For Madmen Only

Atomic Opera

It speaks well of this hard-hitting, secular-market Christian-metal offering that 23 years after its initial appearance Derek Oliver’s Rock Candy Records has seen fit to release it in a “special deluxe collector’s edition” (replete with a detailed behind-the-scenes essay and other booklet goodies). As relevant as ever: a song called “War Drum” that by quoting the melody of “Onward, Christian Soldiers” christens the song’s militant pacifism and elevates it beyond politics—and Sam Taylor’s layered production, newly remastered for maximum eardrum-toughening punch.

Ruins

First Aid Kit

On their second Columbia album, Johanna and Klara Söderberg continue to excel at what brought them to the attention of the majors in the first place: achingly lovely vocals and arrestingly melancholy melodies. As combined by their latest producer Tucker Martine, these qualities result in a reasonable facsimile of folk music for moderns. What separates them from the real thing is the lyrics. In song after song, the Söderbergs lament unrequited love without ever hitting upon a memorable phrase or image. Maybe “Emmylou” was a fluke after all.

As You See Me Now

Jools Holland, José Feliciano

“Treat Myself,” a song about imagining there’s a heaven, is one of the high points of Stevie Wonder’s latter-day output, and, believe it or not, Feliciano, Holland, and the Rhythm & Blues Orchestra raise its emotional and spiritual temperature. They bring something to Fats Waller’s “Honeysuckle Rose” (crisp swing, two Feliciano acoustic-guitar solos) as well. They certainly don’t subtract anything from “Hit the Road Jack” or Tracy Chapman’s “Baby Can I Hold You.” Elsewhere, the good time that is obviously being had by all is reward enough.

I Can Feel You Creep Into My Private Life

tUnE-yArDs

If cookie-cutter #Resistance leftism could be said to have depths, Merrill Garbus could be said to plumb them. Her whirligig-of-consciousness lyrics retain an open-endedness even when tethered to such closed-ended subjects as the death of Eric Garner (“Heart Attack”) and white privilege (“Colonizer,” “Private Life”). She manages this trick primarily by sing-chanting her lyrics until they verge on incantation and by tethering them to rhythms that aren’t above colonizing funk. Or maybe it’s just that she’s not above letting funk colonize her.

ENCORE

By now, the story told by Sensational Sweet: Chapter One: The Wild Bunch (RCA/Sony) is well-known: Four U.K. musicians known as “The Sweet” go from scoring bubblegum hits written for them to dropping the “The” and reinventing themselves as a self-contained, hard-rocking unit, eventually winding down after a 10-year run amid internal dissension and the declining interest of an audience conditioned to prize novelty.

Still, a story that begins with “Little Willy” (1972); climaxes with “Ballroom Blitz,” “Fox on the Run,” and “Action” (1975); and winds down with “Love Is like Oxygen” (1978) is likely to have entertaining subplots—i.e., more adrenalized tunes where those came from. In this regard Sensational Sweet, which collects the U.K. configurations of the band’s first six albums, adding two live discs and a singles-only compilation, delivers. In fact, it over-delivers, thanks, no doubt, to an audience conditioned to prize demos and alternate takes. —A.O.