The Cadillac Three’s Country Fuzz precisely captures the delightfully ragged album, which soaks a straight-forward country in a tub full of distortion, creating music that will delight metal heads and line dancers, both groups previously only in agreement over the appropriateness of mullets.

The follow up to 2017’s TX Jelly carries on that loose, almost improvisational jam vibe that made that debut such an anomaly when it first came out.

On 2018’s The Other, Thomas was questioning and searching in sometimes morbid ways. Now, with the personally emotional Smalltown Stardust, he has found some solid answers in nature, love, friends, and hometown memories; King Tuff sounds gratifyingly grounded.

Dreams on Toast has the same stadium rock credentials as the mega-hit Permission to Land. Guitarist Justin Hawkins’s vocals are a bit more subdued, but he still croons and belts with a natural swagger. His brother, guitarist Dan Hawkins, delivers solid riffs anchored by the strong rhythm section of bassist Frankie Poullain and drummer Rufus Taylor.

Lloyd, as he typically does, enters gently but increases his intensity to the highest levels in the four pieces, his trio mates in restrained accompaniment until Wilson first blossoms with a jagged, inspired solo followed by Clayton’s cascading, shimmering turn which builds to a crescendo. At the diminuendo, Lloyd reenters with a simple six notes, the piece fading quietly. Enough said.

The album is not perfect. As Morrison often does, he makes the album too long with ‘filler’ songs – “If It Wasn’t for Ray” (a failed attempt at honoring his main influence, Ray Charles), “Cutting Corners,” and “Colourblind,” the latter annoyingly placed in the spellbinding songs in the album’s latter half. Take most of the songs that are left and arguably you have the best music Van Morrison has presented in over three decades.

This is a high octane record filled with hooks, strong musicianship and maybe just a bit too much production. Through it all, Price has some interesting reflections on motherhood and coping with her rising fame. The clincher, as you might well guess, is the unrelenting power of her voice that just continues to amaze.

A bare quaver and a patch of rough grit here and there are the only signs you’re listening to an octogenarian. The grit actually gives Starr’s voice some character, especially alongside Tuttle on the heartbreaker “She’s Gone” or the sublime duet “You and I (Wave of Love).”

Entering Heaven Alive is a joy to sink into and overall one of the most easily accessible and best of Jack White’s solo career.

While previous Van Etten albums, and pandemic albums in general, carried a somber scarcity to them, We’ve Been Going balances the deeply personal diary entries with moments of levity and hope.

Making A Door Less Open is a worthy addition to the creative evolution of Car Seat Headrest.

The ten-year hiatus hasn’t diminished anything about the Millers” unique partnership. The songs are as good as ever, Buddy still sings passionately and rips his guitar with determined fury. Julie sings as well as she ever has.

Murdoch and company have done a great job in creating a live album that includes a little bit of something for everyone. What to Look for in Summer does a fairly good job of capturing the magnetic energy of a Belle and Sebastian show and since we have been starved for live music this year, this is a welcome release to help tide us over.

Everything Was Beautiful pulls heavily from throughout the Spiritualized catalog, whether it be the Ladies and Gentlemen-era “Best Thing You Ever Had”, the soft, sentimentality of Pierce’s mid-career work on “Crazy” or the lush balance of And Nothing. All those influences, and their tonal similarities to his last album, never distract or take away from the conceptual success of Everything Was Beautiful.

Mavis has always strived to make us feel stronger. She is a remarkable role model bringing us remarkable, enviable spirit, captured here as well as it’s ever been.

Collaboration is a good color on Bass Drum of Death as Barrett looking to outside opinions allowed for his ideas to take full form and provide us with 12 tracks of unfiltered rock with enough melody to plant itself firmly in your psyche and remind you of what album to throw on when you need to get lost in a cloud of harmonious garage rock.

“Beye Bu Beye Ba,” may be the consummate track that combines brass, Taylor’s vocal, and his background singers, sounding authentically African as if one were transported to a ceremonial dance in a village. The final track is the other English titled tune, “Feeling,” with Taylor and his substantial accompaniment sailing off in blissful, horn and vocal punctuated glee.

It takes a while to get through this collection, but it’s time well spent. This collection is full of songs that will get your head bobbing and your body moving. On top of that, it is a must-have for collectors due to the rarity of some of the tracks and the presentation of the box set.

It’s an album that invites you in with warmth, unsettles you with its peculiar details, and leaves you somewhere between the past and the present, not entirely sure which is which.

Most of the songs maintain a decidedly hollow-eyed sound, one that requires the listener to lean in and patiently wait for the songs to reach a crescendo. Happily, it’s well worth the indulgence.

The arrangements here are spacious and dreamy, anchored by rich, righteous organ topped with airy falsetto and mesmerizing four-part harmony. Belying his sometimes-bleak persona, the writing here is buoyant and soulful – geared in every way to offer hope.

Brother Sister feels bigger than just the siblings, but it is essentially a gentle folk record with lovely instrumentation and gorgeous harmonies. With Sean primarily on guitar and Sara on fiddle, and both sharing vocals, the sound comes across at times like a full band but it’s usually just the two of them making stirring music.

The Sick, The Dying … And The Dead doesn’t have anything as epic as “Holy Wars” or “Hangar 18” or a riff as instantly memorable as “Symphony of Destruction.” But from start to finish, it offers unrelenting intensity and an outlet to channel anger and fears from a world ravaged by a pandemic, war, and economic struggles into shouting and head-banging along with Mustaine’s somewhat-fictional tales of the same. ... All these years later, the band’s music is as relevant as ever.

Gold Past Life operates almost on two levels for Fruit Bats, the sheer pleasure of making fun music that draws on the things we’ve treasured from ages past, while consciously rejecting the temptation to live forever in that space. The result is a record that is both easy to leap into, and rewarding to stay in.

Silver Tongue is an excellent collection of Scott’s strengths as a producer, performer and songwriter as her sounds run the gamut from modern pulsing anxious odes to open confessional natural pleas, each delivered with grace and ease.

Tare achieved something magical on 7s. The collection of music presented on the album changes with every listen, almost like watching a plant grow. The more your surrender yourself to the album’s intensity, the more you find solace in the hecticness.

Nada Surf has evolved into one of the most consistently satisfying indie pop/rock bands out there. Moon Mirror shows that their music is still evolving.

The mix of songs that sound like they’re being written on the spot sitting on a stool in a bar, with tracks that are a bit more polished and contain several musical layers makes for a compelling listen.