music to a wider audience, praised for its intimate, gothic beauty. With Joshua / Same Day Walking, Lindahl delivers his […]

Listening to Toronto-based musician Beta Trip (known to his family as Steve Lewin), it appears as if the mid-1990s never ended. On Superette, his debut LP, echoes of Clinton-era alt-rock influences, from Toad the Wet Sprocket and Better Than Ezra to Tonic, are heard on nearly every song here. The layered guitars and emotional lyrics are a […]

Getting Killed, the third studio album from post-punk indie rockers Geese, is a pivotal release for the young band, marking the beginning of a vein that could carry the blood of their artistry to the artery. After cementing themselves as modern-day sonic trapeze artist with releases like the aggressively twangy 3D Country, and vocalist Cameron […]

The fearless Neko Case has returned from a seven-year hiatus with perhaps her most fully realized album to date. Neon Grey Midnight Green is a title only Case could conceive, let alone the lyrics to these songs, possibly more intimate and personal than ever. She creates a universe unlike any other, and that universe remains, […]

Throughout her debut record, Things I’ve Said Before, classically trained folk musician Remi Goode relies solely on a nylon-stringed guitar. While this is not unheard of for country and folk musicians—Willie Nelson has been playing one for 55 years—it’s certainly not the norm nowadays. But the choice gives rich warmth and softer tones to an […]

Dave Hause’s musical style is best described by an old Frank Turner lyric: “The path I chose isn’t straight and narrow/It wanders around like a drunken fellow.” From his hardcore past (The Curse, Paint It Black) to his punk band (The Loved Ones) to acoustic folk (his solo work), Hause has moved fluidly across genres. […]

Ambition is a dangerous beast to attempt to tame. The unforgiving thrusts of the sensation can shoot someone down a dark hole, or toss a person into the blinding light of fulfillment and wonder. Ambition has been the fall of empires, but it has also led to some of the most inspiring and heartfelt stories […]

Partnership, humility, and deep dives into American folk, blues, and gospel are the threads that run through Robert Plant’s post-Led Zeppelin output.  While humility is not the first word associated with one of the most famous and ego-driven frontmen in rock in the ‘70s, his persona with his new band, Saving Grace (also the album […]

When Milo Goes to College landed in 1982, it didn’t just mark the debut of the Descendents, it redrew the lines of American punk. While the hardcore scene of the time often leaned into aggression, nihilism, and politics, the Descendents broke the mold by writing songs about coffee, boredom, awkward crushes, and suburban frustration. The […]

The NYC-based singer/songwriter Kendra Morris stripped down her sound for her newest record, Next. The ten-song collection delivers a cool slice of minimalist indie-soul on Colemine Records.  Morris worked with her band, guitarist Supremo “Premo” Massiv, bassist Monti Miramonti, and drummer Chauncey Yearwood, and co-produced the album with Leroi Conroy, recording in Loveland, Ohio, and […]

Ten years have passed since Motion City Soundtrack — a band that helped define the late-’90s/early-’00s pop-punk/emo hybrid — last released an album. But between the revival of the Vans Warped Tour, the Millennial catnip of the When We Were Young fest, and “emo nights” that pop up at local clubs across the country, now […]

Golden Apples, the expansive, folksy project from Philadelphia, centered around Russell Edling, is entering an exciting transition period. What started as a lone venture from Edling has flourished into a whole collective that is slowly becoming one of their city’s brightest young stars, cloaking the jagged, sprawling music culture with a blanket quilted from warm […]

My Life Matters is the third Blue Note album from drummer and composer Johnathan Blake. A commission from The Jazz Gallery in 2017 inspired Blake to pursue a path of social justice through his music, as the title alludes to. While the album may not be as direct as Max Roach’s iconic We Insist! Freedom […]

Atmosphere, the Hip-hop duo of producer Ant and vocalist/writer Slug, has reached yet another milestone in their illustrious career. After not only establishing themselves, but also their now-iconic independent label Rhymesayers Entertainment, as pivotal and forward-thinking members of the early 2000s Hip-hop scene, a gritty movement to juxtapose the artsy flash that was compiling in […]

As Wednesday, one of the more exciting rock bands to emerge in the 2020s, entered their latest album, the band was surrounded by a whole lot of noise. With guitarist MJ Lenderman’s solo career skyrocketing to new heights, the critical buzz built by the band’s 2023 album, and interpersonal romantic relationships coming to a close, […]

What began as an experiment has proved to have lasting legs. If you were to read this quote from co-founder Dave Alvin out of context, you’d swear it pertains to an avant-garde, improvising group. “It’s five musicians walking a tightrope, improvising in dialogue with each other and finding the songs in real time.” Yet, this […]