Tom Hardy spent two decades playing menace on screen, then decided to prove he could do it in a booth too. Masked up as Frankie Pulitzer, he links with Czarface's Inspectah Deck, 7L, and Esoteric for fifteen tracks of boom-bap that plays it straighter than the premise deserves. Busta Rhymes and Method Man don't treat it like a novelty. El-P shows up to remind you why RTJ hits as hard as it does. And yes, that's Bane reciting Richard III over dusty drums like it's a battle rhyme, no wink, no bit, full commitment. Old-school, because.

Find the space between life and death with this Ryan Gosling record. Creepy. Haunting. Children’s choir bringing the spooky.

Watch it and listen to it with someone you love. It’s a love story only Glen could tell.

◆ left917 Glen Hansard spent his last hours in a pub session in Chapelizod, no stage, singing with whoever showed up. Last week the world lost someone special. Thank you Glen and rest in peace.

I grew up on 90s country, the Brooks & Dunn, Garth, Alan Jackson, Tim McGraw of it all, then spent years wandering off before outlaw country (Johnny, Waylon, Hank, Willie) pulled me back. Fancy Gap is where those two roads meet. The frontman of Triangle indie band The Love Language built a country outfit out of Charlotte, pulled in guest voices like Adam Lazzara of Taking Back Sunday, and their 2024 self-titled record lands right in my sweet spot. Cue up Little Heart Racer or Filthy Habits, drop the truck windows, and let a summer afternoon do the rest.

◆ left917 If you're looking for some indie country. Check this one. If we get sun on Saturday just remember to roll the windows down.

Kevin Parker sings like John Lennon wandered into a disco and decided to stay. "Dracula," off Deadbeat, is the darkest-sounding thing you'll dance to all week. It comes with a bass line that stalks, and enough shimmer that never tips into gloom. It's already grown a whole world of dance clips. Put it on after dark and let it get its teeth in.

American Football made an album so quietly foundational that a good chunk of modern emo is still chasing the sound of their seminal album, LP1. Their interlocking guitars, restless odd-metered time, and trumpet have come to define what's now known as "midwest emo." Full confession, I slept on them the first time around and only fell for them hard these past few years. If you need one song to get why, mine is this one; "Uncomfortably Numb," the one with Paramore's Hayley Williams, where all that ache finally says itself out loud.

This is a summer night at Fat Harold's @ Myrtle Beach in one song. Shirley Temples at the bar and you're a kid again, watching your folks dance. Press play. Find someone to spin around the kitchen.