In a year when your favorite long-dormant musical act finally released new material after a multi-year hiatus, only a precious few releases -- from voices old and new -- were truly able to capture the pop culture zeitgeist. These are those albums.
The hip-hop story is more exciting to follow than a lot of primetime TV as it changes and adapts, telling stories of so-called "minorities". These are the ten albums that we think tell the biggest stories of 2017's hip-hop scene.
These ten bands share a perspective on the world that doesn't shy away from tough questions or feelings.
The indie rock genre is wide and unwieldy, but the musicians selected here share an awareness of one's place on the cultural-historical timeline.
There's common ground between all 20 metal albums despite musical differences: the ability to provide a cathartic release for the creator and the consumer alike, right when we need it most.
2017 was a year of rejuvenation for progressive rock and metal, with many artists bouncing back from potential hardships to prove just how much they can still offer in terms of trying new things while maintaining what made them beloved in the first place.
In a year when the daily damning headlines make us all want to retreat into ourselves, the ambient/instrumental crowd aren't being idle by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, this roundup of brilliant new voices proves that ambient artists are taking more risks and breaking more ground than we ever thought possible.
The best and most exciting jazz of 2017 is increasingly happening at the intersection of different streams of music. Reveling in a diversity of influences and therefore a kind of complexity makes it "art music", inevitably.
This year, some of the most powerful sounds across the global music industry were those that resisted injustice, whether by directly rejecting it or surviving in spite of it.
