Social Distortion

HARD TIMES AND NURSERY RHYMES

Epitaph Records

Times may have changed, but not Social Distortion (in sound if not in personnel). “I’ll be here to the bitter end/ And I’m here to make my stand/ With my guitar in my hand,” gravel-voiced front man and Social D. constant Mike Ness declares on “Still Alive,” as the band concludes the album with one final blazing rocker.

That steadfastness has served the veteran Southern California band well. “Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes” shows there’s still plenty of juice in Social Distortion’s guitar-driven attack. And also in Ness’ persona as a bruised and battered survivor. Maybe that’s because he knows how to balance the punkish edge of the music with a clear-eyed adult perspective that goes beyond the hard-boiled veneer to reveal some tenderness and even vulnerability. The only non-original is Hank Williams’ “Alone and Forsaken” — rocked up, of course, but still as desolate as the title indicates.

— Nick Cristiano, The Philadelphia Inquirer

Amos Lee

MISSION BELL

Blue Note Records

Amos Lee has a honeyed singing voice — light amber, mildly sweet, a touch of grain — and the tendency to feature it squarely, without much fuss or undue strain. His songs, rooted in a soothing style descended from 1970s folk rock and rustic soul, rarely nudge him from his comfort zone. If you can accept the limits of his emotional palette, which runs from a quiet rapture to a quieter desperation, you can begin to notice the diligence behind his song craft and the deceptive ease of his delivery.

That’s a big “if,” but “Mission Bell,” his fourth album on Blue Note, sharpens the payoff. Produced by Joey Burns of the roots-rock band Calexico, and principally recorded in that band’s hometown, Tucson, Ariz., it plants Lee and his tunes in a stark landscape, enveloped by rustling percussion and reverberant drones.

A few compatible peers, notably Sam Beam of Iron and Wine, contribute tactfully subtle background vocals. A pair of magisterial elders, Lucinda Williams and Willie Nelson, take more of an honored seat at the table.

The album opens with two hymns of praise to the open road: “El Camino” (named after the California Mission Trail, rather than the old coupe) and “Windows Are Rolled Down” (in which an old coupe may actually be involved). But restlessness can only be a matter of lip service with Lee, whose truer moments on this album take the form of direct appeals (“Stay With Me”), plainspoken reflections (“Learned a Lot”) and broken-down petitions (“Jesus”).

— Nate Chinen, The New York Times

Cage the Elephant

THANK YOU HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Jive Records

Matt Shultz’s scratchy, wobbly, jumpy voice isn’t pretty by any means. But it happens to be the perfect instrument for the manic desperation and sardonic defiance of his band, Cage the Elephant. Formed in Bowling Green, Ky., Cage the Elephant had enough success with its self-titled debut album — extensive touring and widespread rock radio airplay for hard-headed singles like “Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked” and “Back Against the Wall” — to embolden the band on its second, “Thank You Happy Birthday.”

The new album is more abrasive, rowdier, more unstable and pushier in the right ways. Where “Cage the Elephant” glanced at the Rolling Stones, punk, grunge and Kings of Leon, the new album also throws in post-punk, the Pixies, more electronic effects and more flat-out hollering from Shultz. The music can swerve in odd directions at any moment, like “2024,” which in its first 15 seconds opens with an electronic swoop, introduces a serviceable upbeat guitar riff, speeds up and tosses that riff aside to change keys for a galloping punk-pop song — which, minutes later, is interrupted once more by that opening riff.

An operatic soprano warbles within “Rubber Ball,” a waltz of self-doubt. “Japanese Buffalo,” a testimonial to derangement, segues from fast, shouting hardcore to a slow, pounding chorus bellowed over classic 1950s doo-wop chords: “We can play by the rules or just leave it alone.”

The songs whipsaw between fury and pessimism, between cynicism and tenacity. In “Always Something,” the narrator observes a good Samaritan helping a man stranded in a rainstorm. “You save him from the flood,” he sings, “and a couple of miles down the road, he’s covered in your blood.”

The songs spare no one, even (or especially) the band’s peer group. Guitars churn frantically in “Sell Yourself” as Shultz sputters, “I know your type, I know exactly what you want to do/ and if the money’s right, you think I’ll just agree.” And amid the revved-up, dissonant surf-rock of “Indy Kidz” Shultz sneers, “I wanna be just like you.”

Mere punk insolence would be too one-dimensional for Cage the Elephant. Its slower songs — still frayed with noise — counsel perseverance against any odds. “Flow” marches steadily, with snare-drum rolls and screams in the background, as Mr. Shultz sings, “Dead and gone, so long, hold on.” And there are two versions of “Right Before My Eyes,” which declares, “I can’t take this anymore it breaks my mind.” One is a paradoxically upbeat surf-rocker with big harmony choruses; the other is a hidden track that closes the album. Played quietly, like a Beatles ballad, it’s brave enough to set bravado aside.

— Jon Pareles, The New York Times

Braids

NATIVE SPEAKER

Kanine Records

In one of art-rock’s unwritten rules, the patterns of minimalism are usually paired with cosmic or cerebral musings. But it doesn’t apply to Braids, a four-member band formed in Calgary and now based in Montreal that has just released its debut album, “Native Speaker.”

Braids’ songs revolve around loops and layers of guitars and keyboards, setting up cascading arpeggios and pointillistic cross-currents, pulsating drones and stereophonic ripples. Clearly, Braids has listened to minimalist composers like Philip Glass and Steve Reich, and very possibly to bands like Stereolab and Dirty Projectors as well. The music materializes part by part, openly revealing its components before they turn into a hypnotic force: a texture, a motif, a mesh, eventually a voice or voices with verses and choruses and then, often, an instrumental postscript, as if the songs and the cycles within them might still be going on somewhere, just out of earshot.

When Braids’ lead vocalists, Raphaelle Standell-Preston (on guitar) and Katie Lee (on keyboards), aren’t singing lyrics, they harmonize ethereal oohs and ahs. But their words are fixated on an earthy subject: carnality in all its phases, from attraction to lust to procreation. “Lemonade,” with vocals blithely flitting around a quick-picked guitar line, juggles jealousy, curiosity and seagull sounds, and it eventually concludes both that “We’re all just sleeping around” and “All we really want to do is love.”

It’s heady music. And it’s every bit as mesmerizing and vertiginous as desire can be.

— Jon Pareles, The New York Times

James Blunt

SOME KIND OF TROUBLE

Atlantic Records

“Everything that I’m trying to say/ Just sounds like a worn-out cliche,” James Blunt sings on “I’ll Be Your Man,” a track off his new album, “Some Kind of Trouble” — and he appears to be heading critics off at the pass.

The album overreaches in its slickness and underachieves in terms of inspiration. All could be forgiven, however, if Blunt’s latest material proved catchier. Despite all the work put into his workmanlike pop, it ultimately comes off as agreeable, but not memorable.

— Matt Diehl, Los Angeles Times