Featured New Releases for
December 11, 2012

This set of largely traditional songs is one of Glee's finest holiday albums.

— Heather Phares

Willy Mason fuses his folk roots with personal lyrics and digital rhythms, taking an unexpected detour.

— James Wilkinson

Produced by T-Bone Burnett, this collection of actor performances from the hit series is a breath of fresh air for contemporary country.

— Thom Jurek

John Eriksson's second album is a synth pop tribute to Van Halen's 1984 using the same titles, song lengths, and keys.

— Tim Sendra

The band's third album finds them moving away from happily anthemic emo pop into a sleeveless and overly cheerful brand of modern country pop.

— Tim Sendra

Radio co-hosts Buddy Miller and Jim Lauderdale have released an album combining originals with some old classics.

— Steve Leggett

The album that introduced Interpol's compelling resuscitation of post-punk.

The aggressive comedian gets gross and politically incorrect, but few could work so blue for so long and so well.

— David Jeffries

The soundtrack to Judd Apatow's This Is 40 is a clever, moving collection of adult pop songs that grapple with the problems of maturity.

— Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Mars' second album sounds good production-wise, but is derailed by too many misogynistic lyrics and not enough memorable songs.

— Tim Sendra

The final installment in Green Day's punk-pop trilogy of 2012 plays like a collection of enjoyable leftovers from its two predecessors.

— Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Antwan Patton's second proper solo album contains a handful of inharmonious collaborations with dream pop and surf punk acts.

— Andy Kellman

With a long list of guest artists, the rapper skillfully explores the divine and the devilish, and how they both feed the soul.

— David Jeffries

The debut from the Welsh all-boys choir and 2011 Britain's Got Talent third-place finisher features a mix of Welsh songs and pop and holiday standards.

— Matt Collar

This collaboration falls decidedly toward the crossover end of Rutter's output. Like most of his productions, it's elegantly executed, and it shows that he probably would have been a grand success even if he had chosen not to devote himself to choral genres.

— James Manheim

Scholl does not simply program a typical lieder recital; rather, he tailors his repertoire to his unusual voice and can claim another triumph, even if it's maybe not the first one for newcomers to start out with.

— James Manheim

On this 2012 SACD from Challenge, Jaap van Zweden performs Anton Bruckner's Eighth Symphony in the widely recorded 1890 edition.

— Blair Sanderson

There are several motets here and the whole album holds together very beautifully on a plane of calm balance. The Tallis Scholars do this kind of thing very well

— James Manheim

Kolja Blacher and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra present a short but interesting program of music by Beethoven and Eichberg.

— Blair Sanderson

Adès throws in music from other sources, but his luxuriant yet inward style gains greatly in definition from this context, and his own accompaniment on piano shows his involvement (and betrays no technical stress).

— James Manheim