Music Releases 01-20-23
Sylvan Esso
No Rules Sandy [Indie Exclusive Limited Edition Tiger's Eye LP]
ON SALE $24.98 Vinyl: $19.87 Buy
Describing their first three albums as a trilogy that is now complete, Meath and Sanborn see No Rules Sandy as the beginning of a new period, with songs that are wilder and stranger and more cathartic than the band used to be, as Nick Sanborn puts it. It feels like who we actually are, Amelia Meath adds. It just feels like us. Were not trying to fit into the mold, just happily being our freak selves.
Cruel CountryWilcos universally-acclaimed 12th studio album will be available for the first time on vinyl and in a standard retail CD format via dBpm Records on January 20th. The double-disc packages are comprised of 21 Country Music inspired tracks, recorded at the bands Chicago studioThe Loft.
Originally released in May 2022 (digital only) and in a limited pre-release CD edition for the June RSD drop, lead tracks Falling Apart (Right Now) and Tired Of Taking It Out On You have already become staples on non-commercial, public and AAA radio. Cruel Country songs and graphics have been featured throughout the bands June European tour and August/September/October North American tour.
A new music video for A Lifetime To Find will be released in conjunction with the pre-order announcement.
Bandleader Jeff Tweedy has commented a length on the concept and recording process of Cruel Country in numerous podcasts, online interviews and print articles:
There have been elements of Country Music in everything weve ever done. Weve never been particularly comfortable with accepting that definition, the idea that I was making Country Music. But now, having been around the block a few times, were finding it exhilarating to free ourselves within the form, and embrace the simple limitation of calling the music were making Country.
Jon Pareles in The New York Times wrote: Wilco makes an understated magnum opus. Its tone is naturalistic and understated; the album was recorded largely with Wilco playing live in the studio as a six-man band, quietly savoring the chance to make music together after pandemic isolation.
Jon Dolan in Rolling Stone wrote: Their latest is a beautifully rootsy album with a broken sense of patriotic concern. ****
Tagged in multiple publications mid-summer Best of Albums of 2022 (so far) Lists including
Variety, Rolling Stone, Spin, Uproxx and Paste.
The plan was to start driving north and not go home to Los Angeles until I was done with a record, Five Easy Hot Dogs is a collection of instrumental recordings from Macs time on the road. Kind of like being on tour, except there werent any shows and Id just be burning money. All of the songs on Five Easy Hot Dogs were recorded and mixed in the corresponding city from each song title and the tracklisting reflects the chronological order in which the songs were produced.
We Are Scientists
Lobes [Indie Exclusive Limited Edition Cathode Blue LP]
ON SALE $27.98 Vinyl: $23.41 Buy
Darker and more danceable and demonic than 2021s Huffy, We Are Scientists new album Lobes features the singles Operator Error, Settled Accounts & Less From You. On their second self-produced outing, the bands assurance and perversion have blossomed. Limited edition, 140g Cathode Blue translucent vinyl available exclusively for indie record stores.
Beauty, disposability and fragility of the culture that surrounds us, and the exhilaration of freeing yourself from those structures these are the themes Ladytron return to on TimesArrow, their seventh album.
Driven by analogue synths, distorted chimes and hallucinogenic soundscapes, Ladytron crash-landed into electroclash at the turn of the century, using the dancefloor as a bridgeheadto the collective unconscious. On Times Arrow the group add new richness, distant shimmers and a shoegaze-adjacent glow with Helen Marnie and Mira Aroyos trademarkunderstated voices now inhabiting a space somewhere between cloudscape and dream.
Announcing their debut album Leisure in 1991, Blur continued to revolutionise the sound of English popular music with second release Modern Life Is Rubbish (1993). Five successiveUK #1 albums followed - with Parklife (1994) and The Great Escape (1995) helping to propel the band to mass popularity in the UK and beyond. The eponymous Blur was released in1997 and seventh album Think Tank (2003). In 2015 the band returned with The Magic Whip It was the band's first studio album in 12 years.The album received acclaim from musiccritics. It debuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart, marking Blur's sixth UK number-one album. It has been certified Gold.
In recent years, his film and TV composing work has included soundtracks for Netflix sci-fi series The One and BBC Ones technological crime thriller The Capture.
Bryan Adams has re-recorded a selection of his biggest hits and deep cuts, now featured on vinyl! The 2LP package features 14 tracks including classic hits like (Everything I Do) I Do It For You, Summer of 69 and Heaven. Side D features an etching.