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1. Peter Adams “What’s Growing”
2. Kesarbai Kerkar “Kesarbai Kerkar: 1944-1953”
3. Green-House “Music for Living Spaces”

Green-House, “Music for Living Spaces”

Green-House is not a band but a project, and the person behind the project is Los Angeles-based artist Olive Ardizoni, who very clearly states the intent of this album: “I’m trying to hit that part of the brain that’s affected by the emotional state that you’re in when you perceive something as cute.” Mission accomplished! The songs on “Music for Living Spaces” are gentle and bright and welcoming, with minimalist synth and keyboard melodies rising and falling and floating through open space like a speck of dust in a sunbeam. A lovely listen for lousy times.

Kesarbai Kerkar, “Kesarbai Kerkar: 1944-1953”

Canary Records is a Baltimore-based record label that focuses on releasing “early 20th century masterpieces (mostly) in languages other than English.” This collection of ragas by Hindustani classical vocalist Kesarbai Kekar, who died in 1977, qualifies on all fronts. The nine tracks here find Kerkar in impressive form, unspooling long and intricate vocal runs as strings drone and hand drums burble behind her. The result is music that’s totally entrancing, and the relatively short track lengths — all but one clock in under five minutes long — keep it from fading into the background.

Peter Adams, “I Woke With Planets in My Face”

An overlooked classic from way back in the ancient times of 2008, “I Woke With Planets in My Face” is every bit as compelling a listen now as it was then. Adams is one of those write-and-arrange-and-play-and-record-everything type of geniuses who takes parts — guitar parts, piano parts, violin parts, digital parts — and layers them on top of each other until a song starts to materialize. And generally speaking, those songs are wonderful examples of symphonic indie-pop that sound kind of like the Flaming Lips playing Of Montreal songs — a good thing.