When “Book It to Fresno” blasts off to open Brendan Canning‘s return to a full band affair you realize how dearly Broken Social Scene has been missed in recent years.

There are few more reliably exhilarating sounds in contemporary garage rock than this: John Dwyer’s indecipherable vocal delivery steeps in intensity, as does his echo-heavy guitar licks, there’s a vicious halt in the rhythm section for a split second before his band of garage-dwelling oddballs launch into a scorching psychedelic hotbed of distortion, feedback and utter, utter otherworldliness.

In 1986, R.E.M. were riding high. Coming off three successive albums that made them a progressively bigger and bigger draw on the college circuit, they were looking to expand their sound and their audience.

As band-formation stories go, nonkeen have one of the most quaint. While many bands formed in their school days, few can say they have been an item since elementary school.

As Wild Beasts get older, they get wiser—continuing to move inexorably towards a carnal lust that proves more dark and twisted than the teenage fumbles of their earlier incarnations. While 2014’s Present Tense prowled around the fringes of such lust, taking stock of its emotional fragility, Boy King tears its way to the center in a smouldering, multi-flavoured gumbo of layered electronica.

To say that fans were surprised when the original lineup of Dinosaur Jr. reunited in 2005 to support Merge’s reissues of their classic work would be a massive understatement given the past resentments between guitarist J Mascis and bassist Lou Barlow that led to their initial breakup after their third album, 1988’s Bug.

There is very little left to say about Ramones’ 1976 debut LP that hasn’t already been written thousands of times elsewhere. Suffice it to say that if you’ve somehow never heard it, you most definitely should, not just to hear the roots of much of the guitar music of the last 40 years, but mainly because it’s a great, fun album by one of the greatest bands ever.

The late J Dilla shot to fame in the ‘90s and early ‘00s for his textured, soul infused production of alt-rap and neb-soul classics like Janet Jackson’s “Got Til It’s Gone,” Common’s “The Light,” plus his acclaimed albums like Donuts and Champion Sound (which he recorded as JayLib with fellow crate digging producer Madlib).

Back in 2004, when Descendents released their last album, things were different. George W. Bush was President and the Iraq War was the hot-button issue of the day.