No Slump Here: 10 Excellent Sophomore Albums
Every now and then, a promising act pulls it all together on their second outing. When careers are done, it’s these special second efforts we remember most.
Every now and then, a promising act pulls it all together on their second outing. When careers are done, it’s these special second efforts we remember most.
A pandemic-era plan to soft-drop a series of EPs proved difficult, so New York’s digi-pop alternates +/- pivoted to a new LP that stands amongst their best.
Cicadastone’s Future Echoes is a gleeful, rip-roaring, endlessly entertaining beat-down of everything sensitive or delicate in our homogenized society.
Progressive rock, arena rock, romantic ballads: Styx’s catalog presents an enviable chain of success, one that still yields surprises 50 years later.
Antwerp Belgium’s Disorientations completely revamp their “Chameleons/Echo and the Bunnymen” post-punk sound on this impressive sophomore effort.
Neo-Britpoppers Sunday League bring baroque rock muscle, energetic walls of sound, plus enough British pub swagger to nick your pint right off the bar.
Does your cruising playlist sound a bit hoary these days? Here are ten fresh driving songs, rocking highway anthems to get your motor running.
Great artists suffer, so we don’t have to! Rather than face such personal demons ourselves, we list 15 classic songs about addiction for the morning after.
In a rare confluence of creativity, five exceptional records helped shape 1999 and yielded some of the most enduring guitar rock of the past 25 years.
Pugwash mastermind Thomas Walsh excels at Beatlesque power pop, sounding like a cross between ELO and baroque-era Trash Can Sinatras.
During their heyday, Supertramp created a run of progressive-pop albums so intricate and irresistibly catchy, as to redefine what AOR radio could sound like.
Forget “Monster Mash”! These ten memorable campfire frightfests should deliver a solid foundation for your scary-yet-sophisticated Halloween.