Album Reviews

Three songs into Sufjan Stevens’ Javelin, he asks perhaps the most common of questions, plainly and pitifully: “Will anybody ever love me? For good reasons, without grievance, not for sport?” He specifies his vision of this love as fairly uncomplicated, as if it’s not too much to ask for — …

Since the earliest days of hip-hop supremacy, rappers have likened themselves to legends–whether on the mic, in the streets, or even between the sheets. Braggadocio has always been part of Puerto Rican rapper Anuel AA’s modus operandi, from his earliest underground recordings right up to today. Now he sells out …

Metal? Rock? Prog? Who knows anymore. All we know is that Mastodon are still exceedingly adept at the ageless art of kicking ass. After 21 years on the job, the venerated Atlanta shredders haven’t lost a thunderous step; in fact, on their eighth album, Hushed and Grim,they’ve gained a whole …

The members of Gang of Four would likely be the first to tell you that you do not need an extravagant Gang of Four box set. They’re the ones who released a 45 sarcastically titled “To Hell With Poverty” and backed it up with “Capital (It Fails Us Now),” a …

Drake’s latest Number One single “Toosie Slide” is either the most radical viral hit ever created, or the most jaded. Despite being an all-ages instructional dance number, it carries none of the slaphappy elation of songs like “Cha-Cha Slide” or “Baby Shark.” Instead, it channels the spirit of that girl …

Towards the beginning of Soccer Mommy’s new album,Color Theory, she gives a startling confession: “I am the princess of screwing up.” The singer-songwriter, real name Sophie Allison, is just two years into her twenties, but she sounds as if she’s been navigating early adulthood for decades, wading through the waters …

Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour dynasty started inauspiciously in 1981 when the singer and guitarist re-recorded every note of “Money” by himself, save the sax solo, for the compilation A Collection of Great Dance Songs. At the time, he just did what he needed to do; the band’s new record label …

Looking back all these years later, it’s shocking that the Band made their self-titled second LP in a Hollywood hills pool house and not a steamy log cabin in the woods. Four out of five of the Band’s members were Canadian, recording songs about struggle and strife in rural early …

Nas, a rap great by any measure, has released four studio albums in the last 12 years — all ambitious, all restless, all with their own cohesive artistic thread. And despite none of them being as groundbreaking as his storied 1994 debut Illmatic or as narrative-grabbing as his 2001 return …

Kansas City indie-rock artist Kevin Morby is a secular guy with a spiritual side, and on his fifth LP he thinks deep (and sometimes somewhat less deep) about the nature of religious devotion, tapping a rich lineage of transcendentally-minded musical history. The title track is a rollicking piano number that …