The video, Biskup explains, is "a life/death metaphor where the girl in the video goes from hunted to hunter. There's a whole lot more going on metaphorically, and the symbolism goes very deep and is very specific, but I'll leave the rest up to interpretation."

Interpret for yourself below.

Mastodon: The Hunter (Warner Bros. / Reprise)

Mastodon: "Curl of the Burl"

Since forming in 1999, Mastodon has grown from cult sensation to preeminent poster-child of metal’s next generation. Along the way, its crushing, complex brand of melodic sludge has absorbed elements of thrash, prog, and Southern rock, all complemented by earthen mythology, literary ambition, and serious chops.

On The Hunter, an album that breaks the band's concept-album streak, vocal melodies are at an all-time high, imbuing tracks such as "Curl of the Burl," "All the Heavy Lifting," and "Creature Lives" with genuine pop catchy-ness that, at times, approaches the intonations of Alice in Chains. But grizzly screams and up-tempo sludge riffs have not gone the way of the band's namesake; "Blasteroid" and "Black Tongue" have plenty of head-bashing fury.

A few spacey and horror-esque elements, musically and lyrically, give the album an interesting wrinkle here and there, such as on "Stargasm" and "Creature Lives," the latter of which uses pitch-shifting synths to set an alien mood. "The Sparrow" then closes the album with touches of lap-steel guitar, setting the tone for some of the airiest Mastodon vocals yet.

In all, The Hunter is a fun, riff-filled album, but it's destined to alienate more Mastodon "purists." The bottom line, however, is that the band continues to crank out killer riffs and turn on a new generation to metal — even if it has a softer edge.

Boom Bip: Zig Zaj (Lex)

Boom Bip: "All Hands"

Ever since his loop-based beginnings, Bryan Charles Hollan — known better as experimental hip-hop artist Boom Bip — has been on the search for his optimal live-band incarnation. With his latest, Zig Zaj, he seems to have found it.

In 2002, Seed to Sun demonstrated Hollan's ability to make compelling organic and instrumental hip hop. On his recordings since that time, nearly everything has been performed by hand, and the results have been admirable — but nothing has clicked quite like this.

Now Hollan is armed with a permanent live band, consisting of Josh Klinghoffer (Red Hot Chili Peppers), Eric Gardner (Gnarls Barkley, Charlotte Gainsbourg), and Josiah Steinbrick. Their chemistry is immediately evident on Zig Zaj, which also sports standout guest spots from Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand (for one very Depeche Mode track), Money Mark, Luke Steele (Empire of the Sun), Cate Le Bon, and Mikey Noyce (Bon Iver).

Partly because of the guests, the new material takes a poppier and more rock-driven direction. But there's still plenty of the old Bip underneath, as synths and electronics commingle with the bass grooves and delicate acoustic riffs. It's a catchy, beautiful, and well-balanced blend, perfect for first-time Bip listeners. Pick this up now.

Welder: Florescence (Ancestor)

Welder: "Run"

Brendan Angelides is a San Francisco-based electronic producer best known as Eskmo, an IDM/electronica project that has come to focus more on atmospherics and on writing songs than on its early roots of making dance tracks. He has found a like-minded collaborator in the incomparable Amon Tobin, with whom he operated as Eskamon for a 2010 single, but for his latest release, Angelides has retraced his roots as Welder for another self-released gem.

Welder began as one of Angelides' first and most introspective projects. Living alone in a lakeside house in Connecticut for two years, he created soft, internal music, a more “chilled” version of electronica, under the alias . But it wasn’t only the remote locale that inspired the quiet sounds, as Angelides pored over documents and papers about the dark underside of American society and government and conspiracy theories surrounding 9/11.

Florescence is almost a rebirth for Welder. The IDM elements remain, but the music is more organic than ever. Gone are the bass-heavy dubstep rumblings of his self-titled Eskmo release, and the worldly elements of the earlier Welder material have been replaced by interwoven grooves, stirring melodies, and diverse timbres.

The emphasis here is on Angelides' musicianship, including his talents on the piano and bass. From the start, Florescence is highly active, intertwining feisty and bubbly melodies of faux cello and glockenspiel. Piano, guitars, synths, and strings surround those other elements, and whether they're real or library samples, they create a sound that's simultaneously lifelike and dreamy.

- Text by Marla Seidell and Scott Morrow. Read the feature story on Eskmo here.

Zechs Marquise: Getting Paid (Sargent House / Rodriguez Lopez Productions)

Zechs Marquise: "Static Lovers"

El Paso-based psych-prog five-piece Zechs Marquise is three-fifths Rodriguez Lopez — brothers Marcel, Rikardo, and Marfred — a surname that gained music-industry notoriety from Omar, the prolific Mars Volta guitarist (and head of Zechs Marquise's label). Together, the siblings have followed in the progressive footsteps of their older brother, but Zechs Marquise has blazed its own trail over its eight years as a band.

Its official debut album, the 2009 effort Our Delicate Stranded Nightmare, was a much more experimental and atmospheric work, patching together songs with eerie intros, funky keys, and jazz-tinged ambience. Getting Paid, however, fully focuses on the groove. Each of the album's nine tracks moves at its own pace, venturing into an alternate sonic universe at a moment's notice. Abrupt tempo shifts, an inexhaustible junk drawer of textures, and a healthy obsession with '70s prog fusion culminate in a truly shape-shifting record, albeit one that consistently rocks. Zechs Marquise knows when to give into its sweaty, twisted vision-quest dalliances and when to let a groove ride.

- Text by Kyle Gilkeson.

Evidence: Cats & Dogs (Rhymesayers)

Evidence: "You"

Los Angeles MC Michael Perretta (better known as Evidence) is one third of the hip-hop trio Dilated Peoples. Over the past four years, with Dilated on hiatus, Evidence has focused on his solo career, and Cats & Dogs marks his move to Rhymesayers Entertainment.

Here Perretta delivers a crisp flow that is complemented by guest vocalists such as Slug (Atmosphere), Aesop Rock, Raekwon, and Aloe Blacc. With samples anchored in soul and pop, the album lays a pliable backdrop for topics that range from the recession to distorted concepts of love. Skits between tracks bear an early-’90s influence, and with shout-outs to KRS-One and De La Soul, it’s clear that the time period remains a strong influence on Cats & Dogs.

- Text by Portia Medina.

Plaid: Scintilli (Warp)

Plaid: "35 Summers"

Despite an eight-year layoff between "official" full-lengths, London electronic/film-scoring duo Plaid certainly has not lost its touch. Initially announcing the news of their sixth studio album back in 2008 and taking as long as an entire day to produce a single beat, Andrew Turner and Ed Handley have used their tedious perfectionism to make Scintilli worth the wait.

Plaid's first non-film-related release since 2003, Scintilli is a dreamy, hyper-melodic mélange from the get-go, as ethereal female vocals glide over the first track’s delicate chimes and synths. Each of the album’s 13 tracks, however, adds an entirely new rhythmical sequence and mood to the mix. With a vast array of layered sound effects, Scintilli has a captivating range. Its infectious loops and spliced styles – hazy pop, acid house, dubstep, glitch – fade in and out in a confused muddle. Yet the mingling of these divergent electronic sounds creates a pleasant disconnect, perfect for eclectic IDM fans.

- Text by Lauren Zens.

Honorable Mentions

Apparat: The Devil’s Walk (Mute)

Bonnie "Prince" Billy / Phantom Family Halo: Mindeater (Knitting Factory)

Brutal Truth: End Time (Relapse)

Extreme Noise Terror: Holocaust In My Head (Candlelight)

Bill Frisell: All We Are Saying (Savoy Jazz)

Itsnotyouitsme: Everybody’s Pain is Magnificent (New Amsterdam)

The Janks: Hands of Time (Sprouted Records)

Junius / Rosetta: Split (Translation Loss)

Rudresh Mahanthappa: Samdhi (ACT Music & Vision)

Jono McCleery: There Is (Counter)

Rwake: Rest (Relapse)

Matt Stevens: Relic

Tom Vek: Leisure Seizure (Downtown / CO-OP USA / Island)

Craig Wedren: Wand (Nerveland)

Wilco: The Whole Love (dBpm Records)

yMusic: Beautiful Mechanical (New Amsterdam)

Empty Space Orchestra: "Exit Strategy"

Empty Space Orchestra is a Bend, Oregon-based space-prog-fusion (feel free to add any number of additional hybrid genres here) quintet composed of classically trained musicians. ESO's self-titled new album — a nine-song, 50-minute, jam-filled harmonic exploration — doesn't come out until May 10, but today ALARM presents an exclusive track to whet your appetite.

The song, "Exit Strategy," builds to truly fierce heights as guitars, horns, and pianos pile atop one another like precariously placed Jenga pieces. Just when you think that the center cannot possibly hold, ESO reels things back in with an abrupt tempo change. After you check out the track above, hop over to YouTube and watch a surprisingly high-quality video of ESO performing "Exit Strategy" at the Les Schwab Amphitheater in Bend right here.

The forthcoming Empty Space Orchestra was recorded with engineer Robert Cheek, known for his work with Deftones and Tera Melos, and mixed by Matt Bayles, who's worked with Mastodon and Isis, among others.

[Have you pre-ordered yet? Don't miss our limited-time offer, saving up to 38%, for Chromatic: The Crossroads of Color and Music, our next book that profiles independent musicians and artists who explore color in unorthodox ways.]

The Secret: Solve Et Coagula (Southern Lord, 9/28/10)

The Secret: "Double Slaughter"

The Secret: "Double Slaughter"

When Goodfellow Records folded this year, Italian grindcore/black-metal quartet The Secret found itself momentarily without a label following a pair of raging, nihilism-fueled full-length albums.  Those releases suggested (if not insisted) that the group had something new to bring to European metal’s increasingly crowded table.

In the wake of the former label’s dissolution (and the band’s countless lineup changes since), The Secret attempts to regain its footing on Solve Et Coagula, its first outing for Southern Lord and an album almost workmanlike in its sound, structure, and unwavering metal attack.

Nothing on Solve Et Coagula even hints at lessening that punch.  There are no stops and no clean guitars, and the only tempo changes move from sludgy, noise-soaked slow grooves (like opener “Cross Builder”) to relentless thrash assaults (like “Death Alive”).

Because of this single-mindedness, standouts like “Pursuit Of Discomfort” are usually followed by more expected, by-the-books numbers such as “Weatherman.”  The album's scant 35 minutes, however, might imply that it wasn't designed as an adventure but rather a challenge, the band almost daring the listener to turn away.

Though The Secret's influences stem from a multitude of bands, the group just as clearly owes a debt to a few specific others, from the Pig Destroyer-esque downbeat grind of “Antitalian” to the time-honored death template laid out by Death on “Bell Of Urgency,” to the vague snare-happy nod to early Mastodon on “Eve Of The Last Day.” But this constant shuffling lets Solve Et Coagula walk the line between a compelling listen and an outright unsettling musical experience: drums a-pounding, bass almost wiped entirely from the mix, guitars firing in unison, and vocals screamed into pure all-in-the-red-all-the-time distortion without pause and without hesitation.

But whatever the mode, the band shows time and again that it knows how to write a great riff, even if not always how best to employ it. By the time the over-the-top circular grind of “1968” yields to a droning guitar beneath Charles Bukowski reading his cataclysmic “Dinosauria, We,” the album has left its finest moments to stand not as a statement but yet another hint at things to come (or, if not a hint, then perhaps a well-sharpened threat). The band may have lost a label and a member or two, but the abrasiveness that defined it from the outset still burns as brightly as ever, lighting the way as The Secret follows itself further into darkness.

The Sword’s third full-length album, Warp Riders, is blown open by a deep, thunderous chug. It’s a hefty, bowel-distressing rumble, one almost better fit for the avant-garde drone of Sunn O))) rather than Austin, Texas’ resident titans of stoner metal. But in less than a minute’s time, this uneasy intro gives way to a fireworks display of furious riffs, courtesy of the band’s dueling axe men, J.D. Cronise and Kyle Shutt. In no time flat, the nebulous red herring that kicks off the roaring, high-speed instrumental is but a forgotten memory.

The Sword: Warp Riders

Following the intense yet melodic works of its first two albums, Age of Winters in 2006 and Gods of the Earth in 2008, The Sword stays true to its heavy, hook-laden aesthetic, delivering its most accessible album in Warp Riders (Kemado). More of a rock-’n’-roll band blessed with a superhuman heaviness passed down from Valhalla than a strictly defined metal band, The Sword bolsters each of the album’s 10 songs with infectious melodies, from the fist-pumping chorus of “Tres Brujas” to the exotic riffs that kick off “Arrows in the Dark.”

“I’m sick of bands with no good melodies,” Shutt says, citing bands like Queen and Thin Lizzy as the biggest influences on his band’s sound. “You can be shredding solos all day, but if there’s no melody, there’s nothing for people to latch onto.”

Deft fretwork is an essential part of The Sword’s makeup, but never at the expense of a complete package. After having taken more of a raw approach to their prior two albums, Shutt, Cronise, bassist Bryan Richie, and drummer Trivett Wingo spent more time fleshing out their songs before entering the studio, ensuring that they had worked out any kinks and tied up every loose end before the first click of the “record” button.

“J.D. will bring in a song, or I’ll bring in a song, and then we let Brian and Trivett come in, and we just play it over and over again until we’re comfortable with it,” Shutt says. “We’ve gotten a lot better at songwriting; it just takes one or two practices for us to come out with a song. We just spent more time shaping things, so it was more polished and ready to go.”

The resultant album is the band’s most polished and most focused to date, flowing seamlessly from the Holy Diver-influenced heavy groove of “Lawless Lands,” to the tempo-shifting dynamics of “Astraea’s Dream,” to the streamlined power-chord punch of “Night City.” Though the songwriting reveals that the band has grown creatively since its 2006 debut, much of the sonic clarity and texture comes courtesy of producer Matt Bayles (Isis, Mastodon, Minus the Bear), making Warp Riders the first Sword release not produced by the band.

“He brought out the best in us,” Shutt says. “We would let ourselves get away with things that he wouldn’t. He would really crack the whip. But it took a lot of pressure off of us. In the past, we would spend 12 hours a day, for three weeks straight, just mixing the record. And at the end, I would want to bang my head against the wall.”

Shutt says that the band had a simple goal for the album: “We just wanted to make a 10-track, 45-minute rock-’n’-roll record.” With Warp Riders, The Sword has succeeded on that front, and then some. Contained within those 45 minutes are some of the most dazzling intersections of tunefulness and beastly metal dynamics in recent memory , yielding the rare album that can appeal to both head-bangers and rock traditionalists alike.

The band’s music is, of course, challenging. Not content to be just fast, brutal, and dark, Converge has consistently, and successfully, pushed every boundary in any category you wish to place it: hardcore, metal, thrash, punk. None of these will fit neatly on Converge.

In Bannon’s own words, “We’re not an easy band to get into. We’re a very abrasive band, very harsh band, a very polarizing band. If somebody’s used to contemporary metal records [and] they hear a band like us, it’s just a big load of trashy noise. If a punk kid hears our band now, he’s used to big singing choruses, pop punk, emotional rock, [and] we’re way too off-putting; we’re vocally way too harsh. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.” (This is what John Darnielle means when he says that metal-core “craves marginalization.”)

This approach has borne some dark and spectacular fruit for Converge. The only way in which it might be considered dull is in the consistency of its critical acclaim. Album after album over the past 15 years has found the band red-lining various critical meters — 10 stars, six skulls, eight guitars, whatever — with its champions escalating in number since the release of its breakthrough, Jane Doe.

That album shellacked Converge’s status as cult gods; it was immediately a touchstone for the hardcore-punk community. Not that it matters to them: “If there’s any key to longevity,” Bannon says, “it’s this: don’t give a shit about what other people think.”

Axe to Fall again finds Converge redefining the game. The band brought in some heavy hitters from around the hardcore and metal communities — members of Cave In, Disfear, and Neurosis pitched in — partly because, as Bannon explains, “Even though [the members of Converge] all come from different places, we’re still very used to working together.

Having these outside people involved made the process longer, more complex. Introducing some other people into something that’s…so comfortable almost forces you to become challenged.”

Showcasing both sides of their famously split musical genetics, the first track “Dark Horse” opens with a freakishly speedy, I-can’t-feel-my-face drum and guitar attack and grafts on the stop-start blasts of hardcore. For the listener, it’s something like being bolted to a giant paint shaker. Axe to Fall gets sludgier about halfway through, but Converge mostly keeps to the quick attack, resisting the prog impulses of some of their colleagues in favor of precision and ferocity.

There’s a clarity and simplicity to it, with each element — Koller’s impossible drumming, Bannon’s intensity, Ballou’s frenzied riffs — showing in high relief against the others. Not only does the entire album command attention, but each part of it commands attention.

As bassist Nate Newton says (in an interview on Converge’s site), “My favorite records over the years were records that—they challenged you. You had to listen to it; you couldn’t just put it on and have it in the background, like ‘Oooh, I love it.’”

Though this is a few weeks old, Ratatat's newest release just arrived in our office, and it definitely deserves some belated love.

Originating from the electro-rock duo's LP3 sessions, LP4 has been criticized as a "dressing up" of an old model, splashing new instruments over a tried-and-true sound. The reality, however, is that LP4 is an entirely different beast.

Ratatat's members, Evan Mast and Mike Stroud, have used their recordings to combine assorted electronics with guitar and bass. Each release has gotten denser and more diverse, but LP4 stands apart as the most dynamic — and possibly the best written.

In addition to the IDM elements and synthesized funkiness, LP4 features a string quartet alongside horns, piano, slide guitar, and harpsichord. High-pitched guitar harmonies occasionally steal the show, but the moody effect of the strings can't be overstated.

In all, the album is Ratatat's finest, a beautiful and multifaceted work that reflects a duo hitting its stride.

Ratatat: "Bilar"
Ratatat: \"Bilar\"

Mastodon: Jonah Hex / Revenge Gets Ugly EP (Reprise)

Released digitally, here we have four brand-new Mastodon instrumentals (plus two alternate versions) for the Jonah Hex soundtrack. The score itself is divided between Mastodon's frenetic, down-tuned metal and the western atmosphere of composer Marco Beltrami.

Beltrami is a renowned and Grammy-nominated composer, but his works go much deeper than the repetitive, sweeping orchestral scores that normally are nominated. His material for the 2007 version of 3:10 to Yuma, for example, combined twangy leads, clever melodies, percussive drama, and sinister sounds in a sort of neoclassical ode to Italian westerns.

Combined with Mastodon's driving, punishing style, the Jonah Hex soundtrack delivers a fantastic mix of power and mood. It seems perfectly suited for the aesthetics of the movie — even if that movie is getting terrible reviews.

Eternia & MoSS: At Last (Fat Beats)

At just 26 years of age, Ottawa native Eternia already has three albums worth of bona-fide rap jams under her belt.

Far from the novelty acts or chorus crooners that are most females in modern hip hop, Eternia can flat-out bring it, dropping a harder delivery than most of her male counterparts who play the tough-guy card. At Last, her fourth full-length, was built by MoSS, an ascending producer whose head-nodding style works with Eternia's rawness.

A handful of other powerful female MCs make cameos, including Rah Digga, Jean Grae, Rage, and Tiye Phoenix. None can steal the spotlight from Eternia, however, and At Last is sure to garner more acclaim for the Juno-nominated rapper.

Eternia & MoSS: "It's Funny" f. Joell Ortiz
Eternia & MoSS: \"It\'s Funny\"

Steel Train: s/t + Terrible Thrills Vol. 1 (Terrible Thrills)

For those not into lovelorn lyrics and breathy vocals, Steel Train may strike listeners as more of the same melodramatic pop music.

Giving it a chance, however, might just make the New Jersey quintet a "guilty pleasure" indie-pop infatuation — if listeners feel guilty at all.

Having parted ways with co-founder Scott Irby-Ranniar and having departed from Drive-Thru Records, Steel Train is as spot-on as ever, delivering a disc full of mile-high melodies. Front man and principal songwriter Jack Antonoff may divide listeners with his sickly sweet vocals, but the band's easy yet infectious melodies are supported by a potent backdrop.

Swelling strings, scaling guitars, and rubbery bass lines tussle with punctuating piano, bubbly synthesizers, and other aural accessories to make this self-titled album a pop gem. And if you'd like to hear the entire album redone by pop darlings, check out Terrible Thrills Vol. 1 — an accompaniment that features each song with a different female lead, including Scarlett Johansson, Tegan & Sara, Angel Deradoorian, Amanda Palmer, and Holly Miranda.

Steel Train: "Turnpike Ghost"
Steel Train: \"Turnpike Ghost\"

Honorable Mentions

Africa Hitech: Hitecherous vinyl EP (Warp)

Amad-Jamal: Barely Hanging On: The Chronicle of a Brotha Like Rodney King (Urban Umpires)

Ceschi: The One-Man Band Broke Up (Fake Four)

Charming Hostess: The Bowls Project (Tzadik)

Vieux Farka Touré: Live (Six Degrees)

Knut: Wonder (Hydra Head)

The Main Street Gospel: Love Will Have Her Revenge (Tee Pee)

Mass Shivers: Contoured Heat (Licking River)

Pan Sonic: Gravitoni (Blast First Petite)

John Zorn: The Goddess: Music for the Ancient of Days (Tzadik)

“I just love acoustic guitar and the combination of heavy guitars and acoustic thumbing,” Hufnagel says. The guitarist’s style is a big reason why this record sounds so dynamic and compelling after more than one listen. Critics have dubbed the band as everything from technical post-rock, which doesn’t jibe with Dysrhythmia’s jarring immediacy, to prog metal, which again would suggest the music puts on airs that it simply doesn’t.

In the past, the band’s approach to recording has been to bring the forceful energy of its live show to a 50-odd-minute album. Throw in high-profile producers Steve Albini, who produced the band’s highly acclaimed 2003 Pretest (Relapse) album, and Martin Bisi, whose bona fides include working with Brian Eno and producing scores of classic underground artists (Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch, John Zorn, Sereena Maneesh), and you have the structure that birthed the band’s last two records.

But this time was different. Although the band would’ve loved to work with Bisi again, he had retired. Thankfully, they had a ready solution to the question of who would produce the new album in bassist Colin Marston, a sound engineer who has worked with the likes of Genghis Tron and Child Abuse. The band decided to hole up in their Brooklyn apartment and record the album on their own.

The relative freedom of being able to take their time to record led the band to explore new directions. “It allowed me to do more things guitar-wise as far as adding a lot of orchestral embellishments, more guitar layers,” Hufnagel says. “There’s lots of stuff to listen to in the mix. I wasn’t concerned with it sounding exactly like we do live; that can get boring.”

Although their intensity never wavers, playing live and recording are definitely two different things for Dysrhythmia. Hufnagel is happy to start using the studio as a more exploratory stage to craft songs that the band has played for sometimes up to two whole years before recording.

The lapse in time could be partially explained by the band members’ own hyperactive involvement in other projects. Hufnagel recently released a full-length solo album entitled Songs for the Disappeared; Hufnagel and Marston are new members of recently reformed Canadian metallers Gorguts; and Marston was, until December of 2008, still working with his former band Behold…the Arctopus.

“We all have so many different things now. So rather than try to throw it all into one band and end up sounding like Mr. Bungle or something, we’d rather really focus our energy elsewhere,” he says.

And right now the energy is focused on Dysrhythmia. Where contemporaries such as Mastodon and Isis have taken off in the past few years thanks to a burgeoning interest in independent metal, Dysrhythmia is still lurking in the shadows, nursing a fan base that’s been created during a decade of touring.

Hufnagel sighs heavily when I remind him of his band‘s age — it’s not a sigh of defeat, of course, but simply one of amazement. This is a band that has earned its following, not gained it overnight; and Hufnagel knows that in many ways, that’s the following that you want to have.

I’ve never seen Metalocalypse on Adult Swim, though the premise of an animated series about a metal band sounds hilarious, and I’d never heard Dethklok before, but when I heard that Converge and High on Fire, two groundbreaking artists with compelling rock shows, along with prog-metal stalwarts Mastodon, were on tour  opening for a cartoon, I had to go to Chicago's Aragon Ballroom on October 17 to see for myself.

I’m not knocking Deathklok—the live band sounded great, despite deliberately playing second fiddle to the large screen above—but I still can’t wrap my head around the idea that thousands more people would prefer to shell out their hard-earned cash to see a cartoon (albeit, a cartoon with a live soundtrack), then to see a badass rock ’n’ roll show on it’s own.

Not to mention that prior to the evening’s headliner, the screen was used to run advertisements for the Metalocalypse DVD. Spinal Tap-ish? Maybe. Disheartening? Definitely.

The good news is that each band was exposed to new audience members for the first time (after all, the Aragon does hold 4500 people), which will hopefully lead to more good things to come. High on Fire introduced a badass new song, most likely evidence of a killer record to come in 2010, and Converge put on a thrilling show, showcasing material from their incredible new album Axe to Fall (Epitaph).

Still, next time I’ll stay at home and watch Metalocaplypse on the small screen before heading out to a show to rock my face off.

-Jamie Ludwig

Baroness: Blue Record (Relapse)

Staying within a chromatic theme, Georgian (US) metal quartet Baroness follows the success of its Red Album with Blue Record, a disc, like its predecessor, that's chock full of riffs.

Through 12 tracks, Southern psychedelia exists amid down-tuned chugs and both vocal gruffness and harmonies. More harmonies, in the form of high-note guitar leads, rain upon a no-nonsense foundation of rhythms.

Blue Record is a riff lover's delight, but tracks such as "Steel That Sleeps the Eye" more resemble Fleet Foxes than Mastodon, and the classic disco/dance syncopation appears on "Swollen and Halo." As a result, Blue Record is an engaging addition to a promising catalog.

Sole and the Skyrider Band: Plastique (Fake Four)

The 2007 self-titled disc from Sole and the Skyrider Band marked a turning point in the career of rapper Tim Holland, a mainstay of the Anticon crew whose style reflects the label's moody sounds. The self-titled disc merged Sole's alt raps and production with live musicians, and though it was a sound "debut," this second foray into life as a group is immensely more evolved.

Plastique is delicately constructed, with breakbeats that give way to somber string vibratos and pizzicatos, dense atmospherics, and ghostly samples. Guitars weave in and out of a mix that brims with layers. All totaled, Plastique sounds like another step in the logical progression of hip hop.

Shawn Lee & Clutchy Hopkins: Fascinating Fingers (Ubiquity)

Uber-eclectic electro-funk multi-instrumentalist Shawn Lee joins forces once more with Clutchy Hopkins, a musician of international mystery, for down-tempo jams that call on lounge vibes, minimalist grooves, and backing strings.

Fans of each musician should dig Fascinating Fingers, the latest collaboration between two men whose sounds mesh with ease.

Honorable mentions:

Del The Funky Homosapien: Parallel Uni-Verses (Gold Dust)
The Flaming Lips: Embryonic (Warner Bros.)
Lightning Bolt: Earthly Delights (Load)
Imaad Wasif: The Voidist (Tee Pee)