Aesop Rock
Fast Cars, Danger, Fire, and Knives (Definitive Jux)

It's rare that an MC can reference the virgin goddess Athena, motor-home appraisers in Cambodia, and '70s comic Cheech Wizard in one song and still have it sound as natural a grouping as peanut butter and jelly. Thus, the magic of Aesop Rock is displayed on the opener, "Fast Cars," from his seven-track, 30-minute EP Fast Cars, Danger, Fire, and Knives. Rock's ability to kidnap cultural refugees, lock them in his basement, and make them play nice to serve his criticism of modern strife and ennui is sharply honed on his fifth official recording. Though not a drastic divergence from 2003's Bazooka Tooth (Definitive Jux), Fast Cars evolves with more-focused beats and thicker production, conducted by Rock himself, his old friend Blockhead, and Rob Sonic, former frontperson for Sonic Sum. Even with three inputs, the EP maintains a more accessible musical cohesiveness than Rock's previous works, making it a better starting point for impatient newcomers than Bazooka Tooth or 2001's Labor Days.

Fans need not worry, however: the music is far from watered-down, and Rock's flow and lyrics are in top form. Lines like "As if twitching upon your authored condition's really that different from administered conditioning glitches," from "Number Nine," show that Rock's blissfully enigmatic statements and brilliant enunciation are far from lacking. "Rickety Rackety" is a throwback to MC battles as El-P and Camu Tao swap lines with Rock, and even though Rock is clearly the master of his domain, the track captures the beloved turmoil of New York City through the eyes of three Def Jux artists. Additionally, the first 20,000 copies of Fast Cars are packaged with a beautiful bound book of the lyrics from his past five albums, so you can now follow along with every grittily poetic word – no small incentive to own this already excellent release. (Keith Axline)

Mouthus
Loam (Ecstatic Peace)

Your auditory limitations are tested on first exposure to this Brooklyn duo, on the Space Is No Place compilation (Psych-o-Path), as an ear-piercing treble buzz clips into a loop of feedback, and you wonder, How long will it be until the test tone is interrupted by an emergency broadcast message, and if it never arrives, will I go insane?

That compilation is full of incredibly pungent noise-improv psych-drone from the "new weird" camps of Black Dice, Animal Collective, No Neck Blues Band, et al. There is the potential to write off that cluster as indulgent art school solipsists making masturbatory noise without consideration of audience enjoyment or any capitalization on boosters such as Ecstatic Peace label head Thurston Moore. But if Loam, Mouthus's second LP, is an indicator of the entire field, this crop may steer clear of such accusations. Sometimes you drink the Kool-Aid, and sometimes the Kool-Aid drinks you.

The first side of Loam starts off with a Dead C-ish rouser, "Yota," which parlays the churn and gnaw of New Zealand into a darkly majestic guitar-and-drum workout. Guitar is credited to Brian Sullivan, and Nate Nelson ably handles the percussion, although such distinctions seem to disappear by the second track, "Sheepdust," a blast of feedback and effects crunch with a mournful and repetitive melodic line that sounds like a keyboard in a wind tunnel. Loam is admittedly an acquired taste for anyone less than worshipful of such mini-empires as Siltbreeze and Load Records.

This is not an immaculate affair, by any means. "Must Anubis" sounds like Suicide with a tribal percussive backing – muffled vocal pleas build toward an exclamation that never arrives. The evocative and feral vocal style creates ascending and descending tone patterns that feel like the edges of organic and technological meltdowns. It doesn't always work as entertainment, yet even the missteps seem redeeming, and the climactic jugular-grabs ring like victory. Mouthus play March 24, Hemlock Tavern, S.F. (415) 923-0923. (George Chen)

Okkervil River
Black Sheep Boy (Jagjaguwar)

Should Okkervil River fail to find the immense success they deserve, Will Sheff might want to seriously consider a career writing fiction. After all, he's one of today's few vocalists who is capable of penning musical narratives with such poetic and short story-like detail that they resonate even without musical accompaniment.

Nowhere is this more apparent than on Black Sheep Boy. A collection of country compositions inspired by Tim Hardin's folk song of the same title, the Austin, Texas, collective's fourth full-length finds Sheff – whose unhinged tenor recalls that of Conor Oberst – spinning his most ornate tales of complicated, unrequited love. "I'll call, some black midnight / Fuck up his new life where they don't know what he did / I'll tell his brand-new wife and second kid," he promises a woman on "Black," explaining how he'll exact revenge on the lout who previously hurt her. Emotionally messy and described with excruciating intimacy, such situations are typical of Sheff's storytelling.

Of course, Black Sheep Boy is more than just words on a page. And with no fewer than 14 musicians contributing everything from lap steel and mandolin to cello and pump organ, the album's orchestral lullabies and rollicking, Neutral Milk Hotel-style shuffles are as complex, explosive, and exquisite as Sheff's wordplay. Just check songs like "Get Big" and "For Real," on which haunting, softly strummed guitars and twangy outbursts frame confessions like "Some nights the blood from real cuts feels real nice when it's really mine." The result, at least for those in need of some emotional bloodletting, is never less than a revelation. Okkervil River play Tues/22 and March 23, Bimbo's 365 Club, S.F. (415) 474-0365. (Jimmy Draper)

L'altra
Different Days (Hefty)

During the past six years, Lindsay Anderson and Joseph Costa of Chicago avant-rockers L'altra have quietly made a name for themselves in the broken-up-couple-as-songwriting-team niche (where royals Jack and Meg currently hold court but might one day cede power to Quasi). In doing so, Anderson and Costa, who first separated during the recording of L'altra's brilliant Music of a Sinking Occasion in 2000, have played the relationship battle to its bitter end over the course of three albums, each weaving distinctly colored tapestries with broken-hearted lyricism and post-rock fragmentation while working in pop, jazz, and electronic styles.

Different Days just might mark the end of that painful road, as the tension that forced the naively engaging songwriting on albums past is all but gone. No more sad songs, just mild-mannered dialogue and softly hewn ballads that indicate that even with miles between them, Anderson and Costa have come to terms with their unlikely friendship (it has been five years).

This album has a beauty all its own, and it's found in the fine interplay between the two primary voices. Where Anderson's is as pleasant as it is too perfect for the role, Costa's muscling yet restrained intonation lends the record its much-needed rough edge, especially on numbers like the title track, on which Costa sounds like he's recording from miles away. Somewhat predictably, though, the production brings them together with seamless synthesis. The tinkly piano, lightly plucked guitar, and smattering of IDM-lite beats provided by Telefon Tel Aviv's Joshua Eustis steady the recording a little too well. It's a bit sadistic to say so, but the voyeur here longs for the days when L'altra's cuts weren't healing so neatly. (Ken Taylor)