Chvrches Stare Down Nightmares in ‘Screen Violence’: Album Review

Chris Willman Music WriterThe irreverent wit of Kacey Musgraves’ first two albums has long since given way on the last couple to an earnestness and, most of all, a gravitas  about love — falling into it, on her last release, 2018’s Grammy-winning “Golden Hour,” and falling back out, in a big way, on the just-released “Star-Crossed.” She does allow herself one good laugh, though… not in the new record’s lyrics, but in its attendant merch.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorYebba — a.k.a. Abbey Smith — is a prodigiously talented 26-year-old singer who’s been buzzing for so long it’s hard to believe “Dawn” is her debut album.

A.D. Amorosi Go ahead: make the “None more black” Spinal Tap joke when it comes to Metallica’s eponymously titled 1991 album.

Chvrches made an appearance on CBS This Morning over the weekend, performing a trio of songs from their just-released fourth album, ‘Screen Violence’.The group delivered a faithful representation of the album, performing its two lead singles, ‘Good Girls’ and ‘He Said She Said’, as well as the deep cut ‘California’.

“Why does it take so long to break up? Why does no one talk about the fact that [divorce] is endless trauma?” Jessica Chastain asks in a heartbreaking moment from HBO’s devastating marital and breakup mini-series “Scenes From A Marriage.” A modern adaptation of Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman’s brutally emotionally honest 1970s series, now written, directed, and executive produced by Israeli filmmaker Hagai Levi, (“Our Boys,” “The Affair,” and “In Treatment”), this new HBO version is intimate,

Brandon Yu Last month, in response to being doxxed by Kanye West, as their feud escalated while their respective album releases approached, Drake posted the most carefree possible video of himself — chuckling in a convertible, the Toronto night sky gliding behind him, a lover’s heart etched into his hairline, beaming and seemingly even tickled by the threat.

K.J. Yossman Interest in the royals has never been higher but in death, as in life, it’s Diana, Princess of Wales, who continues to nab the headlines.The princess, who would have turned 60 in July, died in a Paris car crash in 1997 alongside her then beau Dodi Fayed.

If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power (★★★★☆) radiates strength and intensity. With a production assist from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, Halsey layers dark, industrial elements over her sound.Reznor and Ross’ influence is palpable, but not overwhelming — this is still very much Halsey’s album.

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Chris Willman Music Writer“God’s not finished,” Kanye West sings repeatedly at the end of one of his new songs, “24.” Being made in God’s image, West very much relates to that; he doesn’t like being done with things, either. Yet here we have the miracle, a true, blue spectacle, of a finished “Donda,” the album that until this weekend seemed poised to challenge Guns N’ Roses’ “Chinese Democracy” as the most mythologically delayed major music release ever.

A.D. Amorosi We know the ever-ubiquitous, always-empowered music and lyrics of songwriter Diane Warren, intimately, long before we know her as a performative artist.

Saturday Night, Sunday Morning (★★★☆☆) is Bugg’s first album since embarking on a sort of career relaunch after the tepid reception of his last album, and it is readily apparent from the first few tracks that with his pivot, he has found the sharpness he was looking for, and recaptured some of the rawness of his early work.Aside from his singularly strange name-checking of ABBA as an influence on the album’s sound, there is definitely more of a radio-ready pop sensibility to it, bolstered by the

Chris Willman Music WriterSometimes you learn about a collaboration in the making that sounds so promising, your first instinct is to completely dial down expectations, lest there be too much disappointment when the uncertain chemistry goes pfff instead of pow. So it was when Halsey just recently revealed one of music’s best kept secrets, that an entire album was in the bag with the production team of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorA new lead singer is just about the most dramatic change a band can make — even if a main songwriter or instrumentalist leaves, the voice is usually the clearest link to what came before. Although George Clarke, cofounder and lead vocalist of long-running San Francisco avant-metal act Deafheaven, hasn’t gone anywhere, he’s changed up his style so dramatically for the band’s fifth studio album that it actually sounds like they have a different singer.