STEREOLAB Instant Holograms on Metal Film (UHF Disks / Warp) — The electronic pulse of Stereolab had slowed to such a point that it could be assumed the machine would never rouse itself back into action. Even the band’s return to the stage in 2019, more than ten years after they had last recorded together, was a clear echo of the past rather than a forecast of the future. Evidently, though, there’s no keeping a elegantly experimental electronic pop group down. Instant Holograms on Metal Film, Stereolab’s thrilling, unexpected new album, is a true return to deliberate, daring formlessness. Only the sonic engineers who used synths and dreamy mental calisthenics to manufacture a bridge across the English Channel could come up with this set of songs. “Melodie Is a Wound” seems to hold dozens of ideas, all genially competing with one another for prominence, and “Vermona F Transistor” is a swinging number that could plausibly have coming into being after the band was giving a prompt to come up with the quintessential Stereolab song. Because Stereolab has long specialized in unpredictable creativity, it’s not as if there is any need for them to reinvent themselves just because a decade and a half has passed since their last release. Listening to the album just means cataloging how they swerve from track to track rather than marveling that they’ve done it. “Le Coeur Et La Force” is in French! “Electrified Teenybop!” an instrumental that is bright and antic enough to earn its title! “Flashes from Everywhere” downright wistful, like they spent some time with the last Camera Obscura album. Of course, they don’t need to look inside of their immediate vicinity for inspiration. Stereolab is often in conversation with themselves, as when the Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me bounce of “If You Remember How to Dream Pt. 1” is answered three tracks later by the more exploratory, sing-song “If You Remember How to Dream Pt. 2.” Dreaming is maybe up for discussion, but clearly no length of layoff is going to cause Stereolab to forget how to be Stereolab. In addition to those already mentioned, focus in on these cuts: “Aerial Troubles,” “Immortal Hands,” “Transmuted Matter,” and “Colour Television.”

CAROLINE caroline 2 (Rough Trade) — The British band caroline makes a good case for creative sprawl. A group that’s grown to eight members in the years since Jasper Llewellyn, Mike O’Malley, and Casper Hughes started jamming together around the University of Manchester, caroline makes music that comes across as the results of egalitarian input from anyone who feels a spark rising in their soul. On the band’s sophomore album, helpfully titled caroline 2, this openness to intellectual largesse results in eight tracks that determinedly discombobulate. “U R Ur Only Aching” is emblematic as it alternates between minimalist plunking and magisterial. For the skeptics, this can certainly be off-putting, but caroline also makes room for songs that are a little easier to grasp, such as “Tell Me I Never Knew That,” which features Caroline Polachek guesting. Its airy folk rock that builds elegantly, like Swell Season playing through a fever dream. Intensity really is the guiding principle, though, whether “Total Euphoria,” reveling in its own discordance, or “Two Riders Down,” which sounds like a heart attack made into music. The band spent around a year and half crafting the album, and the care is evident in every intricate edge. Check the following: “Song Two,” “Coldplay Cover,” and “Beautiful Ending”