New Music Reviews (4/20)

Each week KEXP's Music Director Don Yates and other KEXP DJs share brief insights on new and upcoming releases. See what's coming up this week below, including reviews for new releases from Lord Huron, War On Women, The Vaccines, and more.

Lord Huron – Vide Noir (Whispering Pines/Republic)
The third album from this LA band led by Ben Schneider is a darker, more atmospheric take on the band's psych-tinged folk-pop. Produced by Dave Fridmann, the songs range from hazy space-pop to driving post-punk, with lyrics revolving around heartache, loss, and mortality. (Read KEXP's in-depth review here.)

War On Women – Capture The Flag (Bridge Nine)
This Baltimore band's second album is a strong set of politically charged punk and thrash with blistering guitars, energetic rhythms, gang vocal choruses, pointed, anti-patriarchy lyrics and anthemic song hooks.

Confidence Man – Confident Music for Confident People (Heavenly)
This Melbourne, Australia band's debut album is a fun set of funky, psych-tinged dance-pop inflected with house, techno, and classic Madchester, combining burbling synths and propulsive beats with tongue-in-cheek lyrics and buoyant song hooks.

Post Animal – When I Think of You in a Castle (Polyvinyl)
This Chicago band's debut album is a promising set of prog-tinged psych-rock ranging from sunny, hook-filled psych-pop to shape-shifting stoner-rock jams.

The Vaccines – Combat Sports (Columbia)
This British band's fourth album is an improvement over their previous release (2015's English Graffiti) that finds them returning to a sharper, more anthemic and guitar-oriented sound ranging from hook-filled power pop and New Waveish post-punk to raucous garage-rock.

Winter – Ethereality (Everything Blue)
The second album from this Brazilian-bred, LA-based artist (aka Samira Winter) is a well-crafted blend of shoegazerish dream-pop and '90s-steeped grunge-pop with fuzzy guitars, shimmering synths, ethereal vocals and wistful pop melodies.

Daniel Avery – Song For Alpha (Mute)
This London-based producer's second album is a fine set of dark ambient techno with an atmospheric sound combining pulsing rhythms, moody synths, and hypnotic melodies.

Kiran Ahluwalia – 7 Billion (Six Degrees)
The latest album from this India-born, New York-based artist is a mesmerizing blend of various Indian styles with Malian blues, rock, jazz, and more.

Criminal Code – 2534 (Deranged)
This Tacoma band's third album is a potent set of dark, energetic post-punk with angular guitars and driving rhythms.

Gold Casio – Sinners EP (Freakout)
This Portland/Brooklyn band's second EP is a well-crafted six-song set of disco-steeped dance-pop with propulsive rhythms and buoyant song hooks.

Alexis Taylor – Beautiful Thing (Domino)
The Hot Chip frontman's fourth solo album is a densely layered blend of hazy electro-pop and atmospheric piano ballads.

Rafiq Bhatia – Breaking English (Anti-)
The second solo album from this New York composer/guitarist (and Son Lux member) is a mesmerizing blend of jazz, electronic, post-rock, folk, Indian classical, and more.

Old Crow Medicine Show – Volunteer (Columbia)
This Nashville-based band's seventh album is a vibrant blend of mountain string-band music with folk-rock, honky tonk, conjunto, and more, while also injecting many of these songs with more electric guitar energy than usual.

Drinks – Hippo Lite (Drag City)
The second album from the LA-based duo of Welsh singer Cate Le Bon and White Fence's Tim Presley is another adventurous set of quirky avant-pop.

Sibille Attar – Paloma's Hand EP (PNKSLM)
This France-born, Stockholm-based artist's follows up her 2013 debut album Sleepyhead with this evocative six-song EP of dark dream-pop.