You'd Better Listen to These Albums in October
According to a recent study by the National Listicle Board, 98 percent of WIRED readers have no interest in reading this introduction, and instead just want to go the part where we talk about the albums we like. We agree with them, so let's skip the formalities and get to the good stuff, because there's a whole lot of it this month.
Solange, A Seat at the Table
The opening track of Solange's third album A Seat at the Table is called "Rise"—and it is nothing if not an awakening: to the creativity it's about to unleash, to the issues it’s about to lay bare, to the fact that Solange is so much more than "Beyoncé’s sister" (and always has been). From the love-lorn pathos of "Cranes in the Sky" to the black empowerment track "Don’t Touch My Hair," Seat is easily the most genuinely eye-opening "surprise" release of 2016 (yes, her sibling's release made a bigger splash, but everyone expected it to). You won’t take a breath of fresher air this year.—Angela Watercutter
ColumbiaPreoccupations, Preoccupations
The Band Formerly (and Unfortunately) Known as Viet Cong has finally rechristened itself, but its post-punk powers remain intact, as Preoccupations is full of the kind of rigid, frigid, disarmingly melodic gloom-rock that Robert Smith would likely blast in his panic room: “Anxiety” lives up to its name—a gorgeous, twinkling stomper that doubles as a brutal cry for relief—while the 11-minute-plus “Memory” builds from skeletal to soaring to totally diffuse. If you’ve got a thing for downbeat uplift, put this on at your next pre-apocalyptic shindig; you’ll dance, you’ll cry, you’ll unfurl.—Brian Raftery
Jagjaguar
Oshwa, I We You Me
The second album from Chicago's Oshwa—led by vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Alicia Walter—is a finely controlled art-pop explosion: Over the course of just nine tracks, *I We You Me *moves from spry, sparkling dance-floor confessionals ("Ultraflourescent") to sailing orchestral ballads ("Stay") to smoove-lover R&B ("Why Are We Tonight"). Normally, a record this stylistically insatiable would fall apart after just a few songs, but Me is ballasted by Walter’s near-cosmic voice, which booms and bends gorgeously, and unexpectedly, throughout. She takes a chance on pretty much every track here; you should definitely do the same.—Brian Raftery
OshwaJoyce Manor, Cody
The funniest chorus of 2016 belongs to Joyce Manor's "Fake ID," a bubbling bullion of pop-punk about a tipsy partygoer who goes on an overextended rant: "What do you think about Kanye West?/ I think that he’s great, I think he’s the best/I think he’s better than John Steinbeck/I think he’s better than Phil Hartman." Actually, I'm not sure if that's the chorus, or just another sped-through verse on this 24-minute joyride of gotcha-hooks and over-sharing spiels. Full of sing-alongs and stinging one-liners, Cody is the kind of record you want wired directly into your car stereo. I think that it’s great; I think it’s the best.—Brian Raftery
Epitaph Records
Shovels & Rope, Little Seeds
On Little Seeds, Shovels & Rope—the husband-and-wife duo of Michael Trent and Cary Ann Hearst—veer away from the gentle folk sound they’re known for towards a harder one marked by faster, more insistent percussion. Tracks like "Invisible Man" and "Buffalo Nickel" sound more like T. Rex and Jack White than the blues of The Civil Wars or the pop-folk of Houndmouth, but longtime fans won’t be disappointed. Tracks like "St. Anne's Parade" still have mandolin picking and sharp harmonies aplenty.—Charley Locke
New West RecordsFleetwood Mac, Mirage
Fleetwood Mac's Mirage brought the on-again, off-again band into the Reagan era, and now the classic 1982 album is getting a deluxe reissue that adds two discs of rare gold. A disc of demos covers early versions of every song on the album—a highlight is Christine McVie's initial take of "Hold Me," which had a traditional piano-rock chorus rather than the smooth, layered experimental totally '80s vibe the final cut got. (I kinda like the piano-rock version better?) The third disc is a Mirage tour concert from the LA Forum that's been circulating for years as a crappy bootleg. Nice to have it all cleaned up.—Chris Kohler
Warner Bros. Records
Bon Iver, 22, A Million
It's been five years since Justin Vernon released an album under his Bon Iver moniker, but now he's back to keep pushing deeper into the sonic woods he began exploring with For Emma, Forever Ago. This is his Kid A, in the sense that it is both deeply alienating to the audience that loved the soft-strumming folk sounds of his debut, while also drawing closer those who have followed him down a rabbit hole. There are vocals sung into an OP-1—a combination synthesizer, sampler, and sequencer—and heavy use of a proprietary combination of software and gear named after engineer Chris Messina. 22, A Million is also full of demonstratively pretentious song titles like “8 (circle)” and “22 (OVER S∞∞N)” And yet, if you can shrug off all the accouterments trying to push you away, it’s still a fiercely compelling record.—K.M. McFarland
JagjaguwarS U R V I V E, RR7349
Writer/director siblings the Duffer Brothers weren’t the only ones to fly onto people's radars after Stranger Things captured everyone’s attention over the summer. Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein, half of the Austin, Texas band S U R V I V E, also got a lot of much-deserved attention thanks to their killer soundtrack for the series. They’re one of many bands in and around Austin making extensive use of analog synthesizers, and the soaring throwback tracks on their new album RR7349 only make us more excited for another season of Stranger Things accompanied by music from Stein and Dixon*.* If you’re a fan of John Carpenter, Giorgio Moroder, or the soundtracks of The Guest, Drive, or It Follows, you’ll love this record too.—K.M. McFarland
Relapse Records
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