It’s a tender, chaotic, and messy experience that feels all the more natural because of Open Mike Eagle’s transparency with his audience. This is Eagle at his most directionless, and for the time being that’s exactly what we needed to hear from him, because that’s how many of us are feeling too.

These are warm, lived-in songs, the sort that feel instantly classic, becoming canon without ever feeling like they’re trying all that hard to.

YTILAER finds Callahan at his most personally enigmatic, taking inspiration from his own life and filtering those experiences through a prism of modern folktales. He offers us all the most enticing details but manages to keep it wonderfully vague at the same time, a treasure trove of musical obscurantism.

Rolling Golden Holy exudes a communal, back-to-basics charm. The threesome operate within an eternal country-folk formula of less-is-more that fosters a sense of instant familiarity.

Fossora is an incredible and vulnerable project that refuses any easy categorisation. Björk’s dives into sonic obfuscation have never once eclipsed her refusal to be anything except open-hearted and honest. Her power is in how she allows herself to feel and let these emotions guide her artistic expression.

At times, the measured approach he takes on some songs falls short of supplying the momentum needed for each part to hit in the exact way he wanted, but for the most part, Sheff creates a landscape of gentle dynamics that grow until they release their stored energy through unexpected eruptions of kinetic movement.

With Nymph, Shygirl brings another original voice in the mix; good luck hearing a record that portrays sex in similarly tactile, authentic and effortlessly cool fashion.

Produced by Sam Evian, Loose Future is brighter and more buoyant than Andrews’ prior output, the Arizona-born artist displaying her well-honed songwriting and impressive vocal skills while adopting a pop-adherent sound.

A honed songwriting approach from Rankin seems to fuel Blue Rev, with only a few songs inching beyond three minutes. This excess-trimming approach makes Blue Rev the leanest the band has sounded, but also makes it their tightest work to date.

She’s a painter of sound, of mood. And one feels after listening to this document of searching textures, yearning melodies, and newfound sonic intimacy, that she’s only getting started.

One of their boldest statements yet — Cool It Down has everything one would need in a rock record in this day and age, and it’s the most complete version of the band we’ve ever received.

The Bible is undoubtably one of Lambchop’s most mature records, but it is also one of their most honest, most unguarded in its emotional and historical perspectives.

With bops and tearjerkers aplenty, Rina’s sincerity in how she confronts her past demons cannot help but warm even the iciest heart.

Exister succeeds at painting a portrait of his despair in charcoal. Unfortunately, as a piece of music to consume it’s just too choppy and incoherent to elicit a feeling. In the end it’s a risky exploitation of his frail psyche, a destination already travelled to and not worth revisiting all that often.

God Save the Animals’ production approaches are understated compared to those employed in previous work yet still precisely rendered. What stand out – prominently and unabashedly – are Alex’s impeccably crafted and irresistibly delivered songs.

In an era that occasionally feels oversaturated with hyper-pop, demon time is never too frenetic for its own good. It’s short, but these songs groove.

This is a record that feels whole and woven with direction and intent. It may disappoint some who desire the disjointed immediacy of Pain Olympics, but don’t discount Tough Baby just because of its lack of single-worthy material. Give it time to allow its message of hope and empathy amidst disarray to take hold.

It won’t draw new fans in likely, but anyone who’s been following No Age this far are bound to find something worthwhile here, and that’s precisely who the band made this record for.

This album is not served to us on a platter as a radio-ready hit record, and it is not made ‘for us’, but it gives us something better — the feeling of being a part of this music and not a mere recipient.

Overall, Asphalt Meadows is a fine record from a band so deep into their career they really have nothing left to prove — except, it seems, to themselves.

Although sonically the production can feel repetitive – especially towards the album’s middle – what ultimately anchors this project is the lyricism. He manages to explore his experience as a gay man and all its accompanying troubles and triumphs, yet also frame them in the universal understandings of heartbreak and alienation.

As it stands, it’s a solid and often a fun listen, with some real highlights and crystalline production, but for such a lofty eponymous allusion, the album winds up shortchanging itself a bit, rarely languishing long enough in its own ideas to land the dizzying punch Santigold has revealed herself to be capable of time and again.

Arrangements shows the band as a whole accessing a new sense of purpose and creative liberation, planting another flag in the crowded postpunk landscape.

They round out the subtle complexities in the seemingly simple story of longing; a tip-toeing toybox melody reflecting the delicacy of the situation, digital glitches suggesting the distance between them, sighs that relay the inner conflict. This precision features throughout Jennifer B, and it’s thanks to these careful touches that each song connects on a deeper level, despite their structurelessness and unpredictability.

Parks has made her most undeniable statement yet, an album full of uplifting and mesmerizing neo-classics that will fit right in the hearts and minds of the thousands it will touch.

What remains is a record that feels all too groomed, all polished execution and often not well thought out. Music to nod and tap your foot along to, then turn it off and move on.

For the first time in awhile, however, the energies he has expended have converged into a proper piece of art.

Though her debut album told us there’s virtue to having some miles on the soul, PRE PLEASURE kind of does the inverse: a more seasoned, matured artist letting the kid in herself win and giving herself permission to swing away at life.