Today is the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, in the northern hemisphere. To mark the occasion and to celebrate the holiday season, Björk has released a new holiday version of the "Solstice" app from Biophilia. The song is based on a poem celebrating the Christmas season by poet/author Sjón, comparing the solar system to a Christmas tree. The new Solstice app includes additional features like gameleste sound samples, more festive colors, and, most importantly, the opportunity for fans to create a song and send it to friends as Christmas e-cards.

Sara Watkins is back in the studio to record her second solo album for Nonesuch Records. The album, which will be produced by Blake Mills, is due out sometime next year. In the mean time, Watkins will be taking fans inside the recording process as it happens, offering a sneak peek of what's to come when she posts audio clips from each day's session. The first day's clip is now available; hear it here.

Sara Watkins—who, with her brother Sean, is currently on tour in California with the Blind Boys of Alabama—will soon be heading back into the studio to record her second solo album for Nonesuch Records. The album, which will be produced by Blake Mills, is due out sometime next year. Watkins will be taking fans inside the recording process as it happens when she posts audio clips from each day's session to her Facebook page and website.

The Black Keys kicked off release week for their new album, El Camino, with a special performance for some lucky fans at New York's Webster Hall Monday night, webcast live on MTV Hive. The duo "sealed their ten-year ascent," says Rolling Stone, "with a tight and feisty" set, "displaying everything they've learned and mastered over that decade." Watch five songs from the show here.

Jessica Lea Mayfield, who is currently touring North America with Ryan Adams, is featured in a Daytrotter session, performing four songs from her album Tell Me. Mayfield's songs "are beautifully sober reminders that we're not always thinking straight and it's not always such a bad thing to do the things that you're not supposed to be doing," says Daytrotter, who which calls Tell Me "a spectacular collection of heartbreak and innocence ... Mayfield writes about these lessons that she's learning in such honest and staggeringly sophisticated ways that it's hard to believe that she's only 22 years old ..."

The Black Keys will embark on the first leg of their North American tour this March, with shows in arenas like New York’s Madison Square Garden, Boston’s TD Garden, and Chicago’s United Center. The shows are in support of their new album, El Camino, out this Tuesday, December 6. Concert ticket and album packages will be available via the band’s site. The band will perform on Saturday Night Live tomorrow, The Colbert Report on Tuesday, and the Late Show with David Letterman on Wednesday. MTV Hive will livestream their album release show at New York’s Webster Hall on Monday.

The Black Keys are featured in a cover story in this Sunday's New York Times Arts & Leisure section and in the Times' Popcast, which look at the band's new album, El Camino, and their rise to fame. A Guardian profile also examines how the band has "become a global pop phenomenon." The Guardian gives El Camino a perfect fives stars: "They sound like a band who think they've made the year's best rock 'n' roll album, probably because that's exactly what they've done."

Malian singer-songwriter Fatoumata Diawara, whose debut EP, Kanou, was released earlier this year, performed one of the songs on the EP, “Clandestin,” for the latest in the Guardian’s series “How I wrote …” Diawara discusses the various influences behind her music including jazz, blues, rock, and her native Wassoulou, and the inspiration for “Clandestin” in particular, before performing the song. Watch the performance here.

k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang close out their three-week tour of Australia—and months-long world tour—at the Brisbane Riverstage tomorrow night. The Age, reviewing one tour stop, says: "lang's voice remains a marvel." While in Sydney for a sold-out, six-night residency, lang and the band took time out for a special invitation-only live performance and audience Q&A that aired on Channel 7's Sunday Night. Fans around the world can now watch online via the show's site.

Composer/pianist Timothy Andres was featured on Q2 Music's Nadia Sirota show today titled "Timothy Andres: Bringing the Virtuoso Composer-Performer Tradition Into the 21st Century." Q2 is celebrating WQXR's "Beethoven Awareness Month" in its own fittingly contemporary way, looking at "modern-day Beethovens ... some of today's most distinct and inventive compositional voices." Today's show includes four pieces from Andres's 2010 Nonesuch debut album, Shy and Mighty, each introduced by the composer.

The Black Keys are featured on the latest edition of NPR's All Songs Considered, the show's last regular episode of the year. "Run Right Back," off the band's forthcoming album, El Camino, due out December 6, kicks off the show. All Songs Considered host Bob Boilen calls it "wonderful" and says of the band: "They're the pillars. You just know they're gonna put out really solid rock." Derrick Tuggle, the star of the video for the album's first single, "Lonely Boy," stopped by the Ellen show yesterday. Watch the segment here.

Björk's forthcoming album, Biophilia, is due out in just under a week, on October 11, and is now streaming at NPR Music as an exclusive NPR First Listen. "Biophilia's songs are astounding," raves NPR. "These songs have room to breathe, employing space and silence as much as melody and harmony. The sparse instrumentation and arrangements become gorgeously intricate meditations on which to build ... Vocal melodies unfurl more like transcendent devotionals than typical verses, and become even more stirring when accompanied by a chorus of voices that could fill a cathedral."