If you were to go back in time to 1993 and categorically rearrange the CDs at your favorite local record store (now replaced by a Starbucks) from alphabetical order to a “sounds like” organizational flow, you might find Male Bonding’s Nothing Hurts nestled between albums by artists like Teenage Fanclub, Superchunk, Swervedriver, Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh, and maybe even some Nirvana B-sides. 

Emerging from London, Male Bonding offers a slice of fuzzy nostalgia that could easily be mistaken for a great album that came out of the 1990s, particularly on tracks “All Things This Way,” “Your Contact,” “Crooked Scene,” and “TUFF.”  However, this trio’s fast-paced fuzz shares modern signposts with contemporaries like The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, Japandroids, WAVVES, and No Age on tracks like “Nothing Remains,” “Nothing Used To Hurt,” and “Pumpkin.” It’s certainly not an original sound, but Male Bonding hits the mark with their loose, poppy feel over crashing cymbals, blasting, punk-tuned guitars and hazy drone.

Full of hooks and bombastic energy, Nothing Hurts teeters on the corner of fuzzy post punk and lo-fi shoegaze with definitive influences from a bygone era. Frontman John Arthur Webb says it best: “All of my favorite pop songs are ballads, and there’s an inner hippie in me that’s fighting with my inner punk.” Those contradictions in sound are what canonized some of the most influential acts from the ‘90s, like Pixies, Nirvana, and more. Male Bonding doesn’t achieve a monumental record or invent a new genre on Nothing Hurts — instead, they simply reinvent a great one that will be discovered by the little punk skater kid who spray-painted a middle finger on your trashcan and will eventually start listening to The Smiths and wearing cardigans. By Peter Viele

I’d like to believe that there are a lot of people out there who are pretty open-minded when it comes to music. Usually, I’d count myself as a member of that group, but when it comes to deciding what I’ll actually put on my iPod, it’s an entirely different story. An iPod playlist is kind of like sacred ground, and only the most worthy songs make the cut. With that said, every single song on Perseverance, the newest album released by Jacksonville, FL-based reggae band Scholars Word, is headed straight for my iPod, and as soon as you give it a listen, I guarantee this album will be making a beeline for yours as well.

Scholars Word take everything good about reggae and weave it together in a new way on Perseverance, staying true to the roots of the music without sounding cliché or imitative. Their steady, pumping bass lines and energetic rhythms combine with a well-proportioned mix of guitar melodies, saxophone jams, and upbeat keyboard effects to produce a completely genuine and electrifying reggae sound. Pair that with lead singer Bryce Creighton’s clear, soothing voice, which captivates on tracks like “Good Feelin” and Searchin,” and you’ve got yourself an album that sounds remarkable from start to finish. And, as if all that weren’t enough, the lyrics of each song provide enlightened social commentary and life lessons that will make you think about the kind of positive impact you can make on the people around you.

Scholars Word are the real deal, and with songs like “Can’t Turn It Off” and “Perseverance Dub,” which have the uncanny ability to instantly put you in a good mood, their ninth album Perseverance demonstrates that they have every aspect of truly modern reggae on lock. By Allison Arteaga

Ever been forced to buy your drink in a bag so that you don’t accidentally smash a bottle into someone’s melon while octopus spazzing all over the dance floor? Ever been trampled by a bunch of shirtless Caribbean youths? Ever driven way too fast without noticing, then refused to turn down the music when the police officer came to your window? If you answered no to any of these questions, dancehall master Poirier will help you accomplish these three life goals.

The energy on Running High is the pissed-off kind. Ghislain Poirier has spent 15+ years sampling the tropical beats of renowned vocal artists and redefining the path of dancehall potential. Although a completely obscure reference due to his underground status and direct focus on audio, I think Poirier is another link in the chain of pop dance and mixed-media performers such as M.I.A. and Lady Gaga, who both have the intelligence and determination to voice their messages with a silver lining, allowing them to reach millions of Western world youth starving for something both entrancing and empowering.

Poirier released Running High as a two-disc companion piece, the second album being a conversion of the elements found on the first, in which he digs deep into his Montreal community and performance network to feature renowned artists such as Mikey Dangerous and Warrior Queen. It is this need to push things one step further or one disc longer, along with a refusal to compromise for mass packaging, that sets the frantic world of dance and the progressive work of Poirier outside of the U.S. mainstream. Perhaps — and hopefully — this reluctance is soon to change. By William Port Whales

Endearing and honest, Here’s To Taking It Easy is one of those albums I could listen to with any family member on a car ride with no fear of offending them. Usually it’s Merle Haggard or Randy Travis, but here it’s Matthew Houck who walks Phosphorescent along the outer lines of small rural towns and Pentecostal snake-handling venues before diving into the bottle and waking up on a subway searching for his wallet and his broken heart.   

Ricky Ray Jackson’s pedal steel and the heavy marching rhythms of Chris Marine sporadically spin shoots and nodes of transcendental religion into what could have been a straightforward collection of twang. “Hej, Me I’m Light” is the seventh track on the album, and one where a listener might pause the album and take a long, hard gaze back at Pride, the deeply melodic and meditative album Houck released without instrumental assistance in 2007.

Phosphorescent then moved on to release a drunken series of Willie Nelson covers, endearingly titled To Willie, where the talent proved strong enough to pierce the dark brown fifths of whiskey sitting close by. Here’s To Taking It Easy is a concept album whether it’s acknowledged or not. It is the love child of pedal experimentation and raspy vocals atop a foundation built from bonsai trees and sand gardens. The Karate Kid prodigy of a West Virginian sensei, if you will. By William Port Whales