After a long break from making Tame Impala music, during which time Kevin Parker produced other people's albums and played in side projects, 2015's Currents shows that much has changed with the project. Like before, Parker recorded the album on his own, only this time without Dave Fridmann's guiding hand and by mostly forsaking electric guitars in favor of a wealth of synthesizers, and with a much more relaxed, intimate approach. In addition to the soft rock of the '70s feel that permeates the sound, Parker adds elements of R&B and hip-hop to the mix, gets lyrically introspective in spots, and generally sounds like he's either on the verge of a long nap or just waking up from one. These aren't bad things when done right, and Parker's prowess as a producer and musician makes most of Currents palatable, if not extremely exciting. However, by focusing on all these new elements, and by sleepwalking through at least half of the songs, this new way of doing things does a lot to frustrate the expectations of anyone looking to this album as another mind-blowing expression of guitar-heavy psych-pop. It's hard to deny artists the chance for change or growth, and Parker seems dedicated to both here. Where you can fault them is if they don't change or grow in an interesting or unique way. Great chunks of Currents sound like plenty of other bands and artists in 2015, especially since practically everyone with access to recording equipment did their own takes on midtempo, chilled-out R&B. Does Parker do it as well as others like Unknown Mortal Orchestra or Caribou? Sure, he does. Is it enough to make this album worth checking out? Yes, but it's not enough to make it an improvement over his previous work. At Tame Impala's best, they blend huge guitar sounds, melodic basslines, and vintage synths into sweeping psychedelic rock with energy and drive that feel hugely cinematic while still feeling real. There are only a couple times here when Parker comes close to that sweet spot. For example, the both "Let It Happen" and "Reality in Motion" have a good blend of guitars and synths and a sense of purpose that's often missing elsewhere. There are far more times where he strays too far from his strengths and gets bogged down in meandering, overly smoothed-out sounds and meandering songs that deliver no real payoff or sound half-baked at best, like the embarrassingly weak "Cause I'm a Man." It's too bad that Parker stashed his guitars away instead of keeping them around to add to the mix. It's definitely not a case of addition by subtraction; it's quite the opposite. While Currents would have made a decent Kevin Parker solo album, people coming to the album and expecting to hear the Tame Impala they are used to will most likely end up quite disappointed.© Tim Sendra /TiVo

Stevie Wonder broke a three-year silence, one that followed a series of six classic albums released within six years, with this double album, the score/soundtrack to a little-seen environmental documentary directed by Wild Bunch co-screenwriter Walon Green. From the release of Songs in the Key of Life through the release of Plants, Wonder had been active, actually, but only as a collaborator, working with Ramsey Lewis, the Pointer Sisters, Minnie Riperton, Syreeta, Ronnie Foster, and Michael Jackson. Even so, three years was a considerable lag between albums. Anticipation was so high that this release peaked at number four on the Billboard 200 and R&B album charts. It quickly slipped to footnote status; when Wonder’s 1972-1980 albums were reissued in 2000, it was left out of the program. Plants is a sprawling, fascinating album. Though it is dominated by synthesizer-heavy instrumental pieces with evocative titles, there is a handful of full-blown songs. The gorgeous, mostly acoustic ballad “Send One Your Love” was a Top Ten R&B single, while the joyous “Outside My Window” registered in the Top 60. Beyond that, there’s the deep classic “Come Back as a Flower,” a gently lapping, piano-led ballad featuring Syreeta on vocals. Otherwise, there are playfully oddball tracks like “Venus’ Flytrap and the Bug,” where Wonder chirps “Please don’t eat me!” through robotizing effects, and “A Seed’s a Star,” which incorporates crowd noise, a robotized monologue, and a shrieking Tata Vega over a funkier and faster version of Yellow Magic Orchestra. The album is not for everyone, but it suited its purpose and allowed its maker an amount of creative wiggle room that few major-label artists experience. © Andy Kellman /TiVo

All Blues represents a return to roots of sorts for Peter Frampton. At the outset of his career, he was a hotshot six-string slinger, earning his stripes playing sheets of loud, gnarled guitar in Humble Pie, the band Steve Marriott formed after leaving the Small Faces. Frampton never lost his rep as a great guitarist and the blues was never far from his fingertips, but he also didn't devote a record to the blues the way he does on this 2019 album. It's possible Frampton intended the album to be part of a full-circle farewell: when he announced the album's release and its accompanying tour, he also announced that he has inclusion-body myositis, a degenerative autoimmune disease that weakens the muscles. Knowledge of Frampton's disease does lend All Blues a degree of poignancy; it's not intended as his final album -- at the time of its release, he had a collection of original material in the works -- yet it's hard not to think that it may not exist if Frampton didn't believe he should seize the day. That's precisely what he does on All Blues, an album that takes its name from the Miles Davis composition that kicks off the trumpeter's seminal 1959 album Kind of Blue. Frampton's choice to cover Davis suggests how he's willing to play within the margins of this album, adding hints of jazz and swing. Primarily, though, he's interested in delivering revved-up covers of blues standards, occasionally with the assistance of a friend: Sonny Landreth pops up on "The Thrill Is Gone," Steve Morse shows up on "Going Down Slow," while Kim Wilson plays on "I Just Want to Make Love to You." If Frampton doesn't take many chances with either the songs or arrangements -- this is straight-up classic British blues that leans heavily on the Chicago school -- there's still a palpable sense of passion and joy on All Blues, and that evident big, beating heart makes it worth a spin. © Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Bryan Ferry returned to London's Royal Albert Hall in March 2020, some 46 years after performing there in 1974 on his debut solo tour. Recorded just before the U.K. went into COVID-19 lockdown, the show saw Ferry work through a slew of new material as well as renditions of classic Roxy Music songs. © Rich Wilson /TiVo

Repeating their treatment of California country music icons Merle Haggard and Buck Owens on 2013's Bakersfield, singer and guitarist Vince Gill and pedal steel player Paul Franklin now pay eloquent tribute to Ray Price. Born in Texas with a passionate baritone voice, Price was a huge presence in country music by the early 1970s. Along the way he roomed with Hank Williams and led a band, The Cherokee Cowboys, that became a launching pad for talents like Willie Nelson, Johnny Paycheck and Roger Miller. On Sweet Memories: The Music Of Ray Price & The Cherokee Cowboys, Gill decided to avoid Price's best-known hits like "City Lights," "Crazy Arms," and "For the Good Times" in favor of deeper tracks. Bereft country weepers were a Price specialty, and the opener "One More Time," sets the tone as the narrator inevitably tries and fails to do right: "And I make a vow each time you leave that this will draw the line/ Then you come back and just like now I'm falling one more time." At the heart of Sweet Memories is the always amazing instrument that is Vince Gill's voice. Debuting with Pure Prairie League in 1979, Gill spent time with Rodney Crowell's Cherry Bombs and Emmylou Harris's Hot Band before going solo. A triple threat who besides his pure high tenor voice is also a virtuoso guitar player and an accomplished songwriter, Gill has won 21 Grammy Awards and over the last several decades has become one of the most respected elders in the genre. With a band that includes Stuart Duncan on fiddle, John Jarvis on piano and Andrea Zonn on harmony vocals, Gill shows off his lesser-heard lower range on "You Wouldn't Know Love" as Frankin's pedal steel weeps behind them. While a rendition of "Danny Boy"—the Irish lament that became one of Price's signature hits in 1967—predictably becomes a Gill vocal showpiece, it's the title track that provides this set's most moving moments. Written by fellow Texan Mickey Newbury and recorded by Price in 1971, this version soars with Gill singing his own harmonies and includes low-key but imaginative solos by both principals. Another high-class look back from a current country hero with a welcome passion for the music's glorious past.  © Robert Baird/Qobuz

Cale moves toward country and gospel on some songs here, but since those are two of his primary influences, the movement is slight. And longtime producer Audie Ashworth attempts to place more emphasis on Cale's vocals on some songs by double-tracking them and pushing them up in the mix. But much of this is still low-key and bluesy in what was becoming Cale's patented style.© William Ruhlmann /TiVo

A half-century after the release of Karen Dalton's cult classic second album, In My Own Time sounds as magical as it always has; it was never—despite the album's title—that she was ahead of her time, but rather not of this world. Which is not to say she was some ethereal creature. After a whole life lived in her teenage years, married twice and with two kids, Dalton moved from Oklahoma to New York City to be part of the Greenwich Village 1960s folk scene alongside the likes of Tim Hardin and Neil Young. Bob Dylan called her one of his favorites, saying "Karen had a voice like Billie Holiday." She reportedly hated the comparison, though you get why Dylan made it: it's the weary ache and that slim silver thread of hope that remains. You can hear it on her cover of George Jones' "Take Me;" the piano flutters like it needs a fainting couch, but Dalton turns the quiet plea into something wistful rather than desperate. "Take me to Siberia and the coldest weather of the winter time/ And it would be just like spring in California," she sings, drawing out that last word like it's some impossible oasis. (By then, Dalton had had two teeth knocked out in a fight between boyfriends.) It's in her jaunty delivery of the Holland-Dozier-Holland's "How Sweet It is" and her interpretation of Richard Manuel's psychedelic country-rock "In a Station," Dalton blowing like wind through some desolate space. And lord knows it's in her most famous song, the Scottish folk traditional "Katie Cruel." Helped along by high-lonesome banjo, it's as haunted as they come. "When I first came to town, they called me the roving jewel," Dalton sings, managing to make it sound like she's not broken by it all. "Now they've changed their tune, call me Katie Cruel." Credit her wavery, light-refracted voice and the way it reflects both a fragility of nature and a hardscrabble strength of circumstance. (While the story of folkie Fred Neil secretly recording Dalton's first album by not telling her the tape was running has been romanticized, it's also exploitative and manipulative.) Dalton, who would disappear after In My Own Time, battled heroin and alcohol addiction and died at age 55 after an AIDS diagnosis. But her influence carries on, in Angel Olsen, Lucinda Williams, Sharon Van Etten, Courtney Barnett and Nick Cave, to name a few. This new expanded and remastered edition includes alternate takes of "In My Own Dream," "Something on Your Mind" and "Katie Cruel." The latter two light a small fire under the beat, but find Dalton less declarative, like she's consoling a friend in hushed tones. There are also several live tracks. "Take Me," captured in April 1971 in Germany, is so intimate it's disarming, Dalton's voice cracking on the line "like heaven to me." But there is strength—an almost defiance—on the songs from her Montreaux performance a month later, even in "Blues on the Ceiling" when she predicts she'll "Never get out of these blues alive." © Shelly Ridenour/Qobuz

The fact that the Zac Brown Band felt compelled to title their 2021 album The Comeback is a tacit admission that things aren't entirely well in the ZBB camp. A commercial powerhouse from 2008 to 2017, Zac Brown Band were fixtures on both the country and pop charts, a situation that led Brown to stretch his musical wings. At first, this meant he pushed ZBB to rock a bit hard, then jam a bit longer, but soon he heard the siren call of dance music, sending him down the path toward the bizarre electro-pop project Sir Rosevelt, a busman's holiday that informed not only 2018's The Owl by ZBB but the near-simultaneously released solo album The Controversy by Zac himself. The Sir Rosevelt-inspired triumvirate was enough to pump the breaks on ZBB's momentum, which in turn was enough for Zac Brown to get back to where he once belonged. Hence, The Comeback, a record designed to reassure wary fans that the group still can make rock, country, folk, and pop the way they used to back in the Obama administration. The allusions to older songs are shameless. Take "Same Boat," a surgical fusion of the beachy "Toes" and back porch picking of "Chicken Fried" designed to stir up warm nostalgic feelings among fans. That's also the case with the rest of the record, which alternates between harmony-heavy ballads, brawny (but not burly) arena rockers, and mellow pop tunes, all filled with homilies to faith, family, and home. Brown leans into clichés a little too hard and never can resist hitting the nail squarely on the head -- witness "Fun Having Fun," whose meaning is underscored over and over -- but he's savvy enough of a craftsman to make this blatant pandering effective and maybe even a little fun, if you're in the right mood.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

During the short time since her last album, 2013's Stars Dance, and the release of Revival in 2015, Selena Gomez went through about a decade's worth of stuff. A label change (from Hollywood to Interscope), a very public breakup with longtime on-off boyfriend Justin Bieber, management issues, various rehab rumors, and even a few good things (a hit single, a charting collaboration with Zedd). Revival is something of a fresh start for Gomez, both musically and personally. Taking more control over the album, with more writing credits and production oversight, the sound veers away from the bubblegum nature of her early work or the genre-hopping aspects of other releases. Instead, the album sticks pretty close to a club bangers-and-ballads mix with a couple of R&B-inspired jams thrown in. Gomez sounds most at home on the uptempo dance tracks like "Kill 'Em with Kindness" or "Me & the Rhythm," where the smoothness of her voice fits in with the vacant abandon of the beat. She also does a fine job on the tracks that slip outside the bounds of the formula, namely on the snappy, sassy Charli XCX-written "Same Old Love" or the steamy, tricked-out Latin beats and weird synthesizers in "Body Heat." These tracks show at her best, dialing up her personality to match the wit and imagination shown in the arrangements. The songs that don't fare as well are those where Gomez sounds most personal. She aims for several kinds of maturity here, but in the process the music suffers. Whether on the confessional piano ballad "Camouflage," the bruising "Sober" or the cartoonishly sexy "Good for You," it feels forced and overdone. Despite a few too many songs like this, there is still much to like about the album. There are some songs as good as anything she's done and the production is professional all the way thanks to heavy hitters like Stargate, Max Martin, and Hit Boy. It makes for a solid pop album overall, but it's a little too formulaic and predictable to rate among her best work.© Tim Sendra /TiVo

An even slicker record than Manifesto, Flesh + Blood precariously balances between alluringly seductive, sophisticated soul-pop and cloying, radio-ready disco-pop. At its best, the album is effortlessly suave and charming -- "Over You" is one of their greatest singles, and "Oh Yeah" is nearly as persuasive -- but much of the record is devoted to ill-formed, stylish lounge-pop. In particular, the reliance on reworked covers of "In the Midnight Hour" and "Eight Miles High" is distressing, not only because it signals a lack of imagination, but also because it suggests that Flesh + Blood is simply a lesser solo effort from Bryan Ferry. And even the handful of undeniably strong moments can't erase the feeling that Roxy Music were beginning to run out of ideas.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

On her three previous albums, Lera Lynn had cultivated an image of a solitary American singer who’s a little prone to darker, more depressing emotions. Thanks to this allure, many people discovered her due to her role in season 2 of the series True Detective where she appears repeatedly as a singer in a bar that’s frequented by the (also depressed) main characters. With Plays Well With Others, she shows a maturity and an openness to other musicians that we haven’t seen before. The album was recorded in John Paul Wite's studio in Florence, Alabama and features several guest appearances. Rich in acoustics and transfused with dark undercurrents, these thirty minutes with Lera Lynn are totally absorbing. Touched by heartbreak, loneliness and worry, she nevertheless manages to harmonize everything in a light and sincere way that hypnotizes the listener. And yet, the young woman might not have been so relaxed when you look at the list of singers accompanying her… Peter Bradley Adams, Dylan Leblanc, Rodney Crowell, Shovels & Rope, and JD McPherson! But Lynn knows how to leave room for other voices in her music, whether they’re instrumental or vocal, while she remains at the focal point. The acoustic and melancholic ballad Crimson Underground sounds almost like a sensual dance between the young woman's voice and that of veteran Rodney Crowell. A dance where the vocal cords listen to each other, respond to each other, and merge with the greatest delicacy. But Lynn also knows how to adapt her tone to her partner. From languorous folk, she engages in a more rock'n'roll pop-country, notably when JD McPherson joins her on Nothin To Do with Your Love, slipping effortlessly from a minor lyricism to an intoxicating pop. She even lets John Paul White perform practically solo on Almost Persuaded, rather placing herself in the background to then join the male voice in an intensely emotional finale. © Clara Bismuth/Qobuz

Although it is a little too extensive for casual fans, the double-disc, 50-track Anyway the Wind Blows: The Anthology is a definitive retrospective of J.J. Cale's career, featuring all the highlights over the years. Cale's albums often sound similar, but they are remarkably uneven in terms of quality, which is what makes Anyway the Wind Blows essential for both neophytes and collectors. Not only is it a perfect introduction, containing of such essentials as "Cocaine," "Call Me the Breeze," and "After Midnight," but it is one of his most consistently listenable and enjoyable discs.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

The duo's long-awaited debut album is one of the most assured, propulsive full-lengths the dance world had seen since Daft Punk's Homework. A set of incredibly diverse tracks, Remedy is indebted to the raw American house of Todd Terry and Masters at Work, and even shares the NuYoricans' penchant for Latin vibes (especially on the horn-driven "Bingo Bango" and the opener, "Rendez-Vu," which trades a bit of salsa wiggle with infectious vocoderized disco). True, Ratcliffe and Buxton do sound more like an American production team than a pair of Brixton boys would -- they get props (and vocal appearances) from several of the best American house producers out there including DJ Sneak, Erick Morillo, and Benji Candelario. And "U Can't Stop Me" is an R&B production that could probably have gotten airplay in major rap markets across the U.S. Elsewhere, Buxton and Ratcliffe chew up and spit out mutated versions of hip-hop, ragga, Latin, R&B, soul, and garage -- the varied sound that defined the worldwide house scene of the late '90s. © John Bush /TiVo

Hard to believe, but it's been nearly 30 years since Loggins & Messina have had their five albums compiled into a greatest-hits collection. The first, Best of Friends, appeared in 1976, just after the partnership went its separate ways, and this second set, The Best: Sittin' in Again, appeared in the summer of 2005 to coincide with a reunion tour. On the back cover of the CD, Messina is quoted as saying that "this album is about more than hits," with Loggins elaborating that he wants "this new retrospective to accurately depict who Loggins & Messina was." To that end, Sittin' in Again does indeed overlook some hits, including "My Music" and "Thinking of You" -- two Top 20 hits that appeared on Best of Friends -- plus the 1975 "Growin'," one of their last charting hits; similarly, the winding full-length LP version of "Angry Eyes" is here instead of the single edit. While the absent hits are indeed missed, the majority of the duo's biggest songs are indeed here -- "Your Mama Don't Dance," "House at Pooh Corner," "Danny's Song," "Vahevala" -- and there's a strong emphasis on their first two records (six of the nine songs on their 1972 debut, Sittin' In, are here, six of the 11 cuts from its eponymous 1972 follow-up), which are their best LPs (it's no coincidence that there's nothing here from their poorly regarded final album, 1976's Native Sons). Although some listeners will certainly miss those aforementioned two big hit singles, Sittin' in Again nevertheless is a strong summary of Loggins & Messina's strengths, capturing them at their best as a tuneful soft rock duo. It emphasizes Messina's skills as a record producer and Loggins' folky, introspective songwriting, while revealing such usually overlooked traits in their music such as some country overtones and a tendency toward subtly eclectic, laid-back jams, which is why this is arguably the definitive portrait of the duo, even if it skimps on some actual charting hits.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Through the miracle of high-resolution digital transfer and mastering technology, Bird enthusiasts can now get an earful of the shape of Charlie Parker's musical accomplishments for Savoy and Dial in the 1940s. Available as a three-disc box set, the alto saxophonist is recorded in various configurations as performer and bandleader with such mainstream jazz greats as trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis, pianists Bud Powell and Erroll Garner, drummer Max Roach, trombonist J.J. Johnson, and bassist Ray Brown, to name but a few. Charlie Parker draws on his pungent roots and rhythms of the Kansas City jazz scene on "Parker's Mood" and makes a deep statement of the existence of the blues in the jazz tradition. His freedom and rapid-fire sax lines on "Yardbird Suite" serve to confirm his excellence in crafting polished improvisations and solos. One of Parker's strongest compositions, "Orinithology," is pure, unadulterated bebop, and the unique sound of Parker's alto saxophone is clearly articulated through smoothly executed phrasings and cutting, focused energy. Parker picks up the tenor saxophone with the Miles Davis All-Stars on such great songs as "Milestones" and "Sippin' at Bell's." Overall, Bird audiophiles, jazz educators, and historians should be prepared to be impressed. This collection is arguably Bird's most important recording studio work. © Paula Edelstein /TiVo

Stevie Wonder broke a three-year silence, one that followed a series of six classic albums released within six years, with this double album, the score/soundtrack to a little-seen environmental documentary directed by Wild Bunch co-screenwriter Walon Green. From the release of Songs in the Key of Life through the release of Plants, Wonder had been active, actually, but only as a collaborator, working with Ramsey Lewis, the Pointer Sisters, Minnie Riperton, Syreeta, Ronnie Foster, and Michael Jackson. Even so, three years was a considerable lag between albums. Anticipation was so high that this release peaked at number four on the Billboard 200 and R&B album charts. It quickly slipped to footnote status; when Wonder’s 1972-1980 albums were reissued in 2000, it was left out of the program. Plants is a sprawling, fascinating album. Though it is dominated by synthesizer-heavy instrumental pieces with evocative titles, there is a handful of full-blown songs. The gorgeous, mostly acoustic ballad “Send One Your Love” was a Top Ten R&B single, while the joyous “Outside My Window” registered in the Top 60. Beyond that, there’s the deep classic “Come Back as a Flower,” a gently lapping, piano-led ballad featuring Syreeta on vocals. Otherwise, there are playfully oddball tracks like “Venus’ Flytrap and the Bug,” where Wonder chirps “Please don’t eat me!” through robotizing effects, and “A Seed’s a Star,” which incorporates crowd noise, a robotized monologue, and a shrieking Tata Vega over a funkier and faster version of Yellow Magic Orchestra. The album is not for everyone, but it suited its purpose and allowed its maker an amount of creative wiggle room that few major-label artists experience.© Andy Kellman /TiVo