We’re living through unprecedented times—and, most dauntingly, we’re doing it alone. With COVID-19 forcing self-isolation mandates around the world, it’s hard not to feel like you're off on your own island of worry. What has helped our staff during this time of forced withdrawal—besides leaning on each other, of course—are these albums and songs with a soothing touch. We hope they bring you solace as well.
Smog: Red Apple Falls
You wouldn’t think an album that begins the way Smog’s Red Apple Falls does—“The morning paper is on its way/It’s all bad news on every page”—would bring much relief in times like these. But I’ve been finding comfort in a lot of pre-9/11 favorites lately, and there’s something about the intimacy of this album that’s just what the doctor ordered. Bill Callahan’s weathered voice is warm and reassuringly familiar, while piano and pedal steel lend grace and timelessness. The album’s highlight, “Ex-Con,” seems almost eerily prescient: Over peppy piano chords and a downright chipper beat, Callahan mulls over the anxieties of the outside world and concludes, “Alone in my room/I feel like such a part of the community.” For anyone who’s sheltering in place right now, it’s exactly the pep talk we need. –Philip Sherburne
Laraaji: Ambient 3: Day of Radiance
I was a latecomer to Laraaji, one of ambient music’s most influential figures. In 2018, I was introduced to Ambient 3: Day of Radiance, his formative collaboration with Brian Eno. I’d reached an impasse in my life, having realized the rhetoric of productivity had been strangling me for as long as I could remember. I committed myself to a new way of living—one centered on rest and regeneration, not on the value of my labor. Now, in self-isolation, I’ve returned to Ambient 3: Day of Radiance as an exercise of remembered wellness, especially the opener “The Dance No. 1.” In this song, Laraaji’s zither collapses time, weaving a loop of plucked strings into a luminous, nine-minute orchestral arrangement. It feels like a call to return to the present, to refocus my energy towards collective care and community mobilization. And in times of collapse, that practice feels more urgent than ever. –Isabelia Herrera
Burial: Untrue
There are parts of Burial’s Untrue that acutely mirror what I’ve been missing most while in self-isolation—the ability for any real-life human interaction to quickly move into something privately shared and intimate. The album reminds me of the quiet bonding that happens in loud cities, where solidarity and escapism can live in a look exchanged with a stranger. Underneath its pensive gloom, there’s hope and resolve, too.
Burial once described the connectivity he was trying to evoke with his music by comparing it to the comfort of noticing the fires built at other campsites while out in the mountains. “You see their firelight and you know they are there, that’s all you need. [...] You watch over your city at night, you see the distant lights—the fires burning in other places.” Untrue embraces loneliness by illuminating it as something beautiful and recognizable, even as we’re at our most detached—its production gives motivating rhythm to the listless melancholy of daily life. Listen to “Shell of Light” and the loops of melodic bass become a meditative loop as a voice urges us “closer, closer.” The vocals are haunting and ephemeral, like a secret whispered between friends or dispatches from a parallel universe. It’s an album that perfectly captures the feeling of being alone while suggesting that we’re probably not as alone as we think. –Puja Patel
Various Artists: This Record Belongs To __________
Last week was spring break for my family, but instead of jetting off to the Caribbean as planned, we spent it at home. I beckoned the smart speaker to play us comfort food: Stevie and Aretha, Thelonius and Mingus, Fiona and Joanna. My toddler daughter also finally noticed this Light in the Attic comp, a gift from me to her older brother a few Christmases ago. She now often walks up to the shelf and points, chirping for her baby-talk attempt at “record.” What choice do we have?
Luckily, This Record Belongs To __________ is an expertly curated, kid-friendly set of whimsy that even exhausted parents can love. The album brings together beloved stars such as Nina Simone, Carole King, and Jerry Garcia as well as cult heroes like Vashti Bunyan and Van Dyke Parks. That super-catchy Roger Miller country-folk ballad from Disney's Robin Hood is here. So is the Pointer Sisters’ classic jazz-funk math tutorial from Sesame Street. By the time the key change arrives on the closing track—Kermit the Frog’s evergreen “Rainbow Connection”—the room has become an alternate, utopian world. I’m never mad when our lovable scamp demands to hear this “bokah” again. –Marc Hogan
Standing on the Corner: Red Burns
At the 29:36 time stamp on Standing on the Corner’s Red Burns, a deep voice emerges from the jazzy chaos and asks, “I love New York, but why don’t it love me back?” That’s what it feels like right now, as I twiddle my thumbs and watch the city I have always called home shut down and spiral into chaos. I’ve always found Red Burns difficult, like putting together a puzzle with missing pieces, but the album is rooted in New York, and the ensemble finds hope by uniting music and cultures spread around the globe. Hope may not always save us, but it doesn’t hurt to accept it. –Alphonse Pierre
Mdou Moctar: “à la maison”
Whenever I find myself too far down a fruitless Google rabbit hole—Is flattening the curve working? How long until this is over?—I try to put away my phone and play Mdou Moctar’s “à la maison,” one of the most stunning pieces of music I’ve ever heard. The Tuareg musician makes his electric guitar sing, trancelike and sinuous, full of longing and hope. His actual voice is equally as evocative, intertwining effortlessly with the twang of the guitar. The hand-clapping adds a familiar, comforting touch; the South Asian music I grew up on makes heavy use of claps to keep time, too. Both transportive and grounding, celestial and immediate, “à la maison” is a weighted blanket for my ears—a reminder that even among chaos, there is space for beauty and calm. –Vrinda Jagota
Julie Byrne: Not Even Happiness
Soft sounds feel good against these four walls. With the world already held together so tenuously, any clamor feels like it could split the seams of my living room open. Julie Byrne’s light, gracious meditations on connection and seclusion have been on repeat. On Not Even Happiness, the nomadic singer-songwriter pushes through the wariness in her heart, awed by the love that rushes in to replace it, her voice and fingerpicked guitar equally, effortlessly stirring. On “Sleepwalker,” when she sings, “I grew so accustomed to that kind of solitude/But I long for you now, even when you just leave the room,” I am reminded of how, like Byrne, we are in a moment that feels lonely but holds the promise of reprieve; the people we love are much closer than they may feel. –Stacey Anderson
KIRINJI: “時間がない”
If you’re anything like me, you’re incessantly refreshing the timeline as more horrific details trickle in, feeling unshakeable dread that our reality is crashing down. KIRINJI’s city pop masterpiece “時間がない” bears a title that roughly translates to “There’s No Time,” but it’s not a whimper—just a statement of fact. You can feel the longing and melancholy in singer Takaki Horigome’s voice even without understanding Japanese, but the poignant lyrics sum up the current crisis: “Seems like we’re in the second half of eternity/How do you feel? The remaining half is too short,” he declares at first. But then, as the song climaxes: “Spring, summer, fall/How do you feel? Let’s imagine the color of tomorrow.” As Horigome reminds us, every life is a gift, and even through the pain, we’ve got to cling to hope. –Noah Yoo
Merchandise: “Become What You Are”
It starts innocently enough with a recollection of a time gone by, a twinkly post-punk eulogy for the past. But by its second movement, just past the six-minute mark, ”Become What You Are” starts to unravel into a torrent of noise and chaos. I’ve long felt connected to the song—its raw expulsion of energy, the swirls of violence and sex and rage and sorrow. When I first heard it, I realized I had already felt it many times before, at my most unhinged: the relentless rush of a million thoughts and memories rushing forward all at once. Now, holed up at home with my partner and our unborn daughter, as our phones blink with updates on the waking nightmare she’s about to join, this song helps me find my way back to center. It keeps me aimed forward, steely-eyed into the abyss—and for that, I am grateful. –Matthew Ismael Ruiz
DRINKS: Hippo Lite
Cate Le Bon and Tim Presley recorded their last DRINKS album in a state of isolation. In an old mill in southern France, they created a tenuous concoction of clunky percussion, ornate strings, and tender vocals. It became my default listen any time I went camping or hiking in the past two years—this warped little record that grounded me no matter where I was in the world.
Now, as it plays on my turntable, it’s easy to focus on the moments when Presley and Le Bon sing about the outdoors. On “Real Outside,” Le Bon sings about wanting to hang out in the river, and “Greasing Up” is hinged on the anticipation of setting out together: “I’m greasing up/We are leaving,” Presley and Le Bon sing. Hippo Lite is a testament to what two people can create when they’ve sequestered themselves from the outside world—and a reminder of what’s waiting for us when we’re finally allowed to get out there again. —Evan Minsker
Sean Paul: “Like Glue”
My roommate poured the tequila with a heavy hand, topping up our mason jars of raspberry lemonade. I put on “Like Glue,” hoping to turn the living room into one of the bashments my body sorely missed. The most successful interpretation of dancehall producer Tony ‘CD’ Kelly’s “Buy Out” riddim, Sean Paul’s “Like Glue” has been summoning folks to the dancefloor for nearly two decades. The simple backbeat and smooth bassline can pull a two-step out of the meekest partygoer, and its creaky chirping effects soothe like summer crickets after dusk. In isolation, I miss the Afro-Caribbean parties of Bushwick and Bed-Stuy, their spontaneity and joy. But as we twisted our feet and rolled our hips, our night inside made me feel free. –Mankaprr Conteh
Thelonious Monk: Thelonious Alone in San Francisco
Yes, this record is called what it’s called because it features Thelonious Monk playing piano all by his lonesome in an empty San Francisco nightclub. But in October 1959, when the album was recorded amid a run of shows in the city, he was even more alone than that. Days before, Monk’s wife Nellie underwent emergency surgery in Los Angeles. When he set out for San Francisco to earn the money he needed for her healthcare, he gently ribbed her: “Now you make sure you don’t kick the bucket, and you’re here when I get back, because I don’t want to pay for an operation if you’re gone.” (She would later say that joke saved her life.) Thelonious Alone in San Francisco contains flashes of Monk’s trademark playfulness, a natural byproduct of his teetering style, but it’s a relatively somber affair, highlighted by elegant versions of his signature ballads “Ruby, My Dear” and “Pannonica.” It makes the most of loneliness, one off-kilter chord at a time. –Ryan Dombal
Gabriella Smith: “Carrot Revolution”
Last week, while I was subsisting solely on ramen, I daydreamed about peeling fresh carrots, cucumbers, and eggplant into ribbons and basking in their color. Cooped up at home, I feel wilted. One thing that’s kept me alert is “Carrot Revolution,” the adventurous string composition by the Bay Area artist Gabriella Smith. This is not the fussy classical music drilled into you by your stern orchestra teacher: It is startling and textured, with scratchy sounds coming from the strings that make it sound like the piece was improvised in a zipper factory. Inspired by Georgian folk music, Joni Mitchell, and more, the composition derives its name from a quote attributed to the Impressionist painter Paul Cezanne: “The day will come when a freshly observed carrot will start a revolution.” Smith is motivated to look at old things in new ways; as self-isolation stretches on, we will also need to get innovative. –Cat Zhang
Dick Slessig Combo: “Wichita Lineman”
“Wichita Lineman,” composed by Jimmy Webb and made famous by Glen Campbell in 1968, is one of the greatest entries in the American songbook. It’s a country ballad that summons deep feeling from the straightforward tale of a roadside telephone line worker who yearns for a faraway voice he hears “singin’ in the wire.” Of its countless covers, an instrumental rendition by the virtually unknown Dick Slessig Combo stands alone. A sort of conceptual cover band that performed around L.A. in the early 2000s, the group stretches “Lineman” from a tight three minutes to a hypnotic 43. The melody does not appear for seven minutes; the post-chorus turnaround never seems to end, becoming vast and iridescent. I first heard it when an acquaintance posted it on Twitter last week—I imagine a solitary lineman somewhere, braving the virus to ensure the message makes it from his side of the wire to mine—and have been unable to stop listening since. Webb’s lyrics about working in isolation and longing for connection across technology are certainly resonant now, but I suspect you needn’t know them to appreciate the way this version uses repetition and space to map a lonesome highway of the mind. –Andy Cush
Akasha System: Epoch Flux
As far as I’m concerned, the stimulus bill should include funding for Akasha System to make music from here to eternity. Not that the Portland producer needs much of a push towards productivity: In the last three months, he has released two full albums and also Epoch Flux, a longish EP of his signature abstract, house-influenced tunes. It seems appropriate for this moment that he’s turned such purely social music as house into its own kind of isolation sound, with blunted drums and squiggly little synths. As someone predisposed to depressing music even in peaceful times, this ticks all my boxes with its heavy-lidded tone, yet it always manages to keep the mood light with plenty of rhythmic bounce. It’s a slightly lopsided, if more than perfect, yin and yang. –Matthew Schnipper
Chris Smither: Still on the Levee
Albums of legacy artists re-recording songs from their catalog can be hit or miss. At their dullest, they play like contractual obligations—a greatest hits set of vaguely different performances that no one will prefer to the originals. But at their best, they can be comforting and profound. Such is the case with New Orleans singer-songwriter Chris Smither’s 2014 album, Still on the Levee. Merging his newly grizzled readings of the downer folk songs he wrote in the 1970s with enlivened takes on his bluesier recent material, it offers a biographical sense of cohesion, accompanied by musicians who push him forward in subtle, affirming ways. Here is the story of a lifetime—the highs and lows, familiar memories, and wayward experiments—delivered in the vital, broken voice that survived it all. –Sam Sodomsky
Frankie Cosmos: told you so
In the summer of 2013, while interning at a contemporary art museum upstate, I lived alone in a stranger’s home for three months. It was a strange, still time. During my self-isolation, I have returned to some of the music that kept me afloat then, mainly Frankie Cosmos’ 2013 record told you so. (Full disclosure, the project’s Greta Kline is now a friend.) It’s a quietly brutal listen—most of these songs are about being deeply hurt by someone you love, as well as being too stoned to eat bodega brownies—but it feels like a security blanket. So much has changed for me since Greta wrote these songs, but I cling to them because they transport me to a time before the world felt so big, when my heart felt at ease. –Quinn Moreland
Johann Sebastian Bach: The Complete Concerti for Harpsichord and Orchestra
One thing I’ve learned in isolation is that I don’t want to be soothed. I want sensory overload—and a baroque harpsichord concerto certainly fits the bill. Johann Sebastian Bach’s The Complete Concerti for Harpsichord and Orchestra is so relentless and dizzying, it will enliven even the laziest of days. Your mind will race as you try to chase down every key pressed and string plucked—a feat as rapid and disorienting as counting snowflakes in a blizzard. This is maximalist music; each gilded note is followed immediately by another, and another, and another. There is no space to rest or to think about the world outside. –Madison Bloom
Hiroshi Yoshimura: Green
Light in the Attic recently announced that they will reissue Hiroshi Yoshimura’s Green, a long-out-of-print ambient classic, this summer. The archival label must have known we all needed the album sooner, though, because they immediately released it to streaming services. (A bootleg rip has enjoyed a cult following on YouTube in recent years.) The “environmental music” made by Yoshimura and other Japanese ambient composers was meant to soundtrack specific spaces and functions of people’s lives; though he couldn’t have known what strangeness lay ahead, Yoshimura’s soothing yet surreal soundscapes on Green fit our current holding pattern remarkably well. I listened last weekend for the first time and by the second song, “FEEL,” I was weeping in my kitchen. As a swarm of fluttering synthlines passed through my headphones, Green replicated a feeling I hadn’t realized I was missing so much: the wonder of going outside in early springtime and seeing that nature has started to bloom. –Jillian Mapes
Bobby Frank Brown: The Enlightening Beam of Axonda (Gods Proof)
Bobby Frank Brown’s The Enlightening Beam of Axonda (Gods Proof) is a work that seems to find solace in solitude. The reclusive composer and one-man-band crafted zen soundscapes with nearly 50 instruments he invented himself. The result is a meditative mix of surf-rock, drone, soul, spoken word, folk, and more. The concept of the album is equally lofty, attempting to bridge particle physics with spirituality, as Brown believed this would be a path for nonbelievers to feel the presence of God. It’s a dreamy, idiosyncratic, wonderful world to get lost in. –Drew Litowitz
Pharoah Sanders: Live in Paris
bell hooks wrote about treating love as an action more than a feeling, one that demands honesty, commitment, trust, and care. Beyond romance, she meditated on the love shared among friends, family, communities, and with the universe. This collection from spiritual jazz leader Pharoah Sanders, recorded live in November 1975 and first released this year, underscores that mindset of finding love. Sanders steers the ensemble with his glowing saxophone spirals, bolstered by cascades of percussion and Danny Mixon’s gleaming piano. The album’s crackling energy is a tonic against despair and loneliness even in the band’s most chaotic flares, with the players—intimately in tune with one another—emphasizes the power of connection. As Sanders affirms with the album’s ecstatic finale, love—the deep, enduring kind—is everywhere, if you reach for it. –Allison Hussey
Axel Boman: Le New Life
It’s hard to focus with crisis roaring in the background, and similarly, it has been difficult to revisit music that has comforted me through past difficulties, because there really is no comparison to this. Instead I’ve looked to an album that reminds me of happier times not so long ago: Swedish house producer Axel Boman’s Le New Life. (Count me among the people who need something vibe-y and vaguely techno to decompress.) I like its bubbly, pointillist melodies and light-touch percussion, the blissed-out vocal sample that chants the word “ec-sta-cy” on the very first track. The breezy Baeleric sound feels like a sunny day, the kind I treasure even more now. —Anna Gaca
Antony and the Johnsons: I Am a Bird Now
In this moment of seemingly endless isolation, I’ve found there is no replacement for the spiritual nourishment of a human voice, and Anohni’s is one of beauty and justice in every note. On one hand, I Am a Bird Now is a chamber-pop album about dying: Its cover, after all, depicts the glamorous image of Warhol superstar Candy Darling on her deathbed, photographed by Peter Hujar. But I Am a Bird Now is also a 35-minute dream of life, filled with light and connection. In these baroque art-pop ballads, whether she is narrating a love story set in purgatory or a personal fantasy—or collaborating with Lou Reed and Boy George—Anohni’s multi-octave singing is as transcendent as it is steadying. –Jenn Pelly
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