Every Tuesday, we focus on new music releases by naming our top tracks, album highlights, lowlights and important takeaways for select albums.

Ben Harper with Charlie Musselwhite – Get Up!

Top Tracks:
“I Don’t Believe a Word You Say”
“I Ride at Dawn”
“Get Up!”

Album Highlight: Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite’s new collaboration Get Up! is one of the best blues albums I’ve heard in a while. A mix of acoustic and electric, Get Up! showcases the strengths of both artists. Musselwhite’s haunting and impassioned harmonica is a constant throughout, while Ben Harper’s signature slide guitar finds it’s moments to shine.

Album Lowlight: This album is very bluesy, and although that is what makes it work so well, it is also the reason it can be a little pedestrian at time. I really would love to hear what Musselwhite can do outside of the realm of blues.

Takeaway: Harper and Musselwhite have created a rejuvenating blues album merging what we love about both artists into one cohesive record. It sounds like Musselwhite had carte blanche to layer his trademark sound throughout. This is a record that will get regular play in my rotation.

~Kevin Raos

Tegan and Sara – Heartthrob

Top Tracks:
“Closer”
“Drove Me Wild”
“I Couldn’t Be Your Friend”

Album Highlight: “Closer” is the catchiest and most club friendly track on the album. Tegan and Sara divert from their typically indie-rock, girl band strengths to produce a fantastically successful new-wave dance jam. “Closer” showcases their strong grasp of current pop music trends and signifies their evolution as songwriters. However, the opening track falsely sets you up for a less than exciting sophomore effort.

Album Lowlight: “Now I’m All Messed Up” feels like the overproduced, female vocalized electro-rock bands songs of the late nineties. The track lacks in both lyrical content and musical style. The added effects and distorted chorus almost seem like a cover-up for the lack of song structure and lyrics that sound like a high school journal entry.

Takeaway: “I Couldn’t Be Your Friend” has a great piano hook from the beginning, but takes a minute to pick up. Once involved in the chorus though, it is one song that you can’t help but continue to listen and maybe even sing along. “I couldn’t Be Your Friend” is the best lyrical effort on the album and all around most complete track on Heartthrob.

~Molly Kish

Emmy Rossum – Sentimental Journey

Top Tracks:
“Sentimental Journey”
“I’ll Be with You in Apple Blossom”
“Nobody Knows You When You’re Down”
“All I Do Is Dream of You”

Album Highlight: “Sentimental Journey” is the title track and best example of the direction this album should have gone in. This song is a wonderful display of Rossum’s vocals and unlike the rest of the obnoxiously campy show-tune album has a beautifully simplistic blues arrangement, paying homage to the female jazz legends she is attempting to emulate.

Album Lowlight: Although an obvious cover straight off the 1933 soundtrack for Roman Scandals, the final track of the album “Keep Young and Beautiful” further accentuates the actress/musician cross-over effort Rossum struggles with throughout the entire album. It’s over the top within the opening five seconds of the track’s vaudeville monologue and instantly makes me want to listen to it as an actresses’ audition rather than as a recording artists tribute.

Takeaway: Amidst the various efforts on the album to display contemporary jazz ballads, “All I Do Is Dream of You” is the most successful. Rossum clearly has the chops to produce a beautiful love song, best done in this manner of a stripped-down standard.

~Molly Kish

Tomahawk – Oddfellows

Top Tracks:
“Stone Letter”
“White Hats/Black Hats”
“South Paw”

Album Highlight: Mike Patton has always had a knack for the experimental, whether it be Mr. Bungle, Peeping Tom or any of his various acts. “Rise Up Dirty Waters” displays the balance between quiet beauty and maniacal frenzy, always keeping his listeners on their toes.

Album Lowlight: Their sound is kind of stuck in an area of Nu-metal meets Les Claypool. One needs to truly love the singing style of Mike Patton in order to truly appreciate — and enjoy — Tomahawk.

Takeaway: This alt-metal supergroup has been featuring the weird, Patton-fueled sound for over a decade, and this album continues that tradition. A fun romp of a listen for any Nine Inch Nails or Tool fan still holding onto the hard rock heydays of the 90’s and early 2000’s.

~Kevin Quandt

Ducktails – The Flower Lane

Top Tracks:
“Flower Lane”
“Under Cover”
“Academy Avenue”

Album Highlight: The Flower Lane is a Steely Dan-inspired album with a fuller sound than previous releases, yet it’s still in the beach vibe of Matt Mondanile. Tracks like “Assistant Director” feature electronic effects and a danceable vibe, a new sound to this once solo project.

Album Lowlight: I feel like a few of these songs might get a better treatment from his No. 1 gig, Real Estate. Vocals could leave a little to be desired, but it doesn’t subtract from the overall sound much.

Takeaway: Ducktails takes the breezy feel of Real Estate and mixes in more 80’s pop and world influence. For fans of heavy reverb! The inclusion of Big Troubles as Mondanile’s backing band adds the feeling of a full band as opposed to the entirely solo efforts previously released under the Ducktails moniker.

~Kevin Quandt