Courtney Barnett “Things Take Time, Take Time”
Record Label: Mom & Pop
Release Date: November 12, 2021
“I love you! I hate you! I’m on the fence!” Barnett’s fevered cry from her debut stands in contrast to her latest mindset, a shift from panic to patience. Her lived-in, laconic vibe brings realization – or resignation – that life keeps coming at you, however you react. Barnett is the perfect antidote to today’s manufactured, auto-tuned pop assembly line. Sounding wary, she lets her droll wit elevate her observations. Pinballing between exhilarating highs and lows, she fills songs like “If I Don’t Hear From You Tonight” and “Write a List of Things to Look Forward To” with bracing humanity.
-Jeff McCord
IDLES “Crawler”
Record Label: Partisan
Release Date: November 12, 2021
IDLES have ridden the wave of post-punk adulation, particularly in the UK, but they’re not without detractors. Cliches have been an issue. Yet album three finds the band, stung by dismissive press, coming out with their pencils sharpened, so to speak. Vocalist Joe Talbot, turning from politics to first-person dark, near-death experiences, ratchets up the white-hot intensity, while the band tests the tight musical confines of the genre. To a point. They’re no hooks or obvious bows to the marketplace here. And really, this stuff either raises the hair on the back of your neck or – inexplicably -it doesn’t.
– Jeff McCord
The Willie Nelson Family “The Willie Nelson Family”
Record Label: Legacy
Release Date: November 19, 2021
As familiar and well-worn as a Willie Nelson setlist, his latest offing is actually a first-time pairing of siblings Bobbie, Paula, Micah, Lukas, and Amy. Songs are mostly religious, dealing with mortality (but no worries, there’s also a cover of “Keep On The Sunny Side”), along with a couple of other secular covers (Hank, Kris) and the album’s lone curveball – Lukas’ take on George Harrison’s ‘All Things Must Pass’ – all knocked out with the same ambling, one-take charm Willie brings to everything he touches.
– Jeff McCord
Makaya McCraven “Deciphering the Message”
Record Label: Blue Note
Release Date: November 19, 2021
Crate digging in the Blue Note vaults is nothing new. For decades, DJ’s have been reshaping the recordings of Herbie Hancock, Art Blakey, Horace Silver and others, overlaying dance beats and raps to pull in a whole new audience. Yet drummer/producer McCraven, who mostly samples (and re-samples) his own minimalist, hip rhythm tracks, has something else in mind. McCraven dissects 60’s BN gems, both well-known and obscure, with the fervor of a WWII codebreaker. Less concerned with dance beats, McCraven and his collaborators (Jeff Parker on guitar, Marquis Hill on trumpet, longtime associate Junius Paul on bass) are more intent on an immersive experience. Fuzzy and amorphous, genres, generations, machines, masters and new kids all intertwine. Utilizing his mastery of the studio, McCraven applies a mysterious technique that gives nothing away, yet brings all this remarkable music into the light.
-Jeff McCord
