In 2021, Bob Dylan was on the road for his Never-Ending Tour – his tours have been going by the same name since the late 80s. However, it ultimately came to an abrupt end due to a health crisis. Dylan started livestreaming the same year due to his inability to play in public, holding an intimate virtual concert filmed and broadcasted for just a few days. The performance is now known as the Shadow Kingdom, and is accessible to a large number of people despite remaining shrouded in mystery. Subtitled "The early songs of Bob Dylan", this album does not draw on the first albums of the indestructible folk-rock bard. Instead, he plays songs from the 70s and 80s. But the acoustic style, hovering between blues, folk and tipsy crooner songs, is from the time when Dylan made his debut.Mandolins, accordions, guitars, harmonicas, double bass, stories, and the exquisite voice that sings old songs that you can’t help but listen to and share. At 80 years of age, Dylan is completely at ease in this wooded and retro setting. The sound is acoustic, but there is still electricity in the air; the original rock'n'roll is never too far away. Recognisable anywhere, his instrument-like voice undulates around the melodies, before covering and transfroming them into pure dylanries, little pastoral epics. On Sierra's Theme, the unreleased instrumental that closes the album, we find ourselves humming like Dylan, almost as if we’d always known the song. © Stéphane Deschamps/Qobuz

As a film, The Last Waltz was a triumph -- one of the first (and still one of the few) rock concert documentaries that was directed by a filmmaker who understood both the look and the sound of rock & roll, and executed with enough technical craft to capture all the nooks and crannies of a great live show. But as an album, The Last Waltz soundtrack had to compete with the Band's earlier live album, Rock of Ages, with which it bears a certain superficial resemblance -- both found the group trying to create something grander than the standard-issue live double, and both featured the group beefed up by additional musicians. While Rock of Ages found the Band swinging along with the help of a horn section arranged by Allen Toussaint, The Last Waltz boasts a horn section (using Toussaint's earlier arrangements on a few cuts) and more than a baker's dozen guest stars, ranging from old cohorts Ronnie Hawkins and Bob Dylan to contemporaries Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and Van Morrison. The Band are in fine if not exceptional form here; on most cuts, they don't sound quite as fiery as they did on Rock of Ages, though their performances are never less than expert, and the high points are dazzling, especially an impassioned version of "It Makes No Difference" and blazing readings of "Up on Cripple Creek" and "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" (Levon Helm has made no secret that he felt breaking up the Band was a bad idea, and here it sounds if he was determined to prove how much they still had to offer). Ultimately, it's the Band's "special guests" who really make this set stand out -- Muddy Waters' ferocious version of "Mannish Boy" would have been a wonder from a man half his age, Van Morrison sounds positively joyous on "Caravan," Neil Young and Joni Mitchell do well for their Canadian brethren, and Bob Dylan's closing set finds him in admirably loose and rollicking form. (One question remains -- what exactly is Neil Diamond doing here?) And while the closing studio-recorded "Last Waltz Suite" sounds like padding, the contributions from Emmylou Harris and the Staple Singers are beautiful indeed. It could be argued that you're better off watching The Last Waltz on video than listening to it on CD, but either way it's a show well worth checking out.© Mark Deming /TiVo

Alphaville's 1984 debut, Forever Young, deserves to be viewed as a classic synth pop album. There's no doubting that Germans are behind the crystalline Teutonic textures and massive beats that permeate the album, but vocalist Marian Gold's impressive ability to handle a Bryan Ferry croon and many impassioned high passages meant the album would have worldwide appeal. Indeed both "Big in Japan" and the touching, sad change-of-pace "Forever Young" raced up the charts in multiple continents. Borrowing inspiration from Roxy Music's detached theatricality and Kraftwerk's beats and rhythms, Gold and company hit upon a magic formula that produced here an album's worth of impossibly catchy tunes that could almost serve as pure definitions for the synth pop genre. The hits race straight for one's cranium and embed themselves upon impact. "Big in Japan" feels like a more serious cousin to Murray Head's "One Night in Bangkok," as a slow-pounding beat spars with Gold's desperate voice. "Forever Young," a stark, epic song that would become essential for every post-1984 high school graduation, drips sadness and never fails to cause a listener to nostalgically reflect on life and loss. Outside of these hits, the remainder of the songs rarely falter, mixing emotion, theater, and of course electronics into a potent, addictive wave of synth euphoria. It's likely every fan could pick his own favorite of the other should-have-been-hits, but "Fallen Angel" deserves special mention. It begins with spooky, funny warbling and icy keyboards, and then explodes and transforms into a startling, romantic epiphany at the chorus. If its lyrics are a bit goofy or juvenile, it only adds to the heartfelt love the song expresses. Alphaville stick firmly to their synths and sequencers on Forever Young, but they keep things interesting by incorporating motifs from funk, Broadway, Brazilian jazz, and even hip-hop. Even when the band takes itself too seriously, the songs' catchy drive and consistently smart production cover any thematic holes. Forever Young is a technically perfect and emotionally compelling slice of 1980s electronic pop/rock music. It's also a wonderfully fun ride from start to finish.© Tim DiGravina /TiVo

Rod Stewart first embraced his appeal to the middle of the road way back in 2002 when he recorded It Had to Be You, the first in a series of explorations of the Great American Songbook. Given those albums, it's no great surprise to hear Stewart sing with an orchestra on You're in My Heart: Rod Stewart with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. What is a surprise is that he's hopped upon the orchestral overdub bandwagon, letting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra glop on strings and horns over original vocal tracks for such hits as "Maggie May." Clever guy that he is, Stewart contributes a couple of ringers -- including a duet with Robbie Williams on "It Takes It Two" -- but those only wind up illustrating how stilted and stiff the overdubs are. On those hybrids, Stewart doesn't seem to be riding the waves of the music, which is a gift he's had since the beginning. Instead, the vocal tracks are tweaked to suit the needs of the orchestra, which gives You're in My Heart an odd stuffiness. Even on his Great American Songbook albums, Stewart hasn't sounded stuffy, so the fault isn't his, unless he should be blamed for consenting to this project in the first place. The reason why the record doesn't work is the concept itself: it's wrapping warm, empathetic recordings in a lounge robe that winds up as suffocating as a straightjacket.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Following the success of 2016's twin EPs Square One and Square Two, all-female K-pop group BlackPink returned with the chart-topping Square Up, which hit the top spot on Japanese, Korean, and U.S. World Albums charts upon release in the summer of 2018. Riding the success of bombastic trap-influenced lead single "DDU-DU DDU-DU" -- which entered the U.K. trending chart and became the highest showing on the Billboard Hot 100 by an all-female K-pop group (following the Wonder Girls' 2009 hit "Nobody") -- the four-track EP also made moves on the Billboard 200, becoming the highest charting all-female K-pop effort to date at number 40.© Neil Z. Yeung /TiVo

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After drifting away from her pioneering fusion of trip-hop and folk with diversions into jazz-tinged, acoustic alt-folk, Beth Orton's sixth solo album, 2016's Kidsticks, found her broadly re-embracing electronics. Six years later, Weather Alive nestles into a comparatively hushed, atmospheric blend of acoustic and electronic timbres that's meticulous and nebulous at once. The album finds her joined by a skilled group of backers, including core players Tom Herbert (bass) and Tom Skinner (drums), with help from, among others, synth player Francine Perry, vibraphonist Sam Beste, saxophonist Alabaster DePlume, and Shahzad Ismaily, who moved between guitar, Moog, harmonica, and additional bass and percussion. It was self-produced at her home studio, with Orton's unusually brittle vocal performances accompanied by a "cheap, crappy" upright piano in her garden shed. She begins with an absorbing, seven-minute title track that introduces the singer's weary rasp against a backdrop mix of sustain and improvised interjection by duo bass, synthesizer, near and distance saxophone, close-up piano, hand drums, vibraphone, and more. Her first words, "In the morning/All is dawning/In the stillness of the day," evoke a low-lit scene that's eventually populated by the root of a tree, steps down to water, shadows that breathe, and weather "so beautiful outside/It almost makes me wanna cry." Instrumentation expands to include drum kit, percussive noise effects, and plenty of shimmer by the time lyrics arrive at "The love, the love we're giving/Gonna bring us back into being." It ends with a spaceship-like whir that is mirrored at the beginning of the more-skittering second track, "Friday Night." Weather Alive's misty atmospheres part somewhat one-third and two-thirds of the way through for the livelier "Fractals," which actually establishes a bass groove, and the spare "Lonely," which features one of the more expressive vocal performances of Orton's career. The rest of the album, including its over-seven-minute closer ("Unwritten"), maintains an immersive quality that's as haunting as Orton's rough-hewn vocals, song titles like "Haunted Satellite" and "Arms Around a Memory," and lyrics such as "It's just that I was getting unwritten." © Marcy Donelson /TiVo

After a typically busy and fascinating 2014, Drake's 2015 started off much the same way. His chart-topping "album" If You're Reading This It's Too Late started off life as a free mixtape, but his label Cash Money stepped in at the last minute and changed it to a full-priced release. This move came amid reports that Drake was ready to follow his mentor Lil Wayne and leave Cash Money because of money issues. The album's number of references to not getting paid by his label shows that even if the rumors end up being false, Drake was plenty upset with Birdman and his business practices while he was recording this tape. Drake is also mad at women trying to play him for a fool, rappers who diss him, and people who think he's soft. Par for the course for a Drake album lately, but the difference here is that there are no pop singles to balance the claustrophobic rants. There are also no huge radio hooks, and most of the album sounds like it was cooked up (mostly by old mates Noah "40" Shebib and Boi-1da) during sleepless nights behind drawn blinds, with more dank atmosphere than the coach cabin of a passenger jet after an 18-hour flight. His raps sport the same snappy wordplay as usual, but Drake sounds like he's rapping to himself this time out, trying to work out issues and feelings instead of broadcasting to the world. He occasionally breaks out of the murk to make some noise, like on the strutting "6 God," but mostly he keeps his head down and the mood subdued. It makes for an album that's hard to love right away, but if you stick with it, is a rewarding listen. Especially at the end of the mixtape/album when Drake drops three songs that would have been highlights on any of his albums (or anyone's albums for that matter). The heartbreaking conversation with/ode to his mother "You & the 6," the slow-motion Prince-inspired R&B ballad "Jungle," and the swaggering "6PM in New York" sound like the core of what could have been his best album. As it is, they are a stunningly good coda to a very confusing detour in his career.© Tim Sendra /TiVo

Reteaming with the Band, Bob Dylan winds up with an album that recalls New Morning more than The Basement Tapes, since Planet Waves is given to a relaxed intimate tone -- all the more appropriate for a collection of modest songs about domestic life. As such, it may seem a little anticlimactic since it has none of the wildness of the best Dylan and Band music of the '60s -- just an approximation of the homespun rusticness. Considering that the record was knocked out in the course of three days, its unassuming nature shouldn't be a surprise, and sometimes it's as much a flaw as a virtue, since there are several cuts that float into the ether. Still, it is a virtue in places, as there are moments -- "On a Night Like This," "Something There Is About You," the lovely "Forever Young" -- where it just gels, almost making the diffuse nature of the rest of the record acceptable.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

When filmmaker David Lynch backed a disquieting scene in Blue Velvet with Roy Orbison's "In Dreams," he demonstrated the eerie atmosphere behind its pre-'60s innocence. Orbison disciple Chris Isaak played those qualities to the hilt in his shimmering, spare "Wicked Game," so it was no surprise when Lynch included the ballad in Wild at Heart. What was surprising, given the fact that it sounded like nothing else on pop radio in 1990, was that "Wicked Game" became a breakout Top Ten hit, pushing Isaak's accompanying album Heart Shaped World to platinum status. Of course, there's more than that one moody masterpiece of a single to recommend Heart Shaped World. Isaak faithfully recreates his influences with production that's infinitely cleaner than Sun rock & roll, drawing more on its form than its attitude, but he's particularly suited to the sort of Orbison/Presley-style balladry that brought him a mass audience. His rich, sobbing croon is simply a gorgeous instrument, whether he's in a sonorous baritone or quavering falsetto. And he uses that instrument to tremendous effect here, coming across as a brooding romantic with a broken heart and swoon-inducing style. Of itself, Heart Shaped World is a pretty effective mood piece, showcasing Isaak doing a whole lot of what he does best. He does attempt a couple of rockers, but they never really rock -- much like Orbison, it's clear that ballads are his true forte, and given the spirit Isaak wants to channel, the numbers feel much too tame. But aside from that flaw, the rest of Heart Shaped World is a supremely elegant late-night soundtrack, equally suited to steamy romance or solitary heartache.© Steve Huey /TiVo

When Jay-Z first made a series out of his best album, 2001's The Blueprint, it became a game of high expectations. The Blueprint of the first volume was Jay-Z as vital as he'd ever been, storming back to the hardcore after a few years of commercial success. The Blueprint²: The Gift & the Curse was a complete turn, a set of half-cocked crossovers, bloated to bursting with guest features that obscured his talents. The Blueprint 3 is somewhere between the two, closer to the vitality and energy of the original but not without the crossover bids and guest features of the latter (albeit much better this time). Kanye West is in the producer's chair for seven tracks, and it's clear he was reaching for the same energy level as the original Blueprint (which he produced). "What We Talkin' About" begins the album with a wave of surging, oppressive synth, while Jay-Z enumerates (with an intriguing lack of detail) what he's said and what's been said about him, ending with a nod not to the past but the future (and Barack Obama). West also produced the second, "Thank You," and while it starts with typical Jay-Hova brio, the last verse piles on the unrelenting criticism of unnamed rappers doomed to weak sales. There's plenty more lyrical violence to come, but most of the targets are much safer than they were eight years earlier. (Jay doesn't sound very convincing when he claims in "D.O.A. [Death of Auto-Tune]" that it's not "politically correct" to rail against one of the most reviled trends in pop music during the 2000s.) From there, he branches out with a calculating type of finesse, drawing in certain demographics via a roster of guests, from Young Jeezy (hardcore) to Drake (teens) to Kid Cudi (the backpacker crowd). The king of the crossovers here is "Empire State of Mind," a New York flag-waver with plenty of landmark name-dropping that turns into a great anthem with help on the chorus from Alicia Keys. The Blueprint 3 isn't a one-man tour de force like the first. Jay is upstaged once or twice by his guests, and while the productions are stellar throughout -- Timbaland appears three times, and No I.D. gets multiple credits also -- it's clear there's less on Jay's mind this time. Not tuned out like on Kingdom Come, but more content with his dominance as a rap godfather in 2009.© John Bush /TiVo

A double-disc set released for the holiday season of 2000, The Essential Bob Dylan is a fine choice for the casual listener that just wants all the songs they know on one collection -- it's Dylan's equivalent of Beatles One. Outside of the remastering and the previously non-LP (and very good) "Things Have Changed," there's nothing here for collectors, but, then again, that's not who this was designed for. This collection is for the listener that wants "Blowin' in the Wind," "Like a Rolling Stone," "All Along the Watchtower," "Quinn the Eskimo," "Lay Lady Lay," and "Tangled Up in Blue" in one tidy place. Yes, it's easy to find great songs missing, but for those casual fans, and for those looking for a fairly comprehensive yet concise entry point, The Essential Bob Dylan comes close to living up to its title.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo