While TANGK is a mostly successful effort that showcases continued musical growth, it’s hard not to miss the bite that once came with the bark.

Walls Have Ears is certainly less valedictory than Live in Brooklyn 2011. Yet, by virtue of this, it gives a stronger sense of how Sonic Youth earned their unimpeachable credentials through a long-standing ethos of contravention that unsettled musical and artistic complacencies of the time.

Wolfe is as uncompromising a poet as she has ever been on She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She, and while her disparate choices of canvas give us a bumpy ride, it’s one worth taking in good faith.

On Phasor, we are still orbiting and navigating Lange’s particular dreamy sound space with the familiar debris, but this time, there is a stronger emphasis on the power of relational love.

One of this year’s most striking releases so far. Add in a killer style, playful energy, impeccable production, incredible performances, and some very important representation, and you’ve got one of the most striking pop records of the last few years.

There is nothing weighty going on in the lyrics. Think of Spiel as an instructional audio asking one to listen, turn one’s head, and hear the music again.

It’s unlikely this will be a breakthrough to a larger audience, but to the faithful, this is the latest chapter in one of the most consistently rewarding careers in hip-hop.

The nine tracks are relatively brisk and generally run about three minutes long. The short(ish) time spans fit the urgency expressed.

As a long-time lead vocalist and lead guitarist with an established style, J Mascis can’t seem to escape himself. Unplugged or not, What Do We Do Now epitomizes this cul-de-sac.

Saviors probably won’t bring in a lot of new fans, but it will attract lapsed devotees from the past 30 years to check out the band again. These songs will also fit snugly at these upcoming marathon concerts, fitting in snugly between the full album performances of Dookie and American Idiot without sending thousands of people scurrying to the beer lines en masse.

Despite its reserved, dry, soft, and tranquil harmonies, What an Enormous Room sounds even more poppy and self-confident than its predecessors, with its multilayered, luscious-yet-intimate arrangements and a lot of ringing void.

“The Bell” and “Void” take Ty Segall’s listener on an extensive and restless ride in just the first 12 minutes of this 65-minute whopper. The album smooths out a little after that, settling in for 13 more tracks that don’t stray far from what Segall knows and does best.

Carlisle croons in a clear voice layered with dust. He clearly articulates the words and emphasizes the important ones. The details matter. He also lets the syllables slide into each other to express emotions.

Wall of Eyes comes across as a more cohesive project than its older, wilder sibling. Its pace is unhurried, and its songs favor compositional restraint over sheer energy.

People Who Aren’t There Anymore is that rare album where you might find yourself with the unusual but life-affirming compulsion to dance and quietly sob at the same time.

Even with its taut construction, Pick-Up Full of Pink Carnations sags just a bit in the middle. The downside of the renewed focus is that some of the songs sound similar and struggle to assert themselves. .... All of this aside, it is good to hear the Vaccines being a guitar band again—and an excellent one, at that.

Cloudward is a shimmering, deeply satisfying example of a jazz sextet firing on all cylinders. Prepare to be astonished.

It’s good that she kept picking away at that block of ice, as it resulted in what might be her finest album to date.

This record is easy to listen to, forget, and confuse with something else.

Black Dog is the sum of these past strange adventures. The mysterious vibes of The Entiry City, the cold, brutal post-industrial of Unflesh, and the avant-pop musings of Pastoral. It is a work reminiscent of Gazelle Twin but also forges a new path. One that is able not only to merge these disparate aspects but also to surpass them.

Inside the beautiful hot pink mess lies Nicki’s most disciplined and adventurous work to date, one that’s sure to cement her position in a constantly expanding field of female rappers.

No More Blue Skies – a follow-up arriving four years after its predecessor – is a welcome return for fans of Gold Dime, as it includes all of Ambro’s brilliant touchstones. It can be loud and fast, but will also disarm you and create a deeply unsettling atmosphere. Gold Dime are thankfully never boring.

As when he first did it nearly two decades ago, it is an affirming, warm kind of music to serve as a soundtrack for the next valley surely coming for us all.

Of course, anyone who misses the fiery sturm und drang of Grails’ earliest work might somewhat lament their absence on Anches en Maat. The fiddle and fury of their first few records is ancient history at this point, though, and they’ve been reinventing themselves ever since. Thank the deities they have, too.

On Robed in Rareness, Butler takes yet another step in his forward-thinking, far-sighted project, as the opening track title, “Binoculars”, indicates. Despite the brevity of this release, space is still the place.

Kourtesis pieces together all the samples, sounds, and roots she has brought us before in a tighter and more incandescent package than past EPs. Certainly, it’s a debut worth the wait.

It’s another solid, consistent piece of work that shows the country legend having fun and enjoying herself at this point in her career.

As a document of late Superchunk, Misfits & Mistakes provides a fascinating glimpse of them trying new things while reaffirming their signature contributions to the indie rock canon. The sound of Superchunk has aged remarkably well, adapting to our fast-changing times as circumstances have dictated.