Friendship - Love The Stranger - Opaque Blue & White - VINYL LP

The vital new album and Merge debut of Friendship, the Philly-via-Maine outfit led by accomplished songwriter Dan Wriggins. A collection of alt-country songs driving the witty, gritty poetry of pioneers like Kath Bloom and Vic Chesnutt across a 21st century DIY terrain.

Cassie Ramone, known for her influential work with Vivian Girls and The Babies, is back with Sweetheart, her third solo album. Sweetheart is significantly more pop-oriented than her previous releases and is her first solo album to be heavily instrumented by someone other than herself. The album was recorded and produced by Dylan White in Richmond, Virginia, in a Valley Structures barn shed in the Winter of 2023-2024. All of the production and instrumentation was executed by the duo, with the exception of Track 9; InchThe Only Way I Know HowInch was originally engineered by Mac DeMarco at Jizz Jazz studios in Los Angeles in November 2022. The song features DeMarco on guitars and percussion and was completed in Richmond. InchCassie has long been one of my favorite artists. I've been a fan just as much as a friend and collaborator, and I stand in awe of her unique and singular take on songwriting as she approaches the craft from an angle that no other modern songwriter does. Cassie feels music in corners of her soul that most of us can't access, and here is not only her most focused vision in years, but it's also a cross-pollination of everything she's capable of. Some of these songs cast a sonic constellation of stars, while some conjure the ghosts of doo-wops past coming out of the backroom of a VFW hall, while others could hold their own in the rock canon next to The Wipers or Roy Orbison. See for yourself one of my favorite things Cassie has ever done. See for yourself on SWEETHEART.Inch- Kevin Morby

Having barely arrived in London, Handel laid the foundations for his unprecedented operatic career in 1711 with the magic opera Rinaldo. In addition to the novel Italian music, the fantastic plot, which exploited all the possibilities of baroque theatre, also met with enthusiasm from the audience love, anger and passion amid sensational scene changes, fire-breathing monsters, flying dragons and an exotic magical island. The libretto, based on an episode from Torquato Tasso's epic Gerusalemme liberata, which was popular at the time, tells the story of the young crusader Rinaldo, who would much rather marry his beloved Almirena than fight and who must resist the magical arts of the sorceress Armida - who is in love with him - in order to find happiness. Twenty years later, in 1731, Handel fundamentally revised his successful opera once again. This rarely performed version can be heard here on CD for the first time and features an outstanding cast of singers, above all the leading Italian countertenor Filippo Mineccia in the main role and Roberta Mameli and Vivica Genaux as the ladies fighting for him. Marco Angioloni, who also sings Goffredo, conducts the young ensemble Il Groviglio with verve.