Music

An endless churn of new music constantly buries the past, so it's the mark of a great record when you still want to spin it long after a given year's best-of lists are published. Touché Amoré's exuberant road-worn confessional, Parting the Sea Between Brightness and Me, hasn't left my iPod or my psyche since last summer. And, while fans have already begun inquiring about a new full-length, the post-hardcore band's never-ending tour schedule doesn't stop until late December — for now.

I'm a sucker for a stuttered guitar sound. It's a sound I came to love listening to Fela Kuti and other African greats in the '70s and '80s. American rockers often tend to crank their gritty guitars to 10 — they get loud and gritty about two and a half minutes into the tune. But it's that sweeter, stuttered sound that grabs me right away; you can hear it these days in bands like Fool's Gold or Vampire Weekend.

Whitney Houston's 1992 Bodyguard soundtrack was a huge hit. Huge! It sold more than 45 million copies worldwide. Remember "I Will Always Love You"? It's from that record. But according to last week's poll, a staggering 90 percent of you either don't like it or haven't heard it.

The Brooklyn band We Are Augustines wouldn't seem to lend itself to windblown acoustic sing-alongs: The songs on 2011's Rise Ye Sunken Ships songs bellow and soar in the electric, anthemic spirit of, say, Titus Andronicus.

Folk-rock singer-songwriter Melissa Etheridge has been making music since she first picked up a guitar at the age of 8. Playing in country groups throughout her teens in her home state of Kansas, Etheridge went on to a hugely successful and decorated 25-year solo career — and won two Grammy Awards and an Oscar along the way.

Easily one of the hardest working bands in show biz, today’s Little Feat is a six-member powerhouse that ably carries on the group’s tradition of deftly blending Rock, R&B and blues to create a jammin’ blend of Americana that has earned accolades from critics, fellow musicians and fans alike for over four decades. Their new album, Rooster Rag features 10 brand new original songs including four co-writes with Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter plus two blues classics, one from Mississippi John Hurt and one from Willie Dixon.