Today is Friday, the most wonderful day of the week for music lovers because it’s the day when new albums are released. Let’s celebrate by highlighting some of today’s new records.
Neil Young + Promise of the Real
The Visitor (Reprise)
Neil Young has never been afraid to voice his political commentary through his music. For two of his recent releases, the progressive curmudgeon has done so while backed by Promise of the Real, a roots-rock outfit fronted by Lukas and Micah Nelson, sons of country great Willie Nelson. The band has managed to put an almost Crazy Horse-rivaling kick behind the rock and roll sage as he eviscerates Monsanto and chants for peace. The Visitor is another project with Promise of the Real, and it comes at absolutely no surprise that this album is an anti-Trump effort through and through. Young’s lament for today’s political state of affairs is palpable on “Already Great,” but he stands strong with his adopted country and those in it that fight against hate. He reminds us of his Canadian origin in the opening line and then spends the rest of the song telling us why he has stayed in the US for half a century. While perhaps not always sonically ambitious, Young’s string of concept albums have all been excellent exercises in protest and they are always worth a listen. Kudos to the hippie master for pushing his long-running fight into his 70s and hopefully beyond. (JM)
Listen on: Apple Music | Spotify | Tidal
Glassjaw
Material Control (Century Media)
A lot’s happened in the 15 years since Glassjaw released Worship and Tribute, their last full-length album. The angry young men from Long Island have grown up a bit, as evidenced in a recent interview that frontman Daryl Palumbo gave to The Guardian, apologizing for the group’s early, often grotesquely misogynistic lyrics. “You don’t talk to a woman like that,” he lamented. “I was angry. It’s offensive.” But people can change, and on Material Control, the group’s first album since 2002, Glassjaw appears to have shed their casual misogyny, finally dropping the one thing that gave even their best work a bad aftertaste. Gone are the knee-jerk, violent revenge fantasies. In their place are ruminations on dealing with a world that seems hopeless, coupled with the band’s lush, expansive and manic instrumentation. If there’s one band that can perfectly capture the human emotional spectrum in the Trump-era, it’s Glassjaw. (TW)
Listen on: Apple Music | Spotify | Tidal
Chris Stapleton
From a Room: Volume 2 (Mercury Nashville)
Since releasing his debut Traveller in 2015, Chris Stapleton has essentially upended the mainstream country machine. Thanks to the hirstute Kentuckian, country music seems to be straying farther from the “cutoff jeans and jacked-up truck” bro-ness of the past few years and heading in a more traditional direction, as evidenced by the recent success of artists like Jason Isbell and Sturgill Simpson. But neither of those two artists can capture the sort-of everyman, bipartisan spirit that Stapleton does. On From a Room: Volume 2, the companion to another album released earlier this year, Stapleton tightens his grip on country’s steering wheel, offering up nine tracks that pinball between contemplative country-folk and brawny heartland rock. And while he may still lack Isbell’s hyper-literate storytelling ability or Simpson’s psychedelic flourishes, From a Room: Volume 2 has a mainstream accessibility that can really make country music great again. (TW)
Listen on: Apple Music | Spotify | Tidal
Cindy Wilson
Change (Kill Rock Stars)
Cindy Wilson, longtime vocalist of The B-52s, has officially struck out on her own for the very first time since the new wave band’s inception in the late 1970s. After putting out a couple of EPs in quick succession, Change is her first long-playing release and it seeks to establish Wilson as an artist in her own right. Her music is dreamy electro-pop, backed by a slick disco smoothness that she’s been perfecting over the last 40 years. “No One Can Tell You” finds Wilson’s traditionally belted-out vocals breathy and reserved as they shimmer in and out around synthy hooks. The technicolor qualities of her new wave background are tuned down and disseminated, taking things to a more subdued, reflective place. It’s the sincerity of Wilson’s music that really differentiates her from her past. Wilson’s solo work is as reserved as The B-52s’ is in your face, and that is bold on its own. She can still get it done, with or without the kitsch. (JM)
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