The achievements evidenced on Alan Goldberg’s Fuel For the Fire—40th Anniversary Edition, come as rapidly as the alliteration in the very title of this piece. The collection of cuts makes order from bedlam sound pleasing, the simple sound progressive, and the possibilities nothing short of illimitable. Through it all (which only lasts eight tracks, some of which are far too

If there’s nothing else you take away from this review, do yourself a favor. Remember the name Lord Sonny The Unifier. Throw his latest album on, The Escape Plan Handbook. Dig the vibes, feel his flow, and hear his heart pouring, song after song. Then, and only then, can you truly comprehend the magnitude, if not the import, of the

They simply don’t make albums like Thought Bubble, from The Scrub Ups, anymore. And, we’re not just talking about the full 11 tracks the band cranks out on this affair, either. No, this is something like, but actually much more than, a throwback to when music was raucous, unbridled, and something altogether of its own. The project takes the best

The sincerity of the latest effort from 1499, Love, is unassailable. In fact, it’s everywhere on this seven-cut affair. One can feel it in the titles of the songs, which include numbers like “How He Loves”, “Spirit Breaks Out”, and “Gratitude”. It’s evinced in the name of this collection of cuts, and certainly in the heartfelt vocals, which are greatly

There’s not a lot of tracks out there that even remotely sound like what Aronieme’s putting down on “Hallow”, her latest release. Matter of fact, the title alone is largely suggestive of that fact, even before one puts an ear to the tune itself. When was the last time you heard a record without a snare? Aronieme, who’s credited with

It’s really, truly, something what JBNG is able to pack into little over three minutes of music madness on his latest effort, the single “Many Moons”. The track shifts through different moods, styles, and feels in what, for some passages, seems like far too short of a time. The adage about it’s better to leave them desiring more than to

Were they not so deliciously smooth, the highs on Lonesome Cat’s LP, Acoustic Mourning, would be euphoric. They come at you rapidly and often throughout this project, itself a working wonder of perfection of music, vocals, and emotional lyrical wizardry. Sometimes, those highs take the form of Cat’s vocals. Money’s got the silkiest, most diaphanous falsetto this side of Mawell,

Todd Kolod, the guitar and vocal genius behind the rarely heard, yet sorely missed groups Daddy-Doo Band and JustFolk, is thinking about hanging it up. Matter of fact, if you listen to him, he already has. Retired may or may not be the word he chooses to use. Either way, he claims he’s done, out the game, and out to

There’s a lot that’s really, really right on Barren Mother of All, the latest album from Post Death Soundtrack, that’s set to be released on July 14. The entire ethos and appeal of the project, for example, is steeped in dark sounds and colors, brooding tracks, and music that moves. Mind you, this is largely, if not exclusively, the brainchild

If you’ve never heard him, or even heard of him before, then take this reviewer’s word for it. There are few forces in all of existence like that known as Todd Kolod. The things he’s able to do, and accomplish, as the front man for the Daddy-Doo Band, simply bewilder the imagination, to say nothing of the ear drums, on

To get on the hype of The Tirith, especially when the band is in as rare form as it is slinking through 10 tracks of esoteric, clandestine material as populate its latest album, Quetzalcoatl, takes a lot. Even just as a listener, that is. Beware before digging too deep into this affair, which is business that’s about as serious as

The moods found, existent, and lurking in between the lines of Sun Raven’s 10-track Long Player Anam Caram are heady. They lure you in, bringing out the best quality of guitars to entrance, weave spells, and change the very shape and feeling of the rooms in which are very lives are lived. Such efficacy, of course, is a testament to

For sheer ambition alone, you’ve simply got to give it up to your man The Kiss That Took A Trip, AKA M.D. Trello. Dude’s put together a double album spanning 30 songs. When’s the last time you heard that? Never? And, so much for this 12-cut stuff, or today’s equivalent of eight or nine tracks being called an album. Moreover,

Pol Sembrano’s self-titled debut album is nine tracks’ worth of extremely electric, post-modern EDM inspired, yet ultimately transcendent, synth and keyboard work. However, these overt tendencies to court and cultivate mass appeal, as it were, are tempered by a decent quantity of rap drum patterns and Sembrano’s expressive vocal phrasings. When this combination comes to fruition with aplomb, which it

Granted, there are multiple members of 6 Speed Supernova. At least three of them, to be exact. And though there are other instruments on what likely could be the band’s magnum opus, “Starfire”, one wouldn’t be wrong for thinking of this number as a duet. That’s because the chops, mastery, and verve of the lead singer, Marie Gutierrez, and the

The Levity that is the titular motif of Bitter Blue’s latest EP is found, throughout the work, in a sundry of locations, effects, and appeals, if you will. It exists most prominently, perhaps, in lead singer Luka Nikolic’s voice, as his silky falsetto wraps around at least a passage or two of most, but not quite all, of the songs.

Mighty Joe Belson’s “The Process of Individuation” is quite a cut. There’s certainly not too many other tracks out there that are reminiscent of it, or which attempt to mimic its trajectory, which is more than merely refreshing. Adorned with just an acoustic piano and a smattering of what could be synths, the simplicity of the number is readily apparent.

  For the sentient, thinking, and dare we say sensual listener, the key question after checking out Emitter’s 9-track album Extra Pale is direct and to the point. How long, exactly, can you put an ear to what might be the best number on the entire affair, “Adelaide”, before you tacitly yell and tell yourself that you’ve just got to

“It’s mostly the voice that lifts you up/it’s mostly the voice that makes you buck/a lot of kids got flavor and some have skill/but if your voice ain’t dope then you need to chill” –“Mostly the Voice”, Gangstarr, Hard to Earn, 1994. In conversation, there are distinct moments in which the voice of Suzanne Jarvie is momentous, moving, and even

The best of No Wave Gaze, the brand new album that just dropped from Jason Vitelli at the end of last month, is somnambulating, with a smoothness to rouse one from bed or, on the contrary, induce a magical, enchanted form of sleep. There are few other artists that can produce such an effect. Examples readily include “Standing at Your

There are rare occasions when one just so happens to stumble upon an album—such as JustFolk’s Best of JustFolk 2012-2025—where the songs sound so good, it’s nothing less than a chore to get through (listening-wise, that is) one tune, because you’re so amped about it you just know there’s stuff just as good, if not better, on the rest of

So, you decide to throw on Redemption, the latest Long Player from Karey Lee. You breeze through what, perhaps the first three tracks or so and, for all intents and purposes, you could—but you don’t—stop right there. But it’s at this point, after just a song or two, that the artist’s whole angle becomes apparent. Lee is a performer, in

Sometimes, the seriousness of an artist is defined, if not readily identified, by a look on his or her face. It might be one of intensity, perhaps, or of contemplation, or of rumination. Sometimes it’s defined by the tools he or she uses, which endow him or her with certain types of brushstrokes, sounds, or an evocation of raw emotion.

“mother’s day”, the forthcoming LP from Suzanne Jarvie, is a concept album characterized by heavy, heady doses of poignant pianos, groovy guitars, and down home soulful vocals doused in the artist’s unabashed propensity for story-telling. The project will be released on February 20, 2026 on Wolfe Island Records in North America and May 15, 2026 on Continental Record Services (CRS)