Album Roundup

Tyler, the Creator Let’s first address what Call Me If You Get Lost isn’t. It isn’t a mixtape — though the instant shouting from DJ Drama throughout might have you thinking otherwise — or even much of a concept album: while there’s certainly a…

Japanese Breakfast For the last couple of years, big Internet music press has been hellbent on selling us this notion that indie rock is still the most vital mode of pop song-making around, a dominant force on yearly “Best Of” lists at various entrenched…

Migos There’s an alternate timeline where Culture III never came to be, where, following the January 2018 release of Culture II, the trap trio went on to successful solo careers, Quavo Hunhco, The Last Rocket, and Father of 4 establishing each respective artist as…

Modest Mouse Modest Mouse has touched heights few of their contemporaries have managed (or, necessarily bothered to pursue), the band’s career a curious journey beginning in the punk/DIY scene of the American Pacific Northwest, before meandering on into mainstream credibility and Top 40 respectability…

Olivia Rodrigo The cultural phenomenon that is Olivia Rodrigo, beyond whatever fanbase she amassed while a Disney channel star, can be best interpreted as follows: Most members of the elite media class have never really gotten over their high-school years and are therefore willing…

St. Vincent The teaser trailer that dropped on March 2 showed a collection of wavering handheld shots, depicting a harried Annie Clark in a blond wig and trench coat running the green-tinted halls of an aged Manhattan apartment building, frantically searching for a ringing…

J. Cole J. Cole is, somewhat inexplicably, really popular amongst hip-hop fans — and just about nobody else. He garners little critical praise from most music publications, and generates scant attention on a grander cultural scale, but if you ask any one of his…

BROCKHAMPTON When Kevin Abstract pensively observed that “It’s kinda sick and I was born in 1996 and 1999 the only year that I remember,” on Saturation II’s “JUNKY,” it helped put things in perspective: the appointed ringleader of Texas-rap group BROCKHAMPTON, who was 21…

Rhiannon Giddens & Francesco Turrisi Rhiannon Giddens may not be the only musician who recorded an album during lockdown, but she may be one of the best-suited for such a project. For one thing, she spent quarantine with her partner, the jazz instrumentalist Francesco…

Young Stoner Life Records What’s changed for YSL (Young Stoner Life) Records since their last compilation album, Slime Language, was released in late 2018? Well, they’ve signed a few more minor members to their roster including Cactus Slatt — which so far is a…