Bill Frisell's latest album, Disfarmer, is out now. The Observer gives it four stars, finding it done "brilliantly" by "guitar maestro" Frisell. The Independent gives it four stars as well, calling Frisell "not just the outstanding jazz guitarist of his era but also the most diversely prolific," following, as the album does, his recent "sublime compilation" of Folk Songs. Four more stars from the Evening Standard, describing Frisell's soundscape as "a peaceful world where the twin streams of jazz and country-and-western meet in gentle confluence." The Boston Phoenix sees Frisell as "one of jazz's great impressionists" and Disfarmer "the perfect subject for one of his audio mini-movies."

Amadou & Mariam's tour with Coldplay comes to Carson, California, tomorrow night. MTV has named their album Welcome to Mali among the Top 10 albums of the year so far. On the album, "the duo make breathtakingly beautiful, undeniably inspired music," says MTV. "[I]t's music for all seasons and all people." LA Weekly calls it "a wonderfully engaging blur of unexpected influences." The San Diego Union Tribune says that "few who listen will be able to resist." The Dallas Observer sees them likely to transcend the "world music" label, their music "capable of transforming unsuspecting English-speaking audiences into dancing throngs of joy."

Wilco was joined by Feist to sing "You and I" at Monday night's concert at KeySpan Park in Brooklyn and on Tuesday night's performance for the Late Show with David Letterman. Stereogum posts video of the latter and reports: "Jeff [Tweedy] and Feist enjoy a laid back but engaged rapport onstage that matches the dulcet mesh of their voices, one of those rare collaborative dynamics that enhances the song's meaning as much as it raises the song's profile." Billboard says of Monday's concert: "The sight was American rock 'n' roll at its finest, with one of the genre's most powerful live acts at the helm." WFUV's Rita Houston says: "Great show in a great setting on a beautiful night in Coney Island. Magic was all there."

Wilco, fresh off last night's rocking sold-out set at Coney Island's Keyspan Park, is set to perform on Late Show with David Letterman tonight. The group will play "You and I," the Wilco (the album) duet with Leslie Feist, who will join the band for the show, as she did on Coney Island last night. Following last week's concert at Wolf Trap, outside DC, the Washington Post says the band offered "something for everyone ... all delivered in the tightest possible package." France's Télérama gives the album a perfect "four keys." The Daily Telegraph gives four stars to the new album, "a collection of unflaggingly high-quality, Beatles-y tunes ... with a yearning, uplifting summery spirit." The Scotland Herald says, "The whole album is beautifully produced and suffused with a kind of mature smarts ... It's great to have them back, America's best band."

Disfarmer, Bill Frisell's latest Nonesuch release, is due out a week from today you can now listen to the complete album online for NPR's Exclusive First Listen. NPR describes Frisell as "a guitar tactician with warmth and a composer of unclassifiable songs," and, on this album (inspired by the work of the late photographer Michael Disfarmer), "the quiet tactician of the electric guitar, who engineers loops and subtle distortions with phrasing you never knew you were expecting." NPR concludes: "It's a record alternately spare and full, languid and rollicking, pastoral and urbanely produced."

Voltaic, the audio-visual celebration of Björk's Volta tour, is out now on Nonesuch. The Wall Street Journal spoke with the Icelandic songstress who "makes music that melds edgy beats with dreamlike lyrics," about the project. Nashville Scene points to its visual aspect, describing her concerts as "absolutely spellbinding marriages of ethereal sound and astonishing vision," and explaining, "As always, the singer's voice is simply unparalleled in its celestial beauty, her primal stage presence is captivating, the beats are club-stomping, and the visual spectacle of the show is stunning." All About Jazz sees her  "here she's near the top of her game."

Shawn Colvin's Live album was released late last month on Nonesuch, and, says MusicOMH in its four-star review, "a live album is long overdue ... [T]his career-spanning selection of songs could easily be a wish list for any fan," he states, "but also serves as fine introduction to a singer-songwriter who is frequently mentioned in the same breath as James Taylor, Lucinda Williams and Joni Mitchell." Shawn is set to begin a run of solo dates this week, opening for Jackson Browne on Thursday. She spoke with Popdose, which calls her "one of the leading lights of 'Americana' music and perhaps the most important singer/songwriter—male or female—of the last 20 years."

Christina Courtin's self-titled Nonesuch debut is out now, and, the Daily Express gives it a perfect five stars. She puts "her exceptional composition skills to 10 superb songs full of emotional complexity and subtle style shifts," says the paper. Teletext says that "what makes Courtin's debut stand out is the understated variety of her vocals. As precise as k.d. lang one moment, she's as untamed as Bat for Lashes the next." The Scripps Howard News Service calls Courtin "impossibly enchanting" and the new album "intoxicating."

Road Show, the latest work by Stephen Sondheim, is out now. The true-life tale has been through a number of permutations (including 2003's Bounce), and, says Playbill, "this recording sounds new, vibrant and refreshing." As always, Jonathan Tunick's orchestrations "perfectly translate the composer's music for orchestra" and producer Tommy Krasker "has made a fine job" of the recording. Talkin’ Broadway concurs, asserting: "The sound and spectacularly theatrical feel of the whole project is masterful." The review concludes: "The highly crafted work of Sondheim and the many intertwined lines of Weidman's are sharp, packed, concise and full of character specificity."

Ry Cooder's three-week tour through Europe with Nick Lowe came to a close in Liverpool on Saturday with "an understated concert of music that captured an air of simplicity, honesty and restrained virtuosity," says the Liverpool Daily Post. "Ry, it’s great to see you back playing live where you belong." The Guardian gives four stars to last week's concert in Gateshead, asserting, "Cooder belongs to the elite group of guitarists, Eric Clapton and BB King among them, whose style can be identified by a single note." The Scotsman gives a perfect five stars to Thursday night's set in Edinburgh: "Cooder showed why he's considered the best slide player in the world." The Herald gives rates it five stars as well, saying the set "confirmed Cooder's status as the king of slide guitar."

Wilco's Jeff Tweedy is front and center on the cover of American Songwriter's 25th Anniversary issue out now. In an interview with Tweedy, the magazine says the story of the band since 2002's groundbreaking Yankee Hotel Foxtrot "has been a fruitful one," describing its latest, Wilco (the album), as "another great record from a band who seems incapable of making a bad one." BBC 6 Music has named it Album of the Day for Friday. Aquarium Drunkard asserts that it "not only succeeds but stands near the top of Wilco’s extremely distinguished catalogue ... And if the sound of six of the world’s best musicians banging out spangled and bejeweled pop-rock doesn’t get you off, then you may want to reconsider your record collection."

Steve Reich's latest creation, 2x5, premieres tonight on a double bill with pioneering electronic music group Kraftwerk, in a sold-out concert to open the Manchester International Festival. Bang On A Can performs the piece with the composer in the sound booth. The piece builds on the framework of Reich's 2009 Pulitzer Prize-winning work, Double Sextet. The Star-Ledger writes of a recent performance of Double Sextet that "both the piece itself and the sense of lifetime achievement came through in full glory." The Guardian, in a feature on the composer, writes, "Reich has been composing for more than 40 years. In that time, he has seen the music he is most closely associated with ... seemingly emerge from nowhere to become one of the dominant musical forms of the age."