It goes without saying that this second album was hotly anticipated. Having shot to international superstardom with When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? and having already taken five Grammy Awards, Billie Eilish has flipped the script without changing the fundamentals. Her tortured dark pop has evolved with the ironically-titled Happier Than Ever. "Almost none of the songs on this album are joyful", she points out. Take the cover, where she poses as Our Lady of Sorrows, this gifted but tearful icon chooses to clothe yesterday's sorrows in soft and voluptuous pop sounds. Where the last album was all about nightmarish fiction, this more intimate work takes a realist turn. Very eclectic musically, sometimes vintage, sometimes futuristic, its sixteen tracks rack up one surprise after another: Billie is never where you expect her to be.The sequences are carefully worked-out. Eilish oscillates between slow tempos (Getting Older, Billie bossa nova) and haunting EDM beats on Oxytocin – the hormone of love – or minimalist sounds (as on OverHeated), making for an amazing mix of genres. Thus, among Grimes-like syncopated choruses (GOLDWING), autotuned R'N'B (NDA) in the style of 070 Shake, folk ballads (Halley's Comet) and spartan soundscapes (Not My Responsibility), she manages to slip in the guitar-vocals number "Your Power", an emotional peak on which she speaks about suffering abuse. Accompanied by her brother, Finneas O'Connell, an enjoying a slick production job, Billie Eilish has created a masterful record which she hoped would prove timeless. That ambition is easy to understand when she mentions Frank Sinatra, Antonio Carlos Jobim and Julie London as influences. "It was the most enriching and deepest experience I have ever had with my music," she says. Fortunately, at just 19, there are likely to be many more. © Charlotte Saintoin / Qobuz

There were comedic hip-hop records before De La Soul's first album. There were beats that pushed the limits not just of what sampling technology could do, but where those samples came from and how they riffed off each other. There were lyricists who broke so far out of the ABAB rhyme schemes of basic rap that it blew the potential for new flows and structures wide open. And there were eccentrics—artists who didn't appear to adhere to any previously existing formula for hip-hop in style, perspective, or attitude because they couldn't be anybody but themselves. But 3 Feet High and Rising did all those things to such a surprising extent for a debut album that its barrage of audaciously new and unique ideas planted a flag nobody's been able to fully uproot. Rappers Posdnuos and Trugoy, DJ/co-producer Maseo, and beatmaker Prince Paul pulled off a work that might've left more people scratching their heads in bafflement if it hadn't also solidified the appeal of hip-hop's emerging bohemian strain. Maybe it's because there's as much reliance on familiar if transformative referential pop-music hijackings (Steely Dan on "Eye Know"; Hall & Oates on "Say No Go") as on the kind of sublime crate digger silliness that lends cartoonish joy to cuts like the head-swimming shaky-kneed "Plug Tunin' (Last Chance to Comprehend)" or the mellow soul-jazz melange of early Native Tongues teamup "Buddy." Even the interstitial stuff fits, weird as it is—goofy skits about body odor ("A Little Bit of Soap") and passé fashion ("Take It Off") adds to their just-rap-about-whatever approach that acts as both a met artistic challenge and a casual bit of messing around. De La Soul would take great pains to control and define their own multifaceted image—peaking with hit single "Me Myself and I," which declares their defensiveness over being perceived as contrived hippie-fashion poseurs while also nodding to a clear silly-yet-deep musical precedent in Funkadelic. But it only takes a couple close listens of 3 Feet High and Rising—and the lyrical intricacy and storytelling in deep cuts like the empathetic social-struggle analysis "Ghetto Thang" and the stay-posi fable-spinning "Tread Water"—to realize they'd be impossible to pin down for the rest of their careers. © Nate Patrin/Qobuz

One year after ...But Seriously, England's best-selling album in the year of its release, Phil Collins followed up with a live worldwide tour. The former Genesis drummer was at the height of his fame, and this Berlin concert on July 15th, 1990, perfectly documents his impressive performances from that time. Surrounded by four virtuosos (Leland Sklar on bass, Daryl Stuermer on guitar, Chester Thompson on drums and Brad Cole on keyboards), here Phil Collins reveals a kind of ‘best of’ album with the hits Against All Odds (Take A Look At Me Now), One More Night, In the Air Tonight as well as a rather muscular cover of You Can't Hurry Love by The Supremes. Everything here is XL! Brass, rhythm and melodies! And the remastered edition of this live album in 24-Bit Hi-Res quality makes the experience even more powerful. © Clotilde Maréchal/Qobuz

Phil Collins certainly has enough hits to fill out a double-disc compilation -- in the U.K. he had 25 Top 40 singles and he reached the Billboard Top 40 21 times in the U.S., with many of them overlapping -- but the 2016 set The Singles doesn't march through these hits in chronological order. Opening with "Easy Lover," his 1985 duet with Earth, Wind & Fire's Philip Bailey, this 33-track compilation happily hopscotches through the years. Such non-chronological sequencing does mean certain hits are saved for the greatest emotional impact -- naturally, "Take Me Home" closes out the proceedings -- but it also focuses attention on songs that weren't blockbusters, whether it's such meditative turn-of-the-'90s adult contemporary hits as "That's Just the Way It Is" or the brooding early single "Thru These Walls." Ultimately, this forced perspective is why The Singles is something more than just a collection of big hits: it helps illustrate that Collins' solo catalog ran deeper than "In the Air Tonight," "You Can't Hurry Love," "Sussudio," "One More Night," "Against All Odds," and "Another Day in Paradise."© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

The title Finally Enough Love: 50 Number Ones is slightly misleading, suggesting that Madonna topped the pop charts 50 times. The 50 Number Ones in the title of Finally Enough Love refer to the hits Madonna placed at the top of Billboard's dance charts, a chart she called home even longer than the pop charts themselves. The last time Madonna placed in the Billboard Top Ten was in 2012, when "Give Me All Your Luvin" peaked at ten, but she remained a dominant presence on the Dance charts into the 2020s, when "I Don't Search I Find" -- a single that lends this compilation its title phrase -- reached number one in 2020. Truth be told, Madonna had more than 50 dance chart-toppers -- "Causing a Commotion" is notable among the absences -- but it's difficult to find fault with a compilation this generous, particularly when it offers such revelations as well. Positioning Madonna as a dance artist helps emphasize her innovations while suggesting she remained a vital part of dance culture for decades. Viewing her through this prism naturally downplays her pop sensibilities and gift for sultry ballads, yet it still comes as a shock that the '80s hits are wrapped up in nine songs, while the '90s are concluded at the collection's 22nd track with "Beautiful Stranger." This means well over half of the collection is devoted to the 21st century, a period when Madonna was a superstar yet only occasionally in center stage. Effectively, this is the photo negative of Celebration, the 2009 album that contains all the pop radio staples: where that largely played for comfort, this is percolating and alive, with even the biggest hits being offered in alternate single or video edits or different mixes. The result is a compilation that pushes Madonna's artistry to the forefront, as it shows a musician who continually engages with fashions, trends, and innovations. Certainly, this doesn't tell the entirety of Madonna's story, but it's a crucial chapter to document and, fortunately, it's done so quite thoroughly here.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

After the one-two punch of Phil Collins' first two solo albums, Face Value and Hello, I Must Be Going!, plus the hits he was concurrently having with Genesis, it might seem like he was primed for an artistic and commercial drop-off. Instead, he responded with the biggest album of his career. No Jacket Required topped the charts in the U.S. and U.K., won a Grammy for Album of the Year, and spawned four Top Ten singles, including two number ones in "Sussudio" and "One More Night." It was such a monster success that it made Collins one of the biggest stars on the planet, something that a few years before seemed unlikely if not impossible. The reason why No Jacket was such a smash is simple: it combined the aching honesty of Face Value with the pop smarts of Hello, added some seriously focused songwriting, then coated it all in slick digital production that sounded great on the radio. Collins' gift for a huge hook came through most obviously on the Prince-inspired "Sussudio," where he turns nonsense into something almost profound, but also on tracks like the big rocker "I Don't Wanna Know" and the soulful "Inside Out," which featured some of his trademark gated drum bashing. His knack for spilling his guts in heartbreaking everyman fashion hits a new high on "One More Night," one of the most affecting ballads of the '80s. When he combines the hooks and the heartbreak, it comes together brilliantly. "Take Me Home" is a wrenching, soaring song that inspires singalongs and teardrops; "Doesn't Anybody Stay Together Anymore" has the perfect combo of big drums, the catchy chorus, and the weary heart. Add in flashy radio monsters like "Don't Lose My Number" and "Only You Know and I Know" that retain the horn-heavy sound of his earlier work while adding up-to-date keyboards, the even more Prince-inspired "Who Said I Would," and the closing piano ballad "We Said Hello Goodbye," and No Jacket Required ends up earning all the sales and accolades it got. Collins was at the top of his considerable game, the sound was state of the art, and there were more classic songs on one record than most pop stars could put together in an entire career. Too bad its chart and airwave dominance was so great that it inspired something of a backlash, one Collins never really recovered from despite having more hits in the future. While Face Value is still his solo masterpiece due to the raw emotion it transmits, No Jacket Required comes very, very close to topping it.© Tim Sendra /TiVo

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After the dark and chilling themes of 2006's Black Cadillac, which saw Rosanne Cash dealing with the deaths of her mother, Vivian Liberto, her father, Johnny Cash, and her stepmother, June Carter Cash -- all of whom passed within a two-year span -- one might assume that her next project would move into an even deeper level of bleakness, but with The List, it's immediately clear that she has instead found a more measured place to stand, and it's a lovely and redemptive outing that looks back to go forward. When Cash turned 18, her father, alarmed that his daughter only knew the songs that were getting played on the radio, gave her a list of what he considered 100 essential American songs; Cash kept that list, and now she's drawn on it for this wonderfully nuanced outing that brims with a kind of redemptive timelessness. The List is a renewal and a testament to life, and it belongs to her father as much as it belongs to her, a beautiful restatement of her father's passions, only now, they've become his daughter's treasures, as well. It's an affirming story, but that's all it would be if Cash didn't sing her heart out here. And she does sing her heart out. The opener, a version of Jimmie Rodgers' "Miss the Mississippi and You," is full of comfortable grace and sentiment, and Cash keeps that fine emotional tone throughout this set. Songs like the folk classic "500 Miles" feel at once both lovingly rendered and reborn for a new century in Cash's hands, and she doesn't update them so much as find redemption and solace in them, which in turn gives these songs a bright relevance, and because of the connection to her father and the list he gave to her, it also feels like a deep personal statement. There's so much to take comfort in here, including her fine rendering of Bob Dylan's "Girl from the North Country," a nice turn at Harlan Howard's "Heartaches by the Number" (which features Elvis Costello), a calm but still spooky duet with Jeff Tweedy on the faux-murder ballad "Long Black Veil," and a duet with Bruce Springsteen on Hal David and Paul Hampton's "Sea of Heartbreak." Cash sings with a calm, measured authority, and all these the songs fit together with the same sort of refreshing resignation and care. Contemporary country radio probably won't touch anything here, since country these days seems to be more about name-checking than any actual preservation, but Cash is after something else again -- it's about connecting with the past and carrying it forward as an act of personal faith. It has nothing to do with hats or belt buckles.© Steve Leggett /TiVo

Apart from "She Wants to Dance With Me," Astley's second album didn't have songs as strong as those on his debut. Most of the album was pleasant dance-pop filler, showing the weaknesses of the Stock, Aitken & Waterman production team.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Body and Soul has Joe Jackson playing both hot- and cool-styled jazz songs, getting some worthy help from producer David Kershenbaum, who also lent Jackson a hand on his I'm the Man album. This is Jackson at his smoothest, from the fragility of "Not Here Not Now" to the earnestness of "Be My Number Two." While both this song and "Happy Ending" charted fairly low in the U.K., the explosive "You Can't Get What You Want" went to number 15 in the United States, thanks to the brilliant horn work and colorful jazz-pop mingling of all the other instruments, not to mention Jackson's suave singing. But the album's energy isn't spent entirely on one track. "Cha Cha Loco," "Losaida," and the cheery yet stylish "Go for It" carry Jackson's snazzy persona and enthusiasm even further, laying claim to how comfortable he really is at playing this style of music. Sometimes sounding preserved and entertaining in the same light, Body and Soul uses some of the character of 1982's Night and Day album, but instead of splitting up the music into mild jazz, pop, and modern R&B, he decided to tackle one of the genres wholeheartedly, and in doing so he came up with a truly impeccable release.© Mike DeGagne /TiVo