Consumer Guide: May, 2025

A must-own from 1959, 13 songs that are unfailingly melodic and undeniably sincere, spare sonics contemplating mortality, and a capsule history of British imperialism and its aftermaths.

Julien Baker & Torres: Send a Prayer My Way (Matador) Now based in L.A. and Brooklyn respectively, these two ex-Christian lesbians from Macon and Memphis are crystalline sopranos blessed with the gift of attractive yet unassuming tune as they outline, explore, and ponder love relationships they clearly hope—with reason, I'd say—"the passing years won't wash . . . away." Still, when Torres goes on to aver that "There's no such thing as guilty pleasure, as long as your pleasure's not unkind," I do wonder exactly what they had in mind in re "unkind." A MINUS

Blondshell: If You Asked for a Picture (Partisan) One of the big problems with the heterosexual "lifestyle," as some foolishly designate it, is that the women who are worth loving so outnumber the men ("Two Times," "Event of a Fire") *

The Buttress: Endofunctor (self-released) Post-Xian noizemaker keeps the electroboom not just beaty enough but grotesque enough to make the appropriately inclined listener suspect the artiste may yet come to meaningful terms with not just feminism but horrorcore, both of which interest her. Try the arresting "Aesthetic," the playful "Haunted Casio," the theoretically definitive "Endofunctor" itself. They're all different, promise. B PLUS

Ray Charles: What'd I Say (Atlantic, 1959) Having pulled out this 1959 album for Carola's delectation in March and then found myself singing along on track after track, I checked and found I'd never written about it, not once—shabby treatment for the second rock and roll album I'd ever bought, right out of college with some Miles and such in 1962, five years before I became Esquire's short-lived "secular music" columnist. (For the record, 1956's The Platters was the first.) That is a major lacuna, because this is a bona fide classic—an album I soon learned Carola had heard so often in college that she didn't need my introduction. The seven-minute title track, which I guarantee you'll never tire of, is only the lead. You too will find yourself joining in on the Raelettes' "Tell Me How Do You Feel" "I want to know"s followed by their title-establishing "What Kind of Man Are You"s followed by the piano-dominated "Rockhouse" and the lightly crooned "Roll With My Baby" and then three more stone winners including the Genius's near-conversational interpretation of "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean." A must-own, nothing less. A PLUS

Common/Pete Rock: The Auditorium Vol. 1 (Loma Vista) For well over three decades, the rapper christened Lonnie Rashid Lynn whose rap name evolved from the simultaneously humble and dull Common Sense to the simultaneously simple and grandiose Common has lived up to both claims, and although crediting producer Pete Rock in the slug line would seem a nice show of humility it's also a by now a commonplace—as Common has said himself on Instagram: "A Dream to let the world know I've been here. A dream to be part of Hip Hop. A Dream to MC at a level where De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, KRS One and Ice Cube knew who I was." Musically, he doesn't get there, because that's just not who he is flow-wise. Instead he nails a hip-hop of the everyday, a rare thing just because it sounds so ordinary. Daydreamin' of Gladys nights, he's proud to "use the microphone for a rhyme and a staff," to celebrate "the birth of the Nation of Islam," and at 52 still wants to know why "my endless love always comes to an end." Because he never actually brags on this attempted masterwork, he personifies the common sense he started off by claiming. Just for that you have to respect the guy. A MINUS

Lucy Dacus: Forever Is a Feeling (Geffen) Come on—for Dacus, forever isn't just a feeling but a goal. Song after unfashionably sweet, unfailingly melodic, undeniably sincere song, she falls in something like love with partners and/or objects of desire who if they aren't all different people (and it's conceivable they're all just one) inspire different apercus and/or call up different memories. "You are doing the Lord's work every time you smile at me." "Clasping your necklace, zipping your dress/Hands on your waist, kissing your neck." "You may not be an angel, but you are my girl/You are my pack a day/You are my favorite place/You were my best friend before you were my . . . " "I'm thinking about breaking your heart and if I do I'll break mine too." "Now I'm knocking down your door 'cause I'm trying to make up for lost time." "This is bliss/This is hell." A MINUS

Horsegirl: Phonetics On and On and On (Matador) Sez Carola: girl group with Thurston Mooreish guitar, yum. Sez I: single out a coupla songs or I'll have to do it myself ("2468," "Julie") ***

Jenny Hval: Iris Silver Mist (4AD) Her tempos both delicate and deliberate, her sonics spare whether acoustic or electronic, her soprano simultaneously somber and fluting, this Norwegian journalist-novelist turned singer-songwriter is only 44, a little young you could say to be obsessed with mortality. Post-Covid, however, all such cavils are null and void, especially given the song that tracks the fatal illness of her mother or someone like her. The music is quiet and slow. But because it's philosophical without shame, it definitely doesn't aim for the background. And it firmly suggests that you stop smoking. A MINUS

Jason Isbell: Foxes in the Snow (Southeastern) Formally, if this isn't a folk record then it's an unaccompanied singer-songwriter record—in the old days the two were synonymous. But given his deep connection to the Drive-By Truckers, Isbell's picking has a way of making you anticipate a rousing chorus that never comes to pass, an observation I see I'm making on the very day he's scheduled to join his own 400 Unit band in hard-rocking Saskatchewan. My preference for this voice-plus-acoustic iteration no doubt reflects my enthusiasm for the kind of thoughtful love songs many guys never come up with one of and all of these tracks qualify as. I mean, he wrote the eternal "Outfit" and put his back into the pro-Dem Georgia Blue, so give him credit for not just respecting but welcoming the impressive array of female charm, substance, and erotic allure these songs address. From "Last time I tried this sober I was 17" to "I wasn't even fishing when I caught you," I respect him enough to believe his heart's in the right place and like him enough to hope the rest of him settles down there. A MINUS

Salif Keita: So Kono (No Format) At 76, the legendary Malian vocalist can't come close to equalling his 2019 Un Autre Blanc summum and probably never will, but give him credit for his too-late-to-stop-now ("Cherie," "Soundiata") ***

Low Cut Connie: Connie Live (Contender) "Digital-only," as Adam Weiner wrote me, this live one by no means surpasses his band's Covid-era Tough Cookies covers tour de force but does its chore of giving catalogue keepers a second life ("Rio," "Big Thighs, NJ") ***

The Mekons: Horror (Fire) Although Jon Langford sings the lead single on this unannotated CD, which is basically an acerbically associative capsule history of British imperialism and its dire aftermaths (some of them, anyway), it comes off as the brainchild of the glummer and more ideological Tom Greenhalgh, which in this horrendous Trump moment-we-hope seems all too apt even if you still believe that the American constitution has its uses. But though the mood is bitter, it's not desperate—the songs aren't what you'd call lively much less cheerful, but they are relaxed enough to make you not just believe but feel that the end is by no means in sight. Yet. A MINUS

Model/Actriz: Pirouette (True Panther) Mostly retrospective, often gay, sometimes highly personal experiments in deliberate textures, murmured lyrics, and rock sonics ("Headlights," "Cinderella") ***

Joanna Wang: Modern Tragedy (New Tokyo Terror Music, '18) Delivered in a strikingly delicate alto, this TikTok-ish songlet cycle has a knock for switching back on itself as it does skillful structural work elaborating that most received of concepts, true love. Homely details surface: he hands her a pair of scissors points first, she spills milk on the pajama pants he loaned her, she finds the money he left. After all this static, will a happy ending come to envelop their "bittersweet goodbyes"? Probably not. But Wang's account remains so flavorsome that only a cynic would rule out the possibility much less assume there won't be another chapter sometime. B PLUS

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