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      The Endless Pop Shimmers of the Weeknd

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      “Dawn FM” extends and reimagines Abel Tesfaye’s fixation on perfect pop that he’s been chasing since the mid-2010s.There’s not a moment to breathe on the new album by the Weeknd, “Dawn FM” — no spaces for resolution and calm, no indications of a world outside of its borders. An uninterrupted set of iridescent megapop anthems blended like a D.J. mix, it is, as with so many things that he has made in the last decade, an all-or-nothing proposition.Since the Weeknd, born Abel Tesfaye, first arrived in 2011 with a trio of dank, sleazy mixtapes that radically reconstructed R&B, he has steadfastly, maybe even stubbornly, committed to thinking of his albums as discrete eras with evolving ideologies. And as he’s become one of the biggest pop stars on the planet, this has required both tremendous skill and a not insignificant amount of faith — in an era of microtargeting and niches that explode into ubiquity, he is choosing a far less assured top-down path.He has succeeded by remaining, even at peak saturation, enigmatic. Tesfaye, 31, is interested in world-building, and he remains obscure — at this point, evolving past strategic anonymity into full-scale character work — hiding behind hits.“Dawn FM,” his fifth major-label album, is sleek and vigorous and also, again, a light reimagining of what big-tent music might sound like now, in an era when most global stars have abandoned the concept. “Dawn FM” extends and reimagines Tesfaye’s fixation on perfect pop that he’s been pursuing since he first teamed with the hitmaker Max Martin in the mid-2010s — seven years later, he’s still chasing a deeply polished orb at the end of an infinite galaxy.What’s striking is the path he’s chosen to get there — yes, Martin is here, as are Oscar Holter and Swedish House Mafia. But Tesfaye’s true consigliere is Daniel Lopatin (a.k.a Oneohtrix Point Never), who began his career as a channeler of interstellar rumble but evolved into a soundtracker for space disco. Together, they make work that is mesmeric, both for its quality and its seamlessness. Tesfaye pulls Lopatin closer to blunt rhythm while allowing himself to get absorbed in the producer’s endless shimmers.On “Dawn FM,” they land squarely in the window between 1982 and 1984, when New York’s emergent hip-hop production was coalescing into the electro that was streaking its way into pop. This is breakdancing music, touching on everything from Afrika Bambaataa’s seminal “Planet Rock” to Man Parrish and Mantronix to the first Force M.D.s album to the tuneful Los Angeles proto-rap of Egyptian Lover and World Class Wreckin’ Cru to Maurice Starr and Arthur Baker’s early work with New Edition.What Tesfaye and Lopatin build on that foundation is ambitious. “Don’t Break My Heart” is soaringly sad, framing romantic desperation as an unescapable sonic maze. “Gasoline” dips into Depeche Mode-style hauteur for a classic Weeknd story about alluring degeneracy: “It’s 5 a.m. I’m high again/And you can see that I’m in pain/I’ve fallen into emptiness.”“How Do I Make You Love Me?” is a super-sweet version of the Michael Jackson-esque pop Tesfaye has been reaching for, as is the majestic “Take My Breath.” These songs, which appear back to back early on the album, are the best arguments for Tesfaye’s vision, and crucially, both are songs where Martin is there as an amplifying force.On “Dawn FM,” Tesfaye occasionally edges up against simu-funk, like on “Sacrifice,” which samples Alicia Myers’s dance-liberation thumper “I Want to Thank You.” And “Here We Go … Again,” which has the faintest mist of “How Deep Is Your Love” by the Bee Gees, is the album’s weakest and least characteristic moment, a lyrical jolt into the deeply specific present for a performer who is trying to make music that exists outside of time.There’s a reason no one is currently trying to emulate what Tesfaye is achieving — it requires the meticulousness of an engineer, the ego of a superstar and the scars of the deeply wounded. Done wrong, it can come off as icy and algorithmic.The album is threaded with interstitials from a fictional radio station, mainly voiced by Jim Carrey — amusing but not particularly meaningful. What does hit harder is “A Tale by Quincy,” in which the influential producer and mogul Quincy Jones relates a story about learning to grow up rough. Jones is an obvious antecedent for Tesfaye, who aspires to be an orchestrator as much as a singer and songwriter. (There are echoes of Jones’s 1981 album “The Dude” here as well.)If anything has changed for Tesfaye, it’s his relationship to dysfunction. Though there are moments — like “Sacrifice” (“The ice inside my veins will never bleed”) and “Gasoline” — that recall the louche desperation of his early albums, he’s more often the victim.“I Heard You’re Married” — which features a crisp, dexterous guest verse from Lil Wayne (“If I ain’t your husband I can’t be your hybrid”) — is about what happens when your old weapons are turned against you: “Your number in my phone I’m gon’ delete it/Girl, I’m way too grown for that deceiving.” “Is There Someone Else?” is a remarkably chill song about being a reformed cad. And he boasts about a movie-star girlfriend on “Here We Go … Again.”Perhaps the shift is an acknowledgment of the regrets that come with age and experience. Perhaps it’s because the bad guy can only be the hero for so long. Or maybe it’s just a phase. The last full song on the album is “Less Than Zero,” a nod to Bret Easton Ellis debauchery but also a slightly stripped-down song about inner sadness. It’s the only moment on this mirror ball of an album that feels truly vulnerable, and dares to peek inside: “I try to hide it, but I know you know me.”The Weeknd“Dawn FM”(XO/Republic) More

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      What We Forgot to Talk About in 2021

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      Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | StitcherTaylor, Drake, Olivia, Adele, Billie, Lil Nas X, Sondheim, Kanye, Kacey: Popcast has covered them all in the past 12 months. In the second year of the coronavirus pandemic, pop music returned to something like normal, with big stars releasing albums and returning to the road (at least for now). There was quite a lot to talk about.On this week’s Popcast, a loose round table about some of the year’s musical high points that haven’t yet been discussed on the show: the global breakthrough of Maneskin, the ascendance of Jazmine Sullivan, the resilience of Kelly Clarkson, some left field TikTok high points and the musical stylings of Candiace Dillard of “The Real Housewives of Potomac.”Guests:Joe Coscarelli, The New York Times’s pop music reporterCaryn Ganz, The New York Times’s pop music editorConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica. More

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      A Trip Through Pop, Rap and Jazz’s Past, in 27 Boxed Sets

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      Collections from labels like Fania and Armabillion, icons including Ray Charles and J Dilla, and living artists such as Beverly Glenn-Copeland and Radiohead were welcome additions this year.In an era of abundance when every day brings a deluge of new music to consume, it may seem particularly futile to turn to the past. But this year’s resurrections and recontextualizations in boxed sets and reissues gathered up what’s been forgotten or overlooked — or in some cases, what’s been dissected ad nauseam but still commands attention — and put it back at center stage. As Taylor Swift proved this year, there’s no reason the old can’t be experienced as new, too.‘Almost Famous 20th Anniversary’(UMe; multiple configurations with deluxe editions starting at $169.98)Cameron Crowe’s 2000 film, “Almost Famous,” was his fond reminiscence about writing for Rolling Stone during the hard-partying, all-access 1970s. The expanded anniversary editions are overstuffed with familiar songs alongside a few live rarities. They also include a disc of mostly folksy soundtrack instrumentals by Nancy Wilson, from Heart, and the complete recordings of the film’s invented band, Stillwater — a Led Zeppelin/Bad Company knockoff stomping through songs written by Crowe, Wilson and Peter Frampton — along with, in boxed-set style, the demo versions. (A Stillwater EP, minus the demos, is also available separately.) Stillwater’s vintage style was meticulously reconstructed — booming drums, screaming lead guitar (from Mike McCready of Pearl Jam) — with hints of meta self-consciousness in the lyrics. “It was juvenile, it was something wild,” the band shouts in “You Had to Be There.” JON PARELESArmabillion Recordz(Armabillion.com; albums start at $30)One of a handful of obscurantist rap reissue labels that have emerged in recent years, Armabillion is based in Italy but specializes in limited-run vinyl pressings of undersung gangster rap classics from around the United States, especially the South and the Bay Area. This year’s slate of releases has been impressive, among them Gank Move’s dreamy, tough-talking “Come Into My World”; Coop MC’s slinky “Home of the Killers”; Ant Banks’s essential debut album “Sittin’ on Somethin’ Phat”; and the rowdy “Straight From tha Ramp!!!” by Tec-9 (of U.N.L.V.), an early release on Cash Money Records. JON CARAMANICALouis Armstrong, ‘The Complete Louis Armstrong Columbia and RCA Victor Studio Sessions 1946-1966’(Mosaic; seven CDs, $119)The period covered by this boxed set mostly fits within what’s considered to be Armstrong’s long midcareer lull, but when it comes to the creator of the modern jazz solo, even the mellow years can support a certain level of fascination. And this loving revisitation from the jazz archivalists at Mosaic spares no enthusiasm: The scholar Ricky Riccardi’s liner notes clock in at roughly 30,000 words, illustrated by 40 photographs, most of them never before seen. And the recordings — covering the full sweep of Armstrong’s studio dates for Columbia and RCA over a 20-year span — have been transferred directly from the originals and remastered. There are two discs of singles that include midsize- and large-ensemble performances, a rare duet with the German singer and film star Lotte Lenya on “Mack the Knife,” and even a promotional track, “Music to Shave By,” that Armstrong recorded on behalf of the Remington Company. Also included are his Columbia LPs from this era, plus outtakes from the sessions: “Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy”; “Satch Plays Fats” (that’s Fats Waller); and his musical-theater collaboration with Dave Brubeck, “The Real Ambassadors.” GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOPastor T.L. Barrett and the Youth for Christ Choir, ‘I Shall Wear a Crown’(Numero Group; five CDs, $35; five LPs, $90)Half a century ago, T.L. Barrett was far from the only pastor in Black America — or even on the South Side of Chicago — fusing gospel standards with funk. But good luck finding anyone who did it with more flavor, more hooks or more genuine frontman flair. “I Shall Wear a Crown” pulls together the four albums and various singles Barrett released throughout the 1970s, all with his Youth for Christ Choir joined by a crackling rhythm section. The end of the ’60s was a golden moment for youth choruses on wax, with the era’s each-one-teach-one activism shining through. (See also: the Voices of East Harlem; Sister Nancy Dupree’s classroom choir in Rochester, N.Y.; and the loose group of neighborhood kids whose voices are captured on James Brown’s “Say It Loud — I’m Black and I’m Proud,” from 1968, possibly helping to set off the trend.) But Barrett’s music evolved through that moment, and he kept finding new ways to use the choir. By the mid-70s, he was dealing with synthesizers and crunchy electric guitar and cosmic slow-jam textures. This is the era that provided Kanye West with one of his most brilliant “Life of Pablo” samples, “Father Stretch My Hands,” a sultry, tantalizingly slow song in multiple parts. The box’s 24-page booklet features evocative and scholarly liner notes by Aadam Keeley and Aaron Cohen shining light on what has been, in many ways, a life of bridged contradictions and extraordinary achievement. RUSSONELLOThe Beach Boys, ‘Feel Flows: The Sunflower & Surf’s Up Sessions 1969-1971’(UMe; five CDs and hardcover book, $125)The Beach Boys revisit a less-heralded era in their history in “Feel Flows.”“Sunflower” (1970) and “Surf’s Up” (1971) were the Beach Boys’ most ambitious attempts to stay relevant in the 1970s while living up to Brian Wilson’s vision of merging complex music with mass popularity. “Sunflower” celebrated the joys of music and romance; “Surf’s Up” was as topical as the Beach Boys would ever be, worrying about environmental pollution, fatal student protests and the end of youthful innocence, with lyrics that sometimes reveled in literary conundrums. The boxed set includes both of the full albums and some complete outtakes, along with concert performances, alternate versions and stripped-down instrumental and a cappella tracks. The tracks are an education for aspiring producers, unveiling elaborate arrangements and savoring every earnest nonsense syllable of the band’s defining vocal harmonies. PARELESThe Beat Farmers, ‘Tales of the New West’(Blixa Sounds; two CDs, $19.99)The debut album from the San Diego band the Beat Farmers, released in 1985, is a dynamic and sturdy roots-rock gem, with flickers of the cowpunk sound that had been coursing through the region in the years just prior. The band’s best known song from this album, “Happy Boy,” scans as a novelty in retrospect, but the rest is full of savvy guitar work, slinky, yelpy singing and a rollicking rhythm section, peaking on the uproarious and blowsy “Lost Weekend.” The reissue’s bonus disc is an assured and easeful concert recording, “Live at the Spring Valley Inn, 1983.” CARAMANICAThe Beatles, ‘Let It Be (Super Deluxe)’(Capitol; five CDs, one Blu-ray audio disc and hardcover book, $140; five LPs and hardcover book, $200)An expanded boxed set for the Beatles’ “Let It Be” includes two discs of studio conversation.Anyone who didn’t get enough Beatles outtakes, dialogue and rehearsals in Peter Jackson’s documentary “Get Back” can try the expanded boxed set of “Let It Be,” which includes a new mix of the original album and singles (including the goopy orchestral arrangements), two discs of studio music and chatter, and another of the engineer Glyn Johns’s rough 1969 mixes from the album sessions. After making elaborate, groundbreaking studio albums, for “Let It Be” the Beatles dared themselves to record live in real time in front of a film crew — no pressure — joined only by the keyboardist (and unifier) Billy Preston. As in the documentary, the outtakes contrast Paul McCartney’s goal-oriented consistency with John Lennon’s casual restlessness. The find is the 1969 mixes: more open, more revealing, sounding even more live than the original album tracks. PARELESBush Tetras, ‘Rhythm and Paranoia: The Best of Bush Tetras’(Wharf Cat Records; three LPs, $98.98; two CDs, $29.98)With their most-loved songs scattered across various 7” singles and EPs, the delightfully prickly New York art-rockers Bush Tetras are the perfect candidates for a best-of collection like “Rhythm and Paranoia,” a chronologically sequenced triple album that puts their long, rich career into proper context. Thanks to underground hits like the walking-after-midnight anthem “Too Many Creeps” from 1980 and the groovy kiss-off “You Can’t Be Funky” the following year, the group was often associated most closely with the post-punk and no wave scenes. But the latter half of this set proves that for decades it continued to evolve in surprising yet intuitive new directions, as heard on the 1996 Fugazi-like wailer “Page 18” or the billowing blues-rock of “Heart Attack” from 2012. LINDSAY ZOLADZEva Cassidy, ‘Live at Blues Alley (25th Anniversary Edition)’(Blix Street Records; two LPs, $37.98)A new Eva Cassidy reissue presents her first solo album fully remastered, in the highest fidelity available.Though the vocalist Eva Cassidy didn’t write her own songs, and could sometimes slip into an almost exact approximation of Aretha Franklin or Bonnie Raitt’s phrasing, it never made sense to question her legitimacy or intent. Cassidy’s heart was right there, laid bare in her voice. When she saved up the money to record “Live at Blues Alley,” her first solo album, in January 1996, Cassidy wasn’t even a known figure on the small Washington, D.C., music scene. Just months after it came out, she died of cancer at age 33. It would be another couple of years before she broke through to a wider audience, thanks to a posthumous compilation CD, “Songbird” (drawn partly from the “Blues Alley” recordings), and the stream of cobbled-together releases that followed. This new reissue, pressed at 45 r.p.m. onto a pair of heavyweight LPs, presents the original document fully remastered, in the highest fidelity available. RUSSONELLOWhat to Know About ‘The Beatles: Get Back’Peter Jackson’s seven-plus hour documentary series, which explores the most contested period in the band’s history, is available on Disney Plus.Re-examining How the Beatles Ended: Think you know what happened? Jackson may change your mind.Yoko Ono’s Omnipresence: The performance artist is everywhere in the film. At first it’s unnerving, then dazzling.6 Big Moments: Don’t have time to watch the full documentary? Here’s a guide to its eye-opening scenes.‘Changüí: The Sound of Guantánamo’(Petaluma; three CDs and hardcover book, $63)When he realized there were very few recordings of local, rural changüí — music for all-night neighborhood parties in Guantánamo province, at Cuba’s eastern tip — the journalist Gianluca Tramontana began making his own with a hand-held stereo recorder, capturing the music live, acoustic and unadorned. This extensive boxed set, annotated with lyrics and musicology, offers Afro-Cuban music at its most elemental and kinetic: endlessly syncopated riffs picked on a tres (Cuban guitar) backed only by percussion and the plunked bass notes of a marímbula (a box with metal prongs), topped by singers who may well be improvising rhymes, answered by backup refrains. The lyrics offer history, advice, love, pride in the changüí tradition and up-to-the-minute commentary on what’s going on at the party or in the world. More important, the percussion and tres make the music eternally danceable. PARELESRay Charles, ‘True Genius’(Tangerine; six CDs and hardcover book, $105)“True Genius” collects decades of Ray Charles’s work.For me, and others, America’s greatest male singer was Ray Charles. His voice was grainy, earthy and wise; his emotional impact was unmistakable and complex, merging pain and strength, sorrow and humor, flirtation and heartache. Of course, he was no slouch as a pianist, either. This straightforward, career-spanning compilation covers his early years as he forges his fusion of gospel, swing, blues, country and pop, though for his pivotal 1950s Atlantic singles — “Hallelujah, I Love Her So,” “I’ve Got a Woman” and “What’d I Say” — it swaps in live versions instead of the studio classics. It moves through his decades as an interpreter, when he homed in on the soul within other people’s hits, and includes a rambunctious 1972 concert set from Stockholm and latter-day duets with admirers like Willie Nelson, Norah Jones and Billy Joel. PARELESJ Dilla, ‘ Welcome 2 Detroit — The 20th Anniversary Edition’(BBE Music; 12 7” singles for $129.99)A box of 7” singles includes instrumental versions and alternate mixes of J Dilla’s 2001 debut studio LP.By the time the tastemaking Detroit hip-hop producer J Dilla released his 2001 debut studio album, “Welcome 2 Detroit,” he was already somewhere in the realm of mythos. A member of the Soulquarians and the Ummah production collectives, he was known for music that was both luscious and thumping — he was wildly influential and essentially uncopyable. (He died in 2006.) “Welcome 2 Detroit” is a musically wide-ranging album, but never thrums with anything but his particular vibration, the J Dilla feel that exists somewhere just beneath the skin. This immaculately detailed boxed set features 7” singles of the album’s songs along with instrumental versions, alternate mixes and a book detailing the making of the album. CARAMANICAWillie Dunn, ‘Creation Never Sleeps, Creation Never Dies: The Willie Dunn Anthology’(Light in the Attic; two LPs, $35; MP3 download, $10)Willie Dunn (1941-2013) was a Canadian songwriter, filmmaker and Indigenous activist; this set offers just a sampling of his extensive recorded catalog. He emerged in the 1960s with songs rooted in folk and country, sometimes incorporating Indigenous instruments and melodies. His voice was a kindly but forthright baritone, with hints of Hank Williams, Johnny Cash and Gordon Lightfoot. Dunn was a cleareyed storyteller, and in songs like “The Ballad of Crowfoot” he chronicled individual lives, historical injustices and the power and majesty of nature. PARELESBob Dylan, ‘Springtime in New York: The Bootleg Series Vol. 16 (1980-1985)’(Columbia/Legacy; five CDs, hard-bound book and memorabilia, $140)The latest excavation of Bob Dylan’s archives is from the first half of the 1980s, when he let go of the certainties of his born-again phase and returned to thornier, more enigmatic songs that still grappled with morality, love, history and responsibility on the albums “Infidels” (1983) and “Empire Burlesque” (1985). He also tried 1980s-style production, which left those albums with overblown drum sounds and a dated electronic sheen. Two discs from the 1980 sessions and rehearsals for his 1980 “Shot of Love” are mostly throwaways, except for the murky, ominous “Yes Sir, No Sir.” But the songs from sessions and tours for “Infidels” and “Empire Burlesque” offer more. The set unveils a full-band version of “Blind Willie McTell” and a boisterous, bluesy rock song that only surfaced briefly on tour in 1984, “Enough Is Enough.” It finds more vulnerable, less gimmicky versions of familiar songs, and it details the evolution — and sometimes overnight rewrites — of the songs that became “Foot of Pride” and “Tight Connection to My Heart,” a close-up of Dylan’s constant tinkering and improving. PARELESBeverly Glenn-Copeland, ‘Keyboard Fantasies’ and ‘Keyboard Fantasies Reimagined’(Transgressive; LP, CD, cassette or download, from $6.99 to $27.99)This is the latest installment of the campaign to resurrect the work of Beverly Glenn-Copeland, the Canadian new age/electronic music producer and singer whose recordings were rediscovered a few years ago. “Keyboard Fantasies,” originally released in 1986 in a limited cassette run, is entrancing and almost uncannily soothing. “Welcome to you, both young and old/We are ever new, we are ever new,” Glenn-Copeland softly warbles, a beacon of safety and possibility. The original album, now released on CD and vinyl for the first time, was followed by a collection of remixes and reinterpretations by acolytes, most notably Kelsey Lu’s ecstatically elegiac take on “Ever New.” CARAMANICAGeorge Harrison, ‘All Things Must Pass (50th Anniversary Edition)’(Capitol/UMe; Uber Deluxe Box, $999.98; Super Deluxe Box with eight LPs, $199.98, or five CDs, $149.98; other configurations from $19.98 to $89.98)Seek out the discs featuring 42 previously unreleased demos from George Harrison’s solo debut, “All Things Must Pass.”Anyone who has watched “Get Back” knows how creatively stifled George Harrison was feeling in the final days of the Beatles. His first post-Fab Four solo album, the sprawling, tenderly spiritual masterwork “All Things Must Pass” from 1970, became a repository for all those pent-up ideas. The joy of creation is palpable throughout the 50th anniversary deluxe edition of the album, which features a meticulous and punchy new mix derived from the original tapes by Paul Hicks. The set’s most revelatory material is on the discs featuring 42 previously unreleased demos, which strip Harrison’s compositions down to their bare essentials and showcase the almost otherworldly outpouring of song-craft that accompanied his musical liberation. This season of retroactive Beatlemania is the perfect opportunity for a deep dive into Harrison’s long-gestating opus — consider it “Get Back,” Part 4. ZOLADZ‘It’s a Good, Good Feeling: The Latin Soul of Fania Records (The Singles)’(Craft Latino; four CDs, one 7” vinyl record, $63.98; two LPs, $29.98)While it was on its way to becoming New York salsa’s equivalent of Motown Records, Fania was also helping to boost the Latin-soul hybrid known as boogaloo. In the late 1960s and early ’70s, Fania put out a stream of albums and singles with English-language lyrics, mixing funk, rock ’n’ roll and son rhythms; dollops of doo-wop vocals; and more than enough cowbell. This box culls together 89 such singles that Fania released between 1965 and 1975; most weren’t hits, but plenty were by hitmakers: Ray Barretto (whose smash “El Watusi” had presaged boogaloo), Joe Bataan, Willie Colón. Boogaloo could sometimes feel like a fusion of related but not directly compatible parts (“Everybody gather ’round,/I’m gonna introduce the Latin soul sound,” Joe Bataan sings, with something of a heavy hand, on “Latin Soul Square Dance”), but some of the most fun to be had here is on the covers of pop and soul hits sprinkled throughout, which embrace the task directly: Larry Harlow’s orchestra covering “Grazing in the Grass,” Harvey Averne’s take on “Stand,” Joe Bataan’s “Shaft.” The LP version of the box is abridged, including 28 tracks across two discs. RUSSONELLOThe KLF, ‘Solid State Logik 1’(Streaming services)In 1992, the KLF — the British Dada prankster dance-music anarchists who had become global hitmakers in the previous two years — fired machine-gun blanks at the audience at the BRIT Awards and announced their retirement from the music business. Shortly thereafter, they took their whole catalog out of print and, later, burned one million pounds in royalty payment cash. So it’s cause for excitement, and perhaps skepticism, that the group’s catalog began to trickle onto streaming services this year. Most crucial is the compilation “Solid State Logik 1,” which contains all the stratospheric, ornate, deeply ambitious hits: the spooky “What Time Is Love? (Live at Trancentral),” the ecstatic and triumphant “3 a.m. Eternal (Live at the S.S.L.)” and “Justified & Ancient,” with those Tammy Wynette vocals that still, three decades on, are disorienting in just the right way. Is the reissue series a scam? A prelude to a prank? Or a concession to permanence from a musical act that seemed content to live on only as a memory? CARAMANICANirvana, ‘Nevermind: 30th Anniversary (Super Deluxe Edition)’(Geffen; five CDs, one Blu-ray videodisc and hardcover book, $200)A 30th-anniversary edition of “Nevermind” features four concert recordings from 1991 and 1992.GeffenAs if Nirvana ever had to, it proves its punk bona fides yet again with the 30th-anniversary expansion of “Nevermind.” The newly remastered album adds a little additional clarity that brings out both the songs’ pop structures and the rasp and yowl of Kurt Cobain’s voice. It’s packaged with four live concert recordings of variable fidelity from 1991 and 1992 — Amsterdam (included as both audio and video), Melbourne and nearly mono-sounding sets from Del Mar, Calif., and Tokyo — that show Nirvana bashing the music out night after night, screaming and blaring, overloading with physical impact and probably spurring some wild mosh pits. Wherever the tour led, as Cobain sang, there was “no recess.” But the 20th-anniversary “Nevermind” box, in 2011, included a better-sounding 1991 concert, “Live at the Paramount,” and more rarities. PARELESOutkast, ‘ATLiens (25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)’(Legacy Recordings/Sony Music; four LPs, $69.98)A sublimely sinuous Southern funk album full of jackhammer rhymes, “ATLiens,” the second Outkast album, from 1996, is perhaps the duo’s most overlooked from its pre-pop-breakthrough era — not the scrappy statement of purpose that preceded it (the 1994 debut, “Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik”) nor the psych-rock philosophy lesson that followed (“Aquemini,” from 1998). But it’s crucial to the Outkast worldview formation — it shows the duo both at ease with the languor of laid-back Southern production but also champing at the bit to incorporate small moments of explosion. This release includes the original album alongside, for the first time, the full set of instrumentals. CARAMANICA‘R&B in DC 1940-1960’(Bear Family; 16 CDs, $273.04)Probably the heavyweight champion of boxed sets this year (it weighs 10 pounds), “R&B in DC 1940-1960” collects nearly 500 singles recorded in the nation’s capital back when doo-wop, mambo, early rock ’n’ roll, jump blues and big-band jazz were first being lumped together in the pages of trade magazines into a category called “R&B.” It’s all contextualized engagingly in a 352-page book, full of closely researched history, images and song-by-song notes. You can tease out the presence of some major figures and themes: Marvin Gaye lingers in the backing vocals on at least one track; his mentor, Bo Diddley, also makes an appearance; the recordings of the Clovers and Ruth Brown, as the notes attest, played a role in keeping Atlantic Records afloat in the label’s fledgling days. But the point of this collection is to get you to listen more broadly, and more completely, to an entire musical and social moment: Jay Bruder, the researcher who compiled the collection, wisely included commercials, jingles and other radio-broadcast ephemera in this collection. These are the sounds of Washington in the midcentury, when it was home to one of the country’s most thriving Black middle classes and an incubator of musical talent to match. RUSSONELLORadiohead, ‘Kid A Mnesia’(XL; three CDs, $23; three LPs, $60)Radiohead dig out songs that didn’t make the cut for “Kid A” or “Amnesia” on a new box taking in both releases.Radiohead thoroughly dismantled its rock reflexes to make “Kid A” (2000) and “Amnesiac” (2001), two albums drawn almost entirely from the same sessions. Its former arena-rock guitars and anthemic choruses receded behind fragments, loops, electronic beats, orchestral experiments and ominous noises; disquiet and malaise floated free. “Kid A Mnesia” unites the two companion albums and adds a disc of alternate takes, stray instrumental tracks and songs Radiohead had not quite committed to disc: “Follow Me Around” and “If You Say the Word.” They’re not revelations, but they extend the mood. PARELESThe Replacements, ‘Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take out the Trash (Deluxe Edition)’(Rhino; four CDs, one LP, one 7,” $79.98)Snarling, thrashing and defiantly tuneful, the Replacements’ 1981 debut album, “Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash,” has always sounded like a power-pop LP stuffed into a blender and flicked on to high. But this comprehensive, 40th-anniversary deluxe edition is a sustained reminder of the craft and winning chemistry behind an album that was never quite as anarchically tossed-off as it seemed. Across 100 tracks — 67 of them previously unreleased — it becomes clear that the sturdy melodic core of Paul Westerberg’s songwriting and the ramshackle fury of Bob Stinson’s solos were present from the earliest days of the Minneapolis band’s existence. Some of the most fascinating tracks on this reissue, though, point to where the Replacements were headed on “Let It Be” from 1984 and beyond: A handful of Westerberg’s solo home demos, the best of which is the gut-wrenching “You’re Getting Married,” foreshadow the ragged-heart balladry of a ’Mats classic like “Answering Machine.” Nearly four hours of material is plenty to sift through, but a high percentage of this “Trash” is treasure. ZOLADZThe Rolling Stones, ‘Tattoo You’(Interscope; four CDs, picture disc and hardcover book, $150; five LPs and hardcover book, $198; two CDs, $20)Beyond the kick of “Start Me Up” and the unexpected tenderness (and Sonny Rollins saxophone solo) of “Waiting for a Friend,” “Tattoo You” (1981) was a second-tier Rolling Stones album: vigorous performances of merely passable material. With band members estranged, it was built largely by finishing lyrics and vocals atop outtakes from previous albums. Its 40th-anniversary expanded version includes nine previously unreleased songs that casually continue the album’s 1981 strategy, revisiting tracks from the vault; Mick Jagger sings some obviously anachronistic lyrics in songs like “It’s a Lie,” which mentions eBay. (More deluxe versions add a two-CD 1982 Wembley concert recording.) The new tracks offer familiar pleasures: hearing the band romp through every song. PARELESNina Simone, ‘The Montreux Years’(BMG; two LPs, $29.99; two CDs, $19.98)Between 1968 and 1990, Nina Simone played the Montreux Jazz Festival five times.The most arresting scene in Liz Garbus’s 2015 Netflix documentary “What Happened, Miss Simone?” is a performance from the 1976 Montreux Jazz Festival, during which a weary but incandescent Nina Simone performs her interpretation of Janis Ian’s “Stars.” Simone’s reading is one of the most damning and deeply felt critiques of fame I have ever heard — and luckily it is featured on “Nina Simone: The Montreux Years,” a new and beautifully packaged two-album collection of live material. Between 1968 and 1990, Simone played the Swiss jazz festival five times; each performance was both a reflection of a specific moment in her career and a testament to her continued virtuosity. For all her ambivalence about jazz festivals and her noted preference for performing in classical music halls, Simone clearly had a special connection to Montreux and, as this collection attests, brought her best to its stage decade after decade. ZOLADZWadada Leo Smith’s Great Lakes Quartet, ‘The Chicago Symphonies’(TUM; four CDs, $71.99)The trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith turned 80 this month but continues to compose and perform prolifically. And his projects have only been growing grander in scale, while still centering his stark, epigrammatic style of playing and writing. Smith’s latest effort (it isn’t an archival recording) is “The Chicago Symphonies,” four extended works, carefully composed but minimalist in craft, written not for an orchestra but for a quartet: the Pulitzer Prize winner Henry Threadgill on alto saxophone, John Lindberg on bass and Jack DeJohnette on drums. (The saxophonist Jonathon Haffner replaces Threadgill on the fourth and final symphony.) It’s the same group that was featured on Smith’s celebrated “Great Lakes Suite,” from 2014. This new collection of music is dedicated not to the natural beauty of the region, but to the lives of great Midwesterners, from politicians like Abe Lincoln and Barack Obama to Smith’s own colleagues in the avant-garde. The simpatico between Smith and Threadgill is an exciting and rarely documented thing, and it gives these already spellbinding compositions the allure of a privileged conversation. RUSSONELLOThe Who, ‘The Who Sell Out (Super Deluxe Box Set)’(UMe/Polydor; five CDs, two 7” singles, hardcover book, memorabilia, $139)A new boxed set pulls together the Who’s scattered trove of recordings from 1967-69.The Who tried multiple directions while writing and recording “The Who Sell Out,” amid tour dates and the general psychedelic ferment of 1967. Pete Townshend was coming up with character sketches, expanding songs toward mini-operas and layering voices and instruments ever more ingeniously. To hold together its hodgepodge of songs, “The Who Sell Out” was sequenced as a pirate radio show, including jingles and parody commercials. The boxed set pulls together the Who’s scattered trove of recordings from 1967-69. It expands the original album (in mono and stereo versions, plus non-album singles) with three discs of recordings from 1967-68 along with sketches that Townshend would mine for “Tommy” in 1969 and, newly unveiled, a dozen of Townshend’s increasingly ambitious demos, including a thoroughly unrelaxed “Relax” and a smoldering, baleful “I Can See for Miles” that fully maps out the album version, which would be one of the Who’s pinnacles. PARELES More

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      ‘Ain’t Too Proud’ to Close on Broadway as Covid-19 Takes Its Toll

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      The jukebox musical about the powerhouse Motown group will end its run on Jan. 16. It is now the fourth show to announce a closing in the last eight days.“Ain’t Too Proud,” a jukebox musical about the Temptations that opened on Broadway in early 2019, will close on Jan. 16, the show’s producers said on Tuesday.The musical is the fourth Broadway show to announce a closing in the last eight days, as the spike in coronavirus cases from the Omicron variant has exacerbated the financial woes of an already pandemic-damaged theater industry.Last week, the musicals “Jagged Little Pill” and “Waitress,” as well as the play “Thoughts of a Colored Man” announced that they had closed without so much as a farewell performance — all were already on hiatus because of coronavirus cases among cast or crew.The Broadway production of “Ain’t Too Proud,” about the powerhouse Motown group, has not run since Dec. 15, citing coronavirus cases. It is planning to resume on Tuesday, Dec. 28, and hoping to run for three more weeks before closing for good.The musical also has a touring production that had to postpone shows at the Kennedy Center in Washington because of coronavirus cases; it is scheduled to have its delayed start on Tuesday night, as well.“Ain’t Too Proud” had a yearlong prepandemic run, opening in March 2019 to a positive review in The New York Times, where the critic Ben Brantley wrote, “While honoring all the expected biomusical clichés, which include rolling out its subjects’ greatest hits in brisk and sometimes too fragmented succession, this production refreshingly emphasizes the improbable triumph of rough, combustible parts assembled into glistening smoothness.”After the lengthy Broadway shutdown, “Ain’t Too Proud” resumed performances on Oct. 16; because the Broadway League is no longer releasing box office grosses for individual productions, it is not clear how the show has been doing over the last two months. The production received a $10 million Shuttered Venue Operators Grant as pandemic emergency assistance from the U.S. Small Business Administration.The musical won a Tony Award for its choreography by Sergio Trujillo; it features a book by Dominique Morisseau and direction by Des McAnuff, and the lead producers are Ira Pittelman and Tom Hulce. The show was capitalized for $16.75 million, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission; it successfully recouped that investment, according to a spokesman. More

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      Wanda Young, Motown Hitmaker With the Marvelettes, Dies at 78

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      She was the lead voice on “Don’t Mess With Bill” and other songs written by Smokey Robinson, who said she “had this little voice that was sexy to me.”Wanda Young, one of the lead singers of the Marvelettes, the girl group whose 1961 song “Please Mr. Postman,” recorded when they were teenagers, was Motown’s first No. 1 hit, died on Dec. 15 in Garden City, Mich. She was 78.Her daughter Meta Ventress said the cause was complications of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.The Marvelettes began recording in 1961, two years after Berry Gordy Jr. founded Motown Records. They signed the same year as the Supremes and a year before Martha and the Vandellas, all-female groups who eventually overshadowed them at Motown.Ms. Young (who was also known as Wanda Rogers) and Gladys Horton shared lead singer duties. “Don’t Mess With Bill,” which rose to No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1966, was one of several hits written by Smokey Robinson on which Ms. Young sang lead. (Ms. Horton was the lead singer on “Please Mr. Postman,” “Beechwood 4-5789” and other songs.)“Wanda had this little voice that was sexy to me, a little country kind of voice,” Mr. Robinson was quoted as saying in the music writer Fred Bronson’s liner notes to the 1993 Marvelettes compilation, “Deliver: The Singles (1961-1971).” “I knew if I could get a song to her, it would be a smash.”Among the other Robinson songs that featured Ms. Young’s voice were “I’ll Keep Holding On,” a 1965 release that peaked at No. 34 on the Billboard chart; “The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game,” which rose to No. 13 in 1967; and “My Baby Must Be a Magician,” which hit No. 17 in 1968.The Marvelettes, who recorded for Motown’s Tamla label, released more than 20 singles that made the charts.The group, which started with five members and later became a quartet and eventually a trio, disbanded around 1970. That year, Ms. Young recorded an album, produced by Mr. Robinson with backing vocals by the Andantes, a female session group, that, although actually a solo project, was released as “The Return of the Marvelettes” and marketed as a Marvelettes album.Wanda LaFaye Young was born on Aug. 9, 1943, in Eloise, Mich., and grew up in Inkster, about 20 miles west of Detroit. Her father, James, worked for the Ford Motor Company, and her mother, Beatrice (Dawson) Young, was a homemaker.Ms. Young, whose early ambition was to be a pediatric nurse, joined the Marvelettes after one of the original members had to leave.Ms. Horton had formed a quintet in 1960 with three high school classmates, Katherine Anderson, Georgeanna Tillman and Juanita Cowart, and a recent graduate, Georgia Dobbins. The group — then called the Casinyets, a contraction of “can’t sing yet” — competed in a talent show whose top three finishers were to receive an audition with Motown. The quintet didn’t win, but a teacher helped get them an audition anyway. Motown executives were impressed but told the young women that they needed to return with original material.They did: Ms. Dobbins’s friend William Garrett had composed a blues song, which Ms. Dobbins rewrote and recast as a pop song, about a girl pining for mail from her distant boyfriend. “Please Mr. Postman” was a hit, but Ms. Dobbins left the group before it was recorded because her mother was ill and her father had forbade her to be involved in the music business. Ms. Horton recruited Ms. Young.“She wanted to know if I could sing alto, and I said, ‘I think I can sing all of them — soprano, second soprano and alto,’” Ms. Young said in an interview with Blues & Soul magazine in 1990. “So that evening I went over to Georgeanna’s house and instantly became a member of the group.”Ms. Horton sang lead on the song. Three months after its release, it became a No. 1 hit.While Ms. Young fondly recalled the family atmosphere that Mr. Gordy fostered at Motown, she was disappointed when he moved the company to Los Angeles in 1972.“It was all done so quietly that we didn’t know if the gangsters had taken over or what was going on,” she told Blues & Soul. She added: “I felt like I’d been personally left behind. I’d grumble and complain within myself sometimes: Why would they move to California, knowing that this is Berry Gordy’s hometown?”Ms. Young’s 12-year marriage to Bobby Rogers of the Miracles ended in 1975. They had two children, Robert III and Bobbae Rogers, who survive her, along with Ms. Ventress, her daughter from another relationship; seven grandchildren; a great-grandson; four sisters, Adoria Williams, Cynthia Young, Regina Young and Beatrice Wilson; and four brothers, James Jr., Stephen, Paul and Reginald Young. Another daughter, Miracle Rogers, was killed in 2015. Ms. Young lived in Redford, Mich.Ms. Young reunited with Ms. Horton in 1990 for the album “The Marvelettes: Now!” on the producer Ian Levine’s Motorcity Records label. It featured some Marvelettes oldies, including “Don’t Mess With Bill.”Ms. Horton died in 2011.Ms. Ventress said that her mother — who lived off her royalties in the years after the Marvelettes broke up — was sometimes surprised at the longevity of her music.“I told her constantly, ‘All these people love you,’” Ms. Ventress said in an interview. “And she’d say, ‘Wow.’” She added, “She didn’t wake up every day thinking of the Marvelettes, but she never lost that glamour.” More

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      Cécile McLorin Salvant Branches Out, and 7 More New Songs

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      Hear tracks by FKA twigs and the Weeknd, Leon Bridges and Khruangbin, Animal Collective and others.Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.Cécile McLorin Salvant, ‘Thunderclouds’The headline here isn’t that the cream-of-the-crop jazz vocalist Cécile McLorin Salvant has serious creative appetites that run beyond the American-songbook-and-curios repertory, which she has so famously explored. That was becoming clear, slowly but surely, over the past few years. It’s that when she focuses instead on her own writing, and shifts away some from straight-on modern jazz, she also softens the archness and the neatness of her delivery. There’s a new, expanded range in both the music and the expression. “Thunderclouds” will help you clock the shift: an up-tempo lullaby of wistful, wounded hopefulness, its shapely chord changes carried loosely by the band and its bouncy rhythm nodding to Caribbean-infused jazz. “Sometimes you have to gaze into a well to see the sky,” Salvant sings, repeating the phrase as if to convince herself. The song comes from a forthcoming album, “Ghost Song,” due in March; it’ll be her first for Nonesuch Records and her first to feature primarily originals. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOLeon Bridges and Khruangbin, ‘B-Side’In a Texas alliance, the soul singer Leon Bridges is backed by Khruangbin, a trio from Houston that has soaked up global rhythms. “B-Side” is from a collaborative EP due in February. Khruangbin supplies mid-tempo, two-chord Afrobeat funk, with terse bits of rhythm guitar answered by tootling organ chords, as Bridges croons in falsetto about much he misses a distant lover. It sounds like a slice of a jam that went on much longer. JON PARELESAnimal Collective, ‘Walker’Plinking, cascading xylophone and marimba sounds and the nasal, pumping string tones of a hurdy-gurdy circle through “Walker,” a meditation on getting through grief that’s named after the songwriter Scott Walker. It’s less dizzying and more patient than much of Animal Collective’s catalog, and for its final minute, only plinks and stray words remain, like shards of mourning. PARELESTierra Whack, ‘Sorry’The high-concept miniaturist Tierra Whack has been releasing a series of three-song genre-testing EPs: “Pop?,” “Rap?” and now “R&B?,” which relies on slow-ticking drum machines and electronic tones. “Sorry” is cast as a phone message, “one last conversation” with someone who won’t answer. The synthesizer chords are frayed and quivery as her apologies tumble out — heartfelt but apparently too late. PARELESFKA twigs featuring the Weeknd, ‘Tears in the Club’Miserablism and sensualism pair elegantly in this collaboration between FKA twigs and the Weeknd. For twigs, an impressionistic singer, this marks her most pointed and theatrical vocals, and the Weeknd, who has long embraced deviant sadness on a grand scale, dials it back ever so slightly to match the beatifically aghast mood. JON CARAMANICARvssian and Future featuring Lil Baby, ‘M&M’On “M&M,” the Jamaican producer Rvssian serves up an ominous synth that sounds like a video game console on its last legs, tinny and fading. Lil Baby matches it with a needling singsong verse, and Future approaches it with an indignant wheeze. CARAMANICATyondai Braxton, ‘Dia’Tyondai Braxton’s new electronic track, “Dia,” emerges after a long silence. It has an insistent but implied beat, many layers of overt and implied syncopation, and a determination to keep changing. PARELES24kGoldn, ‘More Than Friends’Around 14 months ago, 24kGoldn was at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with his breakout single “Mood.” Now he’s remaking Biz Markie’s “Just a Friend.” It’s a cheeky success that feels like a grim concession. CARAMANICA More

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      Tame Impala’s Disco-Prog Shrug, and 9 More New Songs

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      Hear tracks by Alice Glass, Jean Dawson and Mac DeMarco, Girlpool and others.Every Friday, pop critics for The New York Times weigh in on the week’s most notable new songs and videos. Just want the music? Listen to the Playlist on Spotify here (or find our profile: nytimes). Like what you hear? Let us know at theplaylist@nytimes.com and sign up for our Louder newsletter, a once-a-week blast of our pop music coverage.Tame Impala, ‘No Choice’“No Choice” sums up the stasis of the pandemic: limited mobility, boredom, yearning, questioning, resignation. To be released as part of the expanded version of Tame Impala’s 2020 album, “The Slow Rush,” it’s one of Kevin Parker’s era-straddling solo productions: disco drums and percussion, prog-rock phasing on his voice, a guitar solo that sounds like Ernie Isley in the 1970s and lyrics that wonder, “What are we living for?” JON PARELESAlice Glass, ‘Fair Game’A listener doesn’t have to be aware of Alice Glass’s own story to recognize the crescendo of psychological manipulation — humiliation disguised as sympathy — in “Fair Game.” “I’m just trying to help you,” Glass deadpans in a little-girl coo alongside assessments like “You screw up everything” and “I’m so embarrassed for us.” A deep industrial thump, Gothic choir harmonies and a screamed backup refrain — “Where would you be without me?” — make clear that it’s actually a hellscape. PARELESJean Dawson and Mac DeMarco, ‘Menthol’The pop-punk revival of 2021 is alive in the melodic, middle-finger yelps of Jean Dawson, the genre crusher behind “Menthol” who was raised on the border between the United States and Mexico. This is gritted-teeth pop-punk, music for cheap cigs and driving with too many friends in the car. There is angsty precocity here, sure, but signs of versatility, too: Halfway through the track, Dawson takes a pause from screaming into the mic and melds his voice into a lonely R&B melody. The sun-dappled guitar tones of Mac DeMarco arrive, curling out of the track’s heavier, chugging riffs. And before it’s over, the sagacious DeMarco drops off a fatherly piece of advice for his host: “You should take it easy on yourself. Enjoy what you’re doing. And if you stop enjoying it at some point, no problem. Don’t do it anymore.” ISABELIA HERRERARuel, ‘Growing Up Is _____’Understatement of the year: “Growing up is weird.” The Australian songwriter Ruel admits but doesn’t quite take blame for his relationship misdeeds in this song, thumping along as he hops between tenor and falsetto, trying to justify himself. Even though he knows he failed, he tries to assign himself, “No regrets, no mistakes.” PARELESMitski, ‘Heat Lightning’How much did U2 change the landscape of rock? Mitski’s “Heat Lightning” is the kind of echoey and allegorical march that U2 forged decades ago, underpinned by a Velvet Underground drone. As its guitars and strings swell, the song surges forward steadfastly: “I’ve held on to feel the storm approaching,” Mitski sings, and then, “I give it up to you — I surrender.” PARELESLittle Dragon, ‘Drifting Out’“Drifting Out” has Yuri Nagano singing about precisely that feeling — “Deep sleep, crashing waves, heavy tide/Mmm, ooh love carry me down” — on an EP with three versions of the song: one with piano, one with cellos, one mixing all the sources with electronics. The cello version is the keeper; brawny arpeggios and rhythmic chords delivered by a pair of cellists including none other than Yo-Yo Ma. PARELESFlores, ‘Fools Gold’Some relationship send-offs surrender to despair; others are tokens of personal fortitude, reminders that there will always be a way forward. Flores’s “Fools Gold” is about an estrangement from a partner, but the Texas singer-songwriter is the one who comes out sure of herself. With the smokiness of a ’90s R&B icon, she oozes coldhearted pity for her ex over a funky bass line and operatic strings. “I got all your things to the left of me/You won’t be the death of me,” she sings. “Let me get one good look at you/Ain’t that a shame.” Ouch. HERRERAGirlpool, ‘Faultline’A country guitar twang, Harmony Tividad’s breathy coos and a sense of impressionistic abandon conjure a cinematic intensity on “Faultline.” But Girlpool doesn’t stop there — instead, it returns with the same propensity for piercing, bleeding-heart lyricism that has defined its work since “Before the World Was Big” in 2015. When Tividad sings, “I loved you so traumatically that I/Can barely lift the world you left for me,” there is little left to do than pull the covers over your head, turn off your alarm and let yourself decay under the sheets. HERRERAJeff Parker, ‘Ugly Beauty’There’s an almost alluring feeling of remove, of darkened vision but not necessarily a darkened attitude, in the sound of Jeff Parker’s guitar playing. When he’s unaccompanied, that feeling doubles. A collaborator with Meshell Ndegeocello and Makaya McCraven, among plenty others, he’s an expert at shooting friction into the groove of a group, one jagged single-note line at a time. But in solo-guitar moments, there’s nothing to disrupt but himself. Parker gets halfway into covering Thelonious Monk’s “Ugly Beauty,” from his new solo-guitar LP “Forfolks,” before he starts toying around with a sustain effect, giving his rich chords an electrified, ghostly power. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOCarmen Villain with Arve Henriksen, ‘Gestures’This meditative but constantly changing instrumental begins with the assembly of a steady-state percussion pattern on bells and hand drums. It’s joined by the trumpeter Arve Henriken, improvising a solo that’s backed by loops and washes of his harmonized, electronically warped trumpet. It’s a clear homage to the continuing influence of the trumpeter and “fourth world music” innovator Jon Hassell, who died in June. PARELES More

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      Alicia Keys, on and Off the Digital Grid

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      Her new double album, “Keys,” shows how thoroughly the production can transform her songs.“Keys,” Alicia Keys’s new album, is a high-concept experiment, the kind of self-conscious, introspective project that has been emerging during the pandemic. Like Keys’s decision to no longer wear makeup in public, the album is in part a pushback against phony, superficial perfection. “I used to live hidden in a disguise,” she sings in “Plentiful,” an affirmation of both religious faith and faith in herself that opens the album.“Keys” also exposes the options available to a 21st-century musician, the countless digital tweaks and variations. It’s a double album with 21 songs, eight of them appearing twice. It begins with “Originals,” tracks that Keys largely produced by herself, followed by “Unlocked”: alternate versions produced by Keys with the hitmaker Michael Williams II, who bills himself as Mike WiLL Made-It. Though the whole album is a studio production, “Originals” has a home-alone spirit, while “Unlocked” heads for the car and the club. Each half tells a different story about how songs move listeners, physically and emotionally.The songs themselves explore desire, love and loneliness. Throughout her career, Keys has mingled the personal and the political, often invoking a woman’s strength and determination. But for most of “Keys,” she plays a woman in thrall to her feelings, by turns connected, needy, amorous, giving, desolate, jealous, and, eventually, healing. Most of the songs vamp through a handful of chords as Keys gives her voice room to leap, to curl, to muse, to syncopate; she has rarely sounded so jazzy and improvisatory.The track list of “Keys” isn’t completely symmetrical. Each half of the album varies the sequence and includes unique songs. But anyone can now reshuffle an album, and “Keys” invites every listener to think like a producer, hearing the possibilities of timbre, propulsion, weight and context for every sound, while making clear how much those choices matter.The “Originals” half of the album promises intimacy. Unlike her 2020 album, “Alicia,” which involved dozens of collaborators, “Keys” usually brings in just a handful of musicians for each song. There’s still plenty of audio illusion in her “Originals” versions, with samples (like the Sade drumbeat in “Best of Me”), multitracked backup vocals and scratchy-vinyl sound effects. Yet those songs determinedly conjure small, private spaces as she sings her way through mixed emotions. In the tearful “Dead End Road” she’s desperately trying to save a failing relationship, hinting at Aretha Franklin in a gospel-style call-and-response with a choir that seems to be coming from inside her own head, still encouraging her to “try to make it.”In “Only You,” Keys declares, “I am nothing without you here” over reverberating piano chords, with the tempo fluctuating as if each line is occurring to her on the spot, though a band eventually joins her. And in “Is It Insane,” Keys is at the piano, leading a vintage-style jazz trio through complex chords as she sings about obsessing over an ex, deepening the grain of her voice like a latter-day Billie Holiday or Nina Simone while she begs, “Take away the pain.”The “Unlocked” productions put Keys back into the digital grid that often defines current pop. After a gauzy intro, the second version of “Only You” announces the changeover with a steady-thumping beat and digitally chopped-up bits of piano and lead vocal along with sound effects, including sirens and a gunshot. It’s a sign of what’s to come: heftier beats, vocal phrases crisped into hooks, guest appearances (like a nonchalant Lil Wayne spot on “Nat King Cole,” a song that challenges its hearer to become “unforgettable”).The “Unlocked” tracks have virtues of their own. They push Keys’s voice upfront, with a sharper focus. They give Keys a confident strut when she’s enjoying the romance in “Skydive” and “Love When You Call My Name,” and they shift “Old Memories,” a 1950s-tinged song about what music can trigger, from regret toward resilience. Mike Will also deploys little background interjections — a vocal snippet, a saxophone flourish, a handful of plucked guitar notes — as ingenious, near-subliminal attention-grabbers.But the “Unlocked” songs sound like public performances, neat and armored and solidly 4/4, more locked than unlocked. The “Originals” hint at freer, messier, closer, unresolved feelings, daringly unguarded — and thoroughly, openly human.Alicia Keys“Keys”(RCA) More