Editors' Choice for September 2023

Album cover for Isn't It Now?

Isn't It Now?

Domino

With help from D'Angelo producer Russell Elevado, this experimental pop troupe continue the inspiration they rekindled on their 2022 return to form Time Skiffs.

— Fred Thomas

Album cover for Le Jour et la nuit du réel

Le Jour et la nuit du réel

Thrill Jockey

The French composer/producer returns to her roots with poignant analog synth instrumentals reflecting the ever-changing nature of reality.

— Heather Phares

Album cover for Stratosphere

Stratosphere

Numero

The band's first album is sad, subdued lo-fi indie that folds in elements of shoegaze, sadcore, and noise rock to create something timeless and real.

— Tim Sendra

Album cover for Perspective

Perspective

Planet Mu

Original electronic versions of Jerrilynn Patton's Pulitzer Prize-nominated collaboration with Third Coast Percussion.

— Paul Simpson

Album cover for Endling

Endling

Rise Records

A lively black metal throwdown that cements the validity of the Norwegian band's second act.

— Timothy Monger

Album cover for Tension

Tension

BMG / BMG Rights Management

Euphoric 16th album from the Australian dancefloor queen that carries the party from the disco to the club.

— Neil Z. Yeung

Album cover for Atlas

Atlas

Awe / Awe

A flowing sequence of orchestral ambient collages created in part during the artist's residency at Ina-GRM Studios in Paris.

— Andy Kellman

Album cover for Queen of Time

Queen of Time

Kill Rock Stars

Her breezily intricate, style-shifting Kill Rock Stars debut faces adversity with warmth and wisdom (and guests like Billy Strings and Jerry Douglas).

— Marcy Donelson

Album cover for Diamonds

Diamonds

Community Music

Elegant and understated, the Australian duo's fifth album is their most complete statement to date.

— Timothy Monger

Album cover for Ahora

Ahora

Trouble in Mind

The Spanish quartet upgrade from jangling garage rock to bubbling indie rock with vintage synths while upping their melodic craft in the bargain.

— Tim Sendra

Album cover for Again

Again

Warp

The project's restlessly creative tenth album revisits the music of Daniel Lopatin's young adulthood with equal amounts of ambition and emotion.

— Heather Phares

Album cover for Relentless

Relentless

Parlophone / Rhino / Warner Music

Another potent, though more varied late-career highlight from Chrissie Hynde and her collaborators.

— Timothy Monger

Album cover for Push

Push

Sacred Bones

The group's whirlwind debut for Sacred Bones offers dance-punk mutations that sound equally at home in a mosh pit or at a rave.

— Heather Phares

Album cover for Átta

Átta

BMG / BMG Rights Management

Recorded with an orchestra and without their drummer, the post-rock project's gorgeous, ambient-leaning eighth album is offered as a balm to turmoil.

— Marcy Donelson

Album cover for everything is alive

everything is alive

Dead Oceans

The band's second post-reunion album is a brilliant evolution that sees them incorporating electronics, post-punk, and even big pop melodies into their shoegaze sound.

— Tim Sendra

Album cover for Lines

Lines

Shelflife

The California noise pop sextet dial up the shimmer and deepen atmospheres while keeping tempos high and melodies bittersweet on their fourth LP.

— Marcy Donelson

Album cover for Bird Machine

Bird Machine

Anti-

Completed by friends and family, Mark Linkous' fifth album is a heartbreaking, uplifting tribute to the way his music moved so many people.

— Heather Phares

Album cover for Rabbit Rabbit

Rabbit Rabbit

Wax Nine Records

The band confronts the lingering aftermath of abuse with fierce, surprising songs full of novelistic lyrics and teeth-rattling guitars.

— Heather Phares

Album cover for Sea of Mirrors

Sea of Mirrors

Virgin

Designed as a soundtrack for a lost spaghetti Western, the band nimbly add strings and some country-rock along the way to another triumph.

— Tim Sendra

Album cover for So Long Before Now

So Long Before Now

Dot Matrix Recordings / Dotmatrix

Off-kilter and experimental jangle pop from an overlooked band of the '80s, this is all their work collected in one wonderful package.

— Tim Sendra

Album cover for Cousin

Cousin

dBpm

The band's pop experimentalism comes to the fore on their 15th studio album, with help from producer Cate Le Bon.

— Mark Deming

Album cover for Perennial

Perennial

Woodsist

Building from a foundation of dreamy loops, this ever-evolving indie folk act turn in some of their most ornate production and ambitious songwriting to date.

— Fred Thomas

Album cover for Black Classical Music

Black Classical Music

Brownswood / Nonesuch

The drummer/composer's debut studio album is a sprawling 19-track musical autobiography wedding electric jazz to R&B, funk, reggae, and Afrobeat.

— Thom Jurek