Jon Gold’s new single, "Lullaby for a Dream," is an act of gorgeous disorientation. You see the name—a pianist rooted in the intricate soils of jazz—and you prepare for one thing, but what arrives is a mist-laden skiff drifting from an entirely different shore. Gold, a Delaware musician, has composed a piece of British-Gaelic folk, and the cognitive dissonance is half the immediate magic....

Harris Rafferty makes his latest statement with "Burnin’", a track that arrives with the subtle grace of a brick thrown through a conservatory window. Listening to this, I was immediately struck by the sheer kinetic output of the Lancashire artist; it feels less like a studio recording and more like being strapped into a roller coaster that has not been inspected for safety since...