The Staves have released "Trying," the second track from the British trio this year, following last month’s release of "Nazareth." "I wanted to write a song about the state of things in the world and how broken our ability to communicate with each other had become as a society," Camilla Staveley-Taylor says of the new track, "but it became impossible as I was writing to separate my personal life from the broader message ... I feel like trying is what we spend most of our lives doing really. Just trying our best."

Emmylou Harris made her Nonesuch Records debut with the release of her album Red Dirt Girl on September 5, 2000. To mark its twentieth anniversary, Nonesuch will release the album—which won the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album—on limited-edition, translucent red vinyl on February 19, 2021, available to pre-order now in the Nonesuch Store. Harris wrote all but one of the twelve tracks on Red Dirt Girl. The album was produced by Malcolm Burn, who also performs on the album, along with Buddy Miller, Daryl Johnson, and Ethan Johns. Dave Matthews sings a duet with Harris, and Bruce Springsteen, Patti Scialfa, and Patty Griffin also contribute vocals.

Pianist/composer Tigran Hamasyan's new album, The Call Within, is out now. On the album, he performs ten original compositions, with Evan Marien on electric bass and Arthur Hnatek on drums. Produced by Hamasyan, the album is a journey into his dreamlike inner world, taking inspiration from his interest in maps from different eras, poetry, Armenian folk stories, astrology, geometry, ancient Armenian design, rock carvings, and cinematography, and creating what Record Collector calls "a kaleidoscopic tapestry of sound." Jazzwise exclaims: "An exceptional recording for exceptional times." You can take a look inside the vinyl edition in an unboxing video here.

A limited-edition, 45-RPM version of The Black Keys’ chart-topping ninth album, “Let’s Rock," will be available from independent record stores this Saturday, August 29, for part one of this year's Record Store Day. The new Record Store Day edition of “Let’s Rock” is pressed on two 180-gram vinyl discs and comes in a deluxe holographic gatefold jacket, with each piece individually numbered. Also out this Saturday are two special k.d. lang vinyl releases from Warners: Angel with a Lariat and Drag. Due to Covid-19, Record Store Day, usually held in April, is being replaced this year by RSD Drops, three separate title drop dates August 29, September 26, and October 24.

Rhiannon Giddens has released a new original song, "Don’t Call Me Names," about rejecting toxic behavior. The track debuted on the inaugural episode of Southern Craft Radio, Kelly McCartney’s new show on Apple Music Country, and can be heard here. "The framework in the song is a love affair, but it can happen in any kind of connection," Giddens says. "The real story was accepting my inner strength and refusing to continue being gas-lit and held back; and refusing to keep sacrificing my mental health for the sake of anything or anyone ... When I listen to it, the anger that I felt then now is the anger I feel at my entire country being gas-lit, held back, and sacrificed. We have to keep saying NO to toxic behavior, no matter how small or large the stage, and keep saying it nice and loud.”

Mountain Man—the trio of Amelia Meath, Alexandra Sauser-Monnig, and Molly Sarlé—has released Look at Me Don’t Look at Me, a live album recorded in November 2018 at Saint Mark’s Cathedral in Seattle. The live recording captures the band’s intimate touring shows in support of its acclaimed Nonesuch release, Magic Ship, and features tracks from that album, as well as songs from the trio’s 2010 debut, Made the Harbor; Molly Sarle's “Human”; covers of Fiona Apple's “Hot Knife” and Michael Hurley's "Blue Mountain"; and the group’s singularly quirky banter.

The Staves have released "Nazareth," the band’s first new music since its 2017 EP with yMusic. "We recorded 'Nazareth' in one take on a field recorder sat outside the studio in the summer of 2018," says the trio. "The sun was shining and the birds were singing. We tried recording it in the studio but just kept coming back to this version. It seemed to have the magic.  The song was intended to be in the spirit of an Irish blessing or a kind of a prayer, asking to be kept safe—but it pretty quickly became a more personal and introspective lyric. Moments of glory quickly faded. Worrying, trying. How we mean everything and nothing at the same time. To everyone, to no one."

Devendra Banhart's four-song EP Vast Ovoid is out now. It follows his 2019 studio album, Ma, about which Q says: "Banhart’s singular world remains as intoxicating as ever, as if all human life is here." The EP, available in a limited-edition 12" white vinyl 45 and digitally, includes the Helado Negro remix of the Ma song "Love Song" and three songs "that didn’t quite fit in with Ma's theme of maternity," Banhart says. "Ultimately all three songs are about the difference between disappointment and disillusion … Bigger difference than I realized ..."

Pulitzer Prize–winning composer Caroline Shaw’s Orange, which earned Attacca Quartet a Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance, is now available on vinyl for the first time. The two-LP vinyl edition includes the album on double 180-gram orange vinyl, pressed at Record Industry in the Netherlands, along with a printed excerpt from the score. "Completely gorgeous in so many ways," exclaims BBC Radio 3. "It hits you everywhere, all at once." "A love letter to the string quartet," says NPR. "[W]hen you hear all the imaginative sounds on Orange, you know you're listening to the voice of a strong composer."

Congratulations to Joshua Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride, and Brian Blade, whose new album, RoundAgain, debuted at No. 1 on the Current Traditional Jazz Albums chart in the US and at No. 1 on the Jazz & Blues chart in the UK. The album has also debuted in the Top 100 of the Current Albums chart in the US and in the Top 10 of the overall albums chart in Switzerland and Top 100 of the same in Germany, Belgium, and Japan. Tune in this Wednesday to join the musicians for the premiere of an hour-long set from last September via NPR Music and Jazz Night in America, plus a live Q&A.

British singer/songwriter/guitarist Lianne La Havas’ self-titled album, her first since 2015’s Blood, is out now. The eleven tracks span the arc of a love affair, one that brought growth and newfound confidence. “This is my first completely self-produced album with my own band. I got my own way with everything—all the decisions that you hear on this album were mine,” she says. “I’m a woman now, so I’m less shy and timid about saying certain things. And there’s no right or wrong when it’s your record, so I was very much embracing that fact, as well.”

Vagabon (Laetitia Tamko) has released a remix of her song "Water Me Down" by Pamcy, which can be heard here. Tamko discovered and fell in love with the music of Manila-based producer and DJ on Bandcamp, where she herself had first released her music and found a music community. The two began an e-mail correspondence, which eventually led to the creation of this remix. The original version of the song appears on Vagabon's 2019 self-titled Nonesuch debut album.