Bruce Hornsby - Spirit Trail - I went on a Hornsby kick back in August, and man, the guy is just so good. (And a fellow UMiami jazz alum, to boot!) Spirit Trail might be my favorite record of his, opening with the unstoppable “King of the Hill.”

Ibrahim Maalouf - Kalthoum - A trumpet player I wasn’t that familiar with, Maalouf’s record reminds me of what I love about Avishai Cohen’s International Vamp Band. At one point early on I thought, “this sax player sounds like Mark Turner.” Turns out it is indeed Mark Turner.

Bennett Sullivan - Green Song EP - A great record from banjoist/songwriter Bennett Sullivan, produced by my buddy Sam Howard. I recently bought a banjo and this album was an inspiration while I was deciding which type to get. (The nice thing about a resonator is that you can just take it off.)

Sammy Rae & The Friends - Let’s Throw a Party EP - One of the most pleasant albums I’ve been introduced to by the Strong Songs listening club. Killer band, killer vocalist, just killer stuff down the board. I’d love to see this group live.

Gillian Welch - Time (The Revelator) - A recommendation from my sister Amanda, and the first time I’d sat down with a Gillian Welch album in a while. It’s no surprise that she’s great, but guess what? She is.

Sparks - Kimono My House - A fair number of people have recently asked me about Sparks, thanks mostly to the recent Edgar Wright movie about the band. So I figured I should probably do some listening. This is widely held up as one of their best albums, and it’s pretty great!

Public Service Broadcasting - The Race For Space - Another one from the Discord listening group. This band uses historical public radio broadcasts as the “script” for their albums; in this case, a musical narrative about the 1960s space race. The album works exactly as well as I hoped it would, once I realized what they were doing.

Yeasayer - Fragrant World - One of the denser alt/rock albums I’ve listened to lately, and one that I keep coming back to.

Big Red Machine - How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last? - The new one from Big Red Machine is a beautiful collection of songs with some terrific guest artists. I could listen to Anäis Mitchell sing anything.

TROKER - Imperfecto - I’ve been so into this band since discovering them a couple weeks ago. A horns + rhythm + DJ kinda thing out of Guadalajara, this album is just nasty from top to bottom. So many good tunes, grooves, tones, and melodies. Go listen.

Halsey - If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power - Halsey’s new one has Trent Reznor’s fingerprints all over it. Their two sounds are well suited to one another.

Parquet Courts - Wide Awake! - A band I learned about thanks to a listener question for Strong Songs. A great band, kinda post-post-post rock, all sharp edges and harmonic angles. It was really fun learning the title track’s guitar parts for the show.

Ric Robertson - Carolina Child - Straight ahead, strong songwriting from multi-instrumentalist Ric Robertson. Beautiful use of reverb and vocal harmony on this record.