KID ROCK Rebel Soul [Atlantic] On his ninth studio album, Kid Rock lightens up. He’s never exactly been a brooding singer-songwriter, but after stepping up his game with 2010’s Rick Rubin-produced Born Free and dabbling in politics during last year’s Mitt Romney campaign, he seems ready to fling off the fedora and let his hair down. He leads listeners right into the party with “Chickens in the Pen,” a solid Southern rock foot-stomper. He’s... 

RICHARD THOMPSON Electric [New West]  Recorded in a few days at producer Buddy Miller’s Nashville home, Electric sounds more live than Thompson’s Dream Attic(2010), an actual live album. Perhaps it’s because he didn’t overdo it in the studio. Thompson has said that he and his trio banged out the recording with minimal fuss, and the lack of embellishment does these songs good. Fortunately, austerity doesn’t come at the price of substance,... 

GREEN DAY ¡Tré!  [Warner Bros.]  After diving into political and social commentary with concept albums in 2004 and 2009, Green Day lightened the mood in 2012 with a trilogy of less weighty records, released a few months apart. ¡Tré! wraps the triptych in characteristic fashion: There are no grand philosophical statements or particular points of view, just punchy pop songs that echo elements of the band’s career to now. “Missing You,” “Amanda”... 

RA RA RIOT Beta Love [Barsuk] Beta Love is an eccentric marriage of styles coexisting harmoniously, against the odds. This Syracuse quartet has moved from broody indie chamber-pop toward vibrant synth-pop, and the jolt that comes from the opening notes signifies more than just the newfound prominence of keyboards: It’s a complete reevaluation of their songwriting. This restructuring could be attributed to the departure of cellist Alexandra Lawn... 

WANDA JACKSON  Unfinished Business [Sugar Hill] At 75, Wanda Jackson has nothing left to prove. Since emerging in the ’50s as a female Elvis, she’s weathered fallow periods, but the Queen of Rockabilly has never really disappeared. In 2009, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and two years later, Jack White stepped up to produce The Party Ain’t Over, a problematic album that said as much about White’s ambitions as it did... 

MILES DAVIS QUINTET Live in Europe 1969: The Bootleg Series Vol. 2  [Columbia/Legacy] What a difference a couple of years makes.  The Miles Davis Quintet documented on the first volume of this series—recorded in 1967 in various European locales—was, by many accounts, the quintessential Miles Davis outfit, as well as one of the most incendiary and innovative jazz ensembles ever. With Wayne Shorter on saxophone, Herbie Hancock on keyboards, Ron... 

CHIEF KEEF Finally Rich [Interscope] Taken out of context, the songs on Chief Keef’s big-league debut aren’t terribly remarkable. The Chicago rapper slurs his way through slang-heavy lines about liquor, drugs, money, guns, jewelry, foreign cars and occasionally the validation and security that come with success. He’s blunt and boastful, an unrepentant gangsta who found internet fame while under house arrest. The interesting thing: Keef is just... 

SCOTT  WALKER Bish Bosch [4AD] Scott Walker’s output has been sporadic over the last 30 years, but he always makes the music of nightmares. On his first album since 2006, he interrupts stretches of silence with disjointed moments of off-kilter musicality. Bish Bosch is full of mechanical sounds—from the industrial hammering intro of the opening track to guitars that sound like television static and the repeated motif of sharpening knives. Hitchcockian... 

GRAHAM PARKER AND THE RUMOUR Three Chords Good [Primary Wave] Reunion albums naturally make listeners nervous. A record might be good, or it might be embarrassingly lame. Or it might be Three Chords Good, the first new record by Graham Parker and the Rumour in more than 30 years. Rich and exciting, it sounds at first like a long-lost gem. Then the words sink in. While the venom of Parker’s punky New Wave-era work hasn’t disappeared, it’s tempered... 

RAVI SHANKAR Tenth Decade: Live in Escondido [East Meets West] In light of Shankar’s death on  Dec. 11, 2012, Tenth Decade will likely stand as the final major release from an iconic musician who bridged East and West like no other. Filmed at the California Center for the Arts in Escondido, Calif., in October 2011, the nearly 90-minute performance finds the master sitar player—91 at the time, sporting a full gray beard and using a cane as he... 

EL PERRO DEL MAR Pale Fire [The Control Group] Sarah Assbring, the Swedish artist behind El Perro del Mar, continues to evolve her sound, and after beginning the move away from acoustic arrangements on her last album, she completes the shift to electronica on her fourth full-length. Though synthesizers aren’t new to El Perro del Mar’s catalog, the sound of Pale Fire is more obviously electronic, as heard in the intentionally programmed sound of... 

CHRIS STAMEY Lovesick Blues [Yep Roc] Having spent much of his career in the producer’s chair, Chris Stamey fittingly applies lessons learned behind the scenes to this, his first solo album in seven years. Following a recent reunion with his seminal power-pop band the dB’s, Stamey ups the musical ante on Lovesick Blues. The album is lushly arranged and brimming with emotion, and Stamey adds a personal perspective to the radiant pop approach that’s... 

FREE ENERGY Love Sign [Free Energy Records] These Philadelphia rockers started strong on their 2010 debut, a ridiculously catchy collection of power-pop riffs, handclaps and harmony vocals. They’ve only gotten better on the follow-up, a joyous set of songs about dancing all night and making out. It sounds simplistic, but there’s greater nuance on Love Sign. With help from producer John Agnello, the band toys with slower jams and makes room for... 

CLINIC Free Reign [Domino] On their self-produced seventh album, these Leeds art-rockers trade intensity for laser-like focus. Something intangible pushes the songs forward, despite seemingly loose constructions. While Free Reign marks the return of Clinic’s trademark fuzzy guitars—lacking on their previous album, the mostly acoustic Bubblegum—the sound is less bristly than on earlier efforts. It’s also more psychedelic, with vintage organs... 

SALLY SHAPIRO Somewhere Else johanagebjorn.info/sally.html Relative to modern EDM, the ’80s-born sound known as Italo disco is more suave and sophisticated than it is sweaty, though the goal is still to make bodies move. On their third album, the Swedish duo of singer Sally Shapiro and producer Johan Agebjörn venture beyond the subgenre, making successful forays into lush, drowsy synth-pop. They occasionally get back to their roots but even when... 

OVERMOUNTAIN MEN The Next Best Thing overmountainmen.com The past has much to teach us, and whether exploring U.S. history (“Alexander Hamilton”) or the lives of regular folks, Overmountain Men are eager students. They’re also schooled in traditional American music, though Avett Brothers bassist Bob Crawford and singer-songwriter David Childers aren’t dogged bluegrass re-enactors. The standout title track is a dark, smoldering thing, and trading... 

GLISS Langsom Dans officialgliss.wordpress.com This L.A. trio’s song titles are telling. “Blur” describes the guitars—gorgeously bleak and distorted—while “Waves” sums up those wonderful washes of bittersweet synth. “Weight of Love” is the thematic centerpiece, a measurement not easily calculated. Like sometime tour mates the Raveonettes, Gliss makes music that’s both heavy and weightless, filled with big sounds yet fitted with... 

GEORGE KILBY JR. Six Pack georgekilbyjr.com A jammer from way back, this Alabama-born, New York-based blues ’n’ roots vet must have loved cutting “Something I Can’t Find,” the first tune on this six-song EP to feature an extended guitar break. Kilby also gets an audible kick out of trucking country-style through Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love,” trading licks with banjoist Andy Goessling. But he’s even better on the four tighter tracks,... 

TODD MAY Rickenbacker Girls myspace.com/toddmay Rock nerds will read the title and think of the jangly guitars beloved by the Byrds, Tom Petty and countless power-pop bands. Those influences likely apply, but May is actually referencing Ohio’s Rickenbacker Air Force Base. Growing up nearby, he chatted up pilots’ daughters worldlier than he was, and here, he sings songs about girls in motion. May himself is constantly on the move, jumping from... 

BEING THERE Breaking Away facebook.com/beingthereband The thrill of being young and confused and knowing a few chords belongs to no decade or country, and in that sense, there’s nothing unusual about this London foursome. Like fellow U.K. group Yuck, whose self-titled 2011 debut marked something of an indie-rock paradigm shift, Being There does fuzzy, pleasantly disaffected ’90s-style alternative. The reference points are mostly American—Dinosaur... 

LACY JAMES Circle of Swallows mereminne.com When she’s not crafting the kinds of eclectic, electro-tinged earth-child folk fantasias heard on this, her second album, James choreographs her own modern dance troupe. That might explain songs like “Dancing out of the Dark” and lines like “dancing animals / entwining animals / in cuneiform and ruin,” though really, Swallows defies easy explanation. James sets bold, mystical lyrics to clattering... 

THE NIGHT MARCHERS  Allez Allez swamirecords.com John Reis is no dummy. As frontman for Rocket From the Crypt and Hot Snakes, the San Diego punk swami has wrecked stages around the world, and he knows his brand of garage rock is gnarlier and more inventive than most. Hence, “Loud, Dumb and Mean,” a highlight of his second Night Marchers album, is false modesty—a declaration of idiocy from a foursome whose warped, pointy riffs and skewed rhythms... 

JIMBO MATHUS White Buffalo jimbomathus.com Back in the ’90s, while leading Squirrel Nut Zippers, this Mississippi native scored a novelty hit with “Hell,” a hot-jazz tune that snuck onto alt-rock radio. A decade after the Zippers’ demise, Mathus isn’t doing anything quite as radical or conceptual. White Buffalo is a genre record, the genre being Southern—a sweaty, twangy sound informed by country, folk, gospel, soul and good ol’ rock... 

PARADOX Tales of the Weird myspace.com/paradoxbangers After a quarter-century of raging, give or take some periods of inactivity, Paradox is still spoiling for a fight. On their sixth album, the German thrash mainstays wage war against the government (“Brutalized”), the media (“Brainwashed”), mental illness (“Fragile Alliance”) and the idea of war itself (“Escalation”). They wield the typical heavy metal weapons—shamelessly brazen... 

ALY TADROS The Fits alytadros.com On her second album, Tadros is nothing if not elusive, a storyteller determined to kick dirt on her footprints and throw us off the trail. Then, she’s always been tough to pin down. The Texas native spent time in Egypt, Spain and Mexico before settling in Austin, and she brings to her harrowing fingerpicked jazz-noir songs echoes of each country. One minute, she’s vulnerable and needy, imploring, “Say that you’re... 

TUNDE OLANIRAN The Second Transgression tundeolaniran.com When Prince has nightmares, the background music—and you know there’s background music—probably sounds something like Tunde Olaniran’s dark and delirious 21st century R&B. On his second in a series of five EPs, the perpetually project-hopping singer-producer fits rap verses, soulful vocals and bizarre samples—those are Chinese schoolchildren on “Brown Boy”—over paranoid... 

GREGG AUGUST Four by Six greggaugust.com Two bands—a quartet and sextet, as the title implies—give life to this bassist-composer’s singular sound. August digs the choppy start-stop riffs, but he leaves space to swing, encouraging his cohorts to do likewise. Jazz newbies, take heart: The stroll down “Strange Street” ain’t so strange.  Read More →

TED RUSSELL KAMP Night Owl tedrussellkamp.com All the best 21st century troubadours live in L.A., and this alt-country Cali cowboy is as good as any. Kamp’s loose drawl makes him sound slightly haggard—maybe even tipsy—and that works for both the sad ballads and boozy barroom hoots.  Read More →

JAMAICAN QUEENS Wormfood jamaicanqueens.com Hip-hop production has grown pretty inventive in recent years, and Detroit duo Adam Pressley and Ryan Spencer—formerly of the band Prussia—have been paying attention. Here, starchy indie rock meets the woozy bump of modern rap, neither sound spoiling the party.  Read More →

DUOLOGUE Song & Dance duologuemusic.co.uk As U.K. kids reared on Radiohead, Muse and Coldplay come of age, count on hearing more bands like this London quintet. Just don’t expect the same mastery of melancholy stadium pop and glitchy electro-rock. Emotional and experimental, Song & Dance is an impressive debut.  Read More →

X-TIVITY FACTOR Hard and Powerful xtivityfactor.com Manuel Marino makes electronic music under many guises, and as X-tivity Factor, he delivers driving beats and synth lines with a slightly noirish New Wave sheen. Had the folks behind the Drive soundtrack wanted aggressive, not atmospheric, Marino might have been their man.  Read More →

BOBBY BARE Darker Than Light bobbybaredarkerthanlight.com When a fella’s been recording for as long as Bobby Bare has, he gets to thinking about history—not so much his own, but the centuries’ worth of strange and wondrous songs that make up the American folk and country canon. Fifty years on from his first hit, the 77-year-old Bare picks a wide range of classics, everything from Dust Bowl laments (“Going Down the Road [I Ain’t Going to... 

JOHN CALE Shifty Adventures in Nookie Wood john-cale.com Having tried every other genre imaginable—his spectrum spans avant-garde classical to the proto-punk of the Velvet Underground—John Cale has finally made his goth-pop album. With its tense beats and spooky electronics, Shifty Adventures suggests Cale has been on a serious Depeche Mode or Joy Division kick. His drab singing recalls the latter’s Ian Curtis—if not Paul Banks, frontman for... 

TURBO FRUITS Butter turbofruits.com When the going gets tough—too many long nights and drunken fights—Turbo Fruits get going. “Motorcycle, please take my problems away,” frontman Jonas Stein sings on “Harley Dollar Bill$,” leaving hopelessness in his dust. On their third album, these Nashville bashers drink, gamble, play with guns and get their hearts broken, but they find redemption where they can—sometimes on the open road, mostly... 

MONARCH Amber Waves of Cain monarch-the-band.com As Monarch surveys their kingdom—newfangled cities beset with old-timey problems, populated by single moms, drug addicts and Joe Six-Packs—they can’t help but smile. The L.A. quintet plays smart, tragicomic country rock—all reverb, twang, shuffling beats and spur-sharp wit. As frontman Jay Sosnicki spins his sorry tales, he neither pities nor mocks the folks he sings about. He knows the world... 

WHITEHORSE The Fate of the World Depends on This Kiss whitehorsemusic.ca Whenever a married couple sings about the “seven-year itch,” there’s a tendency to think the worst: trouble in paradise. But Luke Doucet and Melissa McClelland, the husband-and-wife duo behind this dark and stormy Canadian twang-pop duo, haven’t made a breakup record. Their full-length debut is all about keeping things spicy, and while the acoustic ballad “Mismatched... 

UNKNOWN COMPONENT Blood v. Electricity unknowncomponent.com Like Kurt Cobain with a keyboard or Trent Reznor with a cooler head, Keith Lynch, the lone Iowan behind Unknown Component, channels his hopes and fears into bummed-out synth-pop. He loves his faux string and choral sounds—touches that turn his home studio into a gothic cathedral—but judging by his mumbled delivery and searching lyrics, he’s not super enthused about much else. “Nowhere... 

RICK HOLMSTROM Cruel Sunrise rickholmstrom.com Through his association with Mavis Staples, who he’s backed onstage and on record, this blues-rock vet has gotten to know Jeff Tweedy, Billy Bragg and Neko Case—songwriters who cast traditional music in nontraditional lights. Here, Holmstrom does likewise, using back-alley guitar riffs and pop-Americana hooks to power cautiously optimistic songs about chasing down dreams. Things don’t always work... 

BONNIE BISHOP Free bonniebishop.com Bonnie Bishop’s latest could almost be a Kelly Clarkson record, only this raspy-voiced Nashville belter writes or co-writes all of her own country-soul jams. The opening trio of “Keep Using Me,” “Shrinking Violet” and “Free” are you-go-girl female empowerment anthems, and in a way, so is “Bad Seed,” co-written by legendary songsmith Al Anderson. That one centers on a politician’s daughter who... 

STACIAN Songs for Cadets stacian.bandcamp.com The really out-there pop music has never been limited to the coasts. Just as Detroit gave us eerily robotic early techno and Minneapolis spawned Prince—once Top 40’s chief experimentalist—Milwaukee has produced Stacian, aka Dania Luck. Keen on sci-fi imagery and primitive synth programming, this one-woman band fills her full-length debut with hypnotic minor-key riffs and harsh mechanized beats. Way... 

SLAM DONAHUE Hemlock Tea slamdonahue.com Sunshine pop for Brooklyn basement dwellers: There’s the tagline for this duo’s debut EP. Singer and guitarist David Otto has the soulful rasp and melodic sense of Them-era Van Morrison, and with the help of producer Ayad Al Adhamy, who’s pulled off similar retro-modern feats with Passion Pit, he sounds simultaneously young and used up, wide-eyed and red-eyed. “I’ll drop anything for fun,” he sings... 

EARLY GRAVES Red Horse earlygraves.com Without a lyric sheet, it’s impossible to say for sure, but the first word on the third album from these high-precision, higher-speed San Francisco metal mavens seems to be “death.” That would be appropriate, as new singer John Strachan fills a void left by founder Makh Daniels, who died in a 2010 van accident. Strachan and his steel-wool larynx keep pace with the band’s gnashing charge, and whether “Death... 

CRUSHED OUT Want to Give crushedoutmusic.com Jack White will leave behind boxcars of boss records, but his real legacy may be the male-female guitar-drum duo, a rock ’n’ roll model he virtually invented with the White Stripes. The latest—and one of the greatest—to follow his coed thud ’n’ thrash lead are Crushed Out, the husband-and-wife team of Frank Hoier and Moselle Spiller. These lovebirds dig Buddy Holly, the Ramones and most likely... 

BRICKWALL JACKSON Just Life brickwalljacksonband.com In life, this rock-tinged Virginia country-pop duo tells us, “There is no right or wrong way.” True, but as they celebrate the good stuff (four-wheel drive, spunky self-assurance) and make sense of the bad (miscarriages, heartbreak, sick children), it’s hard to argue with their methods.  Read More →

AMY GORE AND HER VALENTINES In Love thisisamygore.com Keeping one foot in the garage, poised to stomp on a fuzz box, the former leader of Detroit’s Gore Gore Girls joyrides through rootsy rock, country and even ’80s-style pop, a la Scandal’s “Goodbye to You.” The chorus on “Blackout” is bright enough to light the Silverdome.  Read More →

HABIB KOITE AND ERIC BIBB Brothers in Bamako habibkoite.com “Tombouctou” is your standard wandering blues—American bluesman Bibb and West Africa’s Koite have simply wandered very far afield. They’re caravanning through Mali, tracing the roots of modern music, and as with the other 12 songs, they hit on something fluid, uplifting and beyond time and place.  Read More →

THE REBEL LIGHT The Rebel Light therebellight.com On their debut EP, these L.A. indie-pop hopefuls announce themselves with guitars, pianos, strings, horns and synths. Amazingly, there are only three of them. With their big music and ideas (sample line: “All my heroes are dead”), they could be headed someplace, well, big.  Read More →

DOMENICO Cine Privê domenicolancellotti.com.br Your dad likes bossa nova and space age bachelor-pad music. You dig Radiohead. This Brazilian singer-composer brings peace to your weirdo family, playing groovy lounge jazz with an experimental bent. Dig the ray guns on “Hugo Carvana,” something George and Jane Jetson might have rocked on their honeymoon.  Read More →

ALICIA KEYS Girl on Fire [RCA] Some combination of talent and luck—the former outweighing the latter—gave Alicia Keys one of the biggest debuts of the ’00s. Songs in A Minor (2001) was a hit with hip-hop fans, housewives and just about everyone in between, and in the decade since, the R&B songstress has continually shown her savvy and taste. She’s built a career that lets her cruise the middle of the road without becoming middle of the... 

TITUS ANDRONICUS Local Business [XL] Somehow, Titus Andronicus stitched together a punk concept album about the Civil War and New Jersey on 2010’s brilliant The Monitor. The Garden State rockers take a less narrative approach on their latest, an autobiographical unburdening by frontman Patrick Stickles. He details an inadvertent electrocution on the jaunty sing-along “(I Am the) Electric Man,” a short stint living in New York City on the terse...