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Bingham's songs are gritty and dense, reflecting an overall mood of loneliness and hardship, while opener Hayes Carll is a dryly witty 28-year-old whose humble, melodic folk tunes are often infused with humorous anecdotes. Hear both perform a concert from WXPN and World Cafe Live.

Listen to the new album from the rock group, Derby and you'd swear they hail from Britain. The Portland, Ore.-based band draws heavily on BritPop and classic sounds of past British invasions on their latest CD — their second — Posters Fade. The influence of bands like The Beatles is impossible to miss, but the group leans more towards homage than imitation. The album stands as a catalog of Brit Rock stylings from the last forty years, all filtered through an American band looking back in awe.

Led by an acoustic guitar and a grand piano, Death Cab for Cutie plays a stripped-down session at The Current. Drawing from a decade's worth of material, the band pulls out an old favorite and plays two songs from its new album, Narrow Stairs.

While Nick Jaina's previous release, The 7 Stations was a jangly folk-pop record, his new album, Wool is a more foreboding collection of acoustic songs that seem to drift in on the ether. They crackle and buzz with haunting undertones made of bowed cymbals and resonating bells. It's a beautiful mix Jaina says is best listened to while drifting off to sleep. "Turn on some white noise, like a humidifier. Don't feel bad if you fall asleep before it's over."

Music critic Ken Tucker reviews soul singer Al Green's new album, Lay It Down.

Lizzie Goodman of Blender magazine reviews music from Coldplay, Katy Perry, and Wolf Parade.

His new album sold more than a million copies in its first week in stores. But is Weezy F. Baby as good as he claims? Critics Sasha Frere-Jones and Jake Paine debate the New Orleans rapper's stature on WNYC's Soundcheck.

Onstage at Jazz Standard in New York, recent Juilliard graduate Jonathan Batiste is up first. The pianist leads off for John Ellis & Double-Wide with music from the new CD Dance Like There's No Tomorrow, this week on JazzSet.

When driving long distances, the crushing exhaustion and faceless landscapes can fade from memory in a nanosecond when accompanied by the perfect piece of adrenaline-infused music. These five tracks serve that purpose beautifully, so be sure to put them on for those moments when the landmarks are starting to whiz by in a joyously indistinct blur.

Hear sneak previews of new music from Beck, Randy Newman, solo work from Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes, Kimya Dawson (the singer behind the Juno soundtrack), The Hold Steady, Missy Elliott, and more.