Those who come from Louisiana always have a good ear for music. Always! Soul, blues, zydeco, rock, jazz, R&B, funk, pop or country, no one native to the New Orleans area worries about labels or genres. There is only good music and bad music. Period. Brittany Guerin, known as Britti, is the latest proof of this. Born in Baton Rouge, the singer, discovered by Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys, masters every style that resounds within the unique groove of the American South. And as Britti dresses her songs in a certain classicism, she is often reminiscent of classic soul singers that have come before her. Hints of her idols Diana Ross (“Save Me”) and Dolly Parton (“Keep Running”), as well as Norah Jones, Erykah Badu and Amy Winehouse (albeit less dreamy) can be heard on her debut album Hello, I’m Britti., a title that clearly references Dolly Parton’s first album from 1967, Hello, I’m Dolly… But even though the influence is apparent, it never limits Britti’s own inspiration, style or personality. An expert in 20th-century equipment and vintage sounds, Auerbach brings the perfect production, with just the right amount of sepia. He was clearly the one who assembled a team of studio legends around the singer, including bassist Nick Movshon (Amy Winehouse, Wu Tang Clan and a whole selection of albums for the label Daptone), guitarist Tom Bukovac (Sheryl Crow, Stevie Nicks), and Mike Rojas (Ricky Skaggs, Yola, Miranda Lambert), a wizard on the keys. Supported by this glittering cast,  Hello, I’m Britti. navigates soul vignettes, country pop interludes and R&B daydreams with immense ease and a certain class. Building a solid bridge between New Orleans and Nashville, this Qobuzissime has already declared itself one of the great albums of 2024. © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

With A New Day Now, Joe Bonamassa revisits his debut album A New Day Yesterday. The American bluesman has even rerecorded his vocal parts. According to him, the reason behind this project relates to the lack of experience and rigour that can be heard on the original record. The first release by the young man, then aged 22, came ten years after his noteable performance as the support act for B.B. King and marked the beginning of his artistic blossoming. For Bonamassa, this retrospective album is also an homage to producer Tom Dowd, his former mentor whose demanding approach, both technically and musically, helped him to progress from a child prodigy to the best bluesman of his generation. © IF/Qobuz

Much like Disney's Tarzan, Dreamworks' animated epic Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron opts for a mostly pop-based soundtrack instead of an instrumental score. Tarzan used the music of Phil Collins as a backdrop to its stunning visuals; Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron features 15 new tracks from Bryan Adams to lend atmosphere to the tale of a runaway stallion's journey across the Old West. Adams' rousing, slightly sweet anthems are a good match to the film's look and theme, and they're also in keeping with the rest of his work. "Here I Am," "I Will Always Return," and "Don't Let Go" could fit in just as easily on his albums as on this collection. Likewise, "Get off My Back" sounds a lot like it could've been on 18 'Til I Die. There's some variety here as well, demonstrated by the vaguely Native American-influenced "Brothers Under the Sun" and understated ballads like "Here I Am" and "Nothing I've Ever Known." Not all of the diversity works well, however; the rebellious "You Can't Take Me" suffers from some shrill, tinny-sounding synths that make it difficult to listen to. The few instrumental excerpts at the end of the album round it out nicely, making Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron is a pleasant and successful soundtrack, especially for Bryan Adams' fans.© Heather Phares /TiVo

Following two majorly successful albums as a dance queen all over the world, the alto pop diva extraordinaire Anastacia released her third album, a self-titled one, to huge reception practically all over the globe. Interestingly enough, the only location where the album was never released was in the United States, where the American singer's flame never burst into wildfire. It's a real shame, though; Anastacia was a transition album for a multi-dimensional artist as she shifted from disco flavor into passionate power pop, and this haunting presentation would've been her ticket for gold in the States. Written, recorded, and produced while Anastacia was diagnosed and treated for breast cancer only helped the dazzling singer to create a more personal, painful piece of work that suits her unique voice perfectly. Packed with pop numbers that overlay into rock and soul, Anastacia envelops the listener into a painstaking reality that horrified the singer -- that this might be the end of her career, and her life, and she wasn't going to go down without a fight. Stronger tracks on the album include "Left Outside Alone," a global smash that was the number one single of 2004 in many European countries, on which Anastacia berates the listener with cries of frustration in pop/rock at its finest, and "Heavy on My Heart," a shimmering ballad flushed by pain, love, and bombastic sounds that collide like tidal waves in what can only be described as a magical four minutes. The hits don't stop there, as Anastacia is packed with not only personal musical anecdotes (every track on the album was either written or co-written by Anastacia), but radio-friendly, grit-influenced dark pop hits like "I Do," "Seasons Change," and "Time." Plus, she seams R&B into her mix of melodies on tracks like "Pretty Little Dum Dum" and "Sick & Tired." Overall, Anastacia is truly an artist's record, where listeners get a bird's eye view into the minds of a covertly dark Anastacia whose musical imagination is finally allowed to blossomed due to the catalytic effect of a terrible tragedy that overcame her. Luckily for us, she is 100 percent cured of her disease; now it's time to take this new hauntingly gorgeous Anastacia and give her some credit like she truly deserves.© Matthew Chisling /TiVo

After blowing up Emperor in 2001, guitarist, keyboardist, and composer Ihsahn embarked on a solo career that has been strangely dazzling in its focused creativity, expansive scope, and a relentless willingness to throw caution out the window. While his first five solo offerings retained their tangential connection to second wave black metal, all the while pushing its more progressive and vanguard elements, the evolution shifted jarringly with 2016's Arktis. Guitar tones were more overdriven than jagged, analog synths became as dominant as orchestration, and songs were written consciously with melodic, even poppy, hooks and dense but pronounced rhythms, atmospherics, and dynamics. Ámr, album number seven, marks the first time in Ihsahn's career the he made an album as a conscious extension of its predecessor. This doesn’t mean that it sounds the same, not by any stretch, but it is a refinement of the process that created Arktis. With the notable exception of a lone guitar solo by Fredrik Åkesson of Opeth on " Arcana Imperii," Ihsahn's only accompanist is drummer Tobias Ornes Andersen. The production here is less symphonic in arrangement, this is far more stark and immediate. Ihsahn allows each instrument and vocal layer a separate space here, creating a more open if no less foreboding vibe. Opener "Lend Me the Eyes of Millenia" is a conscious nod to his black metal past, but with a profound twist. The dirty vocals let the listener know immediately that this is Ihsahn with its snarling blastbeats and modal structure, but the Roland 808 synth lines claim the foreground instead of tremolo picking. It's merely the way in, however. The popping, swinging drums and rattling guitar riffing that commence "Arcana Imperii" comes right out of '80s hard rock, while swirling keyboards are framed quite separately around lush vocal harmonies and a proggy pop hook, with Akesson's guitar break simultaneously adding tension and release. Elsewhere, as on "Samr" and the gloomy "Where You Are Lost and I Belong," composer John Carpenter's creepy synth scores to his films -- particularly the original Halloween -- influence the spacious, near-Gothic, funereal, instrumental approach and subdued anguished singing at once menacing and vulnerable. The skeletal synth intro to "Twin Black Angels" recalls the original John Foxx incarnation of Ultravox, as electric guitar and skittering snares frame a lush, loss-filled balladic melody that gives way to a rocker in bridge and refrain where dirty vocals are interspersed with clean ones around a soaring guitar break. Despite, or perhaps because of, the '80s references, only Ihsahn could have combined all of these individual elements and made them gel with his imprimatur style. Closer "Wake" adds the tremolo picking back in alongside wobbly careening synths, filthy vocals, and blastbeats though the chorus is in clean, almost bright four-part vocal harmony before the instrumental bridge traverses the threshold of the anthemic. If Ihsahn attempted to make an accessible, catchy, mainstream metal album with Arktis, Ámr is the sound of him perfecting that vision, and as a result, comprises one of his finest outings. © Thom Jurek /TiVo

.38 Special is a prime example of an AOR band with deep roots in Southern rock. The band hails from Florida, and vocalist Donnie Van Zant is the brother of none other than Lynyrd Skynyrd's Ronnie and Johnny Van Zant. The group's 1982 album, Special Forces, included the flawless Top Ten rocker "Caught Up in You," which injected the mainstream with a shot of much-needed grit. That album's follow-up, 1983's Tour De Force, upped the ante, showing the band's skills at their peak. Propelled by the effortless blend of melody and power stirred up by Van Zant, vocalist/guitarist Don Barnes, guitarist Jeff Carlisi, bassist Larry Junstrom, and drummers Steve Brookins and Jack Grondin, Tour De Force is loaded with irresistible hooks. The hit single, "If I'd Been the One," is a stunner steeped in passionate vocals and simple but highly effective rhythm and lead guitar parts. "Back Where You Belong," which was also a hit, is more of a straightforward pop/rock song. "I Oughta Let Go" is best described as country-rock -- or, better still, country-funk -- and the fun "Undercover Lover" is a sly, laid-back rocker. But the undiscovered gem here is "Twentieth Century Fox" (no, not the Doors song), a fantastic rocker with great guitar grooves, aggressive vocals, and clever lyrics.© Bret Adams /TiVo

Apparently, just one primary color was no longer enough to cover the volume of ideas produced by Atlanta, Georgia's Baroness for its third long-playing release, and thus the 2012 follow-up to 2007's Red Album and 2009's Blue Record has become an 18-song double set named Yellow & Green. The irony is there's no obvious cohesive theme or musical direction particular to either color (Green might be a shade more morose, if at all), as each contains an equally schizophrenic array of musical touchstones, too eclectic to easily categorize. In fact, the biggest headline about this release pertains to something else entirely, and that is Baroness' not entirely unexpected evolution into something other than a heavy metal band; one focused on expanding its arsenal of sounds and moods while embracing big choruses and more commercial songwriting tricks targeting maximum immediacy. "March to the Sea," for example, boasts a new wave pulse and singing harmonies à la Big Country, while "Little Things" borrows something from the Cure (and "Sea Lungs" from U2!); the melancholy country of "Green Theme" owes more to the Band than Black Sabbath or anything metallic, for that matter, while the gothic folk of "Twinkler" takes a left-hand path approach to Fleet Foxes' wistful vocal choir; and perhaps most telling, a few cuts like "Cocainium" and "Back Where I Belong" feature keyboards more prominently than guitars. When those six-strings do get plugged in and their Marshalls properly cranked for songs like misleadingly heavy opener "Take My Bones Away," the Thin Lizzy-praising "Board Up the House," or the thunder pop nugget "The Line Between," it's not like they've been stripped of all their cojones and distortion (and these had already been toned down for the Blue Record), but the higher melodic quotient puts them squarely into the hard rock category, at most. And while one can't help but respect Baroness' general bravura and overwhelming success rate on these songs, the band inevitably falls flat on its face now and then, including a second-half stretch spanning the sleepy "Foolsong," the snoring drones of "Collapse," and the New Order horror show "Psalms Alive" (which admittedly, does come alive near the end). In sum: Yellow & Green undertakes such a massive creative leap that only time will tell whether it goes down as a triumph or a blunder. In fairness to Baroness' heavy metal fan constituency, all this experimentation has almost nothing in common with the band's initial, Isis-inspired post-metal EPs; but between the steady maturation displayed by those ensuing color-coded works and the quantity of songs here, both undeniably infectious and innovative, many more fans are bound to embark on the Georgians' strange, strange ride. Chances are, it will get even stranger from here on out.© Eduardo Rivadavia /TiVo

Named after the early Jethro Tull classic, which he expertly covers here in a jaw-dropping performance, A New Day Yesterday is a fine debut by guitar ace Joe Bonamassa. And though his record company tried to ride the coattails of teenage guitar prodigies like Kenny Wayne Shepard and Jonny Lang and position him (misguidedly and much too late) as a straight-up prodigal blues kid, Bonamassa is really much more than a traditional bluesman. Rather, as best exemplified by the Jethro Tull number cited above, his bluesy take on Free's "Walk in My Shadows," or his hard boogie romp through Al Kooper's "Nuthin' I Wouldn't Do (For a Woman Like You)," this excellent debut places the guitarist's influences as much in classic '70s hard rock as in the blues. Along with his deceptively age-wearied vocals (he was only 22 at the time of this recording), this unusual combination translates into the aggressive, soulful crunch heard on Bonamassa's many original compositions. Among these, the jolting double whammy of "Miss You, Hate You" and "Colour and the Shape" (note the Anglicized spelling) are the most obvious standouts, but the guitarist also makes the Warren Haynes-penned "If Heartaches Were Nickels" his own with a tense, riveting performance. All in all, a promising debut. © Eduardo Rivadavia /TiVo

2000, the third studio album from Brooklyn rapper Joey Bada$$, is a sequel to his debut mixtape, 1999, intentionally designed to follow his first project in style and concept, down to being released almost ten years to the day after its 2012 predecessor. Much like 1999, 2000 is a showcase of musically rich throwback production, with jazz-flecked instrumentals and smooth boom-bap beats backdropping Joey's controlled bars and lyrics of New York City life. The old-school beats are made up of dusty piano loops and samples of distant saxophones, setting the same kind of summery mood that bloomed on 1999, while guests like JID, Larry June, and Diddy stop by to contribute vocal cameos. "Brand New 911" is among the best tracks on the album, serving up a relaxed instrumental that sounds beamed in from 1995, while Westside Gunn offers a fiery verse to compliment Joey's cool-headed flow. "Zipcodes" is another standout, with hard drums offsetting jazzy samples and fluid, MF DOOM-referencing lyrics.© TiVo Staff /TiVo

Previously famous for her 2000 Prokofiev-sampling hit "Taken for Granted" and regular collaborations with Zero 7, Australian jazz-soul singer Sia received international exposure with her third solo album, Colour the Small One. Its lead single, "Breathe Me," was used on the series five finale of Six Feet Under, while its collaboration with Beck, "The Bully," introduced her to a slightly more alternative audience. Eschewing the R&B leanings of previous album Healing Is Difficult, Sia's hushed, intimate vocals are surrounded by acoustic folk-tinged electronica on its 11 tracks, which include the singles "Don't Bring Me Down" and "Where I Belong."© Jon O'Brien /TiVo