Lady Gaga – Born This Way
It is perhaps no small wonder that democracy today appears as a specifically feminine, and perhaps feminist, art. < > presents herself here as a giant womb of freedom, large enough to hold Whitman himself, if not Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band. A Lady Liberty for the < >, she’s not afraid to get her robes dirty, throw back a few shots, and spread democracy in a venereal fashion. As she makes clear in one of her more spiritually-minded songs, “In the most Biblical sense, I am beyond repentance/ Fame hooker, prostitute wench, vomits her mind/ But in the cultural sense/ I just speak in future tense/ Judas kiss me if offensed/ Or wear ear condom next time.” But, in a way, this album seems beyond all politics — governmental, identitarian, or otherwise. Read The Full Review on Tiny Mix Tapes

Thurston Moore – Demolished Thoughts
For starters, Beck produced Demolished Thoughts. And regardless of him being a bat-shit Scientologist in real life, as a musician in the studio, Beck’s palette is bat-shit catholic. Might we get some Thurston “Bonus Noise,” a la Stereopathetic Soulmanure? (Moore did pen a liner essay for Odelay‘s deluxe, so there was at least a chance of a Branca-bustin’ cover of “Electric Music and the Summer People.”) Second, this is still a Thurston Moore record. And most of his part-time loves — The Bark Haze, Northampton Wools, etc. — have essentially been dirt-kink affairs. But just as skronk would have it, turns out that Demolished Thoughts is more akin to the dub narcotic folk of Beck’s One Foot in the Grave than anything Wylde Ratttz ever did. Read the Full Review on Dusted

Amon Tobin – ISAM
Upon hitting play, Amon takes the listener on a journey through twelve tracks that switch from chilled and laidback to gritty and at some points hectic, but always vivid and never lacking a theme. Journeyman opens the album with a dark and twisted lullaby that becomes progressively more psychedelic along the way, after which more sonic warfare is transposed on tunes such as the brilliant Autechre-y Goto 10 and the stunning listening experience that is Wooden Toy, a tune that sounds deceivingly stripped but actually bursts with layers of melancholy and depth. Unlimited creativity is the keyword here. Genres, or any conventional programming really, are put aside. Read the full review on Beats & Beyond