To signal its new musical direction, Shearwater updated its Facebook page with a photo of a gray DeLorean fitted with a flux capacitor. Nowadays, it seems as if every musician on the planet is time traveling to the 1980s for inspiration.

At first glance, the titles of Eleanor Friedberger‘s first two solo records provide context for her clever, knotted lyrics and oddball pop melodies.

Not every examination of a pop record requires an elaborate look at context and character, but anything by David Bowie demands it. In some superficial sense, Bowie’s albums are vehicles for abstract character arcs, and each one leads into the next by either following through on previous themes or abandoning them altogether.

Daughter‘s front lady Elena Tonra isn’t much concerned over the words used to characterize or categorize the music she writes, just those she uses to write with. Tonra has turned to song as self-therapy, a vocalized journal, and a buoy to keep her above the surface of life’s choppy seas.

Mystery Jets may hail from England, but as their career has spanned over five albums, they’ve begun to sound more and more American, and their latest record Curve of the Earth is the next step in their progression towards Yankee assimilation.

Ethereal (or “Etheriel”), that was always the word back then. But Lush‘s celestial shimmer represented only one element of their overall sound. The lower depths of the Lush bass and drums joined in to propel those chiming guitars and sweet yet haunting voices outwards, even taking the whole to some unforeseen places.

You’ve probably heard Hinds’ brand of fuzzy garage pop a thousand times before. The Madrid-dwelling quartet’s ramshackle, lush melodies hark back to historic indie merchants such as The Shop Assistants and The Sonics, while generating a shrill ambiance associated with more modern tykes like Wavves or Psychedelic Horseshit.

Conor O’Brien’s discography under the Villagers moniker is a restless one, as each of his three albums has carried its own distinct aesthetic, refusing to rest on the stylistic laurels of its predecessor.

In the press release for his band’s latest offering, Tell Me I’m Pretty, Matt Shultz of Cage the Elephant declares “We wanted to capture the sentiment of each song, and whatever emotional response it provoked, to be really honest to that.” At first, it’s tempting to investigate whether that’s an old quote regarding their last record, Melophobia.