Chris Brown gambles on techno-trickery and controversy

Chris Brown

Fortune (RCA)

Whether punching or being punched, Chris Brown is a magnet for controversy. Theres always some scrape Brown is in the middle of, whether it involves a woman (Rihanna) or a rival (Drake).

Luckily, the 23-year-old R&B singer with the elastic baritone is capable of souped-up modern soul far bolder than any headline. With each record since 2009s Graffiti, the charismatic Brown, a onetime prince of pop-hop, has become increasingly dependent on techno-trickery and sleek sequenced beats. The result of such electronically induced revisionism is an AutoTuned erotica of sorts, with the mature Brown as the ultimate RoboRomancer on the Eurocentric likes of Strip. Motor-driven machismo and steely sexuality arent all Browns thinking about. While dance-club life gets its due on the clunky Bassline and the slinky Turn Up the Music, hanging at the strip club and getting medicated is the subject of Till I Die. With military electro-beats behind him and rappers Big Sean and Wiz Khalifa, Die races at an up-tempo clip until hitting upon Said she wanna check the poll / I said OK Sarah Palin. If this is Brown hitting up political controversy, he may have another fight on his hands. - A.D. Amorosi

Kitty Pryde

Haha Im Sorry (self-released)

The first words on Kitty Beckwiths second EP are Get out of my room!; on the next track she proclaims herself the rap game Taylor Swift before guest weirdo Riff Raff drops in to rhyme rhinoceros with immaculate. The most laconic voice-of-her-generation candidate ever condenses a few years of New York Times-recognized microgenres (chillwave/ witch house/ swag rap) into a happy, sluggish universe that culminates in turning 2012s biggest breakout hit, Call Me Maybe, into the hypnotic-horns giggle Give Me Scabies. The Floridian, a Claires employee and unlikely rap star, spends Hahas other 10 minutes pri! zing 3 a .m. drunk dials, taking Adderall to stay thin, and bragging that shes ruining hip-hop. Shes smarter than indie-rockers five years her senior, not least because she wont tell us how old she actually is. - Dan Weiss

Dirty Projectors

Swing Lo Magellan (Domino)

With 2009s Bitte Orca, Dirty Projectors established themselves as one of todays most adventurous and significant indie-rock bands. Helmed by singer-guitarist David Longstreth, the band merged avant-garde conceptual structures, West African-influenced guitar lines, and leaping female harmonies in songs that were as knotty as they were uplifting. It was the Projectors most accessible album.

Swing Lo Magellan, the much-anticipated successor and the bands sixth overall, uses similar elements, but its looser, less dense, and less immediate. The songs are full of startling bursts a blast of Jimmy Page-like guitar in Offspring Are Blank, the bleat of womens voices in Gun Has No Trigger amid Longstreths elongated vocal lines. Moments of relative simplicity (the acoustic title track; the easygoing Impregnable Question) contrast with complexly layered, more challenging pieces (the skittering, electronic See What I See; the communal, clattering Unto Caesar). Bitte Orca is still the best gateway to Dirty Projectors complicated rewards, but Swing Lo Magellan often distills the bands strengths. Steve Klinge

Ian Tyson

Raven Singer (Stony Plain)

Get the feel of it, down to the real of it, Ian Tyson sings on Blueberry Susan, a salute to the first guitarist he ever heard and other musical colleagues who have passed on. At 78, the Canadian troubadour and cattle rancher has been doing just that for a long time, going back to the early 60s, when he was half of the hitmaking folk duo Ian and Sylvia.

Tyson is still recovering from the damage his voice suffered in a 2006 outdoor performance and a subsequ! ent viru s. Its more hoarse and hushed than robust and resonant. But that just lends a new intimacy to Tysons performances, framed in spare, acoustic-textured folk-country arrangements. He also maintains all of his usual grace. Combine that with another batch of closely observed and close-to-the-bone songs that draw from his rich and varied life that get down to the real of it and the aging cowboy poet still has the power to move listeners. - Nick Cristiano