FLOOD

Domenico Lancellotti’s second full-length is a mix of dream pop and world music, which proves an intoxicating combination.

The album takes all the musicality the duo has mastered to date and builds on it, with “building” being the operative word.

Despite its energy, “Combat Sports” is more than occasionally boring.

Moby’s latest is a bummer, man—albeit a great-sounding bummer.

Craft’s influences of decades-old bombast and glam and down-home folk and blues combine to create a musical atmosphere that feels both modern and familiar.

The duo’s twentieth studio album gives a nod to the variety of musical styles that have been part of the Giants’ palate all these years.

While Manson’s style of hard rock has been both imitated by other acts and eclipsed by other genres since the artist’s heyday in the late ’90s, the prospect of a new MM release is still cause for anticipation.

The OG trip-hopper returns—with help from some Russian rappers.

Like New York back in the day, Vega’s resilience is inspiring—and still a little scary.

Even the simplest songs can benefit from a bit of production.

With “Vol. 1” you banged your head; “Vol. 2” is the dance party.

It would seem that as a well-heeled, seemingly content octogenarian with a legacy approaching mythical status, Nelson wouldn’t need to keep making records, or that he even could still make one as good as this.

The German capital is a city of dualities and dichotomies.

The dexterity with which Moon Duo present seemingly simple riffs belies the complexity of the songwriting—and the difficulty in getting to their destination.

The reissue of the New Orleans IDM duo’s debut is a refreshing reminder of a more cerebral time.

“It was important to me that none of them were victims of the film.”

In his mid-sixties and playing for ever-larger crowds, the New Jersey–based soul singer reflects on how he got here.

They may well deliver a pop masterpiece one day, but “Jessica Rabbit” isn’t it.

While the Glasgow duo’s debut was a bit more coy, the followup is unabashed in its devotion to the guitar.

On “Telling It Like It Is,” Elias Bender Rønnenfelt enlists the services of members of like-minded Nordic punks in Lower, Hand of Dust, and others.

Thirty-three years after its formation, Dinosaur Jr. continues to make sublime, rousing rock and roll.

As Wild Beasts release their fifth long-player, “Boy King,” we find them facing (rock band) middle age and most likely questioning their relevance.

Burroughs on the mic, King Khan on the boards.

Natasha Khan’s new album was created as a kind of soundtrack to a short film she screened this year at Tribeca.

Car Seat Headrest’s first wide release of brand-new material showcases most of the weapons in Will Toledo’s arsenal.

“Stiff” makes a grand leap into polished retro-rock territory.

At the pace Philly’s eclectic Santigold releases albums (read: slowly), it’s not hard to welcome each LP as more than just a new release for the artist.

A raucous blast of energy to help combat the winter doldrums.

After repeated listens to Harriet, the fact that they are from Los Angeles comes of absolutely no surprise.

Iceland sounds like an easy sell: who wouldn’t like an exotic arctic country inhabited by tall blond socialists? Yet when it…

Oh, to be that simplistic and silly again!

Very well produced and expertly performed, Pray for Rain does its best to entertain without offending—or leaving much of a lasting impression.

Dripping with sex, swagger, and a buzz factor they might have to invent a new scale for, the new Dead Weather album arrives—after almost a year of teaser singles—with a bit of a thud.

We’re glad he’s having fun, but next time he needs to put some power behind it.

Appropriation is nothing new under the creative sun (just ask Sam Smith or Robin Thicke), but the fact that Painted Palms wear their influences on their sleeve in such obvious fashion on their sophomore album is a little disappointing.

A for effort, but we already have “Rio.”

Four decades after the advent of punk, chief rotter John Lydon rejoices in PiL’s post-punk creation.

Blasting out of St. Joseph, Missouri, comes a power trio of young, homeschooled brothers who just delivered one solid debut rock album.

Twelve years later, though, it’s impossible to consider the stellar album without acknowledging its place in the artist’s short and turbulent career.

“Magnifique,” their new opus, is a fourteen-track tour de force that will stand as one of their best.

Brooklyn-based NYU grads turned power-pop revivalists EZTV talk about auditioning for Spiritualized and calling in sick to go on their first tour.

“Calling Out” follows a fairly straightforward path from start to finish, as any good pop-rock album should: guitars lead the way, vocals enter to tell universal stories of urban, existential, and romantic frustrations.

“FFS”’s songs are completely polarizing; you will either love them, or you will not.

It’s solid, let’s leave it at that.

While it’s impossible to confirm, the first punk band ever might have been a God-fearing trio of African American brothers from Detroit, Michigan, called Death.

A beautiful—warts and all—look at the public and private life of modern rock’s most visceral voice.

The sound of fizz, a soda being poured most likely, opens “The Scene Between,” the first new offering in four years from Brighton’s The Go! Team.

Like many of his aging contemporaries, Mark Knopfler is such an accomplished and successful musician that one can appreciate his work without realizing how proficient it is.

Around the time most of the readers of this site were born, Madonna Louise Ciccone was into her second, or perhaps third, career transition.

That the band is now releasing a new album (seventeen years since its last) is certainly newsworthy, but while comparing “I Wasn’t Born to Lose You” to their prior work is inevitable, it ensures a disappointing listening experience of the new LP.

The collaborative group—McCauley along with members of Black Lips, Dead Confederate, Six Finger Satellite, and Los Lobos—continues to succeed with its brash brand of aggressive garage-punk featuring sing-shouted lyrics (“Couldn’t Help It,” “Blame”), but the bouncy fun and joy of 2012’s “Diamond Rugs” seems to be absent on the latest LP.

If you’re familiar with the tastefully produced prior releases from the electro-folk-pop Ingrid stable such as Hortlax Cobra, Woodlands, and Smile, you’ll feel right at home with the falsetto vocals and wispy synth lines of Amason—the collective of Amanda Bergman (Hajen, Idiot Wind), Gustav Ejstes (Dungen), Nils Törnqvist (Little Majorette), Petter Winnberg (Little Majorette), and Pontus Winnberg (Miike Snow).

Exhaustive in its scope, Nothing Has Changed assembles repertoire from almost every crevice of the Thin White Duke’s career, from 1964 to this year.

Simply put, to all but a select handful of the most adventurous music consumers Soused will be unlistenable.

The Raveonettes September 30, 2014 Music Hall of Williamsburg Brooklyn, New York Touring in support of their seventh album (and…

Lo-fi and punk, V for Vaselines is a cheery and welcome ’50s-tinged raver that recalls simpler times—the ’90s for instance—when the gravest threat to public safety was a libidinous president.

While a modern roots rocker’s (a sect of which Adams is “drunk uncle” emeritus) current arsenal centers around acoustic instruments and even—sigh—banjos, with this album, Adams reminds us that the overdriven electric guitar once held sway.

To say that the wait was worth it is a fair assessment; Trouble is a sexy and inviting album that shows a maturation from the youthful, coming-of-age days of La Roux.

Pe’ahi may be The Raveonettes’ sun-drenched, dreamy surf-rock album but dark things always seem to lurk in the lands filled with permanent sunshine, too, just ask David Lynch.

The first bands of this second wave came out of the gate in the early ’90s, including the creative (and relatively obscure) Braid.