Guess Pre's "Clarity." The name itself feels like a punchline missing its joke, or maybe the setup to a philosophical riddle I'm not equipped to solve. Gregory Stanton, the Wisconsin-based artist behind the moniker, has served up a nine-track album that's… well, it's trying to be a lot of things, and surprisingly, mostly succeeding. https://open.spotify.com/album/2hV27eRxEJp08kML02uRW1 This isn't background music for folding laundry. It's more like the...

Stephen H. Cumberbatch (also known professionally as C’batch) bridges the past and present on his latest instrumental release, "The Vault 1 (C’batch Smooth / Rough)". Operating out of White Plains, New York, where he runs the independent Stevette Music, Inc. with his wife Yvette, C'batch took a remarkably reflective approach here. By blowing the dust off unresolved concepts from his past *Unfinished Business* era,...