Waxahatchee released her fantastic, career-best album, Saint Cloud, in March of 2020, just as our world was beginning to change.
Two years later, she’s finally able to tour and play those songs for those of us that have been patiently waiting to hear them live. Added bonus for us Clevelanders: the band cruised through town on Valentine’s Day, making plans for the Hallmark holiday rather easy.
Aside from “Saint Cloud,” we were also treated to some covers, including Lucinda Williams’ “Fruits of My Labor” and Dolly Parton’s “Light of a Clear Blue Morning.” Opener Madi Diaz joined Waxahatchee during her encore to sing “Resentment.” Waxahatchee’s tour continues through the summer, so get your tickets now.
However, sometimes we’re excited to buy the ticket and take the ride, no matter where it might lead. If that describes your carefree nature, then you might want to add 
Record Store Day 2022: The 20 Must-Have Releases: This year’s holiday includes titles from Pixies, The Cure, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, and more. Record Store Day 2022 is approaching, and this year, organizers have decided to return to the traditional single-day holiday model. In light of the pandemic, Record Store Day was spread out across multiple dates over the last couple years, but for 2022 the vast majority of special releases will drop on April 23rd. An additional day, June 18th, has also been named as a safety net date for 
Record Store Day is harming, not helping, independent music shops like mine: Supply chain chaos and a worldwide vinyl shortage means the annual event that once saved record shops from extinction has lost its way. Even in the age of social distancing, Record Store Day survived during the pandemic. After the 2020 edition was cancelled – it was scheduled for what became the middle of the UK’s first lockdown – the organisers staged separate release “drops” later that year, and again in 2021. You may have seen eager shoppers queueing outside record shops of all sizes up and down the country, wearing face masks as well as the usual thick coats and scarves to brave the pre-opening hours chill; perhaps you saw an obligatory news puff piece about how “vinyl is back” as the David Bowie and Prince estates scraped together yet another previously unreleased artefact. This year, on 23 April, it’s a return to business as usual as record stores around the world celebrate the 15th annual Record Store Day (RSD) with help from Taylor Swift, its starriest ambassador yet (who’s releasing a seven-inch to mark the event). But what was once a shot in the arm for physical retail 
NEW RELEASE PICKS: Pan•American, The Patience Fader (Kranky) Pan•American emerged in the late 1990s as the electronic venture of guitarist Mark Nelson, he of the Richmond, VA-based Labradford, themselves one of the vital bands of the ’90s underground. It’s another example of the “solo project” overtaking the outfit that spawned it, as Labradford hasn’t released a record since 2001’s Fixed::Context, while Pan•American has persisted, with The Patience Fader by my count Nelson’s eleventh album released under the sobriquet. It’s a wonderful listen, at once beautiful and weighted emotionally, recorded in isolation during the summer of 2020. It’s more accurately described as a guitar album rather than an electronic one, at least on the surface (lap steel and harmonica also figure in the record’s scheme. But there are surely pieces here where the electronic element is asserted, and productively so. Nelson avoids the increasingly standard maneuvers in contempo ambient electronics, and does the same with his guitar, his playing gentle without becoming oppressively tranquil. ‘tis a heavy record. A-
Mostly Other People Do the Killing, Disasters Vol. 1 (Hot Cup) Along with unpredictability and sharp musicianship, Mostly Other People Do the Killing’s constant factors are bassist-composer-arranger Moppa Elliott (the leader of the ensemble) and drummer Kevin Shea, here joined once again by pianist Ron Stabinsky. This is not the first piano trio lineup for MOPDtK (that would be Paint from 2017), though this set stands out from that one as Stabinsky and Shea both contribute electronics to the recording. The record provides another showcase for Stabinsky’s sheer prowess at the keyboard on eight original compositions from Elliott, all named after locales in Pennsylvania where some sort of calamity occurred. While tapping into piano trio “convention” is a vital aspect of the overall strategy here, so is abstraction, but without following a long-established and by now fairly predictable “start inside, take it outside and then bring it back in” model. Here, inside and out often intermingle simultaneously and productively. While some will view it as a provocation, the electronics add legit dimension. First MOPDtK vinyl. A-
REISSUE/ARCHIVAL PICKS: Jeff Parker, The Relatives (Thrill Jockey) Reissued for the occasion of Thrill Jockey’s 30th anniversary, The Relatives’ initial release arrived halfway through that distinguished stretch, retaining drummer-percussionist Chad Taylor and multi-instrumentalist Chris Lopes (he plays upright bass, electric and acoustic guitars, flute and percussion on this album) from Parker’s 2003 trio set Like-coping on Delmark and adds Sam Barsheshet on Fender Rhodes and Wurlitzer electric pianos. Parker completes the group on electric guitar. Interestingly, Parker only contributes three compositions here, with the title track a co-write with Matthew Lux (his bandmate in Isotope 217). Lopes brings three pieces, Taylor brings one, and Marvin Gaye’s “When Did You Stop Loving Me, When Did I Stop Loving You.” is given a sweet ’70s post-boppish spin. Overall, the sound is rooted in fusion with touches of post-rock, unsurprising given Parker’s background, but it still sounds fresh after 15 years. “Rang (For Michael Zerang)” ends the record on an percussively explosive note. A-
The Detroit Escalator Company, Soundtrack [313] (Mental Groove Records / Musique Pour La Danse) Motown-based multidisciplinary artist and ambient techno specialist Neil Ollivierra’s highly-regarded and potentially quite pricey debut, originally released in 1996 by UK label Ferox as a 2LP limited to 1,000 copies (offering eight tracks) and on CD (with one extra cut), gets a deluxe reissue here, with four bonus selections added to the 2LP, which was half-speed mastered at 45rpm (in two limited editions, with the window of availability closing fast), and two more extras on the CD (a 3-panel digipak, also limited). While there are certainly elements in the overall scheme, particularly rhythmic, that are representative of its era, that’s not the same as falling back onto worn-out tropes. While it doesn’t feel right to describe Soundtrack [313] as unpredictable, the progression (which hits 72 minutes on CD) is never clichéd, and that’s seriously impressive, as people have had 25 years to appropriate Ollivierra’s moves. In the end, this really says something about the uncoppable subtleties of inspiration. A-
US | Record Store Day: Special Titles Announced For Record Store Day 2022! Record Store Day organizers around the world have 
Philadelphia, PA | The Vinyl Countdown: Val Shively has millions of vinyl 45s in a legendary three-story record shop outside Philadelphia, to which people come from around the world. To say he’s the last of a kind is an understatement… Blessed (and weird) are the record store saints, who save God-forsaken disks from ending up in landfill graveyards, finding them venerating homes, instead. Unlike most independent record retailers following today’s standard playbook, replacing compact discs and used vinyl in their bins with virgin 12-inch vinyl re-issues and contemporary pressings, a few shopkeepers still operate shrines to holy relics of the 1950s to 1980s–original 45 rpm singles. No new ones are being pressed, so these halo-like plastic wafers 
