An AC/DC album always sounds like an AC/DC album! Even if the Australian-British bandmembers are now between 65 and 73 years old, they have no reason to change their formula as its their usual prescription that everybody wants: short, sharp riffs, heavy rock infused with blues, metronomic rhythms, stadium anthems and minimalist, haiku-like lyrics. It could be said that there's a bit of a lyrical revolution going on throughout Power Up: for the first time since Fly on the Wall (1985), none of the twelve tracks contain the word ‘rock’! Is this a sign? Not really… Recorded like its three predecessors in Bryan Adams’ Warehouse Studio in Vancouver, Power Up is AC/DC's first opus since the death of rhythm guitarist Malcom Young in late 2017 (Young had been battling dementia for several months). Already in 2014 for Rock or Bust illness had kept him away from the recording studio with his nephew Stevie filling in for him. It was only right that his younger brother, the brilliant Angus Young, put this 17th album together as a kind of testament to his older brother. "I know Mal's not with us anymore, but he's there with us in spirit. This band was his baby, his life. He was always one [to say], 'you keep going'. He always said, 'If you're a musician, it's a bit like being on the Titanic. The band goes down with the ship.'"Over the course of their 45-year career, the two brothers had always kept skeletons of song ideas and hoards of guitar riffs. These musical treasure troves were instrumental in the conception of Power Up which features riffs written by the late Malcom Young. Having already been at the helm of production for Black Ice (2008) and Rock or Bust (2014), American producer Brendan O’Brien mixed the perfect sound to match the timelessness of the songs. Rarely have we heard such purity and simplicity from AC/DC since Back in Black (1980), with an added efficiency similar to that of the Bon Scott era, as on the single Shot in the Dark. Little to no fat here! Even Brian Johnson holds his mic with more steadiness. Occasionally, the blues spirit of the grandiose Powerage (1978) floats in the air, as does the fraternal and juvenile energy of Highway to Hell (1979). It's true that some tracks are only loosely held together by guitar riffs, ignoring fundamental harmony and melody. However, on the excellent Through the Mists of Time AC/DC really do some exploring, and Demon Fire makes it difficult to stay in your seat! Even if Power Up isn't particularly surprising in what it has to offer, you still have the invigorating feeling of having taken a big slap of Rock’n’Roll electricity straight to the face. © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

As proof that Sierra Ferrell has been paying her dues, she opens her second album with the inevitable road song where she can't "seem to get no rest." She laments, "I'm losing touch with all my friends, the ones who remind me who I am/ If I could just get back home to pick up where we left off/ I'd take better care of myself, I'd stop drinking from the bottom shelf/ But my old wheels keep spinning and I cannot make them stop."  Farrell has packed a lifetime of experience and craft into the three short years since her debut, 2021's Long Time Coming. That's never more apparent than in her simple, tuneful ballad, "Wish You Well," where in placid tones she sings of letting go of hurt and anger and saving herself: "I could let you rattle in the rafters of my brain/ Cry until my tears could fill the river with the rain/ But I finally found a way to break your dreadful spell/ Though you've hurt me, I still wish you well." For a different flavor, Ferrell is joined by a number of fiddlers in the dramatic and pounding "Fox Hunt" and it's a definite success.  She enthusiastically sells a nimble cover of Fiddlin' Arthur Smith's novelty tune, "Chittlin' Cookin' Time in Cheatham County," with a growl in her voice and a swinging tempo. Produced by Eddie Spear (Lake Street Dive, Brandi Carlile, Zach Bryan) and Gary Paczosa (Allison Krauss, Dwight Yoakam, Gillian Welch), Trail of Flowers moves towards an indie rock singer-songwriter vibe, albeit one filled with connections to country and bluegrass music. While "Dollar Bill Bar" works in a pop-folk-rock direction, "Why Haven't You Loved Me Yet" energizes a countrypolitan charm using both vibraphone and lap steel. "Lighthouse," a mix of mountain gospel music and bluegrass, asks the question: "Could you be the one that I love so?" In addition to her increasingly sharp and focused songwriting, Ferrell's light and spry voice is confident and right throughout, immune to awkward phrasing or misplaced passions. She fulfills the promise of her debut. © Robert Baird/Qobuz

The band finds a steady R&B groove reminiscent of '60s Stax house band the MG's, and, as with the MG's, it's all in the service of a big-voiced soul singer, in this case a British redhead. Features the U.S. number-one "Holding Back the Years" and the U.K. Top 20 "Money's Too Tight (To Mention)."© William Ruhlmann /TiVo

Establishing identity through the lens of cultural appropriation can be tricky business. On Post Malone's studio debut Stoney, the Dallas-raised musician with gold grills and braids does his best to sing-rap his way through an album's worth of woozy R&B-inflected hip-hop. As a fan of rap and its associated culture, Post delivers with moderate respect, careful not to toe the precarious line over which others like Iggy Azalea and Riff Raff have stumbled. Yet, there still seems to be something missing in the calculated white-guy-does-hip-hop formula. Although he plays guitar and is influenced by Tim McGraw as much as Kanye West, Stoney is mostly devoid of that country twang, save for some outlaw grit on "Broken Whiskey Glass" and faint strumming on "Go Flex" (bonus track "Leave" actually captures his true cross-genre nature better than anything here). Mostly, that part of his background only comes through when he chooses to sing. Those tracks -- notably "No Option" and "I Fall Apart" -- work best, featuring strong vocals that quiver when he pushes it to the limit. Guest vocalists and producers like Kehlani ("Feel"), River Tiber ("Cold"), Pharrell Williams ("Up There"), and Quavo and Metro Boomin ("Congratulations") bolster Stoney with both atmosphere and credibility, while tourmate Justin Bieber increases the star power on the sweet "Cha-Cha"/"Hotline Bling"-esque "Deja Vu." Even though most of the songs bleed indistinguishably into one another, the aptly titled album provides an appropriate soundtrack for a certain type of recreational rest and relaxation (even occasionally threatening to sedate the listener). It's competent and listenable, but many others have tread this same path already. Post Malone has a way to go before standing out with his own unique voice, but there are signs on Stoney that it could happen. © Neil Z. Yeung /TiVo

Since the release of his last non-mixtape/non-collaboration album in 2013, Drake has solidified his position as a pop music icon, scaling the charts, dominating gossip columns, and generally living the good life. Or so it seems. 2016's Views is another in a string of dour transmissions from the dark night of Drake's soul. As before, he casts himself as both the melancholy bachelor looking out over the city from his penthouse manor, and the criminally underrated rap genius demanding his due, and it's one album too many for both personas. He's already delved deeply into his insecurities, lambasted all his exes, and displayed his fierce self-pride, never shying away from telling everyone exactly where he started and how far he's come. Frankly, it's become as boring and annoying as a needle stuck in a groove. No matter how ably the production casts his raps and ballads in the best possible light, no matter how well the frequent use of chopped and swirled samples from '90s R&B songs fit in the mix, no matter that the occasional song rises up from the narrative and makes a splash, the album is a meandering, dreary rehash of what Drake has done before in much better fashion. Of the songs that stand out, his uptempo, Caribbean-flavored duet with Rihanna ("Too Good") is the most enjoyable; "One Dance," another song with a Jamaican dancehall feel, is another fun track. Still, these poppy moments feature Drake as the wounded lover, being treated poorly yet again. A few other tracks connect, like the almost light-hearted "Feel No Ways," which makes good use of a stuttering Malcolm McLaren sample or, of course, the hugely catchy hit song "Hotline Bling." The nostalgic "Weston Road Flows" comes close, with the great Mary J. Blige sample running through the track, but stumbles when Drake name drops Katy Perry and brags about wrecking marriages. The track, like so many others made up of over-blown boasts, seems to be fighting a battle that was won long ago. Drake has not only arrived, he's taken over. And if he's never going to get the same respect that someone like Chance the Rapper gets, making records as self-pitying and self-serving as Views isn't going to do much to further Drake's career artistically, either. Basically, Drake needs to lighten up and add some new colors to the paintbox, whether it’s songs about something other than his bummer love life (like the good times before the inevitable breakup), or the fabulous things that come from all the money and fame he never lets anyone forget he's accrued. Eventually, people will get tired of the same old song if it's sung too often. On Views, Drake is starting to sound a little weary of it himself.© Tim Sendra /TiVo

Without any project and only a few musical extracts, Playboi Carti has become a muse for this generation that is as sensitive to social media presence as to musical creations. With a mixtape and above all his track “Magnolia”, he proved his early fans right, inventing a completely minimalist style by associating with a visionary and atypical producer, Pi’erre Bourne.For this first studio album, released unexpectedly, Playboi Carti and Pi’erre Bourne state on 19 tracks all the ideas suggested in “Magnolia”. A science of texture and sound research is combined to perfect placement, sometimes repeated on loop for entire measures. By stripping down rap to its purest form, the duo engraves their creation as almost concrete electronic music, disorienting the audience in the middle of a maze of syllables and small synthetic sounds. Sometimes surrealist or just from daily life, Playboi Carti’s sentences seem to float in time and space, offering in the course of the tracks a permanent dizziness, a unique experience in current rap. Even the guests like Travis Scott, Nicki Minaj or Chief Keef are broken down in this molecular cuisine in which each atom is multiplied to get the essence of it.With Die Lit, Playboi Carti’s music has become inseparable from Pi’erre Bourne’s work. It is thus an invitation to extreme dance, an almost sensory trip, a new way of thinking for rap music in 2018. © Aurélien Chapuis/Qobuz

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

Arriving hot on the heels of Latest Record Project, Vol. 1, the 2021 double album where Van Morrison unleashed all of his frustrations at being locked down during the COVID-19 pandemic, What's It Gonna Take? finds the singer doubling down on all of his gripes. The shift in intensity is apparent from the artwork depicting a couple being controlled by the hand of an unseen puppet master, an image that crystallizes Morrison's belief that the government and other shadowy forces are conspiring to take away free will from the common man. Van believes himself to be among these little folks: as he sings on one of the record's less politically charged songs, "I Ain't No Celebrity," he's merely a working musician. The fact that he was not able to work during the early months of the pandemic stoked Morrison's anger, and it shines brightly throughout What's It Gonna Take?, seeming even more vivid because his vitriolic lyrics are married to jaunty R&B rhythms or slow, soulful grooves delivered with precision and enshrined in a clean production. There's no ignoring Morrison's repeated references to Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, fake news, and mind control or his huffy denials that he's a conspiracy theorist as they're pushed right to the forefront. Plus, where he seemed merely cranky on Latest Record Project, Vol. 1, Morrison is filled with bile here, letting it bubble to the surface even on slow-burners like "Can't Go On This Way." By the end of the album, he points some of this anger inward, resulting in the relatively nuanced "Fear and Self-Loathing in Las Vegas" and "Pretending," but that doesn't change the general tenor of What's It Gonna Take? The blend of anodyne R&B and anger makes for one of the odder albums in Van Morrison's body of work. © Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

When synthesists Ian Craig Marsh and Martyn Ware left the Human League in 1980, the decision seemed iffy; after all, the League appeared on the way up and would achieve global fame the very next year with Dare!. The first album from Heaven 17, Marsh and Ware's new trio with singer Glenn Gregory, wasn't greeted with quite the same commercial kudos when released in 1981, but it turned out to be an important outing nevertheless. Picking up where Kraftwerk had left off with The Man Machine, the group created glistening electro-pop that didn't skimp on danceable grooves or memorable melodies. What set Heaven 17 apart was the well-deep vocals of Gregory, who managed the difficult trick of sounding dramatic without seeming pretentious, and an overtly left-wing political outlook best expressed on the debut single "(We Don't Need This) Fascist Groove Thang." Other standout combinations of witty lyrics and whiplash electro-grooves include "The Height of the Fighting" and "Play to Win," while the funky title track draws on American R&B for its popping bassline. Despite the catchy material, chart success proved somewhat elusive; the group didn't score a major hit until their next album, 1983's The Luxury Gap. Nevertheless, Penthouse and Pavement stands as one of the most accomplished debuts of the '80s.© Dan LeRoy /TiVo

A decent but short (nine songs) late '60s set, with somewhat sparser production than he'd employ with the beefier arrangements of the "Thrill Is Gone" era. Brass and stinging guitar plays a part on all of the songs, leading off with the eight-minute title track, a spoken narrative about his famous guitar.© Richie Unterberger /TiVo