The real joy in this album is found in the shared musical language that’s exhibited across its seven tracks. Instruments fold into each other and each player seems to relish the chance to explore these sonic spaces with true abandon together. These might not be King Gizzard’s tightest, or most immediately memorable pieces of songcraft, but their creativity and kinship is on full display here, which is ultimately what this band has always been all about (that and reminding us of impending heat death).

Sadness Sets Me Free is a bold direction for Gruff Rhys to take 25 albums in, and for the most part, these risks paid off tremendously. Rhys finds solace in the exploration of himself rather than crafting the perfect LP, giving the album a unique personality that opts for honesty over anything else.

Relative to the two previous releases, Happy Today is much shorter and far more accessible as the band combines their patented immersive ethereal space jazz with tangible, expressive playing. The music has groove and suspense, delivering an uplifting feeling, with some credit due to the passionate audience.

Deleted Scenes as an album oscillates between larger than life theatrical pop numbers and blissful instrumental escapism.

XOXO, while broadening the band’s sound, becomes not a major shift, not even a detour really, but a refocus and sharpening of their hallmark jangly sound – brimming with country, folk, rock, and British Invasion power pop. It’s reinvigoration.

Jump For Joy finds the clouds parting and Taylor and his band finally reveling in the possibility of happier times. The uncertainty is still there, but this time tinged with optimism.

Throughout the nuanced Untame The Tiger, Mary Timony pushes and pulls with experimental wanderings and pop leanings, successfully delivering an engaging album that deals with grief, forlornness, and starting over with a blank slate.

Royce Hall, 1971 is a solo acoustic gig, recorded in January of that year on the UCLA campus, while Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 1971 is a similarly executed performance, with Young on vocals, guitar, piano and harmonica, on the last US show of his solo tour. While these first two may seem redundant in the wake of the aforementioned prior releases, they are also a testament to the consistently high level of Young’s performances.

Those dulcet tones of Knopfler’s voice remain immaculately intact. Now 74, every aspect of his artistry remains at its consistently high quality. As with the past few releases, Knopfler waxes mostly nostalgic here again on One Deep River.

This album has plenty of shifting tempos and is well-paced. The harmonies make it sound if Thompson and Walbourne were just meant to sing together. Don’t be steered away from what may be described as “folk rock.” This has a thumping pulse and plenty of stunning moments.

Death Valley Girls have softened musically with each release, adding more pop influences, and digging more into the spiritual hippy cosmos of the we-are-all-in-this-together vibe. They also have continually improved, as Islands in the Sky is their best album to date.

Royce Hall, 1971 is a solo acoustic gig, recorded in January of that year on the UCLA campus, while Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 1971 is a similarly executed performance, with Young on vocals, guitar, piano and harmonica, on the last US show of his solo tour. While these first two may seem redundant in the wake of the aforementioned prior releases, they are also a testament to the consistently high level of Young’s performances (not to mention a sunny state of mind, then and now, to which he alludes in the abbreviated liner notes to Chandler).

Though Erotic Reruns doesn’t have any of the awe-inspiring moments of some of Yeasayer’s early work, it’s a solid album from start to finish, trimmed of all fat and without a bad note. A few more compositional risks would’ve served the band well, but as a whole the album finds the Brooklyn band in top form, packing its nine songs with dance-hall energy, commanding grooves, and song compositions that stretch the limits of pop music while remaining easy to digest.

Clearly, this is the crowning jewel of Hurray for the Riff Raff’s catalog, and surely their most honest, cathartic songwriting.

Apart from the wayward package design—and, for some listeners, hearing the repartee before “Roll Another Number (For The Road)” as simultaneously unctuous and condescending– Citizen Kane Jr. Blues is a prime example of the kind of unorthodox creativity that’s made this man such a fascinating and (mostly) revered figure for over fifty years now.

Sit Down for Dinner is an album you need to hear multiple times to understand the nuanced beauty of it all, allow Blonde Redhead to wash away the worries of reality and view these stressors through their technicolor, melodic lens.

Through its 10 tracks, we are introduced to an uncompromising artist whose trust in themselves creates moments of sonic bliss. The way they are able to bounce between tempos and moods with ease gives the album its colorful personality and shines a light on the writing talents of Miss Grit.

This soothing, peaceful album reminds us to take stock of who we are, where we’ve been, but mostly to just appreciate the moments at hand. It’s the kind of album that only a superior artist could pull off without sounding cheesy or pat.

Cable Ties use their intriguing mix of punk, rock, and post-punk dance vibes with an assured delivery throughout the powerful All Her Plans, breaking out to a larger audience with committed songwriting, driven playing, and compelling vocal styles.

He [producer Andrew Wells] manages to magnify an already impressive sound without weighing it down in over-production or slickness. The Vaccines have been a big deal back home, but Pick-Up Full of Pink Carnations could (and should) be the record that brings them that same type of recognition in the U.S.

It’s clearly a different time now in so many ways that it’s unlikely that any of these tunes, which are as good as any he’s penned (can’t help using that term), will become mega hits. Nonetheless, these songs are a salve for these times and do plenty of justice to Penn’s legendary status.

The quartet’s sound (produced by Haynes and John Paterno) goes for the retro blues gusto and succeeds; the sonic quality of this record is top shelf.

Ozarker finds Nash tapping into an entirely different genre for inspiration and the result makes for one of his best albums so far. From the big guitars to the anthem-like choruses, Nash’s latest manages to update a sound that resonates both comfortably and refreshing at the same time.

The aptly titled, Deserted finds the old rabble-rousing crew in fine form.

Cook does a great job of keeping the focus on Mavis. None of the guest spots are intrusive. In fact, it’s only the slide guitar parts from Bonnie Raitt or Derek Trucks that are attention-getting. The overall effect is that of Mavis, a living saint and the voice of empathy, leading the hushed gathering in prayer, best evidenced in her take on Curtis Mayfield’s “We Got To Have Peace.”

The first half of the record, complete with some of the catchiest work he’s made so far, also stands in stark contrast to the warmer vulnerability on side two.

The album is as good, maybe even a little better than Vagabonds, if not musically, certainly lyrically.

Instead of the fire-burning street-taking bloodlust of your 20’s, the fight in your 30’s feels seated deeper in the belly. Birth of Violence feels like it’s about that fight: finding strength, power and will, and rising up to exert it all in the face of unending victimization and marginalization. Wolfe draws parallels between the treatment of women throughout history and the treatment and disregard of Mother Earth, also in the throes of shaking off her human oppressors.