1. Willie Nelson and Sister Bobbie: December Day (Legacy) – Still picks, sings, and writes better than professionals a quarter of his age. Nails down a concept album second only in 2015 to the next item–wait, maybe it is better. I can’t remember….
2. Kendrick Lamar: to pimp a butterfly (Aftermath) – Sprawling, manic depressive, multi-masked masterpiece seems to include voices of a whole city, plus 2Pac’s (from beyond the grave). Also, offers cautious consolation to the despairing and a quiet, level warning to the rest. What we were wanting from D’Angelo on Black Messiah, in a way, but didn’t really get. Bonus: Best employment of Robert Glaspar than even on Robert Glaspar albums.
3. Jack DeJohnette: Made in Chicago (ECM) – Never count an old jazzman out–never. Jack and Muhal Richard Abrams keep a loose lasso around reedmen Threadgill and Mitchell.
4. Kate Tempest: Everybody Down (Big Dada) – Skeptical about poetry with music? Me, too. Very. BIG exception that proves the rule.  
5. 79rs Gang: Fiyo on the Bayou (Sinking City) – 7th and 9th Ward NOLA Injuns join forces for one of the best Injun albums in years? Wait: there’s that many of them? YES. Also: support this label!
6. Low-Cut Connie: Hi Honey (Ardent) – Very weird, frequently funny indie roots band powered by sly boogie piano and an odd UK/US duo who always sport at least a Hollywood loaf.
7. The Close Readers: The Lines are Open (Austin) – New Zealand novelist-led band needs you only to do this to be hooked: click the link and follow along. “Hardcore” – Husker Du’s so loud…
   I can’t hear the engine failing
   Driving to your house
   Got a sense of trepidation/You tell me Bob Mould’s gay
   You read it in the paper
   But you say it in such a way
   Trying to cause me aggravation/I say I don’t care who he’s with
   Or if he does it upside down
   Zen Arcade’s still a gift
   it’s the record of our generation/So put on some Little Red Rooster
   Get some words from Thus Spake Zarathustra
   We’ll make another killer tape loop
   Our group is good
   Our group is strong
   Our group’s the greatest
   Group to come along/When you sat on the edge of my bed
   Leaned back against the wall
   Then you put your hand on my leg
   I said, Boy is that all?
   Boy, are you hard
   Are you really hardcore?
   Hardcore, hardcore, hardcore/Let’s put on some Minutemen
   Cos we need a change of pace
   You like Mike Watt’s laugh, George Hurley’s hair
   And D. Boon’s surprising, lovely,
   D Boon’s inviting, lovely
   D Boon’s kind, inviting face
8. Nots: We Are Nots (Goner) – Mean-mama punks from Memphis. I do mean “punk.”
9. Heems: Eat Pray Thug (Megaforce) – My favorite half of Das Rascist waxes a record that’s been needing to be made for 14 years.
10. Sleater-Kinney: No Cities to Love (Sub Pop) – They’re a bit too much of a sober, hectoring machine for me, but they give the drummer some, and does she give back.
11. Pop Staples: Don’t Lose This (Anti-) – They didn’t. Pops’ last session, and, yes, they got some shake on his guitar.
12. Ornette Coleman and New Vocabulary: New Vocabulary (System Dialing) – “New” means 2009, but we may not hear this certified genius again, and he’s in fine form bouncing off youngsters’ constructions, electronic and otherwise.
13. Bob Dylan: Shadows in the Night (Sony) – He’s my hero, but he’s a hustler. And this is a hustle. A very seductive one–and it ain’t no joke. Pick to click from Bizarro Ol’ Blue Eyes: “The Night We Called It A Day.”
14. The Paranoid Style: Rock and Roll Just Can’t Recall (self-released) – If you know who Wide Right was (Buffalo’s finest!) and Sally Timms is, and you’d like to hear a great song called “Master Jack,” step right up.
15. Courtney Barnett: Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit (Mom & Pop) – Clicked play gritting my teeth, came out of the last track charmed, delighted, satisfied. A smart, funny, and ebullient one from Oz.
16. Dead Moon: Live at Satyricon (Voodoo Doughnut) – It is not fair for me to review a Record Store Day exclusive, but maybe you can still get it. It’s only a well-recorded, intense live show from 1993 from the ultimate “family values” garage rockers of all-time–who happen to be playing some reunion dates. Long live the Coles and their drummers Andrew (Dead Moon) and Kelly (The Pierced Arrows).
17. Bob Marley & The Wailers: Easy Skankin’ in Boston, 1978 (Tuff Gong) – Do you need another live Marley record from this period, especially since the estate’s gonna release a bunch more? YES, when the times are like they are now, and when this concert opens with six intense calls to revolution that’d make 25,000 hackey sacks hit the ground and a legion of stoned frat boys turn tail.
18. Obnox: Know America (Ever/Never) – The hardest-working man in midwestern punk rock backs up his title command with nasty noise, wry imprecations, and music that’s seldom made like this by spades. His other (other?) 2015 album, Boogalou Reed (on 12XU), is only 1/119th less excellent. Don’t fight the raver who needs you (click here)!
19. Various Artists: Burn, Rubber City, Burn (Soul Jazz) – Akron: Future home of The Punk Rock Hall of Fame. Copies of this will be handed out at the grand opening. Yes, I know I have used the word punk several times in these descriptions–it’s deliberate and, as Roger Sterling would say about his mustache, “IT’S REAL!!!!” And it ain’t going away anytime soon.
20. Barry Hannah: i have no idea what tradition i’m in. don’t care. (The End of All Music) – It’s not a reading from one of Hannah’s many great stories. But his ramblings on sundry topics here are definitely rock and roll.

Note: I have been very inattentive to this blog. I do work two real jobs, but I have also been suffering from a lack of inspiration and the sneaking suspicion that it’s just not possible for me to capture the essence of a record as I would like. However, for some reason, I awakened this morning ready to peck and quip. I hope you see something you’re moved to hear.