Billie Eilish

Happier Than Ever

Darkroom / Interscope

Pop/Rock

Delivering on the promise of her debut, the pop chameleon matures with confidence and grace atop subtle, powerful, and genre-blurring production.

— Neil Z. Yeung

Prince

Welcome 2 America

Legacy / NPG Records / Sony Music

R&B, Pop/Rock

Unreleased Prince sessions from 2010 featuring the previously undocumented lineup of bassist Tal Wilkenfeld and drummer Chris Coleman.

— Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Bleachers

Take the Sadness Out of Saturday Night

RCA

Pop/Rock

The project's third album channels Bruce Springsteen's glory days as it captures the moment when joy shoves desperation out of the way.

— Heather Phares

Torres

Thirstier

Merge

Pop/Rock

Singer/songwriter Mackenzie Scott turns up the volume -- and the happiness -- on some of her catchiest and most confident songs.

— Heather Phares

Los Lobos

Native Sons

New West

Pop/Rock, Latin, Country

The great East L.A. band cover a dozen songs from their hometown and show how much they've learned and how far they've grown.

— Mark Deming

Aretha Franklin

Aretha [2021]

Atlantic / Rhino

R&B

A comprehensive four-CD box that is the first set to thoroughly cover every aspect of Aretha's career.

— Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Durand Jones & the Indications

Private Space

Dead Oceans

R&B

The band advances on their pleasurable third album with lush ballads and robust disco grooves.

— Andy Kellman

Yola

Stand for Myself

Easy Eye Sound

Pop/Rock, R&B, Country

The Nashville-based Brit delivers a sophomore set that is as inviting as it is powerful.

— Timothy Monger

Son Volt

Electro Melodier

Transmit Sound

Pop/Rock

Jay Farrar and his band once again ponder the state of America with smarts, eloquence, and some soulful accents.

— Mark Deming

Dot Allison

Heart-Shaped Scars

Sa / SA Recordings

Pop/Rock

The former One Dove singer returns after a decade-long break with an album of painfully intimate and lovely folk with strings and shatteringly honest vocals.

— Tim Sendra

Dusted

III

Total Dust

Pop/Rock

Third solo outing from this Holy Fuck member turns to hushed folk songwriting without losing the hazy production mystique of previous albums.

— Fred Thomas

Guardian Singles

Guardian Singles

Trouble in Mind

Pop/Rock

Furious album from this New Zealand band with advanced degrees in early-'80s American underground guitar rock with a little post-punk gloom mixed in for fun.

— Tim Sendra

Blues Traveler

Traveler's Blues

Round Hill

Pop/Rock

With the help of a bunch of old and new friends, Blues Traveler cover a bunch of favorite tunes.

— Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Jim Lauderdale

Hope

Yep Roc

Country, Pop/Rock

The great singer and songwriter gets philosophical, offering a message of encouragement along with some great tunes.

— Mark Deming

Electric Six

Streets of Gold

Cleopatra

Pop/Rock

Detroit's Dance Commanders record an album of covers that doesn't bring the mania their original material generates.

— Mark Deming

Parmalee

For You

Stoney Creek Records

Country

An expert piece of country-pop that emphasizes the pop side of this harmony group.

— Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Sonny & the Sunsets

New Day with New Possibilities

Rocks in Your Head

Pop/Rock

A companion album to 2012's Longtime Companion that sees the indie pop group revisit lonesome country stylings but with a more playful spirit.

— Marcy Donelson

Tangents

Timeslips & Chimeras

Temporary Residence

Pop/Rock, Jazz

The Australian ensemble continue to blur the lines between improvisation and technology-forward studio composition on this sprawling double album.

— Paul Simpson

koleżanka

Place Is

Bar/None Records

Pop/Rock

Slinky grooves, jazzy vocals, and a knotty, improvisational rock undercurrent mark the cerebral solo debut of Phoenix native Kristina Moore.

— Marcy Donelson

Mose Allison

Complete Atlantic/Elektra Albums 1962-1983

Strawberry Music

Blues, Jazz

This six-disc box offers 12 albums from the Mississippi pianist and singer/songwriter's best-known period in a gloriously designed package.

— Thom Jurek

Vasconcelos Sentimento

Furto

Far Out Recordings

Electronic, International, Jazz

Debut long-player by self-taught multi-instrumentalist and composer is a heady brew of lo-fi breaks, atmospheric jazz, and chromatic funk.

— Thom Jurek

Chris Carter / CTI

Electronic Ambient Remixes, Vol. 1

Mute

Electronic

Ambient dub translations of material from the Throbbing Gristle co-founder's 1980 debut solo cassette.

— Paul Simpson

Chris Carter / CTI

Electronic Ambient Remixes, Vol. 3

Mute

Electronic

Chris Carter reworks material from the Throbbing Gristle catalog into creeping ambient dub.

— Paul Simpson

Amaro Freitas

Sankofa

Far Out Recordings

International, Jazz

On his third long-player, the Brazilian pianist's trio interrogate Brazil's musical history to fashion a cornerstone for a bracing new sound.

— Thom Jurek

Various Artists

Changüí: The Sound of Guantánamo

Petaluma Records

Latin

A handsome three-disc, field-recorded overview of under- documented, infectiously danceable party music from southeast Cuba.

— Thom Jurek

Schola Cantorum of the Cardinal Vaughan Memorial School / Scott Price / Iestyn Evans

Great Is the Lord

Aparte

Classical

A gorgeously recorded album of English standards from an unusual youth choir.

— James Manheim

Jean-François Heisser / Jean-Frédéric Neuburger / Serge Lemouton

Stockhausen: Mantra

Mirare

Classical

A strong recording of one of Stockhausen's more accessible works, with the fine sonics essential to its realization.

— James Manheim

Vadym Kholodenko

Kholodenko plays Tchaikovsky: Piano Sonatas Opp. 37 & 80

Harmonia Mundi

Classical

A clean recording of Tchaikovsky's sonatas that respects the works' modest qualities.

— James Manheim

Gothic Voices

Echoes of an Old Hall

Linn Records

Classical

An attractive survey of the Old Hall Manuscript, the most important source of late medieval and early Renaissance English polyphony.

— James Manheim

Iván Fischer / Budapest Festival Orchestra

Brahms: Symphony No. 3; Serenade No. 2

Channel Classics

Classical

A technician's Brahms Third, perhaps, but an impressive example of one.

— James Manheim

Andris Nelsons / Boston Symphony Orchestra

Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphonies Nos. 1, 14 & 15; Chamber Symphony in C minor

Deutsche Grammophon

Classical

This volume of Nelsons' Shostakovich survey with the Boston Symphony explores music from opposite ends of the composer's life.

— Keith Finke

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