Over the years we’ve probed Ride again and again about the possibility of new music. Kudos to them for keeping coy through all of our haranguing (which, no doubt, they’ve received from everyone they’ve ever spoken to in the 20 years since their dissolution.)

The first four songs on Weather Diaries, Ride‘s first album in 21 years, nod to the shoegazing band’s early ‘90s output. Feel-wise and melodically, the intention is there but unfortunately the songs aren’t.

For artists like Lorde who kicked off their career with a legendary record, the anxiety surrounding the sophomore slump is usually there. But Ella Yelich-O’Connor has managed to bypass that notion with the follow-up to her 2013 debut Pure Heroine.

Remember a few decades back when synthesisers took over, heralding the sound of the future? That sound has diluted now, ironically becoming a past artefact modern electronic musicians turn to.

The past has not been smooth sailing for The Drums. What began as a band seems to have reduced to only Jonathan Pierce. A promising start also came unstuck with a move away from the pure indie-pop that brought them to notice in the first place.

Long unavailable except as streams on their Bandcamp page, the Washington D.C. band Priests has fulfilled the demand for the re-release of some of their earliest material by reissuing both of their early cassette releases on a single LP for Record Store Day.

When Fleet Foxes first appeared on the music scene, it was like they’d walked out of their own time and space and arrived in 2008 fully formed.

On his fourth album, City Music, Kevin Morby continues to pencil in the definition of his artistic persona. The Kansas City transplant already offered his musical homage to New York City with 2013’s Harlem River.

With his latest project, Moby continues to brush aside his techno pop tendencies and embrace his punk and alt rock aspirations.