A person whose words are so potent that they cause the people and beings around them to vibrate is said to have a "silver tongue." It's apt, then, that Mackenzie Scott-who has spent the 2010s making boundary-pushing pop music under her Torres moniker-has chosen to call her fourth album, and first on Merge, just that. Recorded at O'Deer in Brooklyn, New York, Silver Tongue is a full-scale realization of the world Scott has created over Torres' last few albums. Even when singing in more subdued tones, Scott's voice is fervent, her lyrics stirring and unyielding as she draws from both the divine and the everyday

It’s country music but not as we know it which begs the question: Have these Bad Kids of 21st Century rock ’n’ roll finally grown up on their ninth studio album? Are they at peace with themselves? Have they made a record their parents could listen to? The Black Lips new album ‘Sing In A World That’s Falling Apart’ continues to flick the middle finger to one and all. This ain’t another gaggle of bearded southern sons fleeing their collective suburban upbringings and collegiate music education. There aren’t the usual clichés about drinking, honkytonks, and heartbreak. These are, after all, the same Black Lips who rescued the waning garage punk subgenre by not sounding or dressing their musical predecessors. They also dug contemporary hip-hop and punk and actualized themselves Like so many dramatic moments in the Black Lips career, ‘Sing In A World That’s Falling Apart’ was born out of crisis. The band’s stylistic evolution through decades of prolific touring and recording took them where no garage punk band had gone before - huge venues, network television shows, and major music festivals. Here Black Lips are at their grimiest, most dangerous and equipped with the best collection of songs since the aughts. Skidding onto the asphalt in a shower of sparks, they roll on with an unapologetic southern-fried twang, pacing the beast, every now and then dropping a psycho howl into the rubber room madness lurking underneath the truckstop fireworks. This ain’t your granny’s country album. And conversely this ain’t your mama’s Black Lips.

Get Fixed is the follow-up to last year’s acclaimed Vitriola. While the album was largely born out of the same sessions as Vitriola with founding drummer Clint Schnase, “Stranded Satellite” and “Black Hole Town” were recorded this year and feature touring drummer Pat Oakes.

Marigold is an urgent, multivalent meditation—and an expanded take on the blend of alt-country, indie rock and cerebral humanism that’s inspired the band’s ardent fan community. It marks their Rough Trade Records debut, offering what songwriter Evan Stephens Hall calls a “heart-first” perspective.

The songs on the first album are the children. The songs on the second album are their parents. Ghosteen is a migrating spirit. The album was recorded in 2018 and early 2019 at Woodshed in Malibu, Nightbird in Los Angeles, Retreat in Brighton and Candybomber in Berlin. It was mixed by Nick Cave, Warren Ellis, Lance Powell and Andrew Dominik at Conway in Los Angeles. 

The follow up to FKA twigs’ critically acclaimed Brit Award and Mercury Prize nominated debut LP1 (2014, Young Turks). Widely regarded as one of the best albums of 2014 and selling over 340,000 records globally. Top-40 rapper Future appears on the album’s second single “Holy Terrain”, continuing a run of rap collaborations including an appearance on A$AP Rocky’s ‘Testing’ LP. Twigs will tour the US in November with a theatrical performance that debuted in May to universal acclaim as well as several major festivals (Afropunk Brooklyn and Atlanta, Flog Gnaw) Press campaign includes September i-D cover, multi-page feature in Vogue October issue, television appearances and more. Twigs is a cultural figure outside of the music realm as well: appearing in the feature film “Honey Boy” out 11/8/19, being named a creative director for Nike, and starring in a viral Spike Jonze-directed Apple ad

Athena is the debut album from violinist, singer, songwriter and producer Sudan Archives. Sudan Archives is widely acclaimed for her thrilling combination of styles: powerful and anthemic R&B, electronic music, a violin style inspired by Northeast African fiddling, and West African rhythms. For Athena, she collaborated with a wide cast of songwriters, producers and musicians for a sound that is her fullest and richest to date, while staying true to the unique blend of influences that has won her fans around the world.

Half red half white vinyl. When Chris Stewart set out to write and record his third album as Black Marble, he was newly living in Los Angeles, fresh o a move from New York. The environment brought much excitement and possibility, but the distance had proved too much for the car he brought along. With it out of commission indefinitely, he purchased a bus pass and planned his daily commute from his Echo Park apartment to his downtown studio, where he began to shape Bigger Than Life. The route wound all through the city, from the small local shops of Echo Park to the rising glass of the business district, to the desperation of Skid Row. The hurried energy of the environment provided a backdrop for the daily trip. When Stewart finally arrived at his studio, he'd look through his window at the mountains and the sky, seeing the beauty that makes L.A. unique - the same beauty his fellow commuters, some pushed to the edge of human endurance, had seen. That was the headspace he was in when he began to map out the syncopated drums and staccato arpeggiation of Bigger Than Life, an ode to his new condition and a shimmering synth-pop response to it's cacophony. "The album comes out of seeing and experiencing a lot of turmoil but wanting to create something positive out of it," Stewart explains. "I wanted to take a less selfish approach on this record. Maybe I'm just getting older, but that approach starts to feel a little self-indulgent. So with this record, it's less about how I see things and more about the way things just are. Seeing myself as a part of a lineage of people trying to do a little something instead of trying to create a platform for myself individually." As with every Black Marble album, Stewart recorded, produced, and played everything you hear on Bigger Than Life using entirely analog gear, though the process was new. This time around, he wrote everything on his MPC and sequenced it live to his synths - only using the computer to record, not to create. "I try new approaches every time, which helps me stay engaged but also it's kind of a trick I play on the creative side of my brain," Stewart says. "Keeping one side of my mind busy on organizational creativity I think frees up the other side where the inspirational creativity comes from."

There is a closeness at the heart of Turnover's aptly titled new album, 'Altogether.' Though it's the first collection the trio has written while living on opposite coasts, the record actually represents the group's most collaborative and connected work to date, showcasing the intuitive, near-telepathic relationship frontman Austin Getz has developed over the years with his bandmates. Turnover first emerged roughly a decade ago in Virginia Beach, VA, but the group's critical and commercial breakthrough didn't arrive until six years later, when they cracked the Top 5 on the Billboard Heatseekers Chart with their acclaimed sophomore album, 'Peripheral Vision.' The band-which consists of Getz, his brother Casey on drums, and their childhood friend Danny Dempsey on bass-followed it up in 2017 with 'Good Nature,' a streaming smash that racked up roughly 40 million plays on Spotify alone and which Vice proclaimed to be "their best album yet." 'Altogether' demonstrates the band's eclectic mix of personalities from the very start, opening with a lo-fi, jazzy intro that quickly gives way to the driving drums and delay-drenched guitar of "Still In Motion." Like much of the album to come, the song is a meditation on change and perspective, on learning to quiet your mind and appreciate the moment before it's gone. The bittersweet "No Reply" reckons with guilt over failing to be present with a loved one, while the effervescent "Much After Feeling" recognizes the sacrifices we make to stay connected across geographical distance, and the breezy "Parties" grapples with the kind of self-consciousness that can leave us prisoners of our own design.

There is a core element to Chelsea Wolfes musica kind of urgent spin on Americas desolation blues thats existed throughout the entirety of her career. Wolfe has always been a conduit for a powerful energy, and while she has demonstrated a capacity to channel that somber beauty into a variety of forms, her gift as a songwriter is never more apparent than when she strips her songs down to a few key components. As a result, her solemn majesty and ominous elegance are more potent than ever on Birth of Violence. The songs stem from humble beginnings little more than Wolfes voice and her Taylor acoustic guitar. Her longtime musical collaborator Ben Chisholm recorded the songs in their own studio and helped fill them out with his modern production treatments and auxiliary flourishes from ongoing contributors Jess Gowrie (drums) and Ezra Buchla (viola). Every Chelsea Wolfe album introduces new unorthodox textures and approaches, and the trajectory of her creative arc has generally aimed for larger and more imposing sounds, but Birth of Violence deliberately alters that course in favor of a more intimate atmosphere. The result yields Wolfes most devastating work to date.

Two Hands, a completely new, fully-realized, 10-song album by Big Thief, will arrive just five months after their breakthrough U.F.O.F., one of the most acclaimed albums of 2019. In sharp contrast to the wet environment of the U.F.O.F. session, Two Hands had to be completely different— an album about the earth and the bones beneath it. The songs were recorded live with almost no overdubs. All but two songs feature entirely live vocal takes, leaving Adrianne’s voice suspended above the mix in dry air, raw and vulnerable as ever. Where U.F.O.F. layered mysterious sounds and effects for levitation, Two Hands grounds itself on dried-out, cracked desert dirt. Anybody who has borne witness to Big Thief in the wild will find songs they recognize here. Much of the album’s tracks (“The Toy”, “Those Girls”, “Shoulders”, “Not”, “Cut My Hair”) have been live staples for years. Two Hands has the songs that I’m the most proud of; I can imagine myself singing them when I’m old,” says singer/songwriter Adrianne Lenker. With raw power, intimacy, and honor, Two Hands folds itself gracefully into Big Thief’s impressive discography. This body of work grows deeper and more inspiring with each new album.

Lost Girls is another brilliant full-length in Khan's incredible, acclaimed discography, mixing sounds she's always loved - heavy bass lines, synth arpeggios, Iranian pop beats, cascading choruses - with some of her finest songwriting to date. It's an album full of romance, a homage to Los Angeles where the album was recorded, to being a kid in the 80's, to films that touched and changed her life. Spanning 10 tracks, Lost Girls sees Khan dreaming up her own fully formed parallel universe, creating an off-kilter coming of age film in which gangs of marauding female bikers roam our streets, teenagers make out on car hoods and a powerful female energy casts spells and leave clues for us to follow. The women of Lost Girls are parallel to one of Khan's previous female protagonists, the tough, darkness-driven Pearl, from her 2009 lauded album Two Suns. Within the women of Lost Girls and the character Nikki Pink, Khan unfolds elements of herself; within these songs, we do the same.

Virginia Metalheads MUNICIPAL WASTE return with a fresh EP for fall 2019. It’s been few years and several hundred live shows since the Waste oozed out the much celebrated Slime and Punishment album. Back with 4 ripper tracks that embrace all the bands punk and street metal roots without clutching the past. That honest formula has led the Waste to innovate the festival scene with the opening track and party of the summer “Wave of Death”. Charged by the exotic and biting wit of vocalist Tony Foresta. Turbo charged by the dual guitar aggression of Ryan Waste and Nick Poulos. Locked in and ready for takeoff by rhythm section LandPhil Hall on bass and Dave Witte on Drums. Partiers, you’ve been taught the “Art” and now it is time for an advanced lesson. Thrashers on alert! MUNICIPAL WASTE is delivering, The Last Rager.

Devour marks the fourth full-length record from Margaret Chardiet's project Pharmakon and her most intense output to date. Like her previous albums, Devour comes with a strong concept that is exorcised throughout the five demolishing tracks on the album, using imagery and language of self-cannibalism as allegory for the self-destructive nature of humans. Each of the five songs echoes a stage of grief associated with this cyclical chamber of self-destruction and the chaos surrounding us that leads us to devour ourselves in an attempt to balance the agony. The album was recorded by Ben Greenberg (Uniform) and is the first Pharmakon album recorded live in studio. The A and B sides were each recorded as a continuous take with vocals from start to finish, marking a totally new process for the artist that allows the ferocity and immediacy of her live performance to resonate throughout. Devour also explores new sonic territory, with denser electronics, groovier hooks, and moments of her most unhinged vocal deliveries to date. As one of the premiere vanguards of modern industrial and power electronics, Chardiet continuously pushes the genres and everyone involved in them, and with the release of Devour, she has once again changed the game. Artist Statement: "Devour" uses self-cannibalization as allegory for the self-destructive nature of humans; on cellular, individual, societal and species-wide scales. In our cells, our minds, our politics and our species, humans are self-destructing. But this behavior does not happen in a vacuum. It is an instinctive inward response to a world of increasing outward violence, greed, and oppression. Turning these wounds toward ourselves can be seen as an attempt at "balancing feedback", within a never-ending positive feedback loop of cause and effect. With this view, the blame is placed not within the individual, but with the world they must contend with, and a society that is designed to fail them - to keep them gnashing and wailing, inflicted with an all-devouring hunger that inevitably turns in on the self. Those that pit them against each other grin from the sidelines, bellies full. Those who see beyond the veil need to obscure the horrid sight by any means necessary, but respite is always brief - nothing can dampen the glare from behind the veil. This album is dedicated to all who were lost to their own demise, all who have been institutionalized; whether in prison, psychiatric facilities, or drug rehabilitation. It is for all those ostracized by and isolated from a totality which chews them up alive in a self-cannibalizing caste system. Here, where martyrs, slaves, and pharmakos are not eradicated, but simply called by another name. "ABOUT THE SHALLOWNESS OF SANITY"... To be well adjusted in this system is to be oblivious and unfeeling. This is for the rest of us, who understand that chaos, madness, pain and even self destruction are natural and inevitable responses to an unjust and disgusting world of our own making.