Illuminati Hotties – FREE I.H.: This is Not the One You’ve Been Waiting For [Tiny Engines/Self-Released 2020]
The backstory, which is quite explicit in the lyrical content, is that her label wasn’t paying her and in order to release herself from her contract Sara Tudzin released these 12 songs in 23 minutes. Her voice now the nasal cartoon character sneer we know her for, she gets quickly to work channeling pop punk and post hardcore into caustic indie rock that thrashes, mopes, and laughs so that that it doesn’t cry. Thanks to her studio training she’s crisp and thanks to her personality and love of melodies there’s something to grasp onto during the rollercoaster ride. 4.2/5
Drive By Truckers – Welcome to Club XIII [ATO 2022]
The exhaustion of that first Trump term caused a great many bands and singers to turn inward after we thought we were done with him and the Truckers seem like they’re no exception. What better way to ground yourself than reflections on the past? This is their 90’s concept album to match Southern Rock Opera’s 70s and The Dirty South’s 80s. In sound and lyrics it’s simple and straightforward, crunchy riffs, sad acoustic lamentations of friends lost to drugs and suicide, the humor of shitty punk bars. It’s all comfort food for sure, the fire seems to have left Hood and Cooley for now and why shouldn’t it, everything they do is still supremely competent and none of the creative constipation that they’ve let bleed in previously is apparent. A summer record for those mourning their youth for sure. 4.0/5
Saba + No I.D. – From The Private Collection of Saba and No ID [The Private Collection 2025]
Since breaking through with Care for Me and adding – somehow – another level of relatability to Chicago’s already humanistic rap streak, though this time bound in grief, Saba’s been able to retain his insightful eye while focusing more explicitly on community. I figure it also helps his focus now that he’s making enough to be middle class. No I.D. is the veteran whose ear has shifted from the soul that powered Kanye to the plushness of Jay-Z to Vince Staples’ noir and here he’s at his warmest and most stripped down in a while. Is there synergy? For two Chicagoans of this level it’d be almost impossible for there not to be, though that doesn’t mean it’s all peaches and cream. The strongest are the intro and outro with sonic pleasures in between to cover up when the rapping is repetitive or trite, the weakest is the three back-to-back interludes in the middle, but it’s not enough for me to hate it. 3.9/5
Model/Actriz – Dogsbody [True Panther Records 2023]
Noisy queer dance band reiterates that s&m is fun. 3.6/5
Stevie Wonder –Talking Box [Motown Records 1972]
One great record in a year might’ve been enough back then but Stevie had to pump out a second one only months later that was not only stronger as a whole but split into clear thematic categories on each side. Side A is love songs as metaphor; appreciation of audience, addiction, or that oldy but goody those creative types do, songwriting itself. Side B is more interesting since it’s all politics, including “Big Brother” which rings so truly today that it really feels like we haven’t gotten anywhere since 1972. As a one-man band with the occasional lyricist co-writer Wonder deepens his sound while retaining its smoothness, some of it’s actually so easy on the ears that it’ll seem to blend into the background without focus. These days we almost take for granted that he wrote “Superstition”, but then that drumbeat comes in and the keyboards teleport you into space. 4.2/5
This is Lorelai – Box for Buddy, Box for Star [Double Double Whammy 2024]
Even before he finally got sober and converted into the workaholic that many creatives do once they give up chemical dependency Nate Amos was already giving his all. One half of My Idea with Palberta’s Lily Konigsberg, one half of Water From Your Eyes with Rachel Brown, and general man about Brooklyn lending his melodic services to those who paid him properly – we get his first intentional album from his bandcamp persona. His subject matter bounces between whimsical and deeply pained just as much as his sound pallet switches between Americana influenced guitar numbers and Postal Service-esque beep boop + piano ones. It’s definitely front loaded, the first four are perfect; an alien abduction, middling love, the kind of reflective ear worm I want to eat with a spoon until I’m sick, and a beautiful lament to love, loss, and loserdom. The rest stays strong but not revelatory, and that’s enough. 4.3/5
Cosmic Hero 