Rachel Alm

Johanna Samuels, Photo: Michael Newsted. Singer-songwriter Johanna Samuels’ new album, Sorry, Kid, went through a few false starts and long pauses in its genesis. But working with producer Jonathan Rado (Foxygen, Weyes Blood) got the momentum moving. “He was the right one for me,” Samuels said over a video call from Los Angeles.

Categorized as a fiction novel, The Fire Agent is based on the real life of author David Baerwald’s grandfather Ernst Baerwald, and it’s an astonishing story from start to finish. Briefly: in 1900, a young Jewish German man is dispatched by his elite school to become as a spy in Japan. After an onerous training montage with a former samurai in Milan, Italy, he begins his espionage work monitoring anarchist rallies.

Jess Williamson. Photo: Jackie Lee Young. This week we bring you folk rock from Tyler Ballgame, Savanna Ruth and Jess Williamson, groovy funk from Blu DeTiger, pop by Catie Turner and rock by Lee Emi and Stand Atlantic. Lee Emi, “Clean Slate” – Emilee Petersmark of Michigan rock band The Crane Wives is going solo as Lee Emi, and reinventing herself. “Clean Slate” is all about that reinvention, the compulsion to escape and start over — and how that sometimes involves a haircut.