Like most songwriters, Kurt Vile claims not to know where his songs come from. But his music, at once poetically aloof and acutely relatable, begs an explanation like little has in years.
Sounding almost post-apocalyptic in its scabrous, searching bleakness, The Flaming Lips’ The Terror moans and scrapes ominously from its opening seconds onward. But the album still finds a way to reward deeper exploration, as cracked loveliness seeps into moments that soar tentatively.
