In retrospect, it's a bit shocking how fully formed the signature Aerosmith sound was on their self-titled 1973 debut -- which may not be the same thing as best-executed, because this album still sounds like a first album, complete with the typical stumbles and haziness that comes with a debut. Despite all this, Aerosmith clearly showcases all the attributes of the band that would become the defining American hard rock band of the '70s. Here, the Stones influences are readily apparent, from the Jagger-esque phrasing of Steven Tyler to the group's high-octane boogie, but the group displays little of the Stones' deep love of blues here. Instead, Aerosmith is bloozy -- their riffs don't swing, they slide. They borrow liberally from Led Zeppelin's hybridization of Chess and Sun riffs without ever sounding much like Zep. They are never as British as Zeppelin -- they lack the delicate folky preciousness, they lack the obsession with blues authenticity, they lack the larger-than-life persona of so many Brit bands. They are truly an American band, sounding as though they were the best bar band in your local town, cranking out nasty hard-edged rock, best heard on "Mama Kin," the best rocker here, one that's so greasy it nearly slips through their fingers. But the early masterpiece is, of course, "Dream On," the first full-fledged power ballad. There was nothing quite like it in 1973, and it remains the blueprint for all power ballads since. The rest of the record contains the seeds of Aerosmith's sleazoid blues-rock, but they wouldn't quite perfect that sound until the next time around.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Michael League and Bill Laurance, pillars within the ‘fusion’ big band Snarky Puppy, have released a surprising duo album, Where You Wish You Were. This release gives light to the most intimate parts of their musical worlds and to the artistry and friendship that has united them for all these years. In keeping with his last solo album, Affinity (in which he abandoned the synthesisers and created elegant, entirely acoustic pieces), Bill Laurance takes to the traditional piano here, drawing inspiration from both new music and the classical world.Michael League adds an array of instruments to this acoustic foundation: from the oud to the fretless acoustic guitar, not to mention the baritone electric guitar and the ngoni. His sound explores the oriental and Mediterranean, and he allows this to develop fully over this new release. Through personal, original compositions full of beautiful melodies, the two men invent a type of music that’s atmospheric, lyrical, journeyed and nuanced in the way it combines tones and textures. With its clear discourse and frank, shimmering harmonies, this stunning album remains accessible despite its experimental sound. © Stéphane Ollivier/Qobuz

After a lifetime of running—away from their Bronx home as a teenager, for freight trains to travel the country, from New Orleans to Nashville and back to NYC—Alynda Segarra (aka, the force behind Hurray for the Riff Raff) was forced to sit still and look around when the pandemic all but stopped the world for a while. "Not being able to travel and get out whenever, I felt nervous energy inside me ... it taught me a lot about trauma and memories being stored in the body," they said. So Segarra began running, as in jogging, to get out the energy—but also sorting through the past and figuring out how to live with it, and thrive. Nowhere is that clearer than on "SAGA," a bittersweet, Velvet Underground-like jangle inspired by Christine Blasey Ford's sexual-assault accusations against then-Supreme Court Justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh, and how that led to a resurfacing of Segarra's own painful memories. "I don't want this to be the saga of my life … push it out of my mind," they rebel against a hopeful wall of horns, kittycat-cute backing vocals contrasting the chant of "Nobody believed me." (Their voice often recalls the power and silk of Annie Lennox.) You can feel Segarra's racing pulse in "PIERCED ARROWS" and a more measured pace in "WOLVES," with its mix of chilled synth, tribal drums and '80-style gospel backing vocals. It feels like a lost Yeah Yeah Yeahs song, and that's a good thing. "ROSEMARY TEARS" sounds sacred and holy, and "nightqueen" is atmospheric, the drums slowly floating in as if to pierce its bubble of keening synth. "RHODODENDRON" is great, as Segarra coos pretty plant names and makes them sound like a roll call of danger—"Rhododendron/ Night blooming jasmine/ Deadly nightshade/ Fox glove … " It bounces along like a joy-riding car without shocks, then settles into a groove just as the singer switches gears to wail their plea of a chorus: "Don't turn your back on the mainland!" It's a reference to their Puerto Rican heritage, and Segarra has said it's about admitting to the "colonizer inside us all." Finally, "PRECIOUS CARGO" is a stunner, Segarra's sing-song spoken word like documentary journalism as they speak in the voice of real-life ICE detainees. "Me swimming just to get across/ With the babies on my shoulders ... Made it through the jungle/ No water there for two weeks," the story goes, detailing the hardships of being captured while seeking asylum: split from their families, sleeping on the cold floor "like a dog." Segarra helped the men work with lawyers to win their freedom but stresses that just being free in the US does not guarantee a functioning, human system. © Shelly Ridenour/Qobuz

In interviews before the release of In Cauda Venenum, Mikael Åkerfeldt, Opeth's vocalist, guitarist, and chief songwriter, stated that "heaviness" was an aesthetic rather than a sound, to explain why he had abandoned death metal. Beginning with 2011's Heritage, Opeth made a conscious shift toward progressive rock that has, as evidenced here, become pervasive. This set is their first to be issued in English and Swedish editions. Sonically and musically, the album contains musical and production traits already evident on Heritage and Sorceress -- and to a lesser degree, on Pale Communion -- as organs, synths, Mellotron, acoustic guitars, syncopated rhythms, strings, choirs, and key changes are crafted into the band's two-guitar-bass-drum attack. But where the previous three studio albums were rife with experimentation, In Cauda Venenum is focused on a cohesively pre-arranged whole. It may be the fourth entry in their progressive evolution, but it's their first to deliver the full realization of the band's potential.These ten songs are laden with lush textures, painstakingly crafted melodies, unapologetic gothic overtones, startling dynamics, and visceral presence. Opeth may deliberately borrow inspiration from many sources, but they aren’t trying to re-create them. The band recorded at Park Studios in Stockholm with all-analog gear and a goal: "to be as epic as possible." While set-opener "The Garden of Earthly Delights" is a three-and-a-half-minute Gothic intro; the first tune proper, "Dignity," is heavy as hell, with multi-tracked wordless choral choruses, swirling organs and Mellotron, sampled spoken voices, sound effects, popping drums, and spiky lead guitars. Its intense opening section gives way to fingerpicked acoustic, gently sung lyrics, and textural atmospherics before roaring back into riff-laden hard rock. "Heart on Hand," the other advance track, commences with a guitar-and-bass riff right out of "Immigrant Song," framing the cleanest, most emotionally resonant vocals in Åkerfeldt's career before swirling into instrumental chaos and transforming itself into a lilting ballad in the final third. There are brutal moments here, too, in angular jams like "Charlatan," with its overdriven, filthy bassline. "Universal Truth" alternates between folk-inflected prog and spidery hard rock. The moody classical guitar and piano intro to "The Garroter" gives way to spooky, swinging dark jazz. While the sprightly keyboard and strummed guitar vamp on "Continuum" are a sinister musical perversity, they circle toward spiraling prog metal with the vocal and rhythmic section syncopations of Yes, then unwind into moody pastoral, poly-harmonic, folk-inflected Gothic rock. Though it emerges slowly, there is a biting crackle in the sweeping majesty of closer "All Things Pass." Åkerfeldt's and Fredrik Åkesson's guitars spiral and slash in a loss-saturated vibe colored by swirling organ, Mellotron, and crashing tom-toms, as Opeth buoy the singer whose lyric is drenched in loss and grief. On In Cauda Venenum, Opeth have thoroughly revisioned prog rock for the 21st century. While there are referents to the past, they have merely been folded into a brand of heavy music that reflects not progressive rock's history, but Opeth's enduring, evolving image.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

Once Appetite for Destruction finally became a hit in 1988, Guns N' Roses bought some time by delivering the half-old/half-new LP G N' R Lies as a follow-up. Constructed as a double EP, with the "indie" debut Live ?!*@ Like a Suicide coming first and four new acoustic-based songs following on the second side, G N' R Lies is where the band metamorphosed from genuine threat to joke. Neither recorded live nor released by an indie label, Live ?!*@ Like a Suicide is competent bar band boogie, without the energy or danger of Appetite for Destruction. The new songs are considerably more problematic. "Patience" is Guns N' Roses at their prettiest and their sappiest, the most direct song they recorded to date. Its emotional directness makes the misogyny of "Used to Love Her (But I Had to Kill Her)" and the pitiful slanders of "One in a Million" sound genuine. Although the cover shrugs them off as a "joke," Axl Rose's venom is frightening -- there's little doubt that he truly does believe that "faggots" come to America from another country and that "niggers" should stay out of his way. Since he wasn't playing a character on the remainder of the album, there's little doubt this is from the heart as well. And what makes it harder to dismiss is the musical skill of the band, which makes the country-fried boogie of "Used to Love Her," the bluesy revamp of "You're Crazy," and the tough, paranoid fever dream of "One in a Million" indelible. So, you either listen to the music and are satisfied or else listen to the lyrics and become disturbed not only by Rose's intentions, but by the millions of record buyers that identified with him. © Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

At the time of its release in March 1990 -- just a mere two years after It Takes a Nation of Millions -- nearly all of the attention spent on Public Enemy's third album, Fear of a Black Planet, was concentrated on the dying controversy over Professor Griff's anti-Semitic statements of 1989, and how leader Chuck D bungled the public relations regarding his dismissal. References to the controversy are scattered throughout the album -- and it fueled the incendiary lead single, "Welcome to the Terrordome" -- but years later, after the furor has died down, what remains is a remarkable piece of modern art, a record that ushered in the '90s in a hail of multiculturalism and kaleidoscopic confusion. It also easily stands as the Bomb Squad's finest musical moment. Where Millions was all about aggression -- layered aggression, but aggression nonetheless -- Fear of a Black Planet encompasses everything, touching on seductive grooves, relentless beats, hard funk, and dub reggae without blinking an eye. All the more impressive is that this is one of the records made during the golden age of sampling, before legal limits were set on sampling, so this is a wild, endlessly layered record filled with familiar sounds you can't place; it's nearly as heady as the Beastie Boys' magnum opus, Paul's Boutique, in how it pulls from anonymous and familiar sources to create something totally original and modern. While the Bomb Squad were casting a wider net, Chuck D's writing was tighter than ever, with each track tackling a specific topic (apart from the aforementioned "Welcome to the Terrordome," whose careening rhymes and paranoid confusion are all the more effective when surrounded by such detailed arguments), a sentiment that spills over to Flavor Flav, who delivers the pungent black humor of "911 Is a Joke," perhaps the best-known song here. Chuck gets himself into trouble here and there -- most notoriously on "Meet the G That Killed Me," where he skirts with homophobia -- but by and large, he's never been so eloquent, angry, or persuasive as he is here. This isn't as revolutionary or as potent as Millions, but it holds together better, and as a piece of music, this is the best hip-hop has ever had to offer.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

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Recordings made by artists at the beginning of their career are a feast for any label that’s trying to earn some quick cash without having to look further than some dusty archives. These throwback albums are always a surprise, with the potential to offer the very best and the very worst of a band (sometimes all at once). This kind of album obviously causes people to think about the sound quality and remastering work, due to the age of the recordings. However, there’s also the matter of the band themselves and their mastery of the repertoire during the studio session. In this respect, Aerosmith graduates with honours. Recorded two years before the release of their first album (which bears the band's name), the songs on 1971: The Road Starts Hear are mostly ones found on Aerosmith. The colour given to the tracks is perhaps the most surprising aspect of this album, more so than its unfinished nature.When Aerosmith were recording these songs, they had yet to become this huge machine capable of mixing hard rock, soul and groove within one track. The general sound of this album seems much closer to the famous English acts of the time, from Led Zeppelin (you can definitely hear some of their influence in Movin’ Out) to the Rolling Stones (their cover of Walkin’ the Dog by Rufus Thomas). Overall, the content is very spontaneous, accentuated by the fact the recording is live with a real homemade feel, yet it still has a lot of charm about it. Even if the band’s inexperience is somewhat noticeable on Dream On, Mama Kin definitely has that more raw, direct sound. The album may seem short with just seven songs (excluding the unnecessary Intro which is supposed to get us in the mood), but this is far more interesting and catchy then a long list of unfinished tracks. Once you’re done listening, you’ll want to listen again to better appreciate its authentic 70s vibe: much better than wading through an overloaded compilation of supposedly unreleased tracks. © Chief Brody/Qobuz

Since Aerosmith had become one of America's premier rock & roll concert attractions by 1978, it was only natural that an in-concert collection was issued that year, the double album, Live Bootleg. Unlike other live albums at the time, it's obvious that not a lot of overdubbing was involved to fix up the tracks, which results in a refreshingly authentic representation of Aerosmith at the group's most drugged-out and rocking. All of the performances were taken from Tyler and company's 1977-1978 U.S. tour (with the exception of a couple from 1973), while the album's packaging and title were a joke on all the poor-sounding, unauthorized live recordings that were in circulation at the time. Just about every classic is included -- "Back in the Saddle," "Sweet Emotion," "Walk This Way," "Come Together," "Last Child," "Mama Kin," "Train Kept A'Rollin," etc. -- as well as key album tracks ("Sick as a Dog," "S.O.S.," etc.). But the album's high point has to be the aforementioned pair of long-lost tracks from 1973 -- loose and groovy covers of the Yardbirds' "I Ain't Got You" and James Brown's "Mother Popcorn." Although the performances may lack the fire of the shorter Classics Live II set from 1988, Live Bootleg is an excellent representation of one of rock & roll's elite live acts. Note: to tie in with the careless bootleg theme of the album, the track "Draw the Line" is unlisted.© Greg Prato /TiVo

4.5 stars out of 5 -- "'[T]he vibe throughout evokes a rootsy session in Muscle Shoals, spectacularly so on the smouldering title track. Call it an expansion rather than a reinvention -- but it’s a dramatic and rather dazzling one."© TiVo

In interviews before the release of In Cauda Venenum, Mikael Åkerfeldt, Opeth's vocalist, guitarist, and chief songwriter, stated that "heaviness" was an aesthetic rather than a sound, to explain why he had abandoned death metal. Beginning with 2011's Heritage, Opeth made a conscious shift toward progressive rock that has, as evidenced here, become pervasive. This set is their first to be issued in English and Swedish editions. Sonically and musically, the album contains musical and production traits already evident on Heritage and Sorceress -- and to a lesser degree, on Pale Communion -- as organs, synths, Mellotron, acoustic guitars, syncopated rhythms, strings, choirs, and key changes are crafted into the band's two-guitar-bass-drum attack. But where the previous three studio albums were rife with experimentation, In Cauda Venenum is focused on a cohesively pre-arranged whole. It may be the fourth entry in their progressive evolution, but it's their first to deliver the full realization of the band's potential.These ten songs are laden with lush textures, painstakingly crafted melodies, unapologetic gothic overtones, startling dynamics, and visceral presence. Opeth may deliberately borrow inspiration from many sources, but they aren’t trying to re-create them. The band recorded at Park Studios in Stockholm with all-analog gear and a goal: "to be as epic as possible." While set-opener "The Garden of Earthly Delights" is a three-and-a-half-minute Gothic intro; the first tune proper, "Dignity," is heavy as hell, with multi-tracked wordless choral choruses, swirling organs and Mellotron, sampled spoken voices, sound effects, popping drums, and spiky lead guitars. Its intense opening section gives way to fingerpicked acoustic, gently sung lyrics, and textural atmospherics before roaring back into riff-laden hard rock. "Heart on Hand," the other advance track, commences with a guitar-and-bass riff right out of "Immigrant Song," framing the cleanest, most emotionally resonant vocals in Åkerfeldt's career before swirling into instrumental chaos and transforming itself into a lilting ballad in the final third. There are brutal moments here, too, in angular jams like "Charlatan," with its overdriven, filthy bassline. "Universal Truth" alternates between folk-inflected prog and spidery hard rock. The moody classical guitar and piano intro to "The Garroter" gives way to spooky, swinging dark jazz. While the sprightly keyboard and strummed guitar vamp on "Continuum" are a sinister musical perversity, they circle toward spiraling prog metal with the vocal and rhythmic section syncopations of Yes, then unwind into moody pastoral, poly-harmonic, folk-inflected Gothic rock. Though it emerges slowly, there is a biting crackle in the sweeping majesty of closer "All Things Pass." Åkerfeldt's and Fredrik Åkesson's guitars spiral and slash in a loss-saturated vibe colored by swirling organ, Mellotron, and crashing tom-toms, as Opeth buoy the singer whose lyric is drenched in loss and grief. On In Cauda Venenum, Opeth have thoroughly revisioned prog rock for the 21st century. While there are referents to the past, they have merely been folded into a brand of heavy music that reflects not progressive rock's history, but Opeth's enduring, evolving image.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

Ten years after his first solo EP, Daniel Rossen is giving us another taste of his unique voice, but this time across a full album. The mastermind behind Grizzly Bear quit the Brooklyn hype a few years ago and settled in New Mexico. It only makes sense then that You Belong There, his first solo album, is anything but urban and far removed from stressful city life. However, this album isn’t blissful by any means. It’s rich and complex, as if he’s taken all the best bits of Grizzly Bear and put them under a magnifying glass. Rossen is one of those songwriters that finds great inspiration in the offbeat musicians of the past, those that made their way to the top of a genre via a seldom trodden path. There’s elements of Robert Wyatt (Tangle), Van Dyke Parks and Judee Sill in his earthy symphonies which are often remiscent of a chamber choir. He’s also a big fan of Brazilian music and as a consequence, he’s taken unusual chords from Baden Powell (Unpeopled Space). His unique guitar playing, exotic chords, and the instruments he chooses to include (double bass, cello) demonstrate that Daniel Rossen has all the traits of a true craftsman; one who constructs towering buildings from the smallest of stones. His tracks also feature baroque elements typical of Grizzly Bear, as well as the stunning harmonics used by his good friend Robin Pecknold in his band Fleet Foxes. Chris Bear, drummer for Grizzly Bear, also lent a helping hand on this new release, though Rossen is the sole architect of this incredible baroque folk record that alternates between the flamboyant and the intimate. This album is a real gem. © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

The veteran Swedish metal group's tenth studio long-player, Verkligheten arrives via its cinematic title track, a slow-burn instrumental that evokes Bring Me the Horizon by way of Ennio Morricone. Soilwork have been infusing punishing Gothenburg-style death metal with European power metal majesty since the mid-'90s, and Verkligheten doesn't disappoint on the latter end of the equation, delivering a meaty 12-track set that's spilling over with soaring guitarmonies and horned hand-soliciting choruses. While vocalist Bjorn Strid and guitarist David Andersson's retro hard rock side project Night Flight Orchestra looms large over the proceedings, the band can still turn out unholy slabs of seismic Scandinavian melodic death metal, as evidenced by the terrific blastbeat-basted "When the Universe Spoke" and the sleek groove metal banger "Bleeder Despoiler." That said, Verkligheten leans significantly harder on the AOR side of the hard rock spectrum, with only cursory nods to the band's metalcore-leaning sixth full-length effort -- and biggest commercial success -- Stabbing the Drama. Embracing the pomp of power and neo-classical metal via stadium-ready rockers like "Full Moon Shoals," the Tomi Joutsen- (Amorphis) assisted "Needles and Kin," and the powerhouse "Nurturing Glance," Soilwork have crystallized their sound into something unapologetically familiar and over the top, yet refreshingly sanguine. © James Christopher Monger /TiVo