I was ready to declare Frightened Rabbit’s The Midnight Organ Fight one of the freshest and most exciting debuts I’ve heard this year, until I discovered that this is actually their second album. How could a band this good remain a secret? The consensus seems to be that their first album, from two years ago, was a bit inconsistent and never quite found an audience. Their fate should now change very quickly. Now with the stellar indie label Fat Cat, this Scottish trio have delivered a warm, soulful and powerful record that only grows more endearing with repeated listenings. (I’ve been listening to it at least twice a day for two weeks.) The opener, “The Modern Leper,” is one of the year’s outstanding tracks, a slow, building anthem filled with anguished lyrics. Indeed, frontman Scott Hutchison’s dark, lyrical songwriting gives the record a unique voice, with his brother Grant’s creative drumming adding a driving force. And despite the band’s spare lineup, The Midnight Organ Fight has great range and a real depth in sound, with plaintive ballads mixed in with moments of countryish twang and a few midtempo stompers. Highly recommended. (James)

Jamie Lidell’s influences are placed in the forefront of JIM, his first album in three years: some mid-70s Stevie Wonder here, some Impressions there. “Another Day” opens the album with restraint and muted horns before careening into the terrifyingly catchy “Wait for Me”, where the propulsively confident music is offset by Lidell’s yearning, uncertain lyrics. (“Where D’You Go” similarly joins brutally honest lyrics with a catchy backbeat; the handclaps don’t hurt.) It’s only on the frenetic “Hurricane” that Lidell’s retro-pop sensibility is fused with a barrage of programmed beats, and it’s a sign of Lidell’s outlook that it manages to fit in with a selection of songs that could otherwise pass for an apocryphal 70s soul album. (Toby)

Seven minutes into Cloudland Canyon’s remarkable new record Lie In Light you might be pretty sure you’re listening to the first Neu record. The album’s opener “Krautwerk” is a pretty faithful tribute to it’s punny namesakes, which is great, but might make for an album more novel than satisfying if the rest of the songs followed suit. Thankfully the homage paid on the first song to Faust, Can, Neu, Cluster and the like just expands into different shades and places as the music continues. Pulse-driven Krautrock rhythms bounce along one minute, fading into shoe-gazy washes of guitar textures on the next song. The stellar, otherworldly “Mothlight Part 1” sheds most discernable reference points with obscured vocals, muted waves of sound and a type of lulling soft psychedellia that when combined with the spikes of rhythm and noise, makes this record so great start to finish. (Fred)

Arriving just in time for spring is the debut LP from young-and-hungry literary pop kids Tokyo Police Club. TPC make a case for exuberance through brevity, with only one of the eleven tracks making it past the three-minute mark, but all of them stuffed with pop hooks and energetic personality. Some songs could come off as a younger brother of The Weakerthans or a better-read Maritime, vocalist/songwriter Dave Monk clearly having been a member of the same book club as Decemberists’ Colin Meloy back in the day, and eager to cash in on both fifty-cent words and Neutral Milk Hotel phrasing. The first single "Tessellate," being a strong example of both. Driving, catchy, and crowded with both ideas and melody, Elephant Shell is a capsule of fresh-faced pop perfect for the longer days and breezy times. (Fred)

M83’s move towards more vocals increases considerably and successfully thanks to new vocalist/keyboardist Morgan Kibby, not only because her breathy vocals are sexily intoxicating, but also for the variety she brings. Leader Anthony Gonzalez’s love of vintage keyboards remains, but he has not just moved more towards pop, he’s also honed his songwriting skills and acquired a better sense of structure. Yeah, the chiming guitars (returning drummer /guitarist / bassist / keyboardist Loic Maurin) and chord progression of “Graveyard Girl” keep threatening to turn into “Money Changes Everything,” but that fits well with the ‘80s love displayed throughout. Gonzalez shows he’s still got the ability to craft lush, dreamily drifting instrumental soundscapes on the closing “Midnight Souls Still Remain.” (Steve)

The Constantines’ first two albums were fine collections of anthemic punk; when the strongest criticism you can muster is that they didn’t match their (incendiary) live show, that’s far from a bad thing. 2006’s Tournament of Hearts expanded the band’s range, occasionally slowing things down and throwing in some quieter moments, and Kensington Heights is equally an expansion, albeit a differently textured one. When the group slows down—as on the critically slow-burning “I Will Not Sing a Hateful Song”—it’s with as much of a gut-punch as their more uptempo songs. “Hard Feelings’ opens things with fuzzed-out guitars and pinpoint rhythms, less the Curtis Mayfield-on-speed sound on previous albums and something rawer, more tenuous. The band’s tendency for memorable hooks and gruff, throaty vocals is still present, but Kensington Heights does sound like the work of a band channeling a greater emotional palette. Gloriously ragged, indeed. (Toby)

From the Valley to the Stars, Sarah Assbring’s second album under the name El Perro del Mar, is an emotionally complex work. Assbring’s sensibility leads her to write organ-drenched, majestic pop songs which nonetheless have a constant starkness, imparting a feeling of pain and sorrow, to the proceedings. The album opens with “Jubilee”, in which Assbring solemnly intones the word “jubilation”, speaking more from hope than conscious experience. That sense of contrast carries the album well into its second half, where the sparse arrangements of the title track flow beautifully into the lush “Into the Sunshine”. Sixteen immersive songs, ranging in influence from folk to an almost sacred vibe at times. (Toby)

Harmony Korine has always relied heavily on music for sculpting the feel and identity of his movies. It’s hard to imagine the images Gummo or Kids being half as effective without their tumultuous scores. Korine’s latest work Mr. Lonely is a damaged film loosely centered on the misadventures of a commune full of celebrity impersonators, and the soundtrack follows suit, hopping genres and styles through demented interludes and ambient longer songs. Spacemen 3 / Spiritualized headman J. Spaceman and ethno-musicology appropriators the Sun City Girls never collaborated on any of the music for the film, (which would have been a whole other experiment) but the two entities compliment each other surprisingly well over the course of the soundtrack. String-heavy numbers like “Garden Walk” drift through random moments of dialogue into soft psychedelia from SSG like “3D Girls” and feedbacky tape collages of cut-up flute on “Panama 1”. A roller coaster of sprawling theatrics and calming ambiance, and a listening experience equal parts disturbing and enlightening as Korine’s films. (Fred)