Sam Markham

TANGK meanders through old and new soundscapes that, on initial listen, might leave you confused as the Reddit user from above, and maybe has more in common with their debut EP, Welcome, than any of their later work, but don’t let this fool you.

There’s certainly no shortage of apocalyptic imaginings these days, and Heartworms like Ellie in the recent The Last of Us tv show stands defiant, ready to fight whatever is coming.

Though I Am the River, The River Is Me is about their personal journey of identity. What they found at the end of that river was that the collective is what saved them.

Ctrl showed that SZA, aka Solána Imani Rowe, was not someone who was to be confined by genre, and SOS doesn’t disappoint in this regard.

Natural Brown Prom Queen is a winding 18-track trip through Sudan’s inner journey from her hometown to finding her place in the world on the other side of the country — an archetypical journey if there ever was one.

AFTER DINNER WE TALK DREAMS is not perfect, some of the songs could have been cut to make it a bit punchier, but that's it. As the trumpet and piano played me out at the end of MY FRIENDS, I wasn't thinking that, though. I was thinking about New York summers.