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First Listen Enjoy select, upcoming albums, in their entirety.
First Listen

First Listen

Hear upcoming albums in their entirety

Sunday

First Listen: Sara Watkins, 'Sun Midnight Sun'

Sara Watkins' new album, Sun Midnight Sun, comes out May 8. Aaron Redfield/Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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Aaron Redfield/Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Sara Watkins, 'Sun Midnight Sun'

As accessible and comfortably sweet-voiced as Watkins' music is, the former Nickel Creek member is smart enough to spike it with surprises — the swooping strings in "The Ward Accord" or the churning, slow-burning electric-guitar grind in "When It Pleases You."

Hear 'Sun Midnight Sun' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Chicha Libre, 'Canibalismo'

Chicha Libre's new album, Canibalismo, comes out May 8. Txuca hide caption

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Txuca

First Listen: Chicha Libre, 'Canibalismo'

With Venezuelan, Mexican, American and French members, the band plays in a Peruvian style that itself resulted from cross-cultural fermentation in Latin America.

Listen To 'Canibalismo' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Royal Headache, 'Royal Headache'

Australian retro-rockers Royal Headache are definitely diamonds in the rough. What's Your Rupture Records hide caption

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What's Your Rupture Records

First Listen: Royal Headache, 'Royal Headache'

The Australian band's debut is a collection of two-minute garage-rock gems — and a reminder of rock 'n' roll's vital connection to Memphis and Motown.

Listen To 'Royal Headache' In Its Entirety

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Sunday

First Listen: Rufus Wainwright, 'Out Of The Game'

Rufus Wainwright's new album, Out of the Game, comes out May 1. Barry J. Holmes hide caption

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Barry J. Holmes

First Listen: Rufus Wainwright, 'Out Of The Game'

Out of the Game succeeds because Wainwright remains stubbornly himself: pouring vibrato into each long vocal line, reaching for the higher note in a chorus, unfolding song lines that only make sense once he's luxuriating in them.

Hear 'Out Of The Game' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Santigold, 'Master Of My Make-Believe'

Santigold's new album, Master Of My Make-Believe, comes out May 1. Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Santigold, 'Master Of My Make-Believe'

The album, out May 1, has its playfully bouncy moments, but its overall tone is one of severity, even solemnity. It's as if pop music caught up with Santigold's sound, and she tacked left to avoid the glare.

Hear 'Master Of My Make-Believe' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Damon Albarn, 'Dr Dee'

Damon Albarn's new album, Dr Dee, comes out May 8. Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Damon Albarn, 'Dr Dee'

The Blur and Gorillaz singer has recorded a willfully obscure folk opera, full of baroque flourishes, spoken asides, unsettling rhythm tracks, guest vocalists and hairpin turns that lead down unpredictable cul de sacs.

Hear 'Dr Dee' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Lower Dens, 'Nootropics'

Lower Dens' new album, Nootropics, comes out May 1. Shawn Brackbill hide caption

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Shawn Brackbill

First Listen: Lower Dens, 'Nootropics'

On Nootropics, the band reinvents itself, trading wiry guitar lines for fluttering synths, droning repetition and transfixing spirals of vocal harmonies.

Hear 'Nootropics' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Patrick Watson, 'Adventures In Your Own Backyard'

Patrick Watson's new album, Adventures in Your Own Backyard, comes out May 1. Brigitte Henry hide caption

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Brigitte Henry

First Listen: Patrick Watson, 'Adventures In Your Own Backyard'

Recorded mostly in Watson's Montreal apartment, Adventures in Your Own Backyard is appropriately named. The relaxed nature of a home recording lets the players dig deep into these songs' twists and turns. If you could wear out an MP3, Bob Boilen's copy of this record would already have scratches.

Listen To 'Adventures In Your Own Backyard' In Its Entirety

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Sunday

First Listen: Norah Jones, 'Little Broken Hearts'

Norah Jones' new album, Little Broken Hearts, comes out May 1. Frank Ockenfels/Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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Frank Ockenfels/Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Norah Jones, 'Little Broken Hearts'

Ten years after her debut, Jones is ideally positioned for the subtle sonic makeover she undergoes on Little Broken Hearts, which she recorded with producer Danger Mouse.

Hear 'Little Broken Hearts' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Sarah Jaffe, 'The Body Wins'

Sarah Jaffe's new album, The Body Wins, comes out April 24. Dylan Hollingsworth/Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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Dylan Hollingsworth/Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Sarah Jaffe, 'The Body Wins'

Produced by John Congleton, The Body Wins busies up Jaffe's sound to a remarkable degree — and, more importantly, retains her cool ability to shape-shift from warm vulnerability to icy distance and back again as it suits her.

Hear 'The Body Wins' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Sea Of Bees, 'Orangefarben'

Julie Ann Bee writes and records as Sea of Bees. Her new record, Orangefarben, comes out May 1. Gabriella Clavel hide caption

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Gabriella Clavel

First Listen: Sea Of Bees, 'Orangefarben'

It's hard to imagine packing more heartache into a single record than Julie Ann Bee does on Orangefarben. The album follows a period of upheaval in the singer's life, during which she came out, toured behind her debut album and broke up with her first girlfriend.

Hear 'Orangefarben' In Its Entirety

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Sunday

First Listen: Spiritualized, 'Sweet Heart Sweet Light'
Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Spiritualized, 'Sweet Heart Sweet Light'

Spiritualized's seventh album reaches reverently for something bigger than itself — something divine, of course, but also shot through with the gut-level, ground-level hope inherent in humankind.

Listen To 'Sweet Heart Sweet Light' In Its Entirety

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First Listen: Horse Feathers, 'Cynic's New Year'

Horse Feathers' new album, Cynic's New Year, comes out April 17. John Clark/Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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John Clark/Courtesy of the artist

First Listen: Horse Feathers, 'Cynic's New Year'

On the band's fourth album, the tension between gorgeousness and grief gets a single line to sum it all up: "Beauty and loss, they are one and the same."

Hear 'Cynic's New Year' In Its Entirety

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Sunday

First Listen: Bonnie Raitt, 'Slipstream'

Bonnie Raitt's new album, Slipstream, comes out April 10. Matt Mindlin hide caption

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Matt Mindlin

First Listen: Bonnie Raitt, 'Slipstream'

Slipstream serves Raitt's lifelong project of expressing how blues idioms apply to the life of the modern woman. The guitarist and singer's first release since 2005, it's warmly contemporary, while still strongly rooted in the blues moods and techniques that Raitt has always treasured.

Listen To 'Slipstream' In Its Entirety

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