Sharon Van Etten invites a handful of artists to cover songs from her 2010 album epic. These new versions—played by Fiona Apple, Lucinda Williams, and more—reveal the music’s healing power and complexity.

Beijing-based producer Howie Lee is releasing his first album of the year via Mais Um Discos on April 16th. Influenced by Taoist music, Buchla synths and seminal London party FWD>>, Birdy Island sees Lee, who is known for club-ready anthems, taking a more downtempo approach. He worked with a four-piece choir made up of himself, West By West, Beijing artist Fishdoll and Shanghai-based singer/producer Yehaiyahan. The eight-track LP spans ambient, jazz and traditional Chinese folk. "Birdy Island to me is a palace in the clouds and the birds are worshipped like Gods," says Lee. "Not like a western God though." According to his vision, this symbolic structure was built by a Chinese investment company that invites Lee to compose the venue's soundtrack.

The alt-rock icon returns with tasteful, timeless rock arrangements on a record about friendship, sobriety, and the love she’d like to receive.

Locks & BME’s new album NOW was created in the final throes of Summer 2020, following months of pandemic-induced fear & isolation, the explosion of social unrest, struggle & violence in the streets, and as the certain presence of a new reality had fully settled in. Set up safely in the garden behind Chicago’s Experimental Sound Studio, the music was recorded in only a few takes, capturing the first times members of BME had ever played or sang the tunes. For Locks, the impetus was more about getting together to commune and make art than it was about producing an album. In his words: “It was about offering a new thought. It was about resisting the darkness. It was about expressing possibility. It was about asking the question, ‘Since the future has unfolded and taken a new and dangerous shape... what happens NOW?’”

Broken Mirror: A Selfie Reflection is a timely callout to the power of collaboration, of kindred spirits connecting in crowded rooms. More important, though, is this collision of two profoundly Southern artists, meeting to shed expectations of generation and genre, scene and situation and exchange truth, wisdom, and energy. The real world is more complicated than a pretty digital picture, bowdlerized of blemishes. As Broken Mirror: A Selfie Reflection reminds us, it can be more revelatory and transformative, too. For fans of On the Corner, Gil Scott-Heron, Can and Bitches Brew. These racks are balls of energized contemplation, Holley crooning grievances and observations above surrealist grooves so irrepressible and heavy that the words strike with the force of gospel. Holley strolls into “I Cried Space Dust” as if he’s wandered into the On the Corner sessions and offered unsolicited insights on true transcendence. “I’m Not Tripping” is an anthem of self-worth and self-enjoyment for a society mired in self-doubt, the words breaking like light beams through clouds of atomized drums and synths. And Holley begins the title track as a character mindlessly staring into a cell phone, captivated by his own image like Narcissus at water’s edge. Holley ponders the egotism of projection over dizzying keyboards and guitars so jagged they conjure fractured glass. By song’s end, he’s mocking this infrastructure of pandering for likes, jeering us all above a savage bassline that dares you to differ. Holley and White may seem like unlikely collaborators, divided as they are by decades and disciplines. Holley, 70, first earned attention as a sculptor far removed from the fiefdom of fine art, using society’s detritus to create curious bricolages that ferried deep narratives of ancestral pride, enduring pain, and eternal hope. His music privately stowed on stacks of cassettes before he released his staggering 2012 debut, Just Before Music, at the age of 62 aired those ideas over extemporaneous pieces for prismatic keyboards. But on Big Inner and Fresh Blood, White, now 38, came into acclaim as one of his generation’s most meticulous songwriters and arrangers. Stretching his assuredly soulful voice like a smile across little symphonies of strings, horns, choirs, and percussive cavalcades, White commanded sounds where Holley seemed to glide inside them

The Floridian emo band channels a sense of boundless possibility on their new LP, which has the heft of a manifesto despite its compact length.

The experimental rapper from Richmond, Virginia raps, speaks, and sings over a strange amalgamation of beat sculptures, glitchy melodies, and found audio. The effect is dizzying and alluring.

Songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist SG Lewis has finally announced that his long-awaited debut album ‘times’ will be arriving on 19th February via EMI Records! Sharing new single ‘Feed The Fire’ featuring Lucky Daye to celebrate the news, SG Lewis says of the track, “‘Feed The Fire’ is the kind of song I’ve wanted to make for a long time and one of my favourites on the album. Lucky’s album Painted is in constant rotation for me and I’d always wanted to hear what he would sound like on something club tempo - the result is better than I ever could have hoped for. So much of this album was inspired by my love of Jamiroquai, so to have Matt Johnson & Simon Hale involved on this song is very surreal.” ‘times’ will also feature August’s track ‘Impact’, which featured Robyn and Channel Tres!

Robin Charles Thicke is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, dancer, musician and actor. He has collaborated with numerous artists, such as Nicki Minaj, 3T, T.I., Christina Aguilera, Jessie J, K. Michelle, Pharrell, DJ Cassidy, Usher, Jennifer Hudson, Flo Rida, Brandy, Kid Cudi and Mary J. Blige.

要么吭哧前行，要么承受皮鞭； 牛牛们反讽一切，独不讨论那把磨刀石上的刀。 今天没有枪响，明天也不会有枪响，鹅卵石是由流水吻成的。 躺平会被碾压，傲立会被标记。 眼睛很容易适应黑暗，而灯塔仍耐着性子等着我们； 最好是尽快找到彼此，我们一起抵住门。 在门后，亲爱的朋友，我多想跟你聊聊生意之外的事； 或者你累了，你睡了，你磨牙； 我为你高兴，在梦中的沙场，你是呐喊的勇兵。 词、曲：蛙池 制作人：张守望 录音师：尹冲 录音棚：北京百花录音棚 客座录音乐手：张靖雅（大提琴）、郭婧文（小提琴） 混音师：小武 混音棚：Sync Studio 母带：时俊峰 监制：健崔 特别感谢：詹盼 录音支持：安柏、王硕、储智勇、张一弛（BowAsWell）、高康迪（广场恐惧症）、罗威（广场恐惧症）、陈泽洋、李品一、韩笑非、詹华、黄普泽、刘天瑶 封面概念：蛙池 封面摄影：文阿冲 封面出镜：王剑俦 封面设计：吴楚浩 鸣谢：Crossroad路口音乐 出品：东莞市池边蛙声文化传播有限公司 数字发行代理：太合麦田（天津）音乐有限公司

The London art-rockers’ outstanding debut is a droll album full of surreal images, bizarre obsessions, and sense memories. The cumulative effect of Florence Shaw’s narration is inexplicably wonderful.

Even as they negotiate complex parameters of rhythm and harmony, the trio’s expertly attuned playing evokes the openness of improvisation and the urgency of justice.

Jacob Buczarski’s cerebral, complex melodic black metal is an elegy for a dying planet. There is little hope on offer here, but plenty of silvery, well-executed riffs.

2021年马海平MHP以“Ma Haiping”之名，正式加入国际级techno厂牌Axis Records，在4月9日发行全新专辑，以嫦娥四号命名的《Chang'e-4》。作为Techno历史上最传奇的巫师（没有之一）的Jeff Mills， 其地位相比底特律的Techno三杰有过之而无不及，他潜心经营的Axis Records几乎是每一位电子乐迷/Techno Animal必听厂牌，并且经营了全Techno文化向的杂志《The Escape Velocity》。这并不算一张纯粹的Techno音乐的EP，7首作品，以“嫦娥四号”命名来代表对宇宙的探索，三大最适合全宇宙的电子乐类型：Ambient，Techno，Electro， 都在这张EP里完整展现，马海平用章节式的曲序来完成整张作品， 神秘的空间氛围感到代表音速冲击的高能Techno，跳舞的成分已经占的很少，整个过程更像一个太空漫游的配乐，只是显得更加的黑暗无边际和神秘。（节选自电板鸭评论）

Tune-Yards’ last release 'I can feel you creep into my private life', was a self-reflexive question mark at the end of a decade of outspoken, polyphonic indie music. From 2009 to 2018, Tune-Yards (both Merrill and her partner and collaborator Nate Brenner) released four critically acclaimed albums, travelled the world relentlessly to play live shows, and composed the psychedelic score to Boots Riley's surrealist cinematic masterpiece Sorry To Bother You. "We had really been non-stop hustling," Merrill reflects. "And when we're hustling, we're complicit in all of the systems that I really don't believe in." Interrogating these systems and her role within them had left Merrill feeling heavy with grief and lost about how to move forward. The duo pressed on, inspired by the Beastie Boys Book and Questlove’s Creative Quest, and began jamming daily for hours in their home rehearsal studio “like athletes”. They ditched computer screens for live instruments (Merrill on drums, Nate on bass) and before long full songs started to emerge. Unlike the lyrical introspection of previous outing I can feel you..., on sketchy. Merrill balances self-inspection and reflection with bombastic rallying cries, reminiscent of the furious tones of early days Tune-Yards. The result is a colourful and joyous record with lyrics that cut to the bone. "I started remembering that people come to us to be entertained, to move, to feel joy. And together, I think, we can wake up.”

2021 专辑「飞狗」自序 说我像计算机前的狗，不如说我看到了一条正在飞的狗，是在黑洞里飞的那条。（如同封面像帽檐下的那片黑。） 时间弯曲、情感压缩！往事如冰、现时如火！ 末日并没有那么可怕，不过是一个时空的转换！ 我现在才知道，我曾经试图做的是一张扭曲现时的专辑。可当我做完第8首的时候，我已经没有力气了，或者说我已经自我感觉平衡了。 最后我想问，2021是一个出唱片的好时机吗？希望这个问题是压垮我的平衡的一根稻草，成为我下一个不平衡的开始。 我渴望被大风吹／我渴望被大浪推／可海水干燥得象风／可风却柔情得似水……——《末日海滩》 崔健 2021年8月 《飞狗》专辑工作人员名单 乐队成员： 崔健 / 演唱、吉他、小号、Program 刘元 / 萨克斯、唢呐 —— 不包括 [爱情量子定律] [留守者] [半边儿天] [继续] Eddie / 吉他 刘玥 / 贝斯 鲁超 / 鼓 —— 不包括 [末日海滩] 特邀： 周侠 / 键盘 —— [时间的B面] [兔子牛] [末日海滩] 徐之曈 / 鼓 —— [末日海滩] 高兴 / 打击乐 —— [飞狗] 伴唱： 关冰效 周甜 —— 不包括 [飞狗] 郭亚男 —— 不包括 [飞狗] 阿旺措 词曲、编曲、制作: 崔健 录音： 王郑 颜仲坤 —— 不包括 [爱情量子定律] [留守者] [半边儿天] [继续] @北京东西音乐艺术制作有限责任公司录音棚 混音： 崔健、王郑 @北京东西音乐艺术制作有限责任公司录音棚 母带处理： Adam Ayan @ Gateway Mastering Studios 封面设计、摄影： 宋晓辉 经理人： 尤尤 感谢： 曹宇、周亚平、曹川、胡译友、陈林、刘英、李马科、李峰、Ian Miller、Luca Bignardi、北京楠木秀吉他博物馆、刘春阳、张军、刘奥、Maxteam、戴彬、郭凯敏、李梦晨、杨泽承

“Bodies Of Water's music is a slippery conflation of punk spirit, folk expressionism, bombastic theatricality and old-fashioned testifying. It's like a church social gone horribly awry..." - Paper Thin Walls