Fresh Picks goes all around the world this week.
We have soul from Australia, jazz from South Africa, country from Duluth, reggae from Jamaica, bluegrass from California, folk-soul from England, new wave from NYC and rock 'n' roll from Americanaland on the way.
Read on for albums like Ella Thompson's Triumph & Sadness, Michael Kiwanuka's FUDGE and Linda Sikhakhane's L I N D A.
Our Fresh tracks include Elsa Krantz's "Exit Sign," Nabihah Iqbal's "Heaven Can Wait," Two Runner's "Punk Rock Bar," and Grey DeLisle & Les Greene's "Mister."
Then, on this week's look back at 1976, after previously digging into to Peter Tosh's Legalize It, it's time for Bob Marley and the Wailers' Rastaman Vibration.
Check out this week's suggestions from Asst. Music Director Malachy Koons and Volunteer Coordinator Dan Gannon.
Albums
Album of the Week: Ella Thompson - Triumph & Sadness
It might be time to add Melbourne as a soul music destination.
Ella Thompson is a singer-songwriter from the southwestern Australian city, releasing her third album Triumph & Sadness. In the past she has collaborated with longtime Melbourne funk icons The Bamboos, and came up in the same scene as the genre fusing Hiatus Kaiyote.
Thompson and the two instrumental bands she worked with who are also at the center of Melbourne's soul scene, Karate Boogaloo and Surprise Chef, have put together an exceptional modern yet retro soul album.
"Promise to Keep" opens the album with a sweetly melancholic meditation on connections and the work it takes to maintain them. It's a theme that runs throughout the ten tracks.
The horns that march "Parable" forward are truly triumphant, echoing Thompson's soaring voice as she sings about what comes after hardships. There's no ifs, ands or buts about it: she WILL see the sunshine after the rain.
Thompson worked with analog enthusiast engineer Wayne Gordon, known for his work with Daptone Records and recently The Womack Sisters. Their collective love for retro warmth stands out on "Make You Believe," a track whose main riff reminds me of the clean and minimal Booker T. & the M.G.s R&B sound.
Thompson mentions driving and listening to Mary Oliver's "The Waterfall" poem (note to self: listen to Mary Oliver while driving to keep blood pressure down), imagining herself as the falling water. The poet's influence is another theme that runs throughout Triumph & Sadness, both in the way her fragmented lyrics come together into a larger picture and the steady stream of imagery from the natural world.
We may be barreling towards winter here in Northern Minnesota, but in Australia summer's next up, so it's soul music and sunshine on this week's Album of the Week. -MK
Michael Kiwanuka - FUDGE
Kiwanuka's latest was recorded concurrently with Small Changes but is something completely different, trading that album's big studio sound for immediacy, single takes and songs born out of loose jam sessions. Kiwanuka also self-produced FUDGE, a departure from his regular super-producer collaborators Danger Mouse and Inflo.
Many songs stretch out into five, six and seven minute territory, beginning gently and ending forcefully, windows into Kiwanuka's life and creative process that are made all the more intimate by the recent news of the British singer-songwriter's health struggles.
The album was originally slated for release in 2025, but was held back after he suffered a life-threatening haemorrhagic stroke at only 38 years old. After emergency surgery and many months in a hospital the singer is now in a rehabilitation center and unable to return home.
A return to performing, and recording, is far off if it will ever happen, making the choice to record an album so intensely himself prior to the stroke, all the more moving.
Somewhere between the folk-soul of Terry Callier and spacious psychedelics of Charles Stepney and Rotary Connection, FUDGE is uniquely Michael Kiwanuka. On the laziest of sunny Sunday mornings or beside a crackling fire on a chilly winter night, this is an album to get lost in. -MK
Linda Sikhakhane - L I N D A
The latest torchbearer in a long line of South African jazz greats like Hugh Masakela, Miriam Mekaba, Abdullah Ibrahim, his mentor Nduduzo Makhathini and many more, Sikhakhane is a saxophonist releasing his fifth album and second on Blue Note.
"Uzalo," with help from his trumpeter brother Thabo, is one of those instant earworm jazz melodies, "Indlela" is all about the Coltrane inspired sax,"Izibusiso" has breathtaking vocals from Ovuyonke, but the album's centerpiece is "Ilanga," a rap/spoken word jazz movement that pairs Sikhakhane's sax with a fiery verse from rapper Zuluboy. -MK
Singles
Elsa Krantz - "Exit Signs (ft. Madi Phyle & Ricky Francois)"
This is the first single from Duluth singer-songwriter Elsa Krantz's upcoming debut album, Deluxe Edition, due out Nov. 19, 2026. Krantz has been building a following with her solo shows and as a member of the trio Cigarette Picnic, and her bandmates from that group join her on this strolling country-rock tune alongside members of Saltydog, Feeding Leroy and Boss Mama & the Jebberhooch. The who's who of the Duluth scene don't steal the spotlight from the vocalist, whose steady voice and assured songwriting make her one to watch in Minnesota music. -MK
Nabihah Iqbal - "Heaven Can Wait"
Iqbal is a DJ and tastemaker who releases '80s inspired guitar rock under her own name. Her latest release draws from new wave, dream-pop and Flying Nun Records indie. It's an ode to all the joys and mysteries of life that make you want to keep going. Let's have some fun while we here, because "Heaven Can Wait." -MK
Two Runner - "Punk Rock Bar"
Paige Anderson, aka Two Runner, has been a traveling musician in her family's bluegrass band since the age of nine. She brings chops and a been-around-the-block feel to this boppy little love song. As she sings "I still turn when you look at me / Oh, the nerves show right through my teeth / And I’ve wanted you for eternity," we also feel the anxious excitement of the early days of love. Anderson is an excellent banjo player, and this up tempo heel stomper will get you swinging your partner round and round. -DG
Grey DeLisle & Les Greene - "Mister"
Both of these fantastic singers have voices that might be known to the broader public as the voice of Little Richard in Baz Luhrmann's Elvis (Greene) or the voice of Daphne in the Scooby-Doo franchise since 2000 (DeLisle). On "Mister" they collaborate on an excellent boogie-blues-meets-gospel-type tune that carries a message of good behavior OR ELSE. DeLisle is the lead vocalist on "Mister" and her clear high-pitched singing equally carries melody, heart and zest. This tune is a go-all-night rocker! -DG
Pick From '76
Bob Marley - Rastaman Vibration
While Rastaman Vibration was Bob Marley's eighth album overall, it was only his second without the rough and tough presence of Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer, who also released big solo records in '76. This record saw Marley combine universally inclusive songs like "Positive Vibrations" with grim tales of life in Kingston's ghettos like "Johnny Was." Rastaman Vibration was the first Marley album to chart in both the US and UK Charts Top 10.
This album succeeds in finding a balance both musically and lyrically, as Marley sought to expand his popularity, renown and reputation as a fearsome live performer. For example, while Rastaman Vibration was recorded at legendary Kingston studios like Harry J's and Joe Gibbs,' it was finished, engineered and produced in Miami by bassist Aston "Family Man" Barrett and Island Records big wig, Chris Blackwell. Another addition with an eye towards modernity and popularity was the controversial inclusion of synthesizers, which had not been brought into the reggae realm just yet and naysayers saw it as a sell out move.
One of the more interesting songs on the album is "War" where we hear Marley singing the words of Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie. The words taken from a speech Selassie delivered to the Untied Nations in 1963 about the causes of oppression. Hearing Marley's powerful voice sing the words “Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another / Inferior / Is finally / And permanently / Discredited / And abandoned / Everywhere is war” will grip you with goosebumps. Bob Marley was a follower of the Rastafarian religious organization who viewed Haile Selassie as God's representative on Earth, and this song highlights the importance of Rastafarianism to reggae culture.
The contradictions of Rastaman Vibration are all over the place musically, lyrically and instrumentally, and it saw Bob Marley successfully launching himself into the stratosphere as the worldwide force that carries on to this day. -DG
