Aphex TwinSyro (Warp)
Vashti BunyanHeartleap (DiCristina)
The digital market has disrupted plenty of things about the way music is created, distributed, and even defined. EPs used to be stopgaps between full-lengths, and mixtapes were collections of freestyles and slapdash cuts; these days, though, MCs are releasing album-length EPs and mixtapes as polished as commercial LPs. NehruvianDoom, a collaboration between young New York MC Bishop Nehru and mysterious rapper-producer Doom, feels like an old-world mixtape and an EP at the same time—it’s a tad too short, and the half-baked tracks are cobbled together. Doom’s loose pileups of samples and boom-bap beats move at a steady, pleasant clip, and occasionally Bishop Nehru, who handles the bulk of the rapping, musters up enough confidence to make an impression. At least on “Caskets” Nehru delivers enough punchy lines (“I’m feeling blanker than a CD-ROM / And all I ever wanted was for them to see these rhymes”) to measure up to his better half. —Leor Galil
GodfleshA World Lit Only by Fire (Avalanche)
The second and final album from this Philadelphia fourth-wave emo outfit kicks off with sharp, anthemic guitar and a rush of adrenaline that lasts through the LP’s unfortunately short running time. Hightide Hotel are the kind of emo band taken with the frenetic energy and bombast of hardcore, and they have a keen ear for applying that power to pop-leaning songwriting. On Naturally they’ve figured out their footing, which makes it bittersweet that this is the last go-round for these three guys. The gaggle of yearning voices that appear near the end of the title track, singing a wordless refrain in unison, makes for one of the most evocative and potent emo songs in a year that’s had plenty of great ones. —Leor Galil
Menace RuineVenus Armata (Profound Lore)
