For those who fall easy under the spell of rock and roll’s wild-haired cosmic prancer, Marc Bolan’s Demos From the Underworld is streaming on the the glam man’s legacy Bandcamp. This digital album collects a sampling of musical sketches from T. Rex’s final three LPs, Bolan’s Zip Gun, Futuristic Dragon, and Dandy In the Underworld, and [...]

Wakin on a Pretty Daze is Philly rocker Kurt Vile’s 5th solo LP and new best. It is marked by maturity, craft, and confidence, evidence that Vile successfully cannibalized all the parts of his sturdy back catalog — the howling guitars, bedroom pop, his quizzical, drawling voice, and even the more fully-figured stuff on the excellent [...]

Raised Omara Moctar in Agadez, Niger, Bombino has quickly matured into a young master of the desert-blues. The singer and guitarist got his start as the protégé of Saharan guitar legend Haja Bebe, and eventually Bombino developed his own robust take on the Tuareg style which pushed him onto the international stage. Bombino’s latest recording, [...]

Dur Dur Band was one of Somalia’s last great party bands, a group that, at its peak powers, was 12 members strong and performed a high energy tincture of cross-cultural funk. The Horn of Africa’s sound filtered through the spritely, synthy pop music of the ’80s, Dur Dur’s dance music was made to bump in [...]

(Album artwork: Does it indeed affect our listening experience, and if so, how? Scratch the Surface takes a look at particularly interesting and/or exceptional cover art choices.) I got into Nanci Griffith in high school, but I didn’t talk about it with anyone much. Loving Nanci was kind of like my love for all those [...]

“FFunny FFriends” was the peppy Bandcamp track that amassed so much online hype it morphed Ruben Nielson’s bedroom project from an internet mystery into an established, touring band. Yet despite a solid, self-titled LP and loads of acclaim, the first word Nielson sings on Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s II is “isolation.” The band’s sophomore release, out [...]

Backing Taj Mahal in The Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus, Jesse Ed Davis plays guitar like a stone cold badass. His face looks almost too at ease to be lucid and focused, yet his deliberate licks on the telecaster are perfectly understated and soulful. When the band drops out during “Ain’t That a Lot [...]

Comprised of now-iconic tracks like “Cod’ine,” “The Universal Soldier,” and “Now That the Buffalo’s Gone”, Buffy Sainte-Marie’s 1964 debut, It’s My Way!, first and foremost introduced the artist to the world as a songwriter. Her topical folk albums on Vanguard Records proved she was one of the more original folk revivalists as well an important [...]