“Let’s Rock” is upfront about its meat-and-potatoes aspirations. This is an album by the Black Keys called “Let’s Rock.” It does.

Gou’s studied craftsmanship coalesces with her tastemaking abilities. It’s most meditative in its unwavering commitment to methodical bass. Gou has always appeared to have an old soul and with this endeavor, it’s on full display.

75 Dollar Bill slyly nudges you beyond the familiar, so that—no matter your record-nerd knowledge—you’ll wind up someplace new.

For Bandana, the pair taps into that heritage and allow themselves to be shaped by its highs and lows, its heroes and villains. Finding themselves within that slipstream of black thought and life, they plot their course on their terms. Bandana is tradition and transgression: one rapper, one producer, no limitations.

Burton sings about interior voyages and the tracks were usually constructed by no more than two musicians; it’s music made at home, for home listening. That’s all well and good, since the duo has considerable skill, but this existential lonerism underscores a chasm between the pair and their influences. Unlike the icons of the era they find so inspiring, Black Pumas rarely look outside of themselves.

It’s GoldLink’s ability to seem at home in any space that makes Diaspora so coherent, and so specific to him, despite pulling music from all over. He is the anchor.

It would do well as an introduction to the group for an unfamiliar listener, but doesn’t feel necessary by any means. If anything, Spirit comes across as more mood music by design, bespoke and undemanding, and it probably already has real estate on every bedroom-themed playlist on Spotify.

Late Night Feelings is not the first recent record to treat the sadness of women as a healthy response to all manner of hurt. It is, however, a worthy entry in this still-developing pop pantheon, authentic and honest in its rendering of many shades of feminine sorrow.

Dusk to Dawn has moments of real drama and surprise, as when a klaxon-like siren cuts sharply through interstellar glitter on Part III’s “Thoth,” or when the AI voice of “Solitude” poses the alarming question, “Why even wear a heart/When you could store it in a chest freezer?” But seemingly every interesting transformation is counterbalanced by slow changes, like the glacial “Indecision.”

Keepsake is an album filled with small, inspired moments like this, but they don’t add up to much. Sugary but hollow, Keepsake melts like cotton candy, dissolving on impact.

Here he and Godrich have perfected a sound of their own, one that doesn’t take Radiohead’s achievements as its primary unit of measurement.

The songs of Help Us Stranger often succeed only because they succeeded before, decades ago, as better songs.

Baroness convince their disparate influences to gel beautifully without lapsing into the homogeneity (or self-indulgent drudgery) that remains a common defect of long, proggy albums. The second half is noticeably quieter and spookier than the more bombastic first half, easing down gently into more melodic and even acoustic fare.

There’s a roominess to the music, a jovial looseness in its rhythmic complexity, and something like celebration in its exploration of these grave subjects. Nothing on here sounds rehearsed or calculated.

It is primordial and juvenile, dumb and clever, arch and true, and captures a band at that rare time before any self-conscious tones creep into their music. All the while, black midi discover what has been pioneered by countless bands before, and still present it as something entirely new.

A Productive Cough felt more like a genre exercise than a passion project, and that’s true of An Obelisk, too, except this time the genre is a far better fit.

Without the hooks of their previous albums, never mind those of their better-known bands, the songs on III take a while to sink in. In return for the slow approach, Bad Books offer a serious body of work that can stand on its own, a testament to the friendship that brought them together in the first place.

A 19-minute EP bookended with the Billy Ray Cyrus remix and the original version of “Old Town Road”--he opens himself up to the criticism that “Old Town Road” bypassed. Each new song on 7 is an attempt at stumbling into another lighthearted hit. ... For the entirety of 7, it’s unclear if Lil Nas X actually likes music.

There’s a fine line between escapist and naïve, though, and Nelson and company aren’t afraid to toe it. The extent to which listeners enjoy this record depends on how much they buy into the fantasy of Nelson and his famous pals clinking Coronas around the pool while the rest of the world goes to hell. If it feels a little hollow, well, that’s by design.

The profane marriage of old and new, big ugly riffs and shrieking noise, beauty and brutality seems like the clearest marker indicating where Full of Hell may intend to head next.

For the most part, it’s compulsively listenable, oddly moving, and stranger than it first appears, as the band gets existential on the dance floor.

Nighttime Stories plays like one seamless expression—its 50-minute runtime passes remarkably quickly—but it’s a statement heavy with meaning and memories.

Though the album doesn’t really step outside of neo-soul conventions, it is nevertheless as stirring and lifting as a memory-triggering scent.

Mustard and 03 Greedo make the most of each other’s talents; Greedo’s crooning and rapping melt into the plush spaces of Mustard’s sweltering cookout beats.

[“XanaX Damage” is] a flash of greatness bogged down by poor execution, which could stand as a theme for the EP as a whole.

Her pop exists to exploit and sand off edges, packaging esotericism for the masses. It’s just that on Madame X, she is not merely dining out on other cultures; she’s whipping around drive-thrus.

The Age of Immunology better highlights the individual personalities and nationalities that inform the group’s unique alchemy.

The album’s hypnotic quality grows ever more romantic and tense with repeat listens, a prescient-feeling experience that matches a zeitgeist: strung-out maintaining in the face of impending doom.