Cory Frye

An epiphany hit early in Steven Blush’s “When Rock Met Hip-Hop” (Backbeat Books, 2026). I felt dumb for never making the connection until now. Rap and punk, argues critic Carlo McCormick, followed a shared aesthetic command: “Rip it up, start again.” From fragmented form, rebuild.

Norwegian rockers mix prog and psych rock with elements of jazz, pop and more. It took some time before Motorpsycho and Theo Buhara found each other again. The Italian director first collaborated with the Hans Magnus “Snah” Ryan/Bent Sæther nucleus to score neo-Western “The Tussler” back in ’94. Why he chased young bucks notorious for feral stalkers with bass quakes dense enough to kill elephants from the inside (that “How Was I to Know,” son, yow) is anyone’s guess. But it worked.

Andy Bell's North American Tour heads to The Van Buren. It wasn’t meant to portend a full-length record. Andy Bell hadn’t made one of those in a decade and a half, electing instead to release some 17 singles between 2013 and 2023. Three — “Aftermath (Here We Go),” “True Original” and “Runaway” — came in creative union with producer Dave Audé. A fourth arrived this past February.