If <i>College Dropout</i> was our introduction and <i>Late Registration</i> a victory lap for a newly anointed champion, then <i>Graduation</i> crystallizes Kanye West's stratospheric success in 24-carat surround sound. Kanye's third album pushes his reflexive rhymes and musical imagination to new places. "Good Life" is a layer cake of silver-gilded synths that lets the listener bask in Kanye's luxurious dream life for three vivid minutes, while the Daft Punk-sampling "Stronger" beams us into a futuristic dance party, awash in neon color.

When <i>DIE FOR MY BITCH</i> was released in 2019, Baby Keem was a 19-year-old virtual unknown scratching the surface of the underground scene. Due to a lack of money and resources, Baby Keem had taught himself to produce beats. He’d also learned how to hustle, cold-emailing links of his early music to countless bloggers and praying for a response. It all paid off with <i>DIE FOR MY BITCH</i>, which proved the barely-adult rapper’s prowess, determination, and potential to soar—while also yielding a sleeper-hit single with “Orange Soda.” <i>DIE FOR MY BITCH</i> was created by Keem under the guidance of his cousin, Kendrick Lamar, and Dave Free, the co-founder of the label and creative house PGLang (who later signed Baby Keem). The mixtape is a testament to the many faces of hip-hop, and Keem’s ability to dominate in all of them. He and fellow producers Kal Banx, Keanu Beats, DJ Dahi, and Cardo, among others, dip into grunge, rock, pop, and R&B, nailing the increasingly difficult-to-achieve goal of creating music that’s both innovative and replay-worthy.

Atlanta Millionaires Club is in Faye Webster’s feelings, and that’s the way she likes it. “Everything is way personal,” Webster says. “I have to write about very personal things for me to even want to write.” On the 21-year-old Atlanta native’s new album, the omnipresence of pedal steel eschews bluegrass trappings, flexible under Webster’s genre-bending direction. Webster didn’t set out to make it sound like any artist in particular, but she cites Aaliyah as her main musical inspiration for how she uses sound. “That’s where I first heard, ‘Oh, there’s this weird guitar that’s bendy and it could totally be in a country song,’ but the way she’s using it is what makes her music so special to me,” Webster explains. “I try to do that. I try to change the way pedal steel is supposed to sound, or keys, to make it more R&B.” Pulling from a familial lineage of folk storytelling and time spent in Atlanta’s hip-hop scene, Webster’s work is a study of duality, weaving through her own introversion and heartbreak; it’s an idiosyncratic sadness punctuated by fleeting observations and an unexpected, sly sense of humor. And like the way Webster takes the traditional instrumentation of Americana and flips it into something else, she uses her own calm, laid-back demeanor to say you can be boldly and unapologetically yourself in a quiet way, too.

Depression Cherry is the fifth album by American dream pop band Beach House. It was announced on May 26, 2015, and will be released on August 28, 2015. According to the band, the album will be a return to the simpler style of dream pop from their first two albums. On the Sub Pop Website, the band has released this statement under the album's page: "In general, this record shows a return to simplicity, with songs structured around a melody and a few instruments, with live drums playing a far lesser role. With the growing success of Teen Dream and Bloom, the larger stages and bigger rooms naturally drove us towards a louder, more aggressive place; a place farther from our natural tendencies. Here, we continue to let ourselves evolve while fully ignoring the commercial context in which we exist."

ILLIT announces comeback with 5th mini album ‘BREAK EVEN.’ Out October 26.

Caroline Elizabeth Polachek is an American singer, producer and songwriter. Raised in Connecticut, Polachek co-founded the indie pop band Chairlift while studying at the University of Colorado. The duo emerged from the late-2000s Brooklyn music scene with the sleeper hit "Bruises.”