But more importantly, the songs on The Very Last Day are great songs. Hades Pleades furiously opens the record with foot-stomping, aggressive glee. Millsap’s performance is completely unbridled, howling like an animal throughout the song with a seemingly unstoppable energy. Not every track carries that level of intensity — Hands Up (a song about a robbery) is another great example of high-speed rock and roll — but Millsap sets the bar for his vocal work on the opening track.

It’s Millsap’s voice that undeniably carries The Very Last Day. On the traditional blues song, You Gotta Move, he screams like Robert Plant on the first Led Zeppelin record. On Wherever You Are, his triumphant howl during the chorus elevates the song from its standard blues rock/American riff.

Lyrically and vocally, Millsap is a revelation. He’s confident and aware of his roots. In fact, if The Very Last Day has one concrete thought throughout, it’s that Millsap wants to show off his roots. Tribulation Hymn sounds like a traditional hymn, and imitates the style perfectly. Millsap’s lyrical genius takes the songs to new places.

Millsap is the artist who’s bigger than the sum of his parts. In a lot of small ways, he feels like the future of the folk rock, Americana genre. The Very Last Day is refreshing and exciting, despite its somewhat bleak topic matter.

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In January this year, as in 2016, Kickstarter backers threaten Elzhi with a class action lawsuit for failing to deliver the new record on time. Not long after that, Elzhi announced the record would be coming out late March.

Here we are.

Lead Poison took so long because it was, according to Elzhi, held back by his struggles with depression, alcoholism, and more. You can hear this throughout the album: he deals with drugs, booze, a broken relationship, the death of his mother, and growing up and being bullied in Detroit. On February, he hints at the relationship that he lost and talks about the slope he slid down after.

It goes without saying that Lead Poison is a hard-hitting, emotionally heavy record with heady lyrical content. Elzhi is a far cry from Kanye West, refusing to spend the record in a braggadocio state of mind or attack other emcees.

It all comes together on The Healing Process, which is a beautiful track about dealing with depression and coping with a mental state that’s out to hurt you. Delivered against a hazy beat, the song pulls the album together and acts as a hinge point, as Elzhi raps at the speed of a thousand miles per hour without ever feeling like anything less than a poet. Even at his lowest point, Elzhi’s flow is flawless and delivered with the ease of a master.

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Stiff is a rock album imitating some of the best soul records. It’s still loaded with the riffs the band has become known for — complicated musicianship and guitar lines that take precedence over the vocal routines — but the vibe of the record is retro-based, with influences that range from James Brown and Gary Clark Jr.

Ha Ha Ha (Yeah) is a perfect example of this: a guitar riff that’s clearly sole-influenced matched to the riff-heavy style that White Denim comes from.

It’s worth talking about White Denim’s origins, too. Hailing from Austin, the band is in a position to absorb everything going on there. The Dallas climate is filled with singers like Leon Bridges or bands like The Suffers, who are all respecting vintage traditional soul music. It makes sense that White Denim goes this route.

The soul influence results in two things: White Denim is now more easily identifiable, and after many albums, feel like they’ve come into their own identity. And their music is now more approachable than ever. That’s not to say that they’ve purposely set out to craft radio songs; it feels like that’s a natural byproduct of their newer influences.

Stiff is the sound of White Denim getting more comfortable with their heritage and where they come from. White Denim has never sounded so at ease, or mature. And while they might not have the same attention they had ten years ago, they’ve finally got a sound dialled in that feels completely theirs.

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It’s with all that in mind that I say Margo Price is a refreshing delight. She absolutely gets the genre. She’s a great singer, a great guitar player, and I’m pretty certain she could beat me up. She tells her story on the six-minute album opener Hands of Time: her family lost her dad’s farm, Nashville didn’t want her, she lived with a married man for a while, spent time in jail, and more — of course.

Short of the pickup truck running out of gas on the highway, or the dog dying in the summer sun, Margo tells every country story ever told in the space of six minutes. Whether or not the whole story is true is irrelevant: if it is, she’s country music’s 50 Cent — a survivor who has lived what the genre espouses. If it’s not true, she’s a gifted storyteller who understands that storytelling is at the heart of what makes country music great. It doesn’t matter.

And Margo Price doesn’t care what you think. On About to Find Out, one of the album’s sassier moments, she sings “you wouldn’t know class if it bit you in the ass.” Throughout the record, Margo is cursing her past, putting it behind her, airing the laundry, and moving on.

This is also the first record for Jack White’s Third Man Records, who (from what I’ve heard) signed her after witnessing her reportedly fierce live shows. Price is intent on proving that she can be tough. Her attitude is quintessential country.

Once in a while, it feels like Margo Price’s music is quintessential country too — and it’s almost undoubtedly the year’s best country record yet.

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That article is still a fairly apt summary of what makes Gojira so wonderful: they’re a death metal band from France that are uninterested in following trends, releasing “bangers”, or following everybody else’s lead. Gojira are thoroughly interested in making their own brand of heavy metal.

Their 2008 record, The Way of All Flesh, might be their best record yet (although it’s tough to pick a favourite from their discography). Oroborus (the album opener) and Toxic Garbage Island are two perfect tracks to dig into this style with: the guitars and drums are pounding and oppressive, the vocal work is impeccable, the production is astounding, and the band’s sense of rhythm is both difficult to approach and easy to appreciate.

All of that isn’t to say that Gojira is impossible to groove to, or that it’s completely experimental — there are moments sprinkled throughout that are easy to whip your dreadlocks to, or riffs that pretty easily played on an air guitar. Gojira simply doesn’t have an interest in that sort of music.

A Sight to Behold is the track I keep coming back to: the song is largely guitar-less, and the verses sound like an electronic song. It doesn’t sound like death metal at all. But Gojira have earned the ability to take the genre in whatever direction they want, and they don’t have to explain themselves.

Gojira is one of the most original and creative bands in heavy metal, and not to say that their other albums are lesser, but The Way of All Flesh is perhaps the clearest statement of their vision.

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