The Witzard

Early on in their career, Leeds -based band alt-J were quickly heralded as "The Next Radiohead" due to their extremely well-orchestrated, thought-provoking brand of Indie/Art Rock heard across their 2012 full-length debut, An Awesome Wave . Then, Joe Newman, Thom Sonny Green & Gus Unger-Hamilton did a total 180° and more or less, alienated nearly half of their new-found fans—à la: Beastie Boys' 1987 single "(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Party!)" debacle—by releasing tongue-in-cheek über- "American" single, "Left Hand Free" from 2014's This Is All Yours ... but, unsurprisingly, "the least alt-J song ever" pretty much back-fired because no one got it, including the label, and the song rapidly became, quite arguably, one of their biggest smash-hits to date. Last summer, alt-J suddenly returned this their third album (technically, an EP) RELAXER , which in the months since, has become my personal favorite release...

When he's not busy making TOTALLY spaced out Prog Rock with My Morning Jacket , melding together some Neo-Soul sounds with Monsters of Folk , covering classic George Harrison tunes, or gettin' Funky with The Roots and Erykah Badu ... Jim James has been quietly fine-tuning a loose concept album called Regions of Light and Sound of God . James essentially based the album around a 1929 woodcut book titled Gods' Man , which he managed to morph into a "hazy dream that a fully-realized android or humanoid capable of thought might have when it reminisces about the good ol' days of just being a simple robot." Once he's done touring behind Regions, Jim James plans to re-group with his fellow My Morning Jacket bandmates in April or May to start work[ing] on their upcoming seventh studio album. Jim James self-produced the bulk of his solo record and played nearly every instrument on it; Effortlessly sprinkling in bits of Americana , Jazz-Funk, Disco ,...