Popular Music CDs for Adults
Hundreds of CDs are added to the Library's collection each month. Here are the most popular Music CDs for adults.
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Endless Summer Vacation
Miley Cyrus has made a career out of doing whatever she wants, and on Endless Summer Vacation, it's growing up and moving on. Framed by the concept of a day and night in Los Angeles, this is a mature album in the best sense of the word; like a good relationship, it's smooth, but not dull, grounded in resilience and self-love. Cyrus attempted a similar mindset on Younger Now, but this time it feels more genuine. She's grown into this mood, starting with her voice, which imbues these songs with significant emotional depth. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the album's opening track and massive hit single, "Flowers." Over a poised fusion of vintage soft rock, disco, and 2020s pop, Cyrus' richly raspy delivery carries the pain, healing, and strength of forgiving a former lover while acknowledging that being alone is better. It's one of her finest moments, with a low-key confidence that feels truer because she's not shouting -- she's worlds away from the devastation of "Wrecking Ball." Starting Endless Summer Vacation with "Flowers" shows how much her artistry has developed even since Plastic Hearts. There's more genuine sweetness in Cyrus' music than in some time, particularly on "Rose Colored Lenses," which spins a swooning fantasy of a perfect day, complete with bubbly saxophones and harpsichord flourishes. She's grown into a remarkably candid songwriter, able to capture a relationship's power dynamic in a single line on "Wildcard" ("Go and meet your mom/In a dress too tight"), while finding the sweet spot between independence and self-destruction. Though Endless Summer Vacation has fewer collaborations than Plastic Hearts, they're just as well chosen. Brandi Carlile's silky harmonies are the perfect backdrop for Cyrus' twangy wanderlust meditations on "Thousand Miles," and Sia adds extra firepower to "Muddy Feet"'s gospel-inflected takedown of a cheater. While Endless Summer Vacation's first half is so consistent that it's tempting to want to spend more time with the witty, self-aware Miley it presents, the album's later songs prove she's not playing it too safe. She could probably spend her entire career singing songs like the piano ballad "Wonder Woman" or "You," a torchy slow dance for slightly reformed hedonists, but Vacation is all the richer thanks to curveballs like the country-meets-dance-pop of "River" or "Handstand," a piece of fever-dream synth pop that proves the instinct that sparked Miley Cyrus and Her Dead Petz is still within her. Cyrus will probably never settle on just one or two sounds to express herself, but her voice and vision are strong enough on Endless Summer Vacation to suggest she'll never need to. ~ Heather Phares (syndetics)
Format: Music CD
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Studio One Space-age Dub Special: Intergalactic Dub From 13 Brentford Road
(syndetics)
Format: Music CD
Availability: All copies in use
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In between thoughts-- a new world
Guitar duo Rodrigo y Gabriela return with their first album since 2019's Grammy-winning Mettavolution. In 2021, they issued an arrangement of Mozart's Symphony No. 25 in G Minor K.183 and received another Grammy nod for a cover of Metallica's "The Struggle Within." In Between Thoughts...A New World was written, recorded, and produced in their Ixtapa, Mexico studio. It showcases a significant expansion of their core sound, adding orchestral and electronic textures. The music was inspired by spiritual reflection and the Hindu text the Advaita Vedanta. Rooted in the concept of non-dualism, it depicts a single, infinite, indivisible reality of pure consciousness. All objects and "selves" derive their identifiable -- not independent -- existence from this interconnected reality. Opener "True Nature" employs slight digital delay, reverb, and funky polyrhythms in a complex melody framed by Gabriela Quintero's frenetic, furious strumming. String sounds embellish the bridge before a funky Niles Rodgers-esque vamp frames Rodrigo Sanchez's blazing fingerstyle surf leads. "The Eye That Catches the Dream" whispers in with gorgeous, lyric guitar interplay, and a synth bubbles, sounding alternately like a jaw's harp and a Brazilian cuica. In the bridge, the percussive, Rodgers'-inspired vamping shifts toward rock & roll as orchestral strings, a high-pitched synth, and Quintero's unshakeable polyrhythmic attack ground it. Single "Egoland" bridges wah-wah funk, spiky rock, surf, and an arid, dramatic orchestral drama that channels Ennio Morricone's spaghetti western cues before becoming its own soaring overture. The trippy third single, "Descending to Nowhere," was inspired by Alejandro Jodorowsky's iconic surreal film La Montaña Sagrada (The Holy Mountain). From its funky rhumba rhythms, sweeping ambient textures, and orchestral drones, it moves across two different lyric guitar patterns, profoundly altering rhythm, harmony, and dynamic. "The Ride of the Mind" is all drama. Percussion, sonics, and orchestral effects frame the guitar's intricate interplay head-to-head as powerful cascading strings add ballast to the tension. "Broken Rage" offers rockist aggression as Rodrigo lays down distorted leads atop Gabriela's buoyant vamp and the strings react in harmonic counterpoint, swelling in grooves before breaking glass signifies its nadir. "Finding Myself Leads Me to You" is the set's most intense track. A warbling synth bubbles in the foreground and is met by Quintero drumming on the guitar's body. When Sanchez enters, their interplay intersects in differing chord patterns, prodded and underscored by strings. The closing title number begins as a charging rocker with distorted orchestral effects and triple-timed strumming from Quintero as Sanchez lays down aggressive, shard-like leads. It gallops frantically as the guitars layer in funk and blues overtones before finding the seam to reveal a swelling, transformative anthem. The creative vision behind In Between Thoughts...A New World is at once ambitious and mercurial. This album moves further afield musically and sonically than Mettavolution. The duo embrace complex Latin and Afro-Cuban rhythms and sophisticated harmonic ideas from jazz and classical music while integrating the additional resources with imagination, taste, and powerful articulation. ~ Thom Jurek (syndetics)
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Savoy
Taj Mahal has released many kinds of albums in his six-decade career: folk, jump, country, blues of all stripes, sounds from Africa and the Caribbean, R&B, soul, collaborations with musicians from across the globe, and even children's records. Savoy moves in another direction still. Recorded in collaboration with producer, pianist, and longtime friend John Simon, this set offers blues-kissed reads of 14 tunes from the Great American Songbook. The album title is an homage to the iconic Harlem ballroom at 596 Lenox Ave. Mahal's parents met there in 1938 seeing Ella Fitzgerald front the Chick Webb Orchestra. Simon and Mahal had discussed the project for decades, but August 2022 was when the planets aligned. They cut the set live with a core band and guests. Mahal's band includes guitarist Danny Caron, bassist Ruth Davies, Simon on piano, drummer Leon Joyce, Jr., and a vocal chorus with Carla Holbrook, Leesa Humphrey, and Charlotte McKinnon. Interestingly, Caron and Davies served in Charles Brown's band, and Joyce drummed with Ramsey Lewis for many years. "Stompin' at the Savoy" starts with spoken word; Mahal delivers a reenactment of his parents' meeting. As he commences singing and scatting the lyrics, backing singers underscore with oohs, aahs, and call-and-response. "I'm Just a Lucky So-and-So" is one of three Duke Ellington numbers here. The languid horn section plays a blues progression with added warmth and grace from Kristen Strom's swinging flute. The arrangement of George Gershwin's "Summertime" is delivered allegretto, with blue, finger-popping swing from lush horns. "Mood Indigo" benefits from co-producer Manny Moreira's accumulated years of big band and Broadway experience. His layered brass colorations add dimension. "Do Nothin' Till You Hear from Me" offers languid, late-night horns (except in the bridge when they deliberately evoke gospel), and Simon's tasteful comping adds drama. The fluid blues guitar break from Caron has elegance and bite. "Sweet Georgia Brown" is meaty and sprightly as Mahal's grainy singing and scatting contrasts beautifully with Evan Price's "Parisian hot jazz" violin. Maria Muldaur -- one of the great interpreters of vintage blues, jazz, R&B, and country -- joins Mahal on the fun, sultry "Baby It's Cold Outside," with excellent violin, trombone, and piano solos. "Caldonia," Louis Jordan's striding jump boogie, offers pumping piano, swinging guitar, and smoking sax and trombone solos behind Mahal's good-time vocal. His harmonica joins Strom's tenor sax to elevate in Benny Golson's dynamic "Killer Joe," before "One for My Baby (And One More for the Road)" closes the set. Mahal references several classic versions and arrangements in shifting tempos, but he ultimately only sounds like himself. Savoy embodies the abundant joy of its predecessor, Get On Board: The Songs of Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, but the album offers added nuance, color, dynamics, and musical sophistication. It seemingly accomplishes the impossible by taking these (overly) familiar standards and breathing new life into them while simultaneously honoring their legacies as well as that of the historic Harlem ballroom. ~ Thom Jurek (syndetics)
Format: Music CD
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Blue Room: The 1979 Vara Studio Sessions in Holland
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The Complete Singles 1970-1980
Gordon Lightfoot is a genre unto himself. Neither pop nor folk nor country nor rock, his music is unvarnished, direct, a statement from one heart to another. And this uncompromising stance has not only made him a legend (particularly in his native Canada, where he is a full-fledged icon), but also, somewhat paradoxically, brought him huge commercial success. Real Gone Music has compiled the A and B-sides of all the singles Lightfoot recorded for the Reprise and Warner Bros. labels, 34 in all. (syndetics)
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Now That's What I Call Music! 86
(syndetics)
Format: Music CD
Availability: On order
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Plastic Eternity
Great bands adapt to change, and never let it be said that Mudhoney is not a great band. When bassist Matt Lukin left following the touring cycle behind 1998's Tomorrow Hit Today, they recruited Guy Maddison, an Australian bassist previously with Lubricated Goat, who had relocated to America's Pacific Northwest and was playing in vocalist Mark Arm's side project Bloodloss. Maddison fit the band like a glove, and in 2022, when he announced he was returning to Australia, Mudhoney wanted to cut one more album with him before he left town. Even though they didn't have a full set of songs completed, they booked nine days in a studio with producer Johnny Sangster, working up riffs they had lying around and whatever uncompleted ideas they'd been fooling with before COVID-19 made rehearsals problematic. 2023's Plastic Eternity is, in many respects, the sound of Mudhoney winging it, and if the result isn't a great album, it's certainly a good one, and shows them rising to the occasion in solid, engaging form. On Plastic Eternity, Mudhoney devote less time to the hard fast tunes (though they pick things up with "Almost Everything" and "Here Comes the Flood") and more to the midtempo grungy slog they love while using additional instruments to fill out the atmosphere, with bongos, keyboards, and occasional lo-fi electronic buzzing augmenting the dirty guitars on several cuts. (Significantly, Sangster gets a songwriting credit along with the band on three tunes.) That said, the inspired howl of Steve Turner's arsenal of guitars and aging stomp boxes is still this band's clarion call, and Mark Arm's Iggy-like vocal sneer remains a snarky joy to behold, while Danny Peters is one of rock's most underappreciated great drummers, with great time and superb feel, and Maddison's bass work shows why they were willing to hurry to have him on these sessions -- he's never showy and always adds just the right flavor to the bottom end. While they open the album with the post-psychedelic status report "Souvenir of My Trip," most of Plastic Eternity sees Arm once again venting his spleen regarding a variety of political, social, and environmental issues as he did on 2018's Digital Garbage, still a bit surprising from the band that gave us "Touch Me, I'm Sick." If you're going to listen to anyone rant about the state of the world, it may as well be Mark Arm, who is wittier than most and whose righteous anger connects, especially on the anti-overwork anthem "Human Stock Capital" and his screed against COVID-19 deniers and Ivermectin addicts, "Here Comes the Flood." The closer, "Little Dogs," is a sincere and unexpectedly charming tribute to Man's Best Friend, a rare moment where the band embraces joy in pure form. Plastic Eternity shows Mudhoney are capable of surprising us (and themselves) 35 years in, and judging from the results, it won't be the last time they'll pull that off. ~ Mark Deming (syndetics)
Format: Music CD
Availability: In-library use only at this time
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Ben
After a long six-year absence, Seattle pop-rap star Macklemore reintroduced himself with Ben. Taking the title from his birth name, this third solo effort is his most vulnerable confessional to date, one that allows him to purge some inner demons and share a bit of himself with fans who might be more accustomed to his rousing hit singles with Ryan Lewis. While 2017's Gemini peppered pop-leaning anthems amongst a glut of timely, trap-laden hip-hop, Ben is almost an even split, with the first half of the set dedicated to radio-friendly fare like the '80s synth pop gem "1984," the inspirational "Chant" with Tones and I, and the bouncy, cheerful bop "No Bad Days" with Collett. He rejoins Windser and Lewis -- who both participated in 2021's big "Macklemore & Ryan Lewis" reunion, "Next Year," which oddly doesn't appear on this album -- for the midtempo, acoustic guitar highlight "Maniac." The production and songwriting on this first half are upbeat and endearing, which feels great until you really listen to the lyrics, which reveal the true heart of Ben. Hardened ruminations on life and death, his relapse and overdose during the COVID-19 lockdowns, struggles with faith, and the ebb and flow of his mainstream popularity fill songs such as "Faithful," "God's Will," and "Day You Die." On "Tears," he takes his creative storytelling to another level, framing his alcohol addiction as a lifelong, love-hate relationship. It's a no-frills, honest approach that is much appreciated after all these years since his earlier, more thoughtful days. Fans of that period will delight when Ben pivots to old-school boom-bap -- DJ Premier even has a credit on "Heroes" -- with standouts such as the head-nod, horn-sampling bar-fest "Grime" and the contemplative sprawl of the dreamy "Lost/Sun Comes Up," which could have been a late-era Mac Miller track. Imagining how the world would react to his death (and facing addiction and the deaths of his friends), it's melancholy and moving all at once. Balancing the personal with biting social commentary, he later adopts a Kendrick Lamar flow for the popping "I Need." Altogether, Ben feels like the first time Macklemore has truly let listeners into his inner world, showcasing his underrated lyrical skills and enough varied production to keep the album moving forward toward a hopeful finish. ~ Neil Z. Yeung (syndetics)
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Pacific breeze 3: Japanese city pop, AOR and boogie 1975-1987
Light in the Attic released the first Pacific Breeze compilation in 2019 and followed up swiftly the next year with Pacific Breeze 2. The enterprise seemed like it might have been a done deal until the label announced the third volume, which arrived in 2023. Although many of the tracks throughout the compilations have been accessible to those outside Japan via streaming platforms, selectors Mark "Frosty" McNeill and Yosuke Kitazawa survey and contextualize the country's '70s/'80s urban musical landscape in a discerning way that considers both collectors on a budget and curious listeners with no idea about where to start. Pacific Breeze 3, a truffle harvest, is a little more colorful and illuminating than the two overviews that preceded it. It's lighter than the others on '70s selections. Ex-Apryl Fool frontman Chu Kosaka sounds amiable and wise over a Haruomi Hosono production indebted to early Jackson 5. Teresa Noda's "Tropical Love" is candied reggae with strings, produced in Jamaica by Ryuichi Sakamoto with Rita Marley and Compass Point All Star Mikey Chung also on the session. A bounding synthesizer delight from Osamu Shoji is in the realm of Yellow Magic Orchestra's "Computer Game" and Change's "The End" (and preceded both). In a way, the 1978 Shoji track points toward the prevailing '80s material with electronic gear figuring prominently in virtually everything from the later decade. The influence of U.S. contemporary R&B is strong in "Bewitched (Are You Leaving)," smooth, high-tech boogie voiced breathily by Naomi Akimoto. (The harmonica solo could be mistaken for the work of Stevie Wonder.) It's even stronger in Miho Fujiwara's RCA-issued "Heartbeat," sophisticated and peppy electro-funk that can fit between Angela Bofill's "Can't Slow Down" and Midnight Star's "Operator" -- appropriately enough, it was recorded for an anime set in Southern California. Further highlights veer from charmingly mannered new wave to oddball art-pop, from Susan's "Ah! Soka," featuring Hosono, Sakamoto, and their YMO brother Yukihiro Takahashi, to Miharu Koshi's "Scandal Night," the most YMO-like track here, a jittering wonder produced by Hosono with human propulsion from former ABC drummer David Palmer. Those exploring the seemingly bottomless well of YMO-related projects are treated even more by Pizzicato Five's "Boy Meets Girl" and Mari Iijima's "Love Sick." Other noteworthy tracks involving none of those three giants include Hiroyuki Namba's Balearic delight "Tropical Exposition [Who Done It? Version]" and Yukako Hayase's glistening "Suiyoubi Madeni Shinitaino," production-wise a collision of Scritti Politti and Ultravox with at least some of the lyrics at odds with its ecstatic vocal. As Kitazawa notes in the liners, the approximate English translation of the title is "I Want to Die Before Wednesday." ~ Andy Kellman (syndetics)
Format: Music CD
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