"Everything seems to start almost normally on Pussyhorse with "Creep in the Cellar," even with the rather gone violin line -- Haynes is intelligible, the piano part is quiet serene. Then again, Haynes is talking about the creep in question doing things like taking off his skin, so clearly all is still at least somewhat tweaked in Surferland. The rest of the album makes that pretty clear; if not quite as strong as Psychic...Powerless, Pussyhorse is still a strong slice of homegrown art/psychedelia gone to a murky hell. Gentler songs like "Sea Ferring" still have a distinct queasiness to them, its sea chanty feeling undercut by the nagging bassline and Haynes' yelps. When the group goes totally nuts, as on a drum-blasting, squiggly voiced cover of the Guess Who's "American Woman" that makes the later Lenny Kravitz version seem like the redundant slice of nostalgia it is, no prisoners are taken. "Perry" is another definite nutter, with Haynes or somebody talking about this and that to his "baby" over a slow, organ-heavy groove. This said, the trick about Pussyhorse, and arguably why it's slightly lesser than Psychic...Powerless, is its overall subtlety in comparison. Things are more dark and gloomy throughout, downright gothic, even, with the organ start and whispery lyrics of "Strangers Die Everyday" being a good example. Leary keeps his playing low and strange throughout, fitting in with new bassist Pinkus rather well as a result. Get past the slight surprise of not always hearing the Surfers going near-all out most of the time, though, and Pussyhorse is still mighty fine, whether talking about the drony guitar weirdness opening "Whirling Hall of Knives" or the echo-treated reprise of "In the Cellar."" - Allmusic.

Now remastered under supervision from the group.

TRACK LISTING

Creep In The Cellar
Sea Ferring
American Woman
Waiting For Jimmy To Kick
Strangers Die Everyday
Perry
Whirling Hall Of Knives
Mark Says Alright
In The Cellar

Seven songs performed live and naked by these slightly off-kilter Texan envelope pushers. Remember: before Pepper, there was an entire decade that the band probably doesn't even recall, but damn, was it good for the rest of us! Recorded at the Meridean in San Antonio, TX in 1984. 

Now remastered under supervision from the group.

TRACK LISTING

Cowboy Bob
Bar-B-Q Pope
Dance Of The Cobras
The Shah Sleeps In Lee Harvey's Grave
Wichita Cathedral
Hey
Something

"The Surfers' Touch and Go debut remains their highlight for many fans, an inspired blast of ugly noise, knowing idiocy, drugged-out insanity and some backhanded surprises. Haynes is still relatively interpretable here; the vocal distortions are only on a few songs, like the opening "Concubine," and what one can't quite understand one can still sense. The band's self-production brings out the mighty rumbles of drummers Coffey and Nervosa and Leary's avant-junkyard guitar work with clarity and a big, thick punch. Leary begins with screwy blues and gentle strums, then cranks up the amps and lets fly. The band also officially recorded their semi-theme song "Butthole Surfer," after which they were accidentally named; the bizarro backing vocals and sudden sped-up shifts at the end are just part of the oddities on display. "Negro Observer" is one of the most straightforward, calmest songs of the bunch, and even that's saying something, with Haynes going off about the title characters -- described as aliens coming to "count heads in singles bars" -- like a barely stable street crazy, insane laughter and all. When it comes to full-on craziness, though, nothing beats the obscene "Lady Sniff," which sounds like an amped-up blues act fronted by a 100-year-old man, and the hallucinatory "Mexican Caravan," with Haynes raving about "that heroin BROWN!" The nods to rock history are subtle but present, from the Black Sabbath-quoting (specifically "Children of the Grave") opening rhythm of "Dum Dum" to the fried Tex/Mex-ranting of "Gary Floyd," written about the legendary Dicks bandleader. However, The Surfers' crazy blend is completely distinctive, taking punk and the inspiration of their acid-addled Texas forebears to new heights" - Allmusic.

Now remastered under supervision from the group.

TRACK LISTING

Concubine
Eye Of The Chicken
Dum Dum
Woly Boly
Butthole Surfer
Lady Sniff
Cherub
Mexican Caravan
Cowboy Bob
Gary Floyd

Musician and visual artist Kim Gordon returns with her second solo album, The Collective, which will be released March 8th on Matador.

Recorded in Gordon’s native Los Angeles, The Collective follows her 2019 full-length debut No Home Record and continues her collaboration with producer Justin Raisen (Lil Yachty, John Cale, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Charli XCX, Yves Tumor), with additional production from Anthony Paul Lopez. The album advances their joint world building, with Raisin’s damaged, blown out dub and trap constructions playing the foil to Gordon’s intuitive word collages and hooky mantras, which conjure communication, commercial sublimation and sensory overload.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: An incendiary new outing from the one and only Kim Gordon. Blurring the boundaries between electronica, art rock and avant-pop, Gordon's unrelenting 'The Collective' is possibly her finest solo moment to date, and one of the highs of her legendary career.

TRACK LISTING

1. BYE BYE
2. The Candy House
3. I Don’t Miss My Mind
4. I’m A Man
5. Trophies
6. It’s Dark Inside
7. Psychedelic Orgasm
8. Tree House
9. Shelf Warmer
10. The Believers
11. Dream Dollar

Fucked Up’s now classic 2008 album "The Chemistry Of Common Life" synthesizes numerous diverse impulses into an expansive epic about the mysteries of birth, death, and the origins of life (and re-living). Merging elements of hardcore songwriting with up to 70 tracks of guitars, organs, winds and vocals, (including 18 guitars on the first single, the fatalistic “No Epiphany”), the music remains iconoclastic and startling, with Pink Eyes’ vocals front and center. Guest musicians, of course, abound, notably gorgeous voices such as Brooklyn’s Vivian Girls and Toronto’s Katie Stelmanis.

TRACK LISTING

1. Son The Father
2. Magic Word
3. Golden Seal
4. Days Of Last
5. Crooked Head
6. No Epiphany
7. The Peaceable Kingdom
8. Black Albino Bones
9. Royal Swan
10. Twice Born
11. Looking For God
12. The Chemistry Of Common Life

On March 28th-30th 2022, Car Seat Headrest played three consecutive sold out nights at Brooklyn Steel in New York. An air of celebration, community and showmanship was present, made all the more palpable as the shows were far from a certainty - they took place amidst a year which saw the band having to postpone or cancel a large swath of their North American tour dates due to ongoing health issues.

The three night residency is captured on Faces From The Masquerade - a double album’s worth of live performances that finds Car Seat Headrest at their most playful, exuberant and precision honed. The title alludes to the by now familiar, custom-made gas mask worn by frontman Will Toledo at shows, complete with an expressive LED display for eyes. In addition to the group’s four core members - Toledo, guitarist/backing vocalist Ethan Ives, bassist Seth Dalby and drummer Andrew Katz - they were joined on the tour by keyboard player Ben Roth.

TRACK LISTING

1. Crows
2. Weightlifters
3. Fill In The Blank
4. Hymn
5. Hollywood
6. Bodys
7. Something Soon
8. 1937 State Park
9. Sober To Death
10. Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales
11. It’s My Child (I’ll Do What I Like)
12. Can’t Cool Me Down
13. Beach Life-In-Death
14. Deadlines

Baker, Bridgers, and Dacus formed boygenius after booking a tour together, but the trio had subconsciously been in the works for longer than that. Through a series of tours and performances together, and chance encounters that led to friendships – including Bridgers’ and Dacus’ first in-person meeting backstage at a Philadelphia festival, greenroom hangouts that felt instantly comfortable and compatible, a couple of long email chains and even a secret handshake between Baker and Dacus – the lyrically and musically arresting singer-songwriters and kindred spirits got to know each other on their own terms.

“It seemed obvious to record a 7-inch for tour, although many adult men will try to take credit for the idea,” adds Bridgers. “When we got together, we had way more songs than we expected and worked so well together, that we decided to make a full EP.”

In early June of 2018, they practiced and wrote for a day before holing up in Los Angeles’ storied Sound City studios. Each brought one finished song and one idea to boygenius, and though all six songs were fleshed out and finalized together, each reflects the sensibilities of its initial author. Baker’s slow builds and taut vocals add urgency to ‘Souvenir’ and ‘Stay Down’, while album opener ‘Bite the Hand’ roils with slow-burning layers of guitar as Dacus stands in her devastating truth: “I can’t love you like you want me to.” The Bridgers-architected ‘Me & My Dog’ chugs into view with a deceptively simple open-road riff and Bridgers’ insistent recounting of a relationship that couldn’t help but fall apart.

“Everyone seemed both confident enough to present ideas and fight for their individual vision, but considerate and humble enough to make decisions which ultimately served the song,” says Baker. “It was a process that required a balance of determination and forthrightness with graciousness and pliability, and I think that we all did a good job of enacting that.”

TRACK LISTING

Bite The Hand
Me & My Dog
Souvenir
Stay Down
Salt In The Wound
Ketchum, ID

Marking the two year anniversary of the release of her critically acclaimed album ‘Valentine’, Snail Mail (Lindsey Jordan) will put out ‘Valentine Demos’ EP. Consisting of four early stripped-down recordings of songs from the 2021 album including the previously shared “Adore You” (a working title for “Valentine”), it also features previously unreleased song “Easy Thing”.

Jordan says: “Without further ado, here are the demo versions of some of the songs that would become integral to the making of Valentine. A little over three years ago, holed up at my parents’ house in Maryland, with just a minilogue synth, an interface, a mic, and a guitar, I started working on writing my second full length record. I prefer some of the demos to what actually came out on the record because of how intimate and solitary the process was. You can kind of hear me crying in one of them. Maybe two actually haha.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Automate (Demo)
2. C. Et Al. (Demo)
3. Headlock (Demo)
4. Easy Thing (Demo)
5. Adore You (Valentine Demo)

bar italia are the London based three-piece of Nina Cristante, Jezmi Tarik Fehmi and Sam Fenton.

‘The Twits’ was recorded by the trio over eight weeks from February 2023 in a makeshift home studio in Mallorca, and was mixed by Marta Salogni. It finds bar italia’s economical yet evocative songcraft taking raucous, mystic, unkempt, occasionally sinister, and wholly committed turns. Songs like “my little tony”, with its in-the-red riff and excitable hooks, the cathartic four-on-the-floor of ‘world’s greatest emoter’ and the festival tent psychedelia of “Hi-fiver” need little in the way of exposition – these are exhilarating rock songs, if wayward and strange.

Other moments see the band’s increasingly signature, three-act mini-dramas moving into previously uncharted territory. Cristante, Fehmi and Fenton can each manifest a different melody, mood, and cadence – at times overlapping and linear, at others unexpectedly divergent – often within the space of thirty seconds, a tag team rooted in shared language and kinship. “Jelsy”, for instance, plays out like a conversation between friends over wistful, buzzing country blues, the alternating voices at points comforting, wry and hopelessly yearning. The sinuous, slow-burning waltz of “twist” stands out in its bare lyricism and seems to invite each band member’s individual take on a confessional.

While Tracey Denim was notable for its compact 2-3 minute compositions, horizontal and open-ended tracks like “Shoo” ebb and flow, moving from reptilian dive-bar soloing to a palpitating two-note piano coda. ‘glory-hunter’ takes playful twists and turns before ending up somewhere entirely different from where it started. “Real house wibes (desperate house vibes)” and “que surprise” imply sleepless, noirish misadventure, while at the other end of the light spectrum, “sounds like you had to be there” features some of the band’s most sweetly optimistic musical gestures yet. Closer “bibs” is a rare instance where all three can be heard in unison, as a procession of ghostly chords and lacerating feedback bookends the group’s most adventurous and rich set to date.

Released in May, bar italia’s Matador debut ‘Tracey Denim’ followed a string of word-of-mouth releases on Dean Blunt’s World Music label and received widespread attention from publications including The Guardian (“one of the albums of 2023 so far”), The Times (“excellent debut album”), The Observer (‘Artist To Watch’), NME ("a lasting impression that’s all of their own making"), The Quietus (“endlessly evocative”) and Pigeons And Planes (“quickly establishing themselves as one of the most enticing upcoming bands”). Single “Nurse!” was playlisted on BBC 6 Music and received spins from BBC Radio 1, Absolute Radio and NTS. The release was accompanied by a UK tour, culminating in a sold-out headline show at the ICA in London, which The Spectator described as “transfixing… They just make their beautiful, off-kilter music, and let you unfold your own stories on top”.

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: We've absolutely fallen in love with Bar Italia here at Picc HQ, so we were over the moon when we found out that they'd be releasing their second LP of 2023. And what a banger it is! Mega tunes and no bullshit, Bar Italia have honed and polished their sound even further. You won't get a better one-two punch than 'Tracey Denim' and 'The Twits' in the indie-sphere right now. So what you doing? Get on both!

TRACK LISTING

1. My Little Tony
2. Real House Wibes (desperate House Vibes)
3. Twist
4. Worlds Greatest Emoter
5. Calm Down With Me
6. Shoo
7. Que Suprise
8. Hi Fiver
9. Brush W Faith
10. Glory Hunter
11. Sounds Like You Had To Be There
12. Jelsy
13. Bibs

Back in print on white vinyl this November 3rd for the first time since 2003: ‘The New Romance’ by Pretty Girls Make Graves, the latest installment of Matador’s ongoing catalog series Revisionist History.

Pretty Girls Make Graves formed in Seattle in 2001, fused together out of the still glowing embers of nearly a dozen important groups. Andrea Zollo and Derek Fudesco had played together in Death Wish Kids and Area 51 along with Dann Gallucci, with whom Derek formed Murder City Devils. Shortly before the Murder City Devils called it quits, he and Andrea started Pretty Girls Make Graves with J. Clark (who was in Kill Sadie and Sharks Keep Moving) and Nick Dewitt and Nathan Thelen (both in Bee Hive Vaults).

Brilliantly produced by Phil Ek (Modest Mouse, Built To Spill, Les Savy Fav), ‘The New Romance’ magnifies Pretty Girls Make Graves’ songcraft and technical prowess while letting some air into their songs and keeping things in crisp focus. Every song on ‘The New Romance’ is an anthem, yet without traditional verses and choruses. Tension builds and shifts without conventional release, as moments of glassy beauty and rousing aggression trade sides.

TRACK LISTING

1. Something Bigger, Something Brighter
2. The Grandmother Wolf
3. Mr. Club
4. A Ll Medicated Geniuses
5. Blue Lights
6. Chemical, Chemical
7. 7
8. The Teeth Collector
9. Holy Names
10. The New Romance
11. This Is Our Emergency
12. A Certain Cemetery

Matador Records will celebrate the 20th anniversary of The New Pornographers’ second full-length, Electric Version – first released May 6, 2003 – with a limited-edition opaque blue vinyl reissue.

As for the music: no sophomore slumping to be found here. Back then we wrote, “With impossibly huge hooks and an innate understanding of every pop trick in the book, this follow-up to 2000’s breakthrough Mass Romantic is the most exciting pop record we’ve heard in a long while.” For once, tastemakers of the day shared our enthusiasm. “The New Pornographers mix the pop purism of the Beach Boys, the power charge of Cheap Trick and the gentle psychedelia of Syd Barrett,” wrote the New York Times, who labeled Electric Version “Some of the best pop of the year.”

TRACK LISTING

1. The Electric Version
2. From Blown Speakers
3. The Laws Have Changed
4. The End Of Medicine
5. Loose Translation
6. Chump Change
7. All For Swinging You Around
8. The New Face Of Zero And One
9. Testament To Youth In Verse
10. It's Only Divine Right
11. Ballad Of A Comeback Kid
12. July Jones
13. Miss Teen Wordpower

10th anniversary of his fifth full-length and first 2xLP, ‘Wakin on a Pretty Daze’ (2013).

To celebrate this milestone, it has been brought back as a yellow vinyl version of the record.

Where previous albums alternated between gorgeous fingerpicking and heavy guitar workouts, ‘Wakin’ blended the two into dreamy and expansive songs that frequently stretched well out beyond the five-minute mark.

Back then we said: “It’s a record that would have sounded great 30 years ago, sounds great today, and will still sound great 30 years from now.” Ten years down the line, we’re still confident that ‘Wakin’ will deliver the goods – yesterday, today, and in 2043.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Wakin On A Pretty Day
A2. KV Crimes
A3. Was All Talk
B1. Girl Called Alex
B2. Never Run Away
B3. Pure Pain
C1. Too Hard
C2. Shame Chamber
C3. Snowflakes Are Dancing
D1. Air Bud
D2. Goldtone

Life is horribly dark right now. And yet, it is not unfunny.

That’s the sentiment that animates Water From Your Eyes on their new album, and first for Matador, ‘Everyone’s Crushed’. On the follow-up to the Brooklyn duo’s 2021 breakthrough, ‘Structure’, Rachel Brown (they/them) and Nate Amos (he/him) find silliness and fatalism dancing in a frantic lockstep, using heart palpitating rhythms and absurdist, deadpan lyrics to convey stories of personal and societal unease. Described by Brown as Water From Your Eyes’ most collaborative record ever, it’s a swollen contusion of an album: experimental pop music that’s pretty and violent, raw and indelible.

‘Everyone’s Crushed’ is shot through with unresolved tension, its nine tracks skittishly refusing to seek out resolute endings or stick to traditional structures. Many songs were written using serialism and microtonalism, and at times evoke the futurist-pop moves of Japanese composer Haruomi Hosono and the brutalism of Glenn Branca. “Barley” is a dance-rock track sequenced in alien tonality, with Brown speaking garbled transmissions (“One two three/Counter/You’re a cool thing count mountains”) over a bed of hallucinatory guitars. “14” leans into contemporary classical, with curtains of overlapping de-tuned strings underscoring lyrics that Nate describes as something out of a “gross-out horror movie”: “I’m ready to throw you up.”

Water From Your Eyes still possess an off kilter, shitposty quality. ‘Everyone’s Crushed’ manages to reference classic rock twice – first, on “Barley,” when Brown accidentally invokes Sting with the lyric “walk in fields of gold,” and again on “True Life”, when they sing: “Neil let me sing your song/It’s been this way for so long/Give me another chance.” Those weren’t the song’s original lyrics – Brown and Amos initially wanted to interpolate the bridge to “Cinnamon Girl” – but this is a typically meta compromise for the pair, a way to turn “True Life” into a song about writing the song “True Life”.

‘Everyone’s Crushed’ maps the liminal space between humor and darkness, between cracking up and freaking out. In the album’s closing moments Brown speaks in direct terms, “Clap those hands/Buy my product/There are no happy endings/I’m spending/I’m spending.” It’s playful and totally serious, punky bordering on anarchic, and a resolution to the record’s opening sentiment - “I just wanted to pray for the rain/Wishful thinking for sunny days.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Ashley says: A wonderfully bold, jagged juxtaposition of gritty electronics and swooning guitar riffs, all topped with perfectly measured vocals and soaring harmonies. It's steeped in post-punk and electronic history, but lightened with a melodic sensibility that could only have bloomed from the past 20 years of pop history.

TRACK LISTING

1. Structure
2. Barley
3. Out There
4. Open
5. Everyone’s Crushed
6. True Life
7. Remember Not My Name
8. 14
9. Buy My Product

Mdou Moctar has announced details of part two of the Niger EP series – featuring live and alternate versions of songs spanning the band’s discography recorded in their native Niger.

“Ibitlan is a love song,” says producer and bassist Mikey Coltun. “Mdou sings about his love for a woman, comparing her to a beautiful valley with a stream running through it, how her skin is a yellow flower and her smile is like lightning. This particular recording was done in Agadez in 2017 at a wedding. Mdou and I had played three weddings a day for about a month and a half on that trip. It was like bootcamp. I loved it. Ibitlan is one of Mdou's oldest songs and is covered by pretty much every Tuareg guitarist. We've played versions of this song lasting over 20 minutes. It's definitely one of my favorites to play!”

An innovative alchemy of Tuareg folk, blues and rock, electric guitar pyrotechnics, field recordings and electronics with poetic call-to-arms lyrics about the plight of his homeland of Niger, Moctar’s 2021 album Afrique Victime swept end of year lists, achieving high placements in The Economist, The Guardian, The New York Times, Uncut, MOJO, Pitchfork, The New Yorker, NPR, Rolling Stone, Dazed & Confused, DJ, Crack and many others.

TRACK LISTING

1. Iblis Amghar
2. Ibitilan
3. Nakane Dish
4. Chimoumounim
5. Asdikte Akal
6. Azawad

Niger EP Vol. 1 features recordings captured in Moctar’s native country, including previously unreleased 13-minute drum machine & electric guitar epic ‘Imouhar’, four live versions of songs from across Moctar’s albums Afrique Victime, Afelan and Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai (translating to “Rain the Color of Blue with A Little Red In It”, the soundtrack to Moctar’s Tuareg-language film remake of Prince’s Purple Rain), as well as a drum machine version of Afrique Victime opening track ‘Chismiten”. Watch a visualiser for ‘Chismiten’ (Drum Machine Version) HERE.

Producer and bass player Mikey Coltun says: “In 2021, we started the Mdou Moctar mixtape series. These releases compiled field recordings, cellphone voice memos, interview clips, conversations captured in the tour van, and blown-out board recordings from shows all over the world. As a continuation of those mixtapes, we present the Niger EPs, which examine the roots of the Mdou Moctar band. Early Mdou recordings were contained on cassettes, though the humble tape was soon replaced by the quick and easy facility of cellphone technology. Long bus rides are common in West Africa. On one of these rides, you might be seated next to a stranger and ask, "What are you listening to?" Then a song exchange would begin over Bluetooth. This is a very real way artists found their music distributed far from home. In that vein, the Niger EP series features solely recordings taped in Mdou Moctar's home country of Niger. Volume 1 begin the series with a mix of recordings from 2017-2020, documenting the band at weddings, picnics, rehearsals, and even impromptu house concerts. A must have for any Mdou Moctar fan!”

An innovative alchemy of Tuareg folk, blues and rock, electric guitar pyrotechnics, field recordings and electronics with poetic call-to-arms lyrics about the plight of his homeland of Niger, Moctar’s 2021 album Afrique Victime swept end of year lists, achieving high placements in The Economist, The Guardian, The New York Times, Uncut, MOJO, Pitchfork, The New Yorker, NPR, Rolling Stone, Dazed & Confused, DJ, Crack and many others.

TRACK LISTING

1. Imouhar (Drum Machine Version)
2. Chismiten (Drum Machine Version)
3. Sibidoul (Live)
4. Afelan (Live)
5. Layla (Live)
6. Afrique Victime (Live)

The most live-sounding Yo La Tengo album in years. Times have changed for Yo La Tengo as much as they have for everyone else. In the past, the band has often worked with outside producers and mixers. In their latest effort, the first full-length in five years, This Stupid World was created all by themselves. And their time-tested judgment is both sturdy enough to keep things to the band’s high standards, and nimble enough to make things new. At the base of nearly every track is the trio playing all at once, giving everything a right-now feel. There’s an immediacy to the music, as if the distance between the first pass and the final product has become more direct.

Available on standard black vinyl, CD and on limited blue vinyl.

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: Yo La Tengo's newest outing takes all of their famous melodicism and folky melancholy and refines it perfectly into a distillation of everything that's made the band so great over the years. Brittle in parts, but retaining the intensity of their more driven excursions and wall of sound art-rock they do so well.

TRACK LISTING

1. Sinatra Drive Breakdown
2. Fallout
3. Tonight’s Episode
4. Aselestine
5. Until It Happens
6. Apology Letter
7. Brain Capers
8. This Stupid World
9. Miles Away

The first Matador pressing of Pavement’s Westing (By Musket And Sextant), the compilation of Pavement’s early work from 1989-1993. The new pressing coincides with this year’s release of the Terror Twilight: Farewell Horizontal 4xLP box set and a 30th anniversary limited vinyl edition of Slanted & Enchanted. Pavement begins several months out touring by headlining Primavera Sound Barcelona before continuing onto sold-out tour dates in North America and Europe.

TRACK LISTING

You're Killing Me
Box Elder
Maybe Maybe
She Believes
Price Yeah!
Forklift
Spizzle Trunk
Recorder Grot
Internal K-Dart
Perfect Depth
Recorder Grot (Rally)
Heckler Spray
From Now On
Angel Carver Blues/Mellow Jazz Docent
Drive-By-Fader
Debris Slide
Home
Krell Vid-User
Summer Babe
Mercy Snack: The Laundromat
Baptist Blacktick
My First Mine
My Radio

Spoon’s tenth album, Lucifer on the Sofa, is the band’s purest rock ’n roll record to date. Texas-made, it is the first set of songs that the quintet has put to tape in its hometown of Austin in more than a decade. Written and recorded over the last two years – both in and out of lockdown – these songs mark a shift toward something louder, wilder, and more full-colour.

From the detuned guitars anchoring “The Hardest Cut,” to the urgency of “Wild," to the band’s blown-out cover of the Smog classic “Held,” Lucifer on the Sofa bottles the physical thrill of a band tearing up a packed room. It’s an album of intensity and intimacy, where the music’s harshest edges feel as vivid as the directions quietly murmured into the mic on the first-take. According to frontman Britt Daniel, “It’s the sound of classic rock as written by a guy who never did get Eric Clapton.”

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Held
The Hardest Cut
The Devil & Mister Jones
Wild
My Babe
Side B
Feels Alright
On The Radio
Astral Jacket
Satellite
Lucifer On The Sofa

In December 2021, Matador Records will celebrate the 21st anniversary of The New Pornographers’ debut record and breakout, Mass Romantic (2000), with a limited-edition LP reissue. The album – clocking three singers and twelve effervescent and undeniable power-pop gems – will return to us on red vinyl and will include a bonus 7”, “Letter From An Occupant”, which includes two rare B-sides, “The End of Medicine” and “When I Was a Baby.” 

TRACK LISTING

Mass Romantic
The Fake Headlines
The Slow Descent Into Alcoholism
Mystery Hours
Jackie
Letter From An Occupant
To Wild Homes
The Body Says No
Execution Day
Centre For Holy Wars
The Mary Martin Show
Breakin’ The Law

Letter From An Occupant (7”)
The End Of Medicine (7”)
When I Was A Baby (7”)

Kurt Vile’s Speed, Sound, Lonely KV (ep) was recorded and mixed in sporadic sessions that spanned four years at The Butcher Shoppe studio in Nashville, TN. It includes five songs —covers of John Prine and “Cowboy” Jack Clement as well as two originals —and was recorded alongside a cast of local heavies like Bobby Wood, Dave Roe, and Kenny Malone with Dan Auerbach (The Black Keys) and Matt Sweeney (Chavez, Superwolf) tossed into the mix as well.

Most importantly, it features what KV has called "Probably the single most special musical moment in my life” –a duet with the late John Prine on the songwriter’s well-loved tune, “How Lucky.” “The truth is John was my hero for a long time when he came into The Butcher Shoppe to recut one of his deepest classics with me. And, man, I was floating and flying and I couldn't hear anything he told me while he was there till after he was gone for the night,” notes Vile in a personal statement that accompanies the record. “A couple nights later we were playing ‘How Lucky’ together again; this time onstage at the Grand Ole Opry on New Year's Eve at the turn of 2020. Nothing like seeing John and his band of musical brothers and family and friends playing into the new decade in front of an adoring audience on that stage in Nashville, TN... and, yup, that's just how lucky we all got that night."

TRACK LISTING

Speed Of The Sound Of Loneliness
Gone Girl
Dandelions
How Lucky (with John Prine)
Pearls

Gimme Fiction, the fifth studio album from Spoon, originally released in 2005 and featuring the single ‘I Turn My Camera On’. Newly recut from the original masters.

Gimme Fiction is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

The Beast And Dragon, Adored
The Two Sides Of Monsieur Valentine
I Turn My Camera On
My Mathematical Mind
The Delicate Place
Sister Jack
I Summon You
The Infinite Pet
Was It You?
They Never Got You
Merchants Of Soul

Transference is the seventh studio album by Spoon, newly recut from the original masters

Transference is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

Before Destruction
Is Love Forever?
The Mystery Zone
Who Makes Your Money
Written In Reverse
I Saw The Light
Trouble Comes Running
Goodnight Laura
Out Go The Lights
Got Nuffin
Nobody Gets Me But You

Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, Spoon’s sixth studio record, featuring the singles ’The Underdog’ and ‘You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb’. Originally released in 2007 and now newly recut from the original masters

Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

Don't Make Me A Target
The Ghost Of You Lingers
You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb
Don't You Evah
Rhythm & Soul
Eddie's Ragga
The Underdog
My Little Japanese Cigarette Case
Finer Feelings
Black Like Me

Matador Records is excited to announce the release of a three-song shaped picture disc commemorating the 25th anniversary of Pavement’s 1995 album Wowee Zowee. The special disc, cut in the shape of the speech bubble found on the cover of Wowee Zowee, features the tracks “Sensitive Euro Man” and “Brink of the Clouds/Candylad” that first debuted on Wowee Zowee: Sordid Sentinels, the expanded edition that was released on CD in 2006, and will be available on vinyl for the first time via Matador Records globally. Limited to a one-time press of 3,000 copies.

TRACK LISTING

Sensitive Euro Man
Brink Of The Clouds/Candylad

‘A Series Of Sneaks’, Spoon's second studio album, released in 1998.
Newly recut from the original masters.

“Hints at the possibility of perfection” – Pitchfork.

‘A Series Of Sneaks’ is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

Utilitarian
The Minor Tough
Execution
Reservations
30 Gallon Tank
Car Radio
Metal Detektor
June's Foreign Spell
Chloroform
Metal School
Staring At The Board
No You're Not
Quincy Punk Episode
Advance Cassette

‘Girls Can Tell’, the third studio album from Spoon, originally released in 2001.

Newly recut from the original masters.

“A start-to-finish triumph” - Rolling Stone. 

‘Girls Can Tell’ is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

Everything Hits At Once
Believing Is Art
Me And The Bean
Lines In The Suit
The Fitted Shirt
Anything You Want
Take A Walk
1020 AM
Take The Fifth
This Book Is A Movie
Chicago At Night

Kill The Moonlight, Spoon’s fourth studio album originally released in 2002 and featuring the hit single ’The Way We Get By’. 

Newly recut from the original masters.

‘Kill The Moonlight’ is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

Small Stakes
The Way We Get By
Something To Look Forward To
Stay Don't Go
Jonathan Fisk
Paper Tiger
Someone Something
Don't Let It Get You Down
All The Pretty Girls Go To The City
You Gotta Feel It
Back To The Life
Vittorio E

Telephono, the debut album, available on vinyl for the first time since 1996. Newly recut from the original masters

Telephono is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

Don't Buy The Realistic
Not Turning Off
All The Negatives Have Been Destroyed
Cvantez
Nefarious
Claws Tracking
Dismember
Idiot Driver
Towner
Wanted To Be Your
Theme To Wendel Stivers
Primary
The Government Darling
Plastic Mylar

Soft Effects, the legendary EP, available on vinyl for the first time since 1997. Newly recut from the original masters.

Soft Effects is released as part of the Slay On Cue series, which will see the reissue of the band’s first eight records in original editions - Telephono (1996), Soft Effects EP (1996), A Series Of Sneaks (1998), Girls Can Tell (2001), Kill The Moonlight (2002), Gimme Fiction (2005), Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) and Transference (2010).

“Some of these albums haven’t been available on vinyl or CD in years, and in some places they never actually came out,” says frontman Britt Daniel.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE 1
Mountain To Sound
Waiting For The Kid To Come Out
I Could See The Dude
Get Out The State
Loss Leaders

SIDE 2
Mountain To Sound
Waiting For The Kid To Come Out
I Could See The Dude
Get Out The State
Loss Leaders

Set My Heart On Fire Immediately is the fifth studio album from Perfume Genius that will be released May 15th on Matador Records. It sees artist and musician Mike Hadreas re-teaming with GRAMMY-nominated producer Blake Mills and features contributions from musicians Jim Keltner, Pino Palladino and Matt Chamberlin. It was recorded in Los Angeles, where Perfume Genius settled in 2017 with longtime partner and musical collaborator Alan Wyffels.

The album explores and subverts concepts of masculinity and traditional roles, and introduces decidedly American musical influences. Throughout Hadreas plays with themes of love, sex, memory and the body, channeling popular music mythologies while irreverently authoring its own – from the delirious, Cyndi Lauper-nodding celebratory pop of ‘On The Floor’, specters of Elvis on haunted tremolo waltz ‘One More Try’, to the harpsichord- punctuated baroque pop of ‘Jason’, and gliding steel guitar and Balearic rhythm of ‘Without You’.

“I wanted to feel more open, more free and spiritually wild,” says Hadreas, “and I’m in a place now where those feelings are very close-- but it can border on being unhinged. I wrote these songs as a way to be more patient, more considered -- to pull at all these chaotic threads hovering around me and weave them in to something warm, thoughtful and comforting.”

First album taster ‘Describe’ captures this sense of fleetingness and living in the moment through a heavy fog of grizzly distortion and tumbling slide guitars: “It started as a really somber ballad. It was very minimal and very slow. And then it turned into this beast of a song. I started writing that about when you are in such a dark place that you don’t even remember what goodness is or what anything feels like. And so, the idea was having someone describe that to you, because you forgot or can’t get to it.” Its accompanying video, self-directed by Hadreas, envisions “an end of the world where there are no boundaries, there are no edges, no rules, or the rules are completely new with how you interact with each other and the space around you.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Whole Life
2. Describe
3. Without You
4. Jason
5. Leave
6. On The Floor
7. Your Body Changes Everything
8. Moonbend
9. Just A Touch
10. Nothing At All
11. One More Try
12. Some Dream
13. Borrowed Light 

Algiers return in 2020 with their third album 'There Is No Year', which will be released January 17th on Matador Records. 'There is No Year' solidifies and expands upon the doom-laden soul of their foundation, toward an even more epic, genre-reformatting sound, one somehow suspended in the amber of “a different era,” as described by guitarist Lee Tesche. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Shouty melancholic rockers Algiers bring us all the feels on their newest outing, 'There Is No Year'. Clearly influenced by the torrid political climes, this rousing and hearty romp is as meaningful as is effecting, a brilliantly written call to arms.

TRACK LISTING

There Is No Year
Disposession
Hour Of The Furnaces
Losing Is Ours
Unoccupied
Chaka
Wait For The Sound
Repeating Night
We Can’t Be Found

In 1997, Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age) and a handful of friends retreated to the desert of Joshua Tree, CA in order to isolate themselves from the distractions and comforts of their everyday lives. What began as a casual writing and recording session amongst friends has since become a project of legend. Spanning twelve volumes over the course of two decades, Desert Sessions has featured some of music’s most cherished icons stepping out of their comfort zones and collaborating with one another to create some of the most exciting music of their careers.

After nearly sixteen years since its last entry, the longest-running mix tape in existence, Desert Sessions returns with two stunning new volumes in its already storied catalog, Vol. 11 & 12, featuring collaborations from Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top), Les Claypool (Primus), Stella Mozgawa (Warpaint), Jake Shears (Scissor Sisters), Mike Kerr (Royal Blood), Carla Azar (Autolux, Jack White), Matt Sweeney (Chavez), David Catching (Co-founder of Rancho De La Luna studio), comedian Matt Berry (What We Do in the Shadows), Töôrnst Hülpft and newcomer Libby Grace.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It looks pretty mad, I know. Josh Homme collaborates with various standout members of rock / indie / grunge royalty (plus a killer tune with Jake Shears of Scissor Sisters), but believe me, it's very good. Country tinged rock, foot-stomping psychedelic shredding and damn good songwriting make for a really interesting combination of sounds, and in the end, a brilliant LP.

TRACK LISTING

Move Together (lead Vocal: Billy F. Gibbons)
Noses In Roses Forever (lead Vocal: Joshua Homme)
Far East For The Trees
If You Run (lead Vocal: Libby Grace)
Crucifire (lead Vocal: Mike Kerr)
Chic Tweetz (vocals: Töôrnst Hülpft, Matt Berry)
Something You Can’t See (lead Vocal: Jake Shears)
Easier Said Than Done (lead Vocal: Joshua Homme)

With a career spanning nearly four decades, Kim Gordon is one of the most prolific and visionary artists working today. A co-founder of the legendary Sonic Youth, Gordon has performed all over the world, collaborating with many of music’s most exciting figures including Tony Conrad, Ikue Mori, Julie Cafritz and Stephen Malkmus. Most recently, Gordon has been hitting the road with Body/Head, her spellbinding partnership with artist and musician Bill Nace. Despite the exhaustive nature of her résumé, the most reliable aspect of Gordon’s music may be its resistance to formula. Songs discover themselves as they unspool, each one performing a test of the medium’s possibilities and limits. Her command is astonishing, but Gordon’s artistic curiosity remains the guiding force behind her music.

It makes sense that this “American idea” (as Gordon says on the agitated rock track “Air BnB”) of purchasing utopia permeates the record, as no place is this phenomenon more apparent than Los Angeles, where Gordon was born and recently returned to after several lifetimes on the east coast. It was a move precipitated by a number of seismic shifts in her personal life and undoubtedly plays a role in No Home Record’s fascination with transience. The album opens with the restless “Sketch Artist,” where Gordon sings about “dreaming in a tent” as the music shutters and skips like scenery through a car window. “Even Earthquake,” perhaps the record’s most straightforward track embodies this mood; Gordon’s voice wavering like watercolor: “If I could cry and shake for you / I’d lay awake for you / I got sand in my heart for you,” guitar strokes blending into one another as they bleed out across an unstable page. Front to back, No Home Record is an expert operation in the uncanny. You don’t simply listen to Gordon’s music; you experience it.

TRACK LISTING

Sketch Artist
Air BnB
Paprika Pony
Murdered Out
Don’t Play It
Cookie Butter
Hungry Baby
Earthquake
Get Yr Life Back

FOR A LIMITED PERIOD ONLY BOTH ALL FORMATS INCLUDE A FREE CD BONUS DISC, 'ACOUSTIC UNSEEN' (TRACKLISTING BELOW).

For over a decade, guitarist/vocalist Steve Gunn has been one the American music’s most pivotal figures-conjuring immersive and psychedelic sonic landscapes both live and on record, releasing revered solo albums ranking high on in-the-know end of year lists, alongside exploratory collaborations with artists as diverse as Mike Cooper, Kurt Vile, and Michael Chapman (whose most recent studio album he produced). Gunn is known for telling other people's stories, but on his breakthrough fourth album, The Unseen In Between, he explores his own emotional landscapes with his most complex, fully realized songs to date. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: Steve Gunn’s talents as a guitarist are well known, whether it be the American primitive finger picking style of his early work, as a member of Kurt Vile’s Violators or from any number of collaborations over the years, but on this album it’s as much about the songs as the guitar. His songwriting conjures vivid images while at the same time leaving space for your imagination to fill the gaps. This is beautifully exemplified on “Vagabond” on which he duets with Espers’ Meg Baird and “Stonehurst Cowboy” a tribute to his father and his generation who grew up in the shadow of Vietnam. And the guitars! Did I mention the guitars? Whether it’s the gentle acoustics of “New Moon” or the hypnotic looping riffs of “New Familiar” and “Morning Is Mended”, they are truly mesmerizing. A wonderfully understated record that’s already worked its way into my all time favourites.

TRACK LISTING

New Moon
Vagabond
Chance
Stonehurst Cowboy
Luciano
New Familiar
Lightning Field
Morning Is Mended
Paranoid

'ACOUSTIC UNSEEN' BONUS DISC:
1. New Moon
2. Vagabond
3. Chance
4. Luciano
5. New Familiar
6. Lightining Field
7. Paranoid

Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus formed boygenius after booking a tour together, but the trio had subconsciously been in the works for longer than that. Through a series of tours and performances together, and chance encounters that led to friendships – including Bridgers’ and Dacus’ first in-person meeting backstage at a Philadelphia festival, greenroom hangouts that felt instantly comfortable and compatible, a couple of long email chains and even a secret handshake between Baker and Dacus – the lyrically and musically arresting singer-songwriters and kindred spirits got to know each other on their own terms.

STAFF COMMENTS

Darryl says: A wonderful folky flecked EP from the amazing combined talents of Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus.

TRACK LISTING

Bite The Hand
Me & My Dog
Souvenir
Stay Down
Salt In The Wound
Ketchum, ID

Travel can inspire in surprising ways: Kurt Vile discovered as much making his first record in three years, the eclectic and electrifying Bottle It In, which he recorded at various studios around the country over two very busy years, during sessions that usually punctuated the ends of long tours or family road trips.

Every song, whether it’s a concise and catchy pop composition or a sprawling guitar epic, becomes a journey unto itself, taking unexpected detours, circuitous melodic avenues, or open-highway solos. If Vile has become something of a rock guitar god—a mantle he would dismiss out of humility but also out of a desire to keep getting better, to continue absorbing new music, new sounds, new ideas—it’s due to his precise, witty playing style, which turns every riff and rhythm into points on a map and takes the scenic route from one to the next.

Using past albums as points of departure, Bottle It In heads off in new directions, pushing at the edges of the map into unexplored territory: Here be monster jams. These songs show an artist who is still evolving and growing: a songwriter who, like his hero John Prine, can make you laugh and break your heart, often in the same line, as well as a vocalist who essentially rewrites those songs whenever he sings them in his wise, laconic jive-talkin’ drawl. He revels in the minutiae of the music— not simply incorporating new instruments but emphasizing how they interact with his guitar and voice, how the glockenspiel evokes cirrocumulus clouds on “Hysteria,” how Kim Gordon’s “acoustic guitar distortion” (her term) engulfs everything at the end of “Mutinies,” how the banjo curls around his guitar lines and backing vocals from Lucius to lend a high-lonesome aura to “Come Again.”

These journeys took Vile more than two years to navigate, during which time he toured behind his breakout 2015 album b’lieve I’m goin’ down, recorded a duets album with Australian singer-songwriter-guitarist Courtney Barnett, opened for Neil Young in front of 90,000 people in Quebec, famously became a clue on Jeopardy, hung out with friends, took vacations with his wife and daughters. “I’ve been bouncing around a lot and recording all over. My family would meet me in the middle of America, and we’d go on a road trip somewhere. I would record in between all that stuff.”

As Vile prepares for another round of lengthy tours and countless shows, these songs should prove good company, reminders of the love and responsibility he has toward those he leaves at home and those
he meets along the way. That makes the sentiments resonate more strongly and lends Bottle It In an emotional weight. “It’s like that moment on the airplane,” Vile says, “when you’re on your way somewhere and you have that burst of panic. When you’re terrified of dying, that’s when you want people to know you love them.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: Everything we love about KV in one superb LP. More dynamic than his last outing and the most beautifully produced of all his albums, Bottle It In also features a cover of Charlie Rich's Rollin With The Flow: a massive, classic, country-pop beaut, which is possibly the prettiest thing he's ever committed to tape.

TRACK LISTING

1. Loading Zones
2. Hysteria
3. Yeah Bones
4. Bassackwards
5. One Trick Ponies
6. Rollin With The Flow
7. Check Baby
8. Bottle It In
9. Mutinies
10. Come Again
11. Cold Was The Wind
12. Skinny Mini
13. (bottle Back)

For the first time since 2007’s Our Love to Admire, Interpol have opened themselves up to the input of a producer. For two-week spells between December of 2017 to April of 2018, they travelled to upstate New York to work with Dave Fridmann – famed for recording with Mercury Rev, Flaming Lips, MGMT, Spoon, Mogwai, and countless more.

In the run up to writing and recording, Sam found himself immersed in soul drummers such as Al Jackson Jr (Otis Redding’s drummer) and 80’s funk producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. “How can I make shit swing?” was the question Sam repeatedly asked himself, and the answer is in the striding gallop of opener “If You Really Love Nothing,” the embellished skip ‘n’ bounce of “Stay in Touch” and the R&B swagger of closer “It Probably Matters.” Interpol have always been world-beaters at creating a feeling, but Marauder is where the feel is just as crucial.

Paul may have stepped out of the shadows as a bassist, but he’s stepping into an even brighter light as a songwriter. During Interpol’s previous albums, the singer largely kept himself out of his own work, preferring to fill his lyrics with detached thoughts, characters, and observations, often phrased in abstract. But more than 20 years on since forming at NYU, the frontman is finally allowing himself to play a role in his own stories.

“This record is where I feel touching on real things that have happened to me are exciting and evocative to write about,” he explains. “I think in the past, I always felt autobiography was too small a thing for me to reference. I feel like now, I’m able to romanticize parts of my own life.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: FOUR YEARS! That's long enough to wait for a new Interpol album isn't it, if anything i'd say it was a little too long, but you'll be delighted to know (as I was) that it's every bit the Interpol album we all want and deserve. Brilliant hooks, snarling vox and heavy AF guitars. Thoroughly killer.

TRACK LISTING

If You Really Love Nothing
The Rover
Complications
Flight Of Fancy
Stay In Touch
Interlude 1
Mountain Child
NYSMAW
Surveillance
Number 10
Party's Over
Interlude 2
It Probably Matters

There's a riot going on. You don't need me, or Yo La Tengo, to tell you that. These are dark times, in our heads as much as in the streets. It's easy to lose contact with the ground, flying through endless banks of storm clouds day after day. Confusion and anxiety intrude into daily life and cause you to lose your compass. There are times that call for anthems, something to lift you out of your slump and put fire in your feet. And then there are times when what is indicated is a balm, a sound that will wrap around you and work out the knots in your neck.

While there's a riot going on, Yo La Tengo will remind you what it's like to dream. The sound burbles and washes and flows and billows. If records were dedicated to the cardinal elements, this one would be water. There are shimmery hazes, spectral rumbles, a flash of backward masking, ghostly flamingos calling "shoo-bop shoo-bop." You are there. And even if your mind is not unclouded--shaken, misdirected, out of words and out of time--you can still float, ride the waves of an ocean deeper than your worries, above the sound and above the Sound.

For Yo La Tengo this is a slow-motion action painting, and Georgia Hubley, Ira Kaplan, and James McNew did it all themselves, in their rehearsal studio, with no outside engineer (John McEntire later did the mix). They did not rehearse or jam together beforehand; they turned on the recorder and let things coalesce. Songs came together over long stretches, sometimes as much as a year going by between parts. You'd never guess this, since the layers are finessed with such a liquid brush. You'd imagine most of the songs had sprung forth whole, since they will enter your head that way. Within two listens you will be powerless to resist the magnetic draw of "Shades of Blue," will involuntarily hear "She May, She Might" on your internal jukebox first thing in the morning and "Let's Do It Wrong" late at night. While there's a riot going on you will feel capable of bobbing through like a cork.

In 1971, when the nation appeared to be on the brink of violently coming apart, Sly and the Family Stone released There's a Riot Goin’ On, an album of dark, brooding energy. Now, under similar circumstances, Yo La Tengo have issued a record with the same name but with a different force, an album that proposes an alternative to anger and despair. Their first proper full-length since 2013’s Fade, There's a Riot Goin’ On is an expression of freedom and sanity and emotional expansion, a declaration of common humanity as liberating as it is soft-spoken. 

TRACK LISTING

You Are Here
Shades Of Blue
She May, She Might
For You Too
Ashes
Polynesia #1
Dream Dream Away
Shortwave
Above The Sound
Let's Do It Wrong
What Chance Have I Got
Esportes Casual
Forever
Out Of The Pool
Here You Are

In a rare break from touring, Steve Gunn and the NPR Music crew ventured to New York’s abandoned Rockaway Branch in Forest Park for a special, solo “Field Recording.” A fitting atmosphere for Gunn’s music and a perfect reminder of the depth of Eyes On The Lines, Gunn played “Full Moon Tide,” and the album’s closing numbers, “Night Wander” and “Ark.”

Steve Gunn & the Outliners just returned from an incredible European run. And to book end that tour, on Black Friday Record Store Day (November 25th), Gunn will release his “Ancient Jules” 12,” which features non-album cuts “The Handshake” and “The Soloist.” 

It’s about change and the power to change. It’s about metamorphosis and evolution. It’s about sticking to your guns and toughing it out. It’s about now, not tomorrow. It’s about recognizing your potential. It’s about self-doubt and inaction. It’s about you. It’s about me. It’s about you and me and the others. It’s about the choices we make. It’s about finding the poetry and avoiding the cliché. It’s about being the solution, not the problem. It’s about showing weakness to be strong. It’s about digging through your dirt to look for diamonds. It's about claiming your right to think unacceptable thoughts. It’s about boredom and the things we do to drive it away. It’s about being on your own so you can be with people. It’s about knowing what it means to be human and what it might mean one day. It’s about the parts and the sum of the parts. It's about the music and the message: together, one and the same. It’s about bass, guitars, drums and vocals. It’s about opening-out and never, ever dying. But most of all it’s about love, every kind of love. Love is the answer.

Savages’ second album Adore Life was recorded in RAK Studios, London in April 2015. Johnny Hostile was the producer and Richard Woodcraft the engineer. Anders Trentmöller took care of the mixing in Copenhagen. 

TRACK LISTING

The Answer
Evil
Sad Person
Adore
I Need Something New
Slowing Down The World
When In Love
Surrender
TIWYG
Mechanics

'The Best Day' - Thurston Moore’s first solo record since 2011’s ‘Demolished Thoughts’ – is released via Matador Records.

Backed by James Sedwards of Nought (guitar), Deb Googe of My Bloody Valentine (bass) and Steve Shelley of Sonic Youth (drums), the album radiates with both his signature thrashing electric guitars as well as blissful 12-string acoustic ballads.

In case you don’t already know: Thurston Moore has been at the forefront of the alternative rock scene since that particular sobriquet was first used to signify any music that challenged and defied the mainstream standard.

He is the founder of Sonic Youth, the band that turned on an entire generation to the value of experimentation in rock n' roll.

From its influence on a nascent Nirvana, to Sonic Youth’s own ‘Daydream Nation’ album being chosen by the US Library of Congress for historical preservation in the National Recording Registry in 2006, the band’s importance in rock history is undeniable.

Moore records and performs in a cavalcade of disciplines ranging from free improvisation to acoustic composition to black/white metal/noise disruption.

Alongside his various activities in the musical world, he is involved with publishing and poetry, and teaches writing annually at Naropa University, Boulder CO, a school founded by Allen Ginsberg and Anne Waldman in 1974.

TRACK LISTING

1. Speak To The Wild
2. Forevermore
3. Tape
4. The Best Day
5. Detonation
6. Vocabularies
7. Grace Lake
8. Germs Burn