A. M. Samurai

The Red Hot Chili Peppers' 11th studio album, 2016's The Getaway, is a sophisticated work of dark-hued maturity that finds the long-running California outfit expanding their sound into nuanced, '70s-style orchestral soul and funky psychedelia. The album follows the equally adventurous I'm with You (2011) and once again showcases guitarist Josh Klinghoffer, who replaced John Frusciante in 2009. A major difference, however, between I'm with You and The Getaway was the band's choice to work with producer/instrumentalist Brian Burton (aka Danger Mouse). This makes The Getaway the first album the Red Hot Chili Peppers have recorded without longtime collaborator Rick Rubin, who has helmed each of the band's albums since 1991's Blood Sugar Sex Magik.

"Bricolage," a French word meaning to assemble something from available materials, is such a perfect term for the art of the remix that it's surprising no one has ever used it before. It's less surprising that Ryuichi Sakamoto, whose work has always had a cool Continental flair despite the artist's Japanese roots, would choose such an elegant term for his swish remix collection. Focusing on reworks of material from 2005's back-to-the-roots electro-pop experiment Chasm, Bricolages features a cross-cultural and cross-generational batch of remixers including Cornelius, whose playful sense of pastiche is to current hipster Japanese pop what Sakamoto's Yellow Magic Orchestra was a quarter-century before; his take on the spoken word cut-up "War & Peace" is considerably lighter and groovier than Aoki Takamasa's tense, austere version. Former Japan drummer Steve Jansen, whose collaboration with Sakamoto goes back to the early '80s, contributes the skittering "Break With," bridging the gap between new wave disco and contemporary IDM.

2020 was a terrible year for gardening. It was terrible for peppers, it was terrible for tomatoes, it was terrible for the condition of the soul. But Chad VanGaalen somehow raised a garden all the same: carrots and sprouts and broccoli and a revivifying new album, all of them grown at home. He likes to eat directly off the plant, he says—"I get down on my knees and graze. It's nice to feel the vegetables in your face"—and the 13 songs on World's Most Stressed Out Gardener were harvested with just such a spirit: in their raw state, young and vegetal, at the very moment, they were made.

Three tracks to note on this companion to the hit cyberthriller: 1) A funky and inconsequential debut by the David Byrne-less Talking Heads (now just The Heads) featuring Deborah Harry; 2) A mesmerizing, The The-like tune ("A Big Day in the North") marking the American debut of Black Grape, the promising new venture for Happy Mondays founder Shaun Ryder; and 3) "Party Man", a trademark mid-tempo Peter Gabriel yawner co-written to no apparent effect by Tori Amos.

For the final performance of the 2018 Summer Tour, Dave Matthews Band returned to the historic Hollywood Bowl for the first time in 6 years. The band was joined by multiple guests over the course of the evening including the addition of a string section for new album standouts such as “Here On Out” and “Come On Come On,” and an augmented horn section for a sweeping “Squirm,” and joyous “Jimi Thing” and “Shake Me Like A Monkey.” Longtime friend and collaborator, Mark Batson, makes an appearance on piano for the live debut of “When I’m Weary” and sticks around for the uplifting “Louisiana Bayou.” No matter what era you prefer your DMB tunes from, this concert has something to offer from "One Sweet World” to “She.” Add this one of a kind night to your music collection!

This is the definitive collection of the Pretenders' recordings issued under the Warners banner from 1979 to 1999 in unique outer slipcase. This 22-disc box set (14 x CD, 8 x DVD) brings together all eight deluxe digipak reissues (six 2 CD + DVD sets and two CD + DVD sets) of Pretenders (1980), Pretenders II (1981), Learning To Crawl (1984), Get Close (1986), Packed! (1990), Last Of The Independents (1994), The Isle Of View (1995), and Viva El Amor! (1999).