Geoff Westen’s album, “Music For My Friends”, thumps onto the scene like a dropped box of heavy disco balls – all shiny potential energy and the slight threat of chaos. It aims for that classic pop song euphoria, the kind designed to rattle car speakers and fuel late-night dance floors, an "aural assault" as Westen puts it. And it does pulse with energy, a...

When the Malaga-based duo My State unleashed "Its Whatever", I half-expected my speakers to start smoking—or at least demand an apology for the sudden surge in voltage. It is rare to hear a track that captures the precise auditory frequency of snapping a pencil in half out of sheer frustration, but here we are. This isn't polite radio fodder. It is high-octane pop-rock that forgot...