There is a ferocious, blood-and-iron honesty coursing through Lior Golan’s new EP, "MIDNIGHT TRAINS", that makes standard heavy rock feel strangely tame. Based in Tel Aviv, the guitarist, composer, and producer crafts music as an urgent survival mechanism, steeped in the grand, rumbling lineage of Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. Golan channels staggering personal trauma battles with addiction, the lingering ghosts of PTSD from...

There is a specific kind of frantic energy in Jacob Chacko’s single "Drive Thru Fog And Rain" (from the album "Give Me The Good Stuff") that reminds me of realizing you’re late for a meeting that might change your life, but your foot is tapping against the floor mat anyway. It captures a feeling that is kinetic, nervous, and strangely electric. https://open.spotify.com/album/3nsiOEVBM8JKDEeZ3jlePu?si=jCITTgSDSy-xdDMJWLFuiw Chacko leans hard into...