Bandleader, guitarist, and sole original member Bill Davis has put in a lot of miles over the course of Dash Rip Rock’s four-decade-long run, but don’t mistake his band for an old clunker. Dash’s current incarnation—which features drummer Wade Hymel and bassist Izzy Grisoli alongside Davis—weaves in and out of lanes with great proficiency on A Song In Everyone. The frantic “2 Much 2 Do” and the fiery “Hell & Back” turn the band’s signature cowpunk rock’n’roll into fuel-guzzling speed chases. In contrast, their slow take on Scott Long’s “River” runs deep with emotion as Davis looks his own mortality in the face, proclaiming his desire to be buried in the river and that “When I die, I’ll be free forever.” The band continues to expand their palette in new directions, such as fusing Huey “Piano” Smith-esque keys with The Beatles’ “Mean Mr. Mustard.” Dash recorded A Song In Everyone at the former Fat Possum studio in Water Valley, Mississippi under the guidance of Drive-By Trucker Matt Patton, who encouraged the band to abandon guitar pedals and embrace the maximum impact of simplicity. He also encouraged the band to namecheck Rush Limbaugh on the catchy upbeat single turned drugged-out downer “Pain Pills Never Expire.” Even after all these years, Dash Rip Rock are continuing to make albums that remind us why Davis earned a spot in the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame. —William Archambeault
As the weaponization of technology against the citizenry of the world accelerates at an alarming pace, Mancunian industrial noise punk quartet Mandy, Indiana reminds us of the radical roots of electronic music. URGH, their second full-length, does not shy away from the band’s commitment to interrogating power at all levels through their music. The songs on URGH hit you in the mind and viscera, urging you to move both literally and metaphorically. Lead singer Valentine Caulfield mostly sings in her native French, allowing her tone and the accompanying music to provide context clues for anyone unfamiliar. Discordant synths and beats accompany jagged guitar work as Caulfield interrogates structural violence at all levels: from rape culture (“I’ll Ask Her”) to the ongoing genocide in Gaza (“ist halt so”). On “Life Hex,” the light as a feather, stiff as a board scene from The Craft is sampled as Caulfied rages against the realities of growing up in a sexist society, amplified by the frenzied playing of drummer Alex Macdougall and guitarist Scott Fair. URGH is a complex and powerful album that compels you to stare down the encroaching apocalyptic forces. On “Dodecahedron,” Caulfield directly addresses us, the listeners, on where we stand as fascism rises and the world burns. Translated from the French, she demands: “Do you want to be remembered / As someone who clapped as the bombs rained down? …Stand up and march.” —Mary Beth Campbell
Power pop trio Mars & Other Planets is part of the new wave of female-fronted projects in the New Orleans independent music scene. Since their founding by frontperson Marissa Douglas in 2023, the band has undergone several iterations. Originally conceived as a folk rock project, the band’s sound has moved on to progressive power pop and rock with musical theatre undertones. With their latest release, Dialectics, Mars & Other Planets delves into a slightly heavier sound, tapping influences from doom metal, grunge, and ‘90s alternative. Opening track “Fever” starts with a sludgy guitar line, keys, and heavy drums before settling into darker pop. “Turnouts” invokes Concrete Blonde, the blues, and David Bowie in his glam rock years through the filter of a musical theatre kid. This transition from darker rock to a lighter pop sound is a pattern they follow on all seven tracks of Dialectics. The songs are catchy and polished, but it feels as though they are playing it safe when the doom rock and grunge elements are actually what make the songs more interesting. Since they have a history of reinvention, hopefully they will learn to embrace this side of their music on future projects. —Mary Beth Campbell
Conduit / Traces, the latest double single from multi-hyphenate and New Orleans scene stalwart Laura Fisher (affiliated projects include Avery Island BCE, loucey, Lyla George, and People Museum), has been waiting to make its debut for years. Written and recorded over a decade ago, the dark, ethereal pop songs are deftly crafted. Sweet melodies are offset by ominous drones and introspective lyrics, creating a dreamlike and almost surreal atmosphere—Fisher cites Björk, Portishead, and David Lynch among the influences for these songs. Think of Conduit / Traces as a two-chapter philosophical novella. On opener “Conduit,” industrial beats accompany Fisher’s clear vocals as she meditates on the question, “why can’t we be / a conduit – but not the flesh?” before seamlessly transitioning into “Traces,” which changes focus to a more personal narrative (“Weaving my web / between satellites / can you feel me? / are you caught yet?”). Fisher does not provide answers but instead has created a mysterious, heady musical world that invites the listener to take the time to delve in and engage in their own interpretation and contemplation of the music and the connections it forms in their own mind. —Mary Beth Campbell
Micah McKee has been part of the indie scene in New Orleans for over 20 years. From Silent Cinema to Little Maker and Empress Hotel—just to name a few of his bands—he has brought his songwriting gift to almost every dusty little bar the city has to offer. On his latest solo release under the moniker Lonesome Wilde, McKee aims to capture the contradictions of being human—in his words, “how beauty and chaos can exist side by side.” The album opens with “Sugar in the Dust,” an atmospheric track that starts with sparse acoustics before the piano and drums come tumbling in alongside McKee’s salt-of-the-earth vocals (though he’s employing more growl than I’ve heard him use in the past). “Beautiful Animal” follows with a polished early aughts indie feel before “Chamomile” enters, a tender and intimate love song clocking in at just over a minute. Standout track “Whispers of Endymion” is up next and it’s the most layered offering on the album, featuring Revivalists guitarist Zack Feinberg. From here, things take a bit of a turn. “Mean Man” comes in a bit jarring with the synths, but on the other hand it shows the most dominant and commanding vocals of any track on the record. “Abundances Pt. 2” is fully instrumental and while it’s a pleasant track, it feels a bit odd in the sequencing. “Heart in the Street” brings us back to that polished indie feel. Then “Miracle by Degrees” plunges us back into indie folk before “Gravity’s Darling” scales the coaster into the big sound of heavy piano and distorted vocals (some excellent horn and percussion work on this one as well). The album ends with “Scratch the Record” (country folk), “Crown of Atoms” (back to atmospheric indie), and “Where I Leave You” (a folksy strummer clocking in under two minutes). At numerous points in the record, I found myself reflecting that it couldn’t seem to make up its mind about what it wanted to be. I imagine this was an intentional choice to highlight the theme of contradictions in the human experience. And while all of the component pieces are enjoyable—and some are exquisite—the pacing choices took me out of the moment more than once. McKee calls this record his most personal to-date, and you can feel that when you listen to the songs individually. I think they’ll be beautiful when performed live and selections from the record are compelling, even if the full album experience as a whole is a little disjointed. —Erin Hall
As someone who came up in a time when indie music was still very much white, cis male-dominated—with all the issues inherent in that sort of environment—it is refreshing and beautiful to see the tides begin to change, especially in this fraught time in human history. Singer-songwriter Lyla George is part of this new and exciting era in New Orleans music, as was made evident at her packed album release show in January. Soup for Lunch is a lushly produced collection of introspective and witty songs, veering more into the experimental than standard guitar-driven indie rock. George is not afraid to play around with genre—elements of psychedelic, trip-hop, folk, orchestral pop, and dream pop can all be heard woven throughout the album. Standout tracks include the groovy and sneakily existential “loose ends” and “the alchemist,” which invokes both Andrew Bird and The Bends-era Radiohead. While George draws from specific experiences in her early 20s, there is a gravity and maturity to the songs that make them universal. Soup for Lunch succeeds in reimagining indie rock for a different time and reality—it is music made by an artist interested in a greater world and community instead of the male-dominated navel gazing of yore. —Mary Beth Campbell
Library music popped its head above ground in the ‘90s and 2000s when DJs hunting for distinguishing beats began to look beyond rare R&B, funk, and jazz. Library music refers to music literally made for music libraries that television and movie producers could visit when they didn’t have the budget to commission soundtrack music. The recently reissued Italian Library Breaks by the Modern Sound Quartet (MSQ) illustrates the genre’s charms. The 10 tracks on this box set of five seven-inch singles have just enough personality to make magic when paired with the right scene, but not so much that it might distract. There’s no signature sound because the MSQ varies moods, tempos, and grooves to create music that might suit different scenes and films. They’re accomplished, but they rarely show off. Library music’s heyday came during the mid-1960s to mid-1980s, and a lot of fetishized sounds that went in and out of vogue give these tracks life. The Moog solo in “Taurus” elevates a chase scene beat, and a breathy flute line combined with the pillowy chords on a Fender Rhodes electric piano suggests new love. MSQ’s Oscar Rocchi and many of the library greats should be thought of next to Willie Hutch, Isaac Hayes, and the artists who made Blaxploitation soundtracks because they display their creativity on the margins. The compositions work with very familiar building blocks, and we hear their creativity in the way they manipulate them into something new. —Alex Rawls
Although not expressly named or identified as such, the black dog of depression sits, eats, and sometimes snarls amongst its brothers in this new release from Oh Dang. This local five-piece have made a record that is brutally honest and intense, portraying a bristled frustration with both exterior and interior worlds. Opening with “OKC,” both vocalists (Tyler Ryan and Harper Browman) question whether they can “make it out alive,” before moving on to detail bouts of existential pain that feel pure rather than performative. With the clear influence of a country vocal combined with heavier guitars, the record veers between emotional states—from the gentler cut “Give Me Love,” acting as a romantic confessional, to “Harddown” which seems to evoke the nuts and bolts of a full-scale breakdown, asking, “does anybody care where the hell I’ve been?” “Fires” announces the anguish of a break-up, asking almost sarcastically, “Ain’t it so much easier without me?” The music tells us that we can never quite be sure. The record feels genuinely timely in a moment where solidarity and love feel more important than ever. With Big Dogs, Oh Dang has made something that feels like a blistering revelation of pain, a pain that appeals so irrevocably to mutual compassion. —Eva Karl
A songwriting device that never seems to get old is “sad lyrics over a happy tune.” It’s the emotional juxtaposition that makes a song like “Hey Ya!” by Outkast eternally great. Timeout Room’s sophomore album, Celebration Station, is full of this kind of conflict, exploring escapism, depression, anxiety, and antisocial tendencies. Led by Stuart Taylor McCrary (a.k.a. S.T. McCrary) of Baton Rouge band Melters, this record sounds far more adeptly recorded and produced than Timeout Room’s debut Tight-Ass Goku Pictures, which is flatter by comparison. That album was also weirder and more playful, with radio DJ skits and ad-libs, making it more outsider pop à la Daniel Johnston. While some of that is maintained on the new record (see “Mrs. McClintock’s School of Fucking Drums”), Celebration Station delivers more of the infectious choruses, snotty vocals, and jangly guitars that made the debut so promising—like Gin Blossoms meets Mission of Burma. One track that stood out to me in particular was “All Away,” an upbeat song about dead friends and coping with grief through denial. Despite best efforts to live in a dream, stubborn and casual reminders like abandoned buildings, out-of-service phone numbers, and old keys jolt McCrary back to reality. In this historical moment, it’s tempting to fall into escapism. McCrary doesn’t really offer a solution, but he does write some cathartic tunes. —Dalton Spangler
New Orleans-based duo Twisted Teens refined their signature blend of garage rock, punk, and country for their sophomore album Blame The Clown. Although an unofficial version existed on YouTube months prior, the official release poetically landed on Friday the 13th right before Mardi Gras Day and with far better production quality to boot. Despite being composed only of Caspian “CPN” Hollywell (who writes every part but steel guitar) and “Razor” Ramon Santos (the steel guitarist), Twisted Teens sound like a complete band from the weird mixture of fuzzy drums and crunchy guitar with egg punk-like synthetic drums and keys—all the while accented by Santos’ harmonious steel co-starring Hollywell’s raspy vocals. “Not Real” feels particularly poignant as a literal wake-up alarm, challenging (perhaps Hollywell himself) to embrace authenticity, especially when it’s uncomfortable. Not to harp on the political moment too much, but this track’s haggard delivery of lines like “this culture of conflict avoidance, creates people who internalize cowardice” stack again and again to create this painfully accurate picture of complacency today that is, in fact, so real. Twisted Teens didn’t reinvent their sound on this record all that much, but they didn’t need to. They just fully realized what the already solid debut and EP set up. —Dalton Spangler
I would not recommend doing your taxes to W-9’s self-titled demo. In truth, I don’t think any punk rock can soundtrack the civil duty of annually checking your adjusted gross income or calculating write-offs. In an even truer truth, tithing to the federal government under the duress of state-sponsored violence doesn’t have a punk vibe at all. However, theming the aesthetics of your band around the dry, gray culture of tax forms and the IRS does seem weirdly apt. In the Devo “Nu-Tra” phase kind of way, this band reclaims the mundane tax season that so rudely interrupts Carnival and makes it into something far less anxiety-inducing. Comprised of some all-star locals from various projects like T.A.C.K., Tonya, SPLLIT, Guts Club, and Dre Perish (the man and the music), W-9 has a wiry sound thanks to its lo-fi, “demo” quality recording—softening the low-ends while sharpening the stringy guitars and fuzzy vintage phone vocals (also used by vocalist Emma Ledgerwood in T.A.C.K). On the opener “Nun,” killer guitar riffs spike over a thumping bass groove that lands with Ledgerwood’s maniacal vocals and breaks down into a menacing chorus. Clattering drums, shrieking guitars, and snotty vocals continue on “Mommy,” while “Bubble Gum Lady” features each band member playing off in different directions without the song totally unraveling. Although it’s unlikely I’ll get a refund from this brief demo, it does make me look forward to what the band files again next tax season. —Dalton Spangler
Historical fiction, crime, drama, boxing, an examination of race and class—The Blackbirds of St. Giles fills many niches. It’s a novel set in 1780s London, but the majority of the narrative doesn’t take place in the ritzy upper crust of society where people wear powdered wigs and sip tea—most of it stays right in the slums. The main characters are siblings Daniel and Pearl, survivors of a slave revolt on the island of Jamaica in the 1760s. Daniel eventually works his way into being a decorated officer for the British Redcoats and is a veteran of the American Revolutionary War. He grows close to a white British Redcoat general and his wife, who become parental figures to Daniel and Pearl, and upon his death, the general bequeaths Daniel and Pearl his last name, as well as an inheritance that would have them set up for life. But when Daniel and Pearl arrive in London from America to take what is theirs, they run into a snag: The white army officer’s brother refuses to give what is owed to them because they are Black. From there, the duo are thrown into the slums, where Daniel is forced into servitude for a crime-lord who runs St. Giles. Daniel has to find a way out of the precarious situation through the aid of a secret society of free Black men scheming to take back what they believe they are owed. The attention to detail and the research that went into this book make the setting come to life. The prose is beautiful and kinetic, propelling you from page to page, making this an easy read. Though slow at points, the pace extracts moments of tension from the relationships of the fully fleshed-out characters. If you can make it past the enraging opening portions of the book, you’ll find a narrative that is as enthralling as it is devastating, as brutal as it is hopeful. The dichotomy makes it a worthwhile read, especially for those who love historical fiction and bingeable reads with heart. —Danny Cherry Jr.
My Life Under Deadline celebrates veteran music writer Cree McCree‘s career thus far. This collection showcases decades of pieces that first appeared in publications ranging from Spin to OffBeat, covering big names (former Stones guitarist Mick Taylor, boogie king John Lee Hooker, and songsmith Rickie Lee Jones) alongside lesser-known names (local rockers Malevitus, Cajun punk band Bas Clas, and the shuttered New Orleans venue SideBar). My Life Under Deadline serves as a testament to the power of prose and personal perspective. Regardless of a subject’s notoriety (or lack thereof), McCree always finds a unique angle through which to consider her muses, allowing readers to immerse themselves in the text regardless of if they’ve ever heard a single note from the profiled artist. McCree is the rare type of figure who was unafraid to hop into a van and follow Blues Traveler around the country in her mid-40s. That type of passion bleeds onto pages that have since circulated for decades. Perhaps McCree’s biggest passion is for New Orleans and its rich musical culture. McCree covered local artists from afar during her time in New York and in their natural habitat after moving to the city she has called home for decades. McCree has more than earned the right to describe her work, distilled in the book’s subtitle, as “Frontline Dispatches from a Trailblazing Woman Music Writer.” —William Archambeault
Murder Bimbo is a semi-satirical thriller told from the perspective of a sex worker turned political assassin. She recounts killing a misogynistic rising star of right-wing U.S. politics she dubs “Meat Neck,” and her collaborations with a white supremacist group infiltrated by a federal agent, three times: first to the host of a You’re Wrong About-style podcast called Justice for Bimbos, signing emails with the pseudonym Murder Bimbo; then to an ex-girlfriend; and finally to the reader, changing her tone, background, and motivations each time. It’s an interesting concept, and a fairly witty story told by an intriguing though highly unreliable narrator. But the novel feels flat overall. Characters other than the narrator are underdeveloped or presented in contradictory ways that make them hard to grasp, thanks to the multi-narrative approach. Though the plot on first blush feels ultracontemporary, author Rebecca Novack never provides any real detail about the novel’s political ecosystem or the assassination’s ramifications—it’s not even clear if it’s set precisely in our world. Ultimately, what’s most memorable about Murder Bimbo may be the implicit notion that “ascending right-wing demagogue” is now essentially a stock character. —Steven Melendez
Enemy of my Enemy is a novel written about beloved street-level superhero Daredevil (a.k.a. Matthew Murdock), the red spandex-clad acrobatic crimefighter who defends Hell’s Kitchen, armed with nothing but his escrima sticks. Oh, and his super senses: Daredevil is blind. Frank Castle/Punisher allegedly murders Daredevil’s biggest nemesis and the city’s crime lord, Wilson Fisk, a.k.a. Kingpin. In the process, Punisher kills a cop. But Daredevil isn’t buying that story—Punisher doesn’t kill cops. In his capacity as lawyer Matthew Murdock, he defends Punisher and loses business in the process, while in his capacity as Daredevil he tries to solve the mystery, sparking gang wars in the process that involve ninjas, cyborgs, superpowered crime lords, and more. Murdock contends with all of this while trying to maintain his sanity and a new relationship. Alex Segura, an award-winning crime writer, knew his shit when it came to depicting the messiness and complexity of Ol’ Hornhead. He captures how Murdock’s Catholicism conflicts with his propensity to violence, how being an officer of the court conflicts with his extrajudicial justice, and the way he struggles to keep it all together. This book would be loved best by those familiar with the world of Marvel, but no prior knowledge is needed. The book is entertaining, but a few of the twists wouldn’t hold up to deep scrutiny. However, this isn’t a book meant to be too closely scrutinized—it’s a thrill ride, plain and simple. —Danny Cherry Jr.
New Orleans history is replete with artists who briefly spent time in the city, leaving behind enough of a legend to keep the tour guides busy—Edgar Degas, William Faulkner, and Trent Reznor, to name a few. Add to that list a young Walt Whitman, who lived near Lafayette Square for a few months in 1848, writing and editing for a newspaper called the Daily Crescent before returning to his native New York. Whitman scholars Stefan Schöberlein (who previously edited a collection of Whitman’s New Orleans-focused writings for LSU Press) and Zachary Turpin make that short stay fascinating while exploring underreported aspects of 1800s New Orleans and the journalism of that era, like informal postal links between newspapers that allowed for the sharing of reporting in a pre-wired period, and probing how New Orleans shaped Whitman’s thoughts on issues like slavery. It’s an engaging book that should appeal to anyone interested in New Orleans history, but much of Whitman’s own New Orleans writing excerpted here has—through no fault of these authors—little to offer modern readers. Some of his cringey approaches to covering race, gender, and Crescent City life will be recognizable, though, down to his casual misspelling of “Techoupitoulas” Street. —Steven Melendez
As the third-favorite for Best Picture according to FanDuel, Hamnet can find comfort in the fact it came out in a year where there are at least two more deserving films that are more entertaining and address societal concerns. It instead feels like more traditional Oscar bait: set in Tudor England, featuring dead children and high theatre. It’s about the writing and debut of Hamlet, arguably the greatest play ever. This plays as the equivalent of Hollywood making a movie about making movies, which Academy voters traditionally love. Chloé Zhao shows she’s a versatile director, going from her Oscar-winning minimalist Nomadland to a Marvel movie in Eternals to now this novel adaptation. Baby Hamlet In The Bardo pulls on heart strings and uses strange anachronistic surveillance camera angles to give us a glimpse into the homelife of a genius and his witchy wife. It’s pretty in the rainy British countryside, Jessie Buckley’s performance may resonate with parents everywhere, and there’s Easter eggs for the Shakespeare fanboys and girls out there, but ultimately this movie reads like Shakespeare fanfic. It’s fine, but it shouldn’t be up for Best Picture—it’s not even the Best Picture About A Mother Who Lost A Child from this year, thanks to The Testament of Ann Lee. —Carlos A. Molina
When he left The Beatles to disappear into the Scottish countryside, Paul McCartney did not heed the adage: Never work with children or animals. Surrounded by sheep, dogs, chickens, and his own growing brood, McCartney set up shop with his photographer wife Linda and slipped into comparative obscurity. While theories of his death abounded in the press, he used this time to reflect on what it meant to “grow up” after his life changed beyond recognition. Morgan Neville’s nearly two-hour documentary returns to this motif of growing up again and again—perhaps too frequently—but this emphasis is McCartney’s own. Using words and music to present the narrative instead of traditional talking heads, this documentary is a collage of McCartney’s life, featuring his own voice, the voices of close friends and family, and plenty of music. The voices speak about McCartney’s time in the Beatles, but mostly about the aftermath. McCartney’s legacy may have come from being part of the biggest band in the world, but the documentary asks a less considered question: “What next?” Paying close and deserved attention to his relationship with Linda, her successes as a photographer, and their collaborations together, this film is an intimate investigation into how an artist’s identity can possibly be reformed after such colossal fame. —Eva Karl
