Notable vinyl releases out this Friday - 19 April (2024)

As a snapshot of where A Certain Ratio stand in 2024, It All Comes Down to This is a towering testament to their staying power. For a band whose path has intersected with the lives of Joy Division, The Fall, Talking Heads, Madonna and Grace Jones, to now be immersed in their most creative and prolific period since the early 1980s, after 45 years together, puts the great majority of their contemporaries to shame. But then again, when you have always been preoccupied with laying the groundwork for your next steps, you’re unlikely ever to derive much satisfaction from standing still.

A Chaos Of Flowers is an album that builds on their ferocious 2023 album nature morte. BIG|BRAVE’s music has been described as massive minimalism. Their fusillades of textural distortion and feedback emphasize their music’s frayed edges as much as its all-encompassing weight. The potency of the trio’s work is their singular artistry combining elements of traditional folk techniques and a modern deconstruction of guitar music. Gain, feedback, and amplitude are essential. For A Chaos Of Flowers guitarist/vocalist Robin Wattie drew heavily on the poems of artists whom Wattie found kinship in, their words resonant with experiences of those often sidelined by cultural norms. “I discovered that most poems from folk traditions or in the public domain seem to be by men – to which I could not quite relate. In my search, I rediscovered some of my favorite works and poets,” says Wattie. Guitarist Mathieu Ball and drummer Tasy Hudson help Wattie shape poetry into pieces as dense and impenetrable as they are vulnerable. BIG|BRAVE achieve their colossal sound through minimalist approaches, a deft understanding of dynamics and an inventive employment of percussion and distortion. The trio reconceptualize what it is to be heavy or minimal, challenging perceptions with their illumination of painfully overlooked perspectives.

There’s a profound tenderness that imbues The Butterfly Myth, the debut album from Toronto artist Caitlin Woelfle-O’Brien. Each of the nine songs, unreserved in their beauty, contain strength and softness in equal measure; a delicate balance that invites the listener to feel themselves held and reflected. Steeped in the lowkey balladry of 90s alt-rock soul searching, propelled by timeless r&b undercurrents and tinged with a few country flourishes, The Butterfly Myth manages to speak of grief in a way that feels warm and nourishing.

Best Of Bruce Springsteen is a collection of original songs spanning his storied 50-year recording career, from 1973's Greeting from Asbury Park, NJ to 2020's Letter To You. It will be available as an 18-track set. The collection will span early-career favorites like "Growin' Up" and "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)," staples of Springsteen's live shows from "Dancing In The Dark" to "The Rising," best-selling breakouts like "Born To Run" and "Hungry Heart," as well as recent releases "Hello Sunshine" and "Letter To You." Here, these career-spanning works appear together in one set for the first time. The packaging includes archival photos and a new essay.

At once a hazy relic and a digital snapshot of the humanexperience, Your Day Will Come is the debut album fromChanel Beads, arriving April 19 via Jagjaguwar. The remarkableproject announces the arrival of New York-based musicianShane Lavers as a new force in experimental music, capturingthe many contradictions of modern existence and the strangeinfiniteness of the digital world. The songs feel like a memory inwhich you can't distinguish between what actually happened orwhat was a false reproduction in your mind-although theburning emotion remains intact. Lavers pushed himself to strip his own sense of ego fromYour Day Will Come. Throughout, Lavers weaves incontributions from his live bandmates, singer-songwriter MayaMcGrory (Colle) and experimental instrumentalist ZacharyPaul, who offer their own layers of feeling. As McGrory offers amore full-bodied tone and Lavers often sings with his higherpitched head voice, the two collaborators meet in the middle;it's an intermingling of identities or a subconscious pining forandrogyny. In this slippery space, different perspectives mergetogether, and there's a sense of empathy and humility thatarises from the blending of these voices. These days, ChanelBeads live shows see all three performers weaving together inabsolute catharsis. This catharsis is pushed to it's peak on "Idea June," which seesMcGrory taking over lead vocals to project Lavers' lyrics. AsMcGrory sings, "The waves wash onto my shore," in a voicethat's both earnest and digitally processed, it's as though she'sspeaking as a separate embodiment of Lavers. In under twominutes, the track of clunky acoustic guitar and gutting stringslands somewhere between detachment and kinship. Similar tothe off-kilter structure of "Police Scanner," these songs arestrangely affecting in their unfinished and liminal forms. Lavers,who is drawn to poor MP3 rips and transitional moments in DJmixes, knows that these inexact musical artifacts evoke humanimperfection. The title of Your Day Will Come could be read as a promiseof the arrival of good karma, or it could be a reminder of one'smortality, said out of spite. Yet as Lavers unpacks the hauntingfeelings of the past that he must release in order to move intohis future, he reminds us that grief and hope might be closerthan they seem to the naked eye.

Sentiment is a meditation of the poignant emotional terrains of loneliness, nostalgia, sentimentality, guilt, and sex. The album’s narrative arc is guided by delicate musical gestures and artistic vulnerability, audaciously synthesizing disparate and unexpected influences. claire rousay is a singular artist, known for challenging conventions in experimental and ambient music forms. rousay masterfully incorporates textural found sounds, sumptuous drones and candid field recordings into music that celebrates the beauty in life’s banalities. Her music is curatorial and granular in detail, deftly shaped into emotionally affecting pieces. rousay’s vocals and guitar take center stage on sentiment. Her intimate, diaristic lyrics contrast with her mechanical-inflected vocal effects, emphasizing a powerful desire for connection, a deep yearning and a lingering sense of separation. The spare guitar playing and laconic tempo both drive the songs and exude a sense of resignation. Her delicate mastery of nuance draws on her explorative musical past that she, with sincerity and admiration, seamlessly interweaves into her adventurous textures and distinctive compositions. “I want to belong to the worlds and communities I look up to. Same as someone using a Fender guitar or dressing like Kurt Cobain. Emulate your heroes,” says rousay. The album balances the poetic soul of her influences with a documentarian heart, rousay capturing moments of her life while living alone in houses across the country, learning to play guitar, and reconnecting with pop music. Her innate ability to conjure pure feeling from sound derives from her delightful embrace of pop forms, the vulnerability found in field recordings, minimalistic arrangements and innovative sound choices. sentiment is blissfully, achingly melancholic, and an undeniably sensual listening experience.

Over the past 15 years Cloud Nothings have become part of the fabric of modern indie rock with a steady run of reliably fantastic records, and this streak continues unabated with Final Summer–an album that’s so assured, so instantly satisfying, that it forces you to pause and realize you’re listening to one of the great American rock bands in their prime. Cloud Nothings recently shared Final Summer's title track (which garnered attention from the likes of Pitchfork, NPR, Stereogum, Paste, BrooklynVegan, Uproxx, and more) and now they've released another high voltage new single, "Running Through The Campus." It's a three minute blast of surging guitars and drums wrapped around the effortless hooks that vocalist/guitarist Dylan Baldi excels at.

British musician Lucy Rose released a third album, No Words Left, back in 2019. It garnered the strongest critical acclaim of her career and culminated in a sell-out show at London's Barbican theatre. It was a record that ruminated in a sort of hushed reverence, emotionally charged and deftly delivered. Rose's new record This Ain't The Way You Go Out is inspired by a trip to America with friend and rapper Logic, she later worked with renowned producer Kwes to finish the record. This Ain't The Way You Go Out is an album constructed from the ashes of despair, nurturing the tiniest of green shoots and giving life to something that had looked otherwise spent. It's a new era for Lucy, and an era in it's purest, truest sense. An artist re-awakening herself to the power of music, and having a lot of fun in the process of it's discovery and delivery.

The Melvins new album Tarantula Heart is like nothing the band has ever done before. Probably the best record they’ve ever recorded. Certainly one of their weirdest. The five song album centers around the mammoth 19-minute opening track “Pain Equals Funny” and the noise laden heavy hitter “Working the Ditch.” In addition to the core three members, also appearing on the album are second drummer Roy Mayorga (Ministry, Soulfly, Stone Sour and Nausea) and We Are The Asteroid guitar player Gary Chester, who the Melvins recently toured with

.Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame inductees, Pearl Jam, return with their highly anticipated new album Dark Matter. The band’s 12th studio album was produced by Grammy® Award-winning producer, Andrew Watt.

T Bone Burnett, the multi-Grammy Award-winner and living legend, returns with a solo project, The Other Side. "Waiting For You" is the lead single released with a visualizer and featuring the angelic harmonies of Lucius as it's backdrop. The album promises a sweeping return to folk and form for this formidable guitarist and singer-songwriter.

The queen of pop returns with The Tortured Poets Department - her eleventh studio album.

In 2024, Mountain Stage will release Live on Mountain Stage: Outlaws & Outliers via Oh Boy Records compiling some highlights from the program, curated by the show’s co-founder and longtime host Larry Groce. With four decades worth of recordings in its archives, many documenting artists in their formative years, this is bound to be an essential release. "I’ve had the privilege of listening to some of these tracks and they’re just jaw-droppingly gorgeous" says Groce. Net profits from the album’s release will benefit the program. Produced out of West Virginia Public Broadcasting in Charleston, Mountain Stage is heard on nearly 300 public radio stations nationwide. The series continues to present world class performances with the same passion, dedication, and curiosity that’s guided it from the start. Some of their most iconic guests include John Prine, Wilco, R.E.M., Phish, Townes Van Zandt, Patti Smith, Allen Ginsberg, Dr. John, Buddy Guy, and Preservation Hall Jazz Band to name a few.