New music: Lorde, Garbage, Ches Smith and Jordi Savll

Winnipeg Free Press

04-07-2025

Lorde
Virgin (Universal)
Fans of the New Zealand singer-songwriter Lorde have long commended the artist for her visceral pop craft. Her music, to certain ears, sounds like freedom. On her new album, it is as though Lorde is able to hear it, too.
On Virgin, the singer born Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O'Connor's fourth studio album and first in four years, pop hits are devoid of any anxious filtering. She is raw.
When Lorde first emerged as a gothic popstar — with Royals, and its critique of celebrity culture and consumerism — she did so with prescience. Her sparse production style and cursive-singing had come from the future, and its influence would be felt for many years to follow. Her debut, 2013's Pure Heroine, suggested that she possessed something her contemporaries did not; the synesthesia synth-pop Melodrama in 2017 all but confirmed her greatness.
She took a step back from all that for the sleepy sunshine of 2021's Solar Power, and then took another — veering away from the spotlight all together.
Musically, Virgin threads the needle from Melodrama to the current moment. The lead single, the synthpop What Was That is a reserved derivation of her previous work but no doubt a banger; on the syncopated rhythms of Hammer, she's matured her racecar-fast pop.
An album standout, the metamorphic Shapeshifter, possesses a tension between organic and electronic sounds that continue onto Man of the Year, with its bass and cello contributions from frequent collaborator Dev Hynes.
For a singer who has always performed physical pop songs, Virgin is her most bodily work to date as well. This is a new Lorde — a more self-assured artist, warts and all — but one that recognizes and evolves her sonic signatures. Now, like in the early days of her career, Virgin is both avant-garde and pop-radio ready, a confluence of unlike features that mirror its messaging. Only now, she sounds unshackled. ★★★★ out of five
Stream: Shapeshifter; Hammer
— Maria Sherman, The Associated Press
ROCK
Garbage
Let All That We Imagine Be the Light (BMG)
Buzz-saw guitars, dense synthesizers and throbbing percussion can sometimes brighten the mood.
That's the goal of the new album from the American rock band Garbage. It's the sound of frontwoman Shirley Manson pushed to the brink by health issues and the fury of our times.
The band's familiar sonic mix provides a pathway out of the darkness, with heavy riffing and dramatic atmospherics accompanying Manson's alluring alto.
The album is Garbage's eighth and the first since 2021's No Gods No Masters. The genesis came last August, when Manson aggravated an old hip injury, abruptly ending the band's world tour.
The other members of the group – Butch Vig, Duke Erikson and Steve Marker – retreated to the studio and began work on new music. Manson added lyrics that lament fatalism, ageism and sexism, acknowledge vulnerability and mortality, and seek to embrace joy, love and empowerment.
That's a lot, which may be why there's a song titled Sisyphus. The sonics are formidable, too. A mix that echoes the Shangri-Las,
Most of the material is less New Age-y, and there's a fascinating desperation in Manson's positivity. Chinese Fire Horse, for example, becomes a punky, Gen X, age-defying fist-pumper.
Manson sounds just as defiant singing about a love triangle on Have We Met (The Void), or mourning in America on There's No Future in Optimism. The album peaks on the backside with the back-to-back cuts Get Out My Face AKA Bad Kitty, a battle cry in the gender war, and R U Happy Now, a ferocious post-election rant.
Then comes the closer, The Day That I Met God, a weird and whimsical benedictory mix of horns, strings, faith, pain management and more. Hope and uplift can sound good loud. ★★★★1/2
Stream: Chinese Fire Horse; R U Happy Now
— Steven Wine, The Associated Press
Ches Smith
Clone Row (Otherly Love)
It can be argued that if one jazz guitar is a good thing then two must be even better. If the two guitarists are among the best contemporary adventurous musicians in jazz, it should lead to some pretty interesting music.
This album is by leader Ches Smith, drummer and composer, joined by guitarists Mary Halvorson and Liberty Ellman, and bassist Nick Dunston.
Describing this as 'interesting music' is an understatement.
From the opening track with its scrawling riff to later more melodic grooves, there is much to enjoy here. Both Halvorson and Ellman are noted for sound clusters and wild flights, but they work with wonderful unison and duet moments that are surprising and unpredictable. Smith's writing gives all members freedom within the 'lines' without committing them to stay between them.
Tracks such as Town Down display a driving rhythm with a challenging time signature. Electronic effects are added in many tracks, giving an often otherworldly mood. Heart Breakthrough has the guitarists spinning around each other in delightful patterns. Guessing the time signature is often just a fun game.
This is unquestionably challenging music. Dissonance rules throughout, though it is not necessarily jarring or out of place. Smith's leadership and compositions are increasingly impressive as the album proceeds. Sustained Nightmare is perhaps well named as it is absolutely on the non-melodic side of the bell curve. And on the topic, the last track, Play Bell (For Nick) gives the bass player front and centre acknowledgement.
One of the exciting things about contemporary jazz is the increasing range of new ways of expressing emotion through adventurous music. Not for everyone perhaps, but albums like this are the new moves in the always shifting world of the genre. It is well worth a listen.
★★★★ 1/2 out of five
Stream: Abrade Wirth Me; Town Down
— Keith Black
CLASSICAL
Forgotten Symphonies
Jordi Savll, Le Concert Des Nations (Alia Vox)
In this followup to his prior successful Beethoven and Schubert recordings, Jordi Savall leads his Le Concert Des Nations in two 'forgotten' romantic symphonies, both composed in the wake of Beethoven's death and relegated to the margins of music history.
The first of those, Schumann's Symphony in G minor, Wo029, or the Zwickau, roils with the passion of youth, its two shorter movements earning the work's title as the 'Unfinished Symphony.' Savall leads the period orchestra through its opening movement with finesse while navigating its resolutely motivic nature.
The second movement recalling Beethoven's Symphony No. 7, is infused with greater drama, from its initial chordal outbursts leading to the strings's more rhythmically active passagework before a fiery finish.
Bruckner's Symphony No. 2 in D Minor, WAB 100, described by the overly self-critical composer as 'gilt nicht' ('does not count') even saw him re-naming his sweeping work penned in 1872 as Symphony No. Zero.
Of its four movements, the Andante is a particular standout with the players instilling gravitas into its slowly measured meditation based on a chorale theme, as is the Finale, capped by a powerful coda attesting to the German composer's arresting voice on full display in this now 'remembered' work that should be heard again – and often.
★★★★ 1/2 out of five
Stream: Symphony in G minor, Wo029; Symphony No. 2 in D minor, WAB 100, Andante
— Holly Harris