The 17 pop and rock albums to listen to today (May 2021)

St. Vincent, during a January 2020 performance in Los Angeles at the Grammy ceremony.Emma McIntyre / Getty Images for The Recording A

May is usually one of the strong months in terms of record releases.

The one in 2021 does not disappoint.

Veterans like Van Morrison, Miguel Ríos or Paul Weller are in good shape in their new jobs;

consecrated men such as St. Vincent or Dinosaur Jr. continue the good run;

and we welcome newcomers like Olivia Rodrigo or Packs.

We will begin to see some of them on stage this year.

- St. Vincent, 'Daddy's Home'

Who is it?

Annie Clark, 38-year-old American, at the top of current pop after albums like

Strange Mercy

or

Masseduction

.

Is

Daddy's Home

that good

?

This album arises (from the title) of the welcome that the singer offers her father after spending ten years in jail after participating in a corrupt financial operation.

It has been sold as a seventies sound work and there is something there: the Stevie Wonder keyboard, the psychedelic funk of Funkadelic, the lysergic joviality of Laurel Canyon, the gospel choirs ... And Prince, who emerged in the late seventies and drank all his career of that decade.

A relaxed album where the decadent characters that the singer is so passionate about appear in the texts.

- Dinosaur Jr., 'Sweep It Into Space'

Who are they?

Fundamental band to know what American alternative rock was about since the mid-eighties and during the nineties.

Led always by J. Mascis, the guy who plays his guitar with the loudest volume.

Don't forget earplugs at your concerts.

Is

Sweep It Into Space that good

?

After five years without an album of new songs, the best that can be said about this work is that here is everything that is expected of Dinosaur Jr .: Mascis's complaining voice spreads through some powerful rock songs where his guitar continues to play. sparks.

Does it look like a record from the nineties?

Yes. Does that matter if the music is good?

Not.

- The Coral, 'Coral Island'

Who are they?

At the beginning of the 2000s and with

Britpop

in decline, English bands began to emerge that bet on psychedelia.

It was about giving a topical patina to what they did in the sixties Love or

Ogdens '

Small Faces

' Nut Gone Flake

.

The Coral were over there.

Is

Coral Island

that good

?

How well this music fits with the sinister year that we have been.

The Coral offer a double disc (54 minutes) that is like going through a spa to eliminate accumulated toxins.

Beautiful pop songs of relaxed psychedelia that leave the body and mind as healthy as a meditation course.

- Olivia Rodrigo, 'Sour'

Who is it?

Born 18 years ago in California to a Filipino father and Irish mother. She began her pre-adolescent career as an actress on Disney series such as

Bizaardvark

or

High School Musical: the series

. As it turns out, he sings very well, he has just released his first feature,

Sour.

Is

Sour

that good

?

It's amazing how someone at 18 can sing so deeply about the calamities of love.

As if he were someone with a long history of bitter relationships, Rodrigo intoned with a trembling voice things like: “Don't tell me you're sorry / Feel sorry for yourself / Because someday I'll be everything to someone else / And you will be the one who is crying ”.

Sometimes it gets rough Rodrigo to Alanis Morissette (in

Brutal)

and others reminiscent of Taylor Swift

indie

of

Folklore

.

It's just Rodrigo's first album: great things await us with her.

- Van Morrison, 'Latest Record Project Volume I'

Who is it?

The most incredible thing about Van Morrison is that at 75 he still retains that

soulful

and crystalline

voice

that he transmits almost as he did in his best days. Almost ... It's better not to talk about his denialist blunders.

Is

Latest Record Project Volume I that good

?

Someone has written that the star has opted for quantity over quality.

Ummm.

Indeed it is too much music in a single disc: 28 songs in two hours and eight minutes.

But everything is so light, so fun and so hesitant that you enter without realizing it.

Surely it will not be an album that we put among the best of their extensive catalog.

Nor is it an album to listen to in a concentrated way and at once.

But it's a nice soundtrack to let it ring and ring.

Of course, some texts with the background pandemic cut digestion.

- black midi, 'Cavalcade'

Who are they?

A London band that lives without rules, the darlings of avant-garde music seekers.

After his debut to rave reviews comes this second,

Cavalcade.

Is

Cavalcade

that good

?

Let's say black midi are kinky enough for Frank Zappa to grant them his blessings.

Experimental, improvisational, uncomfortable, noisy, evocative, fast-paced.

Few groups in rock are as free as this band.

This is not easy music, they are anti-commercial songs for adventurous fans looking for head-on crashes.

- Miguel Ríos, 'A long time'

Who is it?

He is not only the most important Spanish rock musician; In addition, he is one of the few (worldwide) that has maintained a career for more than half a century with enormous successes and minimal serious slips.

Is

a long goodbye

so good

?

What Rick Rubin did with the late Johnny Cash, José Nortes has done with Miguel Ríos (76 years old).

Musical austerity to enhance the curdled voice of a veteran who is still pissed off at this adrift world.

In an acoustic key, not languid, Ríos practices

rock and roll

without electric guitars and full of messages of disgust for the incompetence and bad intentions of those who pull the strings.

His voice is splendid and the energy tank is full.

That is why he will soon launch himself, once again, into his great vice: the road.

- Zahara, 'Whore'

Who is it

? One of the great talents of Spanish pop. Born 37 years ago in Jaén, it is time to present her without pointing out that she is Joaquín Sabina's niece. Starting with us ...

Is it that good

bitch

?

Zahara has suffered an intimate catharsis to write this album, a very upright and pure artist exercise.

The singer tears herself apart to expose how traumatic it is to live as a woman in an unbreathable patriarchal world.

Hopefully with these confessions that will change.

Hopefully… It would be a mistake for

Puta's

stark lyrics to

overshadow the music.

Because it was not easy to match those texts to the open grave.

Perhaps the easiest thing would have been an austere instrumentation.

But no: the electronics burst in, the rhythm changes, the braking, the acceleration, the atmospheres ... Everything is as uncomfortable as it is suggestive.

- Weezer, 'Van Weezer'

Who is it?

Rivers Cuomo's group in a creative incontinence stage: in five months they have released two albums, and both good ones:

OK Human

and this

Van Weezer

.

Is

Van Weezer

that good

?

Above all it is hilarious: 30 minutes spent jumping.

Californians vindicate hard rock groups in the eighties in which they did not stop appearing on MTV: Kiss, Ozzy Osbourne, Metallica or Van Halen.

The songs have thicker guitars than ever and the same catchy chorus as ever.

- Dolour, 'Televangelist'

Who is it?

The American band Shane Tutmarc, 39, who has been putting together a repertoire of basically beautiful pop songs since the late nineties.

Is

Televangelist

that good

?

A suitable album to recover joy through beauty.

Exquisite vocal harmonies, delicate guitars, subtle keyboards ... Everything to get sweet songs lifts your spirits.

If you like ELO, Beach Boys or Teenage Fanclub, this job will occupy many moments of your life.

- Paul Weller, 'Fat Pop (Volume 1)'

Who is it?

In July 2020 Paul Weller released the remarkable

On Sunset

.

Now I'd be on tour introducing it.

As it could not be, he has recorded this

Fat Pop (Volume 1)

—which requires more deliveries—.

The pandemic is bitter, but at least it makes for good songs.

Is

Fat Pop

that good

?

It is an album by a guy who has been composing music for 40 years and who starts playing without red lines and just to enjoy himself.

The result is delicious.

What does it sound like?

Sometimes to Gorillaz, others to Style Council, also to

cosmic

soul

, to PJ Harvey from

To Bring You My Love

, to Canned Heat! ... All are references to place the reader and tell him that it is a very enjoyable album.

- William Seen's Transport Music, 'I Am the Ocean'

Who are they?

A wonderful band from Holland and Belgium.

Is

I Am the Ocean that good

?

There are many fans disappointed with the new Teenage Fanclub album (the not so immediate

Endless Arcade)

and others who long for the Jayhawks of

Tomorrow The Green Grass

.

All of them will listen with enthusiasm to this

I Am the Ocean

, where the vocal harmonies are cared for, the pop is taken as a refined affair and the choruses sizzle.

- Derby Motoreta's Burrito Kachimba, 'Black thread'

Who are they?

From Seville and picking up the baton of those crazy wonderful Andalusian rock pioneers: Smash, Triana or Veneno.

Is

Black Thread

that good

?

The song

13 monos

is an impossible meeting between Jesús de la Rosa and Rage Against The Machine.

That's how crazy

Hilo Negro is

, the group's second album, where they toughen up their proposal compared to the previous one.

They are still devoted to their classics (Triana, Smash), but more psychedelic and wild.

It is like a passage of Easter without hoods and with electric guitars.

- Robe, 'Maieutics'

Who is it?

De Plasencia, 59, head of Extremoduro, whom he has buried to focus on a solo cart that rises with each album.

This is the third.

Is

Maieutica

so good

?

As soon as it was published, it rose to number one in sales. With all the precautions in the world, since few records are sold (although listeners on platforms are also counted in the list of best sellers), it is a tremendous merit for a work against the current: a 43-minute song. Surely on this album are the best texts by Robe Iniesta, that is why listening does not tire as it is an incentive to discover the poetry of Extremadura. Musically it's hard work, with a violin sounding as aggressive as an electric guitar. It's time to turn the page:

Deltoya

and other Extremoduro hymns had their moment, but Iniesta's new music is richer and more passionate.

- Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, 'Deja Vu' (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)

Who are they?

If life was already complicated with three beasts (Crosby, Stills and Nash) fighting to keep their ego well fed, here a fourth element (Young) joins, who came with high spirits thanks to his first two solo albums,

Neil Young

(1968) and

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

(1969)

Is

Deja Vu

that good

?

Despite the complexity of the recording (four controllers in the same studio),

Deja Vu

turned out to be a great album. And it is because it has superb songs, with

Our House

and

Helpless

on the front line. But also with that hippy hymn from Crosby

Almost Cut My Hair

or the wonderful

Teach Your Children

.

Each one is pending to shine in the songs that he composes and goes to accompany the soloist sometimes reluctantly and other times promoting the song with heavenly choirs.

This 50th anniversary edition (it arrives a year late as it was released in 1970) includes three additional CDs, 38 songs, most of which are skeleton recordings of material that has already been released.

This extra content will satisfy the very followers.

The rest can be satisfied with the ten original songs, worked to get a better sound.

- Packs, 'Take The Cake'

Who is it?

The group of a young Canadian named Madeline Link.

This is his first album.

He posted some songs on the Bandcamp platform, had a significant impact and encouraged him to make this album.

Is

Take The Cake

that good

?

With a voice as sensual as it is slurred, Link composes songs about falling madly in love with someone who ignores you.

And when she does, she has turned the page.

It sounds simple and adorable, like playing accidentally, very much in the vein of

90s

indie

bands

like Pavement or Sebadoh.

There are 11 short stories that fit in 23 minutes.

- Vicentico, 'The bright well'

Who is it?

Gabriel Fernández Capello,

Vicentico

, 56-year-old Argentine, piece

Fundamental of Latin rock, either as head of Los Fabulosos Cadillacs or in his solo career, which arrives with

El pozo bright

at its seventh reference.

Is

The Shining Well

that good

?

Vicentico tells that the message of this album is to bend to procrastination, or the art of procrastination. “Do what we always leave for later. It is a call to bring out sensitivity ”, says the artist. Everything opens with a ball,

Freak,

song of the summer if the world were a sensible place.

I don't have

is a striking Spanish version of the famous

Ain't Got No / I Got Life

popularized by Nina Simone. As for the rest, the same arises a spatial mambo, a slow song about escaping from "the prison" in which we live or a postmodern bolero. Everything, always interesting.