Category: Albums

Tortoise, “Layered Presence” (Nonesuch Records)

This is the lead single from this all-instrumental Chicago band’s new album, Touch; there was more of it available for me to review, but it’d be dishonest of me to pretend I wanted to hear it, given that these guys have never made me feel anything other than slightly intimidated that I’ve never gotten the point of their trip, which is invariably described by (strictly hipster) tastemakers as “post-rock with jazz influences.” This meandering but oft-dissonant tune rates the same as anything else I’ve ever heard from them: It got on my nerves, not because the musicians aren’t any good; they are, but not to the point that I think of Tortoise as anything more relevant than a fashion statement that’s way past its expiration date. They pay a lot of lip service to free jazz, so much so that some of their fans literally name-check Ornette Coleman when describing them, but — and this may owe more to production limitations than their creativity — there are always annoying sounds in their tunes, to put it simply. I mean, experimentation and improvisation are fine, but — and this is just my impression, of course — this is more like a Flaming Lips-flavored Pelican: every move was planned, and they should just grow up and hire a singer. But you do you, as always. C —Eric W. Saeger

Kashena Sampson, Ghost of Me (self released)

It was refreshing to see this Nashville folk-rocker opening the one-sheet press announcement for this, her third album, by admitting that the record is about her frustration at not being where she wants to be in her music career, to wit: “Besides being a musician, I have also been a bartender at a music venue for the past 10 years to pay my bills. It’s a great job, but there are some nights that feel like my heart is breaking, watching others live out the exact dream I’m still chasing, night after night.” That’s some rare honesty there, a sentiment many can relate to in our golden age of show biz nepotism, when impossibly high paywalls prevent worthy artists from achieving mainstream success. Now, she did recruit Jon Estes to produce the record (he’s worked with Bela Fleck, Abigail Washburn and many other well-knowns), and he dragged some pretty dramatic performances out of her, so much so that she probably needs her resumé overhauled: In the past, wags (including a Rolling Stone writer) described her as a ’70s radio-folkie, but her vocal sound here evokes Grace Slick, Florence Welch — dare I say an older version of Chappell Roan — mostly in from-the-mountaintop mode. She’s shooting for something of a goth image, but I’d advise her to think about some image redefinition; she’s pretty close to the right formula, I’d say. A+ —Eric W. Saeger

_PLAYLIST

A seriously abridged compendium of recent and future CD releases

• Oct. 24 is the first new-album Friday after my birthday, so if you forgot to do something special for my birthday on the 21st, like leave a microwaved joke on my Facebook about my being older than your grandmother or whatever (do people even bother sending birthday cards anymore, when they can just post something completely vacuous on social media, we really need to change that), you could order one of my books from any bookstore or just send me money, either thing is fine, I thank you in advance for your kind indulgence. Now, as important as it is, we aren’t here to talk about my birthday, we are gathered here today to talk about albums, and I’ll tell you folks, this week’s slate’s getting filled up with new ones, all competing for your holiday dollars, if you have any! Why, just look at this, we were just making fun of talking about this fellow last week, in the context of Chrissie Hynde saying she hates his music, one Mr. Bon Jovi, who of course rose to fame in the 1980s for looking like Farrah Fawcett or whatever his appeal was (mostly the press just talked about his hair), since his music was pretty awful, but then legendary hair-metal songwriter Desmond Child entered the picture and wrote songs for him, like “Livin’ On A Prayer” and such, and then he left the picture, and the Jovis tried to re-capture the magic, but instead went back to their tradition of writing bad music, starting with the awful ballad “Bed Of Roses” and the hilariously contrived single “It’s My Life,” which all of us music critics secretly refer to as “Just Pretend Desmond Child Wrote This Song And Give Us your Money, That’d Be Great” when we’re holding our secret meetings about controlling what music all you people have to listen to on the radio and Spotify. Whatever, who cares, the new album is titled Forever, same as their last album, but this is the “Legendary Edition,” spotlighting the push single “Legendary,” which stole the hook from Whitney Houston’s “Greatest Love of All” and had a mediocre run on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary chart, mostly by accident, given that people who are old enough to be able to name one Bon Jovi song assumed it would be awesome, but it wasn’t, because Desmond Child had nothing to do with the album, and now you’re armed with all the information you need to make a buying decision about this completely unnecessary record (there’ll be a lot of such albums coming out as holiday gift-buying season draws closer), you’re welcome.

• As you all surely know, alt-country folkie Brandi Carlile bestowed upon humanity the ballad-ish single “The Story,” a romantic dirge that was about as fun as getting your four-wheeler stuck in a swamp, and that’s actually what the song sounds like as far as I’m concerned, but many people like it because they think it’s as epic as “What’s Up” by Four Non Blondes for some reason. Returning To Myself is her new album; the title track is a yodely unplugged strum-a-thon that’s pretty unremarkable until the 12-string guitar kicks in, after which it’s pretty decent-ish.

• Demi Lovato rose to stardom after appearing on Barney & Friends and then some Disney Channel things and now she’s just massively famous for totally sounding like Kesha. The title track from her newest LP, It’s Not That Deep, is fine by me, an Aughts-era house track that Tiesto wouldn’t hate at all.

• Finally it’s Boston alt-rock legends The Lemonheads, led by Evan Dando, who has been name-checked in a whole bunch of popular songs, including “Jane” by Barenaked Ladies. “In The Margin,” the lead single from the band’s new album, Love Chart, is a return to their nerdy, low-key, mumbley Ramones-twee roots, it’s pretty cool. —Eric W. Saeger

Featured Photo: Tortoise, “Layered Presence” (Nonesuch Records) & Kashena Sampson, Ghost of Me (self released)

Patricia Brennan, Of The Near And Far (Pyroclastic Records)

The only reason you don’t see a lot of vibraphone-jazz reviews in this space is that I don’t receive many of them from the coffee-pounding public relations people who promote jazz albums. This one’s important: Mexican-born Brennan is one of the best around; she’s played with Yo Yo Ma, The Philadelphia Orchestra and Vijay Iyer for starters, not to mention all the awards she’s won, including Jazz Album of the Year and Vibraphonist of the Year in Downbeat’s 2024 Critics Poll. But wait, what are we even talking about, you ask, isn’t a vibraphone the same thing as a xylophone? No, xylophones have wooden bars, whereas vibraphones have metal bars that produce a warmer, more sustained sound, but either instrument would seem an odd choice for an astronomy nerd who grew up listening to Zeppelin and Radiohead until you knew that Afro-Cuban musical traditions and the sounds of Mexican marimba bands were vying for her attention all the while. This record, as everyone from NPR to Stereogum expected, is a masterstroke, a worthy successor to 2024’s Breaking Stretch; like the album cover, it’s an exercise in beautifully bizarre fractals (opener “Antlia”), frightwig Latin-jazz (Andromeda”) and experimental ambient (“Lyra”). Transcendental stuff for sound explorers. A+

Holy Wars, “Metamorphosis” (Rise Records)

This industrial-indie single came to my attention courtesy of (you should be able to guess by now) friend-of-the-Hippo Dan Szczesny, whose love for badass chick-rock is inexplicable but fierce; this Los Angeles boy-girl duo was his weekly Favorite Band Of All Time a week or so ago, and the singer is now pen pals with Dan’s kid. The tune follows their more recent single, “Crucify,” which for me immediately evoked a bolder, more over-the-top version of another L.A. boy-girl duo, Collide, who entranced me — good lord — 20 years ago, with their Tool-meets-synthpop vibe. The punchline here is that the link Dan sent for “Metamorphosis” was on a delay, and I was literally one of the first people to hear it, along with their most diehard fans and however many PR bots were in attendance (I know how weird that sounds, but it’s the honest truth; I literally clicked the link three minutes before the video premiered). The recipe’s been done, but the song’s quite good; think A Perfect Circle but more sharply focused and with more Nine Inch Nails menace (in other words Poppy, i.e. Evanescence jamming with Rammstein), or, more accurately, Collide after downing a flask of 28 Days Later serum. It goes hard, sure. A

_PLAYLIST

A seriously abridged compendium of recent and future CD releases

• Oct. 17 is the next Friday-load of albums from established rock stars and such, but there are local bands and artists that could always use more attention, so let’s turn to that first! I had planned to visit another local club in order to spout more run-on sentences in support of the local scene, but it didn’t happen this week, because I’ve been so busy with other stuff I’ve barely even checked my rapidly dying Twitter in a month. OK, I’m being serious, I do want to talk more about local bands in this space, like my plan was to see what’s happening at The Wild Rover Pub, which, I hear from Ross The Mandolin Player from local Irish-folk-rock band Rebel Collective, people are pretty excited about. But I didn’t; instead I waited for the universe to send me local stuff to talk about so I wouldn’t have to stop re-binge-watching Alien: Earth and leave the house, and sure enough it did. Here it is: You people know how supportive I’ve been of hilariously underrated Americana-rocker Kristian Montgomery for years now, right? Well, believe it or not, he just racked up a bunch of first-round nominations for actual national Grammy awards, including the Best Rock Album Grammy for his newest full-length, Prophets Of The Apocalypse. Naturally, we all wish Kris the best of luck competing against Taylor Swift and whatever’s left of the Beatles and whatever other nobodies put out records this year, and if he does win, Petunia and I will be attending the afterparty at Snoop Dogg’s apartment, and I will demand a huge bowl of all-purple Skittle-flavored gummies from Snoop’s victory garden. Mind you, competition for that Best Rock Album Grammy will be fierce, because guess who’s got one coming out this week, none other than Chrissie Hynde, of The Pretenders! Titled Duets Special, the record features (spoiler) a bunch of duets with famous rockers, for instance a version of Billy Paul’s 1972 radio hit “Me & Mrs. Jones,” which Chrissie sings with k.d. lang. Spoiler, k.d. sings the really high parts, because she is a more awesome singer, although Chrissie is more awesome at making fun of bands she hates, like Bon Jovi and Duran Duran, no one can top her, don’t even bother trying.

• Speaking of awesome, Icelandic indie band Of Monsters and Men release their new album, All Is Love And Pain In The Mouse Parade, this week! If you’re like most people, you became aware of their awesomeness by way of hearing one of their better songs on TV soundtracks, like the time on Sweet Tooth when their totally killer track “Dirty Paws” was playing while the kid was turning into a goat or whatever the point of that show was. OK, you can already listen to the whole LP on YouTube; I just picked the tune “Dream Team” at random, and it is of course crazy-cool, a cross between M83 and God Lives Underwater, full of surprising electro and post-indie twists and turns. Those guys still haven’t messed up yet.

• Boz Scaggs is responsible for some of the worst cab-driver-radio songs of the ’70s, like “Lowdown” and “Lido Shuffle,” but maybe his new album, Detour, has something good on it, who even knows anymore. Yes, “I’ll Be Long Gone” is a strummy mellow jazz-pop ballad, perfect for watching potato-baking contests on ESPN.

• We’ll call it a column with Deadbeat, the new album from Australian indie dude Kevin Parker, aka Tame Impala. New single “Loser” is a Jamie Liddell/Gorillaz-infused joint that really brings the mellow electro-funk, if that’s your jam (it isn’t mine).

Featured Photo: Patricia Brennan, Of The Near And Far album cover and Holy Wars, “Metamorphosis” album cover

Air, The Virgin Suicides Redux (TH Productions)

I was never a fan of this French space-rock duo or space-rock in general, but this remix of their 1999 album The Virgin Suicides is more like it, mostly because it’s an all-analog affair that reveals the band as the outlet-mall-ambient organism that it is much more so than the original did. They knew the 1999 record wasn’t representative (or useful, let’s just say it) because it was made on a very low budget. “It was during the first era of digital home studio equipment,” the band recently said, now that it’s safe to admit it, “and the sound is very metallic and cold. We’ve always regretted that about the way it sounds.” Well, hear hear, I completely understand it now after hearing this reupholstered version: They wanted it to sound like Dark Side Of The Moon-era Pink Floyd, except, you know, edgier. Or something. No, seriously, the non-cheese-drenched parts are quite indica-stoner-listenable, whereas the over-modulated Flaming Lips parts are still intact, all of which means it’s actually more relevant now than when it first came out. The spaceship sounds and This Island Earth robo-bursts are still idiotic, but Wayne Coyne wouldn’t be around today if it weren’t for that nonsense, put it that way. B-

Magic Wands, Cascades (Metropolis Records)

Ah, a nice easy Halloween-apropos dream-pop/goth record from Metropolis Records. This one features a Los Angeles-based boy-girl duo, Chris and Dexy Valentine, who first surfaced in 2012 with Aloha Moon, the title track of which sounded like a shoegaze band trying Sadé-yacht-pop on for size, while the rest sounded like a Chex Mix of Asteroids Galaxy Tour, Lana Del Rey and Lola Falana. This one stays in that zone but goes harder, starting with “Across The Water,” which borrows the buzzy guitar drone from Wire’s “It’s A Boy” to good brain-zapping effect, after which “Armor” does the obligato Joy Division-meets-Bauhaus thing (translation: there’s a lot of reverb, angst and intentionally cheesy production values; “Hide” uses a similar sewing pattern). “Albatross” is pure shoegaze, sounding like Raveonettes trying to sound really forlorn; “Moonshadow” is the best on board if you like sexy vampires riding motorcycles (and who doesn’t). This is definitely worth any goth’s while. A-

_PLAYLIST

A seriously abridged compendium of recent and future CD releases

• Sure and begorrah or whatever, this Friday is another Friday, Oct. 10, meaning there will be new albums coming out that day, and we will talk about them in this space, but as long as we’re talking about albums while speaking with Irish accents, I would like to discuss very quickly an album that is not coming out on Friday, because it isn’t done yet! This segues magnificently into my new sub-series for this column, tentatively titled “Eric Actually Leaves The House To Find Nightlife In Manchester NH,” which I did once again on Saturday, Sept. 28, to chill with the homies at the Shaskeen Pub on Elm Street! Yes, if you can even understand my words through this thick Irish brogue, that date was the Pub’s 20th Anniversary celebration, so I showed up at midnight to meet Ross The Mandolin Player from the Irish folk/rock band Rebel Collective, whose members live up north a bit, but not as ungodly far as Berlin or Montreal, I forget where exactly. Anyway, they have recorded all the tracks for their upcoming new album, but haven’t mixed it yet. I’m sure it will be awesome; they are influenced by Flogging Molly, The Pogues and of course world music of a leprechaun bent, and it all went off quite well during this performance. FYI, they haven’t played any large conventions where people guzzle green absinthe lager or whatnot, but they have played their tin whistles and guitars and fiddles at the Highland Games, so that’s something to look forward to! Now, recall that I did ask you people where I should go after the Slam Free Or Die poetry event I attended the other week, and you naturally ignored my totally desperate pleas, but funnily enough, I, a confirmed unwelcome person from Mass., heard about the Shaskeen from a friend on Twitter who used to live in Manchester during the days when Pockets The Mastermind was the local king of hip-hop, so neener, I know your secrets now. In the meantime, while you wait for Rebel Collective’s awesome new album, you could always put away your kilt and taxi-driver cap and don your skinny jeans and chullo hat to go listen to Paw, the new album from indie-rock dude Avery Tucker, formerly half of Girlpool, whose awkward moonbat-twee tune “Chinatown” is still talked about among the 10 or 15 people worldwide who still remember it! Paw’s leadoff single, “Like I’m Young” is similarly moonbatty and minimalist, except for when Tucker starts singing increasingly loudly and then the whole mess descends into a slow-motion ’90s-grunge Silkworm-ish skronk-a-thon. It’s OK!

• In April, Mass Appeal Records announced a set of seven albums coming this year from such rap artists as Ghostface Killah, Raekwon, and Nas, the latter of whom helped out on the forthcoming new one from Mobb Deep, Infinite. Includes some rhymes from Prodigy, who died in 2017; “Easy Bruh” is eerie, trippy and of course badass, just like all hardcore hip-hop that appeals to fans who prefer groups whose logos are rendered in Spinal Tap font.

• The Wytches is a raw, rattley post-punk band from England that kind of reminds me of The Horrors when they were good. Talking Machine, their new album, features a tune called “Black Ice” that’s loud and messy in a Hives kind of way but less spazzy and more mid-tempo; you’ll probably like it if you like Brian Jonestown Massacre and that kind of thing.

• And lastly we have to pay attention to veteran emo band Yellowcard, whose new album Better Days sounds exactly like Blink-182 and Lit and Good Charlotte and all the rest of them, isn’t art amazing?

Featured Photo: Shiner, BELIEVEYOUME (Spartan Records) & Patrick Wolf, Better Or Worse [EP] (Appaport/Virgin Music)

Todd Herbert, Captain Hubs (TH Productions)

Herbert, an Evanston, Illinois-bred jazz saxophonist, has been a top-level performer out of New York City for many years now, serving as a member of the Freddie Hubbard Quintet, Jimmy Cobbs Legacy Band, and the Charles Earland Quartet, among others. As great as this album is, it does feel a little sparse all told, but only because Herbert’s only traditional-style cohort here is pianist David Hazeltine, whom I’ve talked about here now and then. The sax runs are gold for the most part, but the excitement, along with the sound levels, drops considerably when Herbert’s seemingly tireless workouts suddenly stop and Hazeltine steps in with his smoke-filled-room tinkling. I say this only to point out that this isn’t a whiz-bang sax-jazz album but a duo collaboration, which some would admittedly find wildly appealing. John Weber’s bass is flawless, as is Louis Hayes’s drumming, and the selections are good; the bombastic title track that opens the record was originally written for Hubbard and is a definite keeper. Wayne Shorter’s “Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum” and John Coltrane’s “Straight Street” are here, so it’s worth investigating, sure. A-

The Belair Lip Bombs, Again (Third Man Records)

Here we have the first Australian band to be picked up by Jack White’s Third Man Records label, and strangely enough it’s not the most amazing Australian band I’ve ever heard, not by a long shot. It’s a female-fronted indie band that makes the right noises, with their scratchy-raunchy ’90s-tinged guitar sound betraying a fetish for Big Black and things of that sort, but singer Maisie Everett’s voice rarely pushes past the tepid Sheryl Crow range that’s well into her comfort zone. I’m saying that the band’s noise level is up there with Amyl And The Sniffers, maybe even more aggressive than that, but Everett doesn’t quite fit in, save for when they try snoozy pub-pop oatmeal on for size (“Cinema”; “If You’ve Got The Time,” which includes an incidental heavy-ass Queens Of The Stone Age riff for no logical reason). “Hey You” reads like Au Revoir Simone, while we’re at it; I literally have no idea what these guys are trying to accomplish, to be honest. C

_PLAYLIST

A seriously abridged compendium of recent and future CD releases

• Friday is Oct. 3, a day that will live in infamy because my sister was born that day (she’s a dog person and I’m a cat person, so Thanksgivings are super-hard and usually end in yelling and Facebook-unfriending until the next time). And speaking of unfriendings and harmless, mindless drama, look who’s got another album coming out, it’s none other than Taylor Swift, the subject of half the internet fights a few months ago, for really no good reason whatsoever! This one is called The Life Of A Showgirl, and it is produced by, you guessed it, ubiquitous Swedish pop-music-oligarch Max Martin, whom I’ve talked about before. He’s written, among other modern super-hits, Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl,” Celine Dion’s “That’s the Way It Is,” Britney Spears’s “Baby One More Time” and TayTay’s “Shake It Off” and “Blank Space,” in other words he’s written the second-most No. 1 singles in history, behind only Paul McCartney, so if you want to write Facebook posts about how much modern music stinks, always be sure to blame it all on that dude. Along with Max, this album is co-produced by his producer-bro partner, Shellback, another overexposed Swede, so I know I am about to listen to something so unbelievably novel that I will explode, so here’s the title track, a diva ballad that sounds like Mariah Carey for a while and then she starts hitting high notes kind of like Celine Dion in yell mode. A lot of people will like this, because it is a single-ladies’ angst overload but not as intolerable as Adele.

• Rachael Yamagata is an adult alternative singing lady who hasn’t dented the U.S. charts since 2003, which means that I’ll probably like what she’s doing on her new album, Starlit Alchemy. Ugh, forget that, her voice is too breathy on the advance single, “Birds,” like a female Peabo Bryson, or Ani DiFranco trying not to be too annoying. It is a piano-driven ballad; I imagine you’ll probably see it on Good Morning America or whatnot and think “well that’s kind of pretty,” and then never think about it again.

• Sparks, a band we talked about a few months ago, is releasing an EP, titled MADDER! Funny story about Sparks, someone read my review of their last album, Mad, in this newspaper and sent me a private Facebook message asking me to write about a Sparks-related art project they were doing, and that was the only time I’d ever mentioned Sparks on Facebook. But then, oddly enough, I started getting spammed by Facebook about Sparks’ Sept. 11 show at Boston’s Berklee Performance Center, meaning Facebook is reading people’s private messages in order to spam them. Isn’t that disgusting, but anyway, the new single is “Porcupine,” a really dumb thing that sounds like Devo trying to be elevator music, go hear it for yourself.

• Lastly and somewhat apropos for early Halloween, Canadian alt-folk/country band The Deep Dark Woods releases their 11th album, The Circle Remains, this Friday! They are from Saskatoon, the biggest city in Saskatchewan, whose closest U.S. city is Portal, North Dakota, all of which means that it’s basically like living on Pluto except it’s much colder. Saskatchewan, which means “Great, how did we end up here anyway” in Native Canadian, doesn’t field a professional hockey team, so they root for the Edmonton Oilers, who have lost the last two Stanley Cup Finals series in a row, which is very sad, so I anticipate that this album will be full of sad songs from these Plutonians, whose team cannot win the Stanley Cup, let’s go listen to some of their mournful wailing on kickoff single “The Circle Remains Unbroken.” So yeah, it’s droopy and soft and vaguely funereal but not really sad, with slow-strummed acoustic guitar and a vintage-sounding organ doing annoying things. The singer sounds like Burl Ives, if that does it for you.

Featured Photo: Shiner, BELIEVEYOUME (Spartan Records) & Patrick Wolf, Better Or Worse [EP] (Appaport/Virgin Music)

Shiner, BELIEVEYOUME (Spartan Records)

This one came to my attention by way of friend-of-the-Hippo and fellow underreported author Dan Szczesny, but wait, don’t flip to the movie reviews yet, this time it’s not another opera-metal band but instead a post-prog/polite-math-rock foursome from Kansas City, Missouri. They’re quite good, these guys, able to shift gears rather seamlessly; we’ll randomly start with “So Far So,” a mid-tempo rockout evoking a harder-edged, art-rock-infused Kasabian (please tell me you’re familiar with Kasabian, I’m at the end of my rope, I swear, but if you haven’t, think Gang Of Four Krazy-glued to Alice in Chains), and then move on to the one they spent the bulk of their video-filming money on, “Asleep In The Trunk,” which launches with an obtrusive, somewhat Rush-like bass line and then shoplifts a few ideas from Muse. That brings us to “The Alligator,” a song that’s reminiscent of Live, or more accurately Collective Soul in radio-wimp-pop mode. I told you a ’90s-rock resurgence was coming, which is what this is, just please don’t shoot the messenger. A- —Eric W. Saeger

Patrick Wolf, Better Or Worse [EP] (Appaport/Virgin Music)

About time I got a record in here that sounds like the musicians wear funny European shoes. This South London, U.K.-based multi-instrumentalist is a folktronica/baroque-pop-grounded genre-tinkerer with a growing cult following; he’s played viola for Arcade Fire and Chicks On Speed among other interminably artsy acts. We find him here experimenting with largely agreeable, pub-friendly sounds, not in the stuffy unplugged fedora sense but in the manner of a crew of heathens adding pop elements to Irish jigs and sounds of that nature. The title track is an odd but very listenable duck, with its M83-style from-the-mountaintop verse, Simple Minds chorus and brightly strummed mandolin. Irish-traditional cover “She Didn’t Dance” reads like a pop-minded ode to the TV show Black Sails, combining boisterous Nick Cave belting with mournful zydeco sounds; “Mejora O Empeora” is a windows-down cruiser with world-music sensibilities. He’ll perform at Center of The Arts Armory in Somerville, Mass., on Nov. 10. A+ —Eric W. Saeger

_PLAYLIST

A seriously abridged compendium of recent and future CD releases

• Sept. 26 is your next new-album-release Friday, so a lot of albums are making their way to your Spotifies and Napsters, which brings us to the latest update in my totally informal Manchester Nightlife series, in which I try to find stuff to do in New Hampshire’s “Queen City,” which should actually be called the King City, as everyone knows! When last we left this exercise, I asked you scamps where a regular fella like me could go to do a little twerking to the latest hip-to-the-hop music from Ye and Kendrick and Skee-Lo, but no one responded, and after much informal polling past that, I’m going to assume that there is a small faction of 21- to 32-year-olds who know of such a dance club, but they’re keeping it on the DL, because they know I’m the best twerker in the state and they don’t want to be embarrassed when they “bust a move.” In the meantime, however, there is an excellent, super-friendly indie-arts community to be found here in town, namely the Slam Free Or Die slam-poetry series, operated by a super-nice bro named Christopher Clauss! It’s a nicely attended open-mic event, held at Stark Brewing Co. at 500 Commercial St. in Manchester on Thursday nights, where you can get a brewski and a burger or other pub food (the fish and chips is a very good buy) or just munch on ketchup packets if you’re broke, then, if you want to, get up in front of all these super-cool people and read a poem (or vaguely rhyme-y rant) that you wrote! It’s a great time, an opportunity to offload a little of your existential angst over the coming Apocalypse, maybe meet a celebrity (actress Amber Tamblyn spoke there once) and yes, there’s beer, so why not give your parrot a little break from watching you misery-browse through Facebook and Twitter and go hang out with some actual people, in our arts community, who want to hear your words, no matter how weird or swear-y! In the meantime, I’ll resume searching for a local twerking club, or just see what the Wild Rover is like nowadays, anyplace where I might be able to perform my hypnotic come-and-get-it mating dance in time to something from Here For It All, the new album from former important person Mariah Carey! The single, “Type Dangerous” is perfect for slow-twerking, with its afterparty hip-hop-soul-meets-new-jack-jazz beat and disposable pop flourishes, my tail is wagging as we speak!

• Robert Plant was the singer for Led Zeppelin, but then he got tired of having enough money to buy random Scottish castles and struck out on his own with some really captivating rockabilly-tinted beach-pop albums in the 1980s, and then shoved Alison Krauss in our face for a while. His new LP (and band) is named Saving Grace, featuring vocalist Suzi Dian, who plays accordion. They’re said to be a psychedelica band, but there’s a (spoiler) polka-Western edge to it, going by opening single “Everybody’s Song.” They’ll be at the Shubert Theatre in Boston on Nov. 6.

• Biffy Clyro is a Scottish alt/prog band that sounds like Braid or Reuben or a busier, feistier Killers, you get the idea, and they’re releasing their 14th album, Futique, this week. The last time I talked about them at all was probably 15 years ago, so this will be as new to me as it is to you. Yuh, new tune “Hunting Season” sounds like Reuben, the end.

• We wrap up the week with a bougie, quirky comedian who’s never made me laugh, as in not once, ever, Portlandia’s Fred Armisen and his new comedy album, 100 Sound Effects. There is no advance sample for me to critique, but one of the titles is “Romanian Crowd At Rock Club Shouting For An Encore,” isn’t that so droll (eyeroll emoji)? —Eric W. Saeger

Featured Photo: Shiner, BELIEVEYOUME (Spartan Records) & Patrick Wolf, Better Or Worse [EP] (Appaport/Virgin Music)

Beat, Beat Live (Inside Out Records)

In my never-ending quest to be a people-pleaser, I cover basically every genre on Earth in this space, and yes, I know how obvious it is. I’ll pick a random record, start listening, and the words start zapping out of my fingers automatically. I really only have a tough time with newest-hottest indie bands, because they’re almost always ridiculously overrated, but another genre that’s out of my wheelhouse is “wildly creative” prog-rock a la Zappa, because I don’t ever get the point. In that vein, King Crimson is another band I’ve never liked at all, but this isn’t all that bad, even though it’s rendered by a supergroup consisting of two Crimson members (Adrian Belew and Tony Levin) along with the guitar wonk’s guitar wonk, Steve Vai, and Tool drummer Danny Carey. Their mission: “re-imagine” three Crimson albums, namely Discipline, Beat and Three of a Perfect Pair, thus it’s obviously for Crimson fanatics. The results are all very tech-prog-sounding, like a wacky Spotify mix comprising random entries from Disco Biscuits, Styx, Talking Heads and Return To Forever, with occasional departures into Captain Beefheart nonsense. What can I diplomatically say other than come and get it, King Crimson completists, yee-hah. A

Bill Brennan and Andy McNeill, Dreaming In Gamelan (self-released)

Wonderfully peaceful “fourth world music”-based collaboration between two Canadian multi-instrumentalists/composers. They deal in “Sundanese Gamelan,” a sound created with gongs and chimes and associated elements, instruments that are manufactured under local conditions in towns in the Indonesian province of West Java, such as Bogor and Bandung. At its core, the music is an Indonesian tradition practiced by the West Javanese ethnic group known as the Sundanese, but here, as you’d naturally expect, the melodic patterns are geared more toward Western tastes. Electric violinist Hugh Marsh (on leave from Loreena McKennitt) adds a layer to the sonic depth, but whether or not that’s really needed is probably a matter of taste; the violin is more an undergirding than anything that ever gets busily melodic. The chimes and gongs have a “singing bowls” effect that sounds simultaneously planned and completely spurious, that is when it isn’t exhaling exquisite ambiance. The tldr: It’s the sort of thing you’d expect to hear at a wildly pricey spa or advanced yoga center, etc. A+

_PLAYLIST

• Like almost every Friday since the fall of Rome or whatever, Sept. 19 will find us covered in new albums, clawing our way to safety, away from all the albums that want us to buy them! Since Christmas is a mere 98 days away, I have a Mount Vesuvius-load of albums to deal with this week, so instead of going into anything obscure right off the bat I’m going to talk about the new one from Sarah McLachlan, Better Broken! She’s my all-time favorite Lilith Fair fixture, but you may better know her as the lady who interrupts your TV show to ask you to donate to abandoned pets, which of course you definitely should do, don’t be a cheapskate (I can’t watch those commercials, like, the minute one shows up on the teevee when I’m watching my shows I change the channel at top speed, which I deserve to do because I’ve rescued enough cats in my lifetime. In fact, it’d be really nice if the Humane Society would give me some sort of special Xfinity code that would block commercials starring starving cats and dogs automatically, you know, maybe show me a nice happy video of skunks and raccoons frolicking in the forest instead, but then again, I’d end up being all like “You know, I should start rescuing abandoned skunks and raccoons,” even though every wildlife expert advises people not to, so don’t do it). Where were we, oh yes, Sarah McLachlan, she’s the best, let’s go lend an ear to the album’s title track, the first single from this new album! It is a deep, mellow tune, starting out with a trip-hop drumbeat reminiscent of Massive Attack’s “Teardrop,” which means she hasn’t changed much; the verse is mature and awesome, then it moves into an addictive little hook that flirts with brazen catchiness before folding into a yodel-filled chill-art piece that’s as good as anything else I’ve heard from her before. Some things never change, and in this case that’s actually a good thing!

• Hark, it’s the sound of rapidly twerking butts, who else could it be but New York rapper Cardi B, twerking away like a demented terrier! Cardi’s new album, Am I the Drama, is out this week; mayhaps you’ve heard the title track if you have small twerking children (I was going to say that you may have heard it at a local Manchvegas club, but now that the local club scene is changing and there’s basically no local place to twerk as far as I know — someone message me on one of my “socials” if I’m wrong of course, that’d be great — you’re better off just having kids if you want to stay hip to twerking and Humpty Dancing or whatnot) (yes, I’m being serious, send me your local club spam. At present I assume the Manchester dance club scene is nowadays the same as Portsmouth’s, just dudes in fedoras doing Bob Dylan covers). OK, this Cardi tune is, of course, a glossy yacht-rap song with lots of swearing, for your kids, who secretly just want you to give them guidance, love, discipline and money for tattoos.

• Yikes, I thought I was going to have to slog through another new Black Keys record, but thankfully it’s just everyone’s favorite demented stoner-indie band Black Lips, with their new LP, Season Of The Peach! “Tippy Tongue” is of course awesome, like early Rolling Stones but 100 times more interesting, meaning it’s nothing like Black Keys.

• And finally it’s nerdy chillwave artist Toro y Moi, with Unerthed: Hole Erth Unplugged, his new album! I hate to name-check José Gonzalez two weeks in a row, but “CD-R” is like his stuff with Zero 7, lazy and techie, but with a dobro in there, which makes it Americana-ish. It’s very nice and yadda yadda.

Featured Photo: Parcels, Loved (ANTI- Records) & Chameleons, Arctic Moon (Metropolis Records)