Listening to Rihanna’s new album, Anti, it’s obvious there’s no mega-smash hit — there’s no eletcro-pop gem like “Diamonds," no “Umbrella”-like anthem. Anti is not a particularly happy or uplifting album either. Rihanna’s emotions shift ...

After a strong showing with their debut LP Over Me last year, punk/electro-pop band Cold Beat is back with Into the Air. Already, the band seems in sync, a feat that could take more than ...

Harpist, singer and composer Joanna Newsom is not everyone’s cup of tea. You may have to pause and look up a word just to glimpse her plane of thought. But that’s just part of Newsom's ...

There’s good reason FKA Twigs commands a captive audience. The young British singer, songwriter, and dancer has been winning accolades since her debut, LP1. Her eye-popping music videos are often overtly sexual, without revealing anything, ...

When noise-punk band Half Japanese formed in a Maryland bedroom in 1975, Kurt Cobain was just a kid. But by Nirvana’s In Utero tour in 1993, Cobain had sought Half Japanese as openers. Since its ...

The British band Pins works the smooth and jagged angles that intersect dream-pop, shoegaze, and garage punk to create a stylized sophomore record. Wild Nights thematically glorifies universal moments of lust and danger; later, when ...

Django Django’s Born Under Saturn revels in the beauty of tranquil harmonies as it envelops new art-pop territory for the British quartet. The collection lands mostly in the realm of synthy dance music, but the ...

On his solo debut, Arcade Fire’s Will Butler attempts to scramble out from the behemoth shadow of his indie-rock super group. But the dreamy rock feeling that flows so freely from his previous band does ...

The band that kept the heart of the riot-grrrl movement pumping is back, in a wicked way. Sleater-Kinney’s No Cities To Love burns bright and flames out on cue, blazing a trail for other punk ...