The music on Relentless Kickdrum, the latest album by Philadelphia-based electronic musician W00dy, is defined by velocity. Not only are the tempos expeditious, but each motif and rhythmic variation that’s introduced is consistently toyed with and reworked, often giving the illusion of repetition while pushing the music forward at full tilt. Although W00dy ostensibly fits into the wave of artists fusing noise and dancefloor-centric styles, the way she synthesizes the genres emphasizes rhythmic disorientation over sonic heaviness.

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“Um, hello everybody. I’m Noname,” Fatimah Warner softly announces over rapturous applause after the first song of her 2017 Tiny Desk Concert. “I’ve watched so many of these, so I’m like, ‘Man, I just wanna be as good as T-Pain,’” she giggles before graciously introducing her backing band. The Chicago rapper Noname is modesty incarnate.

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Doubling down on the move toward cleaned-up, synthy, punky, hyperactive pop music that they had established with last year’s GT ULTRA, Guerilla Toss return with the more confidently playful, more vibrant, and somewhat more convincing release that is Twisted Crystal. If the band maintains pace with their output and continues their inert but gradual motion into new territory (this is their third full-length in a row released with little more than a year in between), we can stay hopeful for what’s to come.

More about: Guerilla Toss

“I went back to feel alone there/ I went back to wipe it clean/ I took the lights and radio towers out of my dreams.”
– The Microphones, “The Moon”

“I went back to feel alone there/ All past selves and future possibilities on hold/ While I tore through the dark on the freeway.”
– Mount Eerie, “Soria Moria”

More about: Mount Eerie, The Microphones

When I was in high school, I stumbled upon a documentary about turntablism called Scratch. This was when I first experienced legends like Afrika Bambaataa, DJ Shadow, DJ Babu, Preemo, Qbert, Cut Chemist; it was my introduction into electronic music that wasn’t 1940s electroacoustic music (I was a strange adolescent). What stuck with me, though, was a suspiciously short section featuring a white female drum & bass DJ, who I misremembered for years after as Goldie; it turns out, of course, that Goldie is a black male British breakbeat musician.

More about: Shinichi Atobe

Unlike other thresholds in the human lifecycle, passing into adulthood is the least tied to physical changes. Birth, adolescence, and even entering one’s golden years all carry transformations requiring no metaphorical elaboration. The wrinkles, spots, pimples… the actual growing pains are there. Instead, a monotonous stillness appears to indicate the arrival of adulthood. Which is pretty counterintuitive, come to think of it.

More about: Sandro Perri