All right, we only have a few more of these left in 2024, maybe, but it's a Great Albums video, going over a handful of records that over the past month, I really enjoyed. I think you might enjoy them, too. I don't want them to slip through the cracks on you. As I know, there's a lot of music out there dropping at any given time. So please do not forget these records because I think they are pretty great, and worthy of your attention.

Let's get into it. Bam.

Starting with Xiu Xiu. 13" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips, the new record from Xiu Xiu, which, of course, is intense. It's dark, it's abrasive, it is just insane off-the-wall indie rock with lots of goth leanings and lofi esthetics. And as odd and as off-putting Xiu Xiu's music can tend to be for the uninitiated, I actually think this is one of the band's most accessible records in a long time. The melodic licks, the riffs, if you can call them that, as well as the drum beats go hard, are very groovy, are very direct and to the point.

It's definitely not as dark or as harrowing a listen as their previous LP, Ignore Grief. As a long-time Xiu Xiu fan, I do tend to enjoy these short, sweet moments in the band's catalog where they do hit us with some songs that I think have some real snap to them. This record is one of those moments despite its incredibly long title. And yes, I highly recommend it to you guys and hope that you check it out.

Following this, though, next we have for the electronic music heads out there, a new one from Sam Sheppard, aka Floating Points, Cascade, a very solid series of techno and house fusions with lots of subtle progressions, good clean, crisp textures, killer grooves, beautiful keys. It is subtle, it is nuanced. Pretty much every track here follows some nice clean edge of your seat, really entrancing linear progressions, some pretty lengthy cuts on this record, too. It's a great one if you're looking for something to really, again, scratch that electronic itch, but bring a cerebral vibe, too.

All right, following this, Nails, Every Bridge Burning, the power violence powerhouse is back with a record that really reinforces a lot of the same aesthetics as their last album, but leans lyrically and conceptual really a lot further into nihilism and just also antisocial behavior and rhetoric.

I mean, the last record, and this is a contrast I wish I specifically he brought up in my review of this album, had at least a sense of... A small sense, a limited sense of community and togetherness to it. You will never be one of us. There's an in-group and an out-group. Whereas thematically on this record, no, instead, the tone has changed to, Fuck everyone. I just want to be by myself. I don't care about anybody or anything or what anyone thinks about not a single thing. I've burned all these bridges with all these people. I'm shutting them out. I'm completely clearing my plate of any single person who I could have to deal with for any reason. It's just a very dark and very lonely record, and the music also does not sound very inviting. So it fits.

But yes, killer riffs, amazing production from Kurt Ballou, a new band lineup in tow as well, which you can really tell because the drumming has definitely I've been revitalized on this LP. But what else would you expect from a band as heavy and as aggressive as Nails?

Next, shout out to Magdalena Bay's Imaginal Disk. Very cool, abstract, conceptual pop record with fantastic production. Great songs, snappy choruses, dreamy instrumental palettes, grooves on grooves on grooves on grooves on grooves. Very surreal lyricism as well, a lot of which deals in self-image. It's a great record. The duo really has outdone themselves this time, and I think they're proving themselves, continuing to prove themselves as one of the best pop acts out there today.

Next, shout out to Blu & Exile on their new record together, Love (the) Ominous World. These guys have made some of the biggest and best modern classics in hip hop together over the last decade plus, and they continue to do so on this new album. Blu has been super prolific as of late, dropping archival projects, dropping collab albums, dropping all sorts of stuff. And of course, I mean, why not throw an Exile album in there, too, as well, I guess.

But if you love your conscious hip hop, your boom bap, your jazz rap, and you love to hear a lyricist who has incredible amounts of personality flow and a very unique knack for jumping very deep deeply into topics on this record, ranging from past memories and experiences to literally a song about rain, then you are going to love what the ominous world here has to offer. I mean, as a record in the greater Blu/Exile catalog, it may not have bested their last together Miles, but I mean, that was such a massive, epic, 90-minute, one-of-a-kind rap experience that I don't think is ever really going to be replicated by much of anybody to be completely honest. But regardless of whether or not it fully compares, this is still much, much, much, much, much better than what you're getting out there today, and it's just the incredible standard that Blu & Exile continue to meet that makes their albums so interesting and always worth checking out.

Following this, I want to shout out a couple of shorter releases that I have not done for reviews of, but I think they are very much worth your time, and they have some great tracks and highlights on them.

One, this new Corpus II EP II EP from Show Me The Body. This is pretty much like an ongoing take in their Corpus series because they had that Corpus record years and years and years back, like in 2017, I believe, where it was just like wall to wall collabs with a variety of different artists. They're pretty much doing that as well on these EP, specifically the second one over here that I want to point you guys to that has some killer appearances from Blackie as well as Spellling.

And yeah, like those high, distorted, crazy, insane banjo riffs, the very aggressive punk drums and instrumentation. Also that punk affectation on the vocals, too. It's all turned up to 11 on this record, outside of a handful of tracks where it seems like they explore some different influences and stuff like that because of the guests they might have on the song. The closing track, bringing Corbin out of the woodwork for that one was actually totally insane. Did not see the band touching on something so moody and out there on that song. And yet it works. It's actually genuinely interesting. But Show Me The Body, continuing to experiment, do very weird and interesting stuff, and work with a wide variety of artists. And that Spellling track, for sure, is a goddamn anthem. Don't miss that one.

That has been the great albums video for this month. Maybe there will be another one in November, but we are just getting close to the end of the year. So it's going to be List Week once we hit December and all that. So it's been quite an interesting year for music, to say the least. Thank you guys for watching.

Anthony Fantano. Great Albums. Forever.