This week’s best albums
With special guests, ex-Megadeth guitarist Marty Friedman unleashes an absolute shred fest—self-described as “the heaviest and most intense playing” of his career.
Members of Slint and Grails combine as Watter to make music that’s as ambiguous and multifaceted as the instrumentalists’ other projects.
Electronic post-rock composer Son Lux releases another EP of re-imagined originals, including a collaboration with Lorde.
Afrobeat inheritor Seun Kuti (with his famous father’s backing band) delivers an even more tightly packed and vibrant—and perhaps more political—offering.
Hundred Waters’ second album is a chilling landscape of its members’ psyches, one that makes goosebumps inevitable.
Honorable mentions
Eyehategod: s/t (Housecore)
Ben Frost: Aurora (Mute)
Jefferson Friedman, Craig Wedren & ACME: On in Love (New Amsterdam)
Misery Index: The Killing Gods (Season of Mist)
Sharon Van Etten: Are We There? (Jagjaguwar)
Trash Talk: No Peace (Odd Future)
Young and in the Way: When Life Comes to Death (Deathwish)