New Recordings

Babel

(Glassnote **1/2)

nolead ends "I'm a cad, but I'm not a fraud," Marcus Mumford exclaims - the London folk foursome's lead singer is always exclaiming - on "Whispers in the Dark," the second of many shouted-out manic strummers on his band's follow-up to 2009's multiplatinum debut, Sigh No More. Mumford doth protest too much: Nobody's accusing the scruffy urban folkies of being the slightest bit inauthentic. The trouble isn't that they don't lay their hearts on the line; it's that they do, each and every time, with glasses raised, banjos plucked, and sweat on their brows. The band's sudden shifts from loud to soft to loud again worked for Nirvana and served them well on Sigh No More hits like "Little Lion Man," but it grows aggravating over the course of a full album, like the cacophony of voices emanating from the titular tower. Best consumed in small doses.

- Dan DeLuca

nolead begins No Doubt
nolead ends nolead begins Push and Shove
nolead ends nolead begins (Interscope ***1/2)

nolead ends With Gwen Stefani's solo excursions as an electro-hop diva behind her, the "Hollaback Girl" and the rude-boy ska guys she came in with commence their album-making career. Push and Shove comes 11 full years after Rock Steady. With the exception of the skank-ing "Sparkle," this isn't nearly the intimate dancehall-pop quartet from Anaheim that started its ragamuffin life in the late '80s. No Doubt now updates the rhythmic surge of Rock Steady while finding a new (wave) way of reminiscing.

With Stefani, 42, still in baby-doll vocal mode, it's the raging sounds around her that add dramatic sizzle and thrust. The affirmations of "Settle Down" are surrounded by a Santigold-ish arrangement,

a Caribbean-inspired groove that's jerky yet gentle. Push and Shove's title track (featuring Diplo's Major Lazer) is a loudly buzzing percussive workout with twists to keep the nu-rave kids intrigued.

Stefani sounds better at being an EDM soccer mom than Madonna. She doesn't pummel you with wannabe hipster clucking. Stefani just saunters through the computer world without a care. Add to this a rediscovered love of the New Wave moment they stemmed from (like the John Hughes-anthemic "Dreaming the Same Dream"), and this quartet casts no doubts at all.

- A.D. Amorosi

nolead begins Van Morrison
nolead ends nolead begins Born to Sing: No Plan B
nolead ends nolead begins (Blue Note ***)

nolead ends Van Morrison is cranky. On Born to Sing: No Plan B, he's upset with capitalism, worship of money, the abuses of the "global elite," the sound of "some kind of phony pseudo-jazz" (which raises the question What is real pseudo-jazz?), and the pettiness of others (he endorses Sartre's statement that "hell is other people"). Although throughout his career he has used songs to rail against record-company abuses, his 35th solo album contains his most overtly political work. His lifelong spiritual quest continues in songs such as "Mystic of the East," but he's more concerned with voicing his disillusionment with the secular world.

Morrison has few peers for longevity and continued vitality - perhaps only Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and Paul Simon - and he's mastered a consistent, comfortable, and appealing style that melds blues, R&B, and jazz, often based on piano and his own alto saxophone. And he's still a peerless singer, locking into phrases and nursing varying meanings through repetition, scatting happily and crooning soulfully, even when he's venting.

- Steve Klinge

nolead begins Brother Ali
nolead ends nolead begins Mourning in America
and Dreaming in Color
nolead ends nolead begins (Rhymesayers ***1/2)

nolead ends On his best album since his ferocious 2003 debut, Minneapolis rapper Brother Ali makes like the world's warmest anachronism, parading "beautiful ideals and amazing flaws" on the opener (featuring Dr. Cornel West!) and elsewhere stating his credo for life: "Low expectations/ High standards." Only human, he continues poking fun at anyone interested in the factoid that his albinism makes him legally blind ("Stop the Press") and lists everyday grievances like having no time to keep up with politics ("Work Everyday") over gorgeous funk samples that include, on the musical highlight "Only Life I Know," James Brown-esque horns. If only Lupe Fiasco's simultaneously released America record could harness the cutting simplicity of proclamations such as "I want to make this country what it says it is"!

- Dan Weiss

A More Perfect Union

(Appleseed ***1/2)

nolead ends nolead begins Pete Seeger
nolead ends nolead begins Pete Remembers Woody
nolead ends nolead begins (Appleseed ***)

nolead ends Like the Hudson River he was instrumental in cleaning up, Pete Seeger at 93 just keeps rolling along, a constant presence. For Lorre Wyatt, however, this album marks the return

of a voice that had been silenced. The folksinger, 67, suffered a stroke in 1996 and underwent 15 years of treatment and therapy.

As the subtitle of A More Perfect Union puts it, the album consists of "New songs by old friends," and Seeger and Wyatt reveal

an easy rapport and still-vibrant creativity. Musically, it's a richly varied set, with tracks ranging from just vocals and percussion and vocals and banjo up to full-band arrangements with choirs of singers.

It's the same musically: There are uplifting sing-alongs, such as "God's Counting on Me . . . God's Counting on You," with guest vocalist Bruce Springsteen, and a reprise of Wyatt's "Somos El Barco/"We Are the Boat," with Emmylou Harris; a poignant Katrina lament in "Memories Out of Mud," with Dar Williams; the antiwar protest of "This Old Man Revisited," with Williams and Steve Earle; and the reflective title song, with Tom Morello.

Seeger and Wyatt also poke some fun at their earnestness and age, with "Howling for My Supper" and the bluesy "Old Apples," which contains the telling line: "I guess old apples still can make good sauce."

Pete Remembers Woody is two CDs of stories told by Seeger, interspersed with performances of Woody Guthrie songs by Seeger and Arlo Guthrie, Work o' the Weavers, and others. Seeger's recollections provide illuminating context for some of Guthrie's best-known works, while also documenting his relationship with his fellow folk giant.

- Nick Cristiano

Alone Together:
With Bobby Rose

(HighNote ****)

nolead ends Talk about home cooking.

Legendary guitarist Pat Martino personally recorded these eight tunes with another guitarist from South Philly, Bobby Rose, in 1977 and 1978. The timing is important because Martino was already experiencing headaches and would suffer a brain aneurysm in 1980, erasing his memory and ability to play.

Martino, who has since rebounded to robust form, reaches some unbelievable heights on this spare duet session. With Rose's energetic comping, Martino seems dialed in to create cosmic climaxes. His lines sear the soul, even on tunes that just reek of the period, such as "Sunny," which Martino had previously recorded.

Both men were absorbed in the I-Ching and the Quran at the time, and the playing shows both a simplicity and a force that is pretty mesmerizing. Martino's "Israfel" is just a straight sprint to the top of the mountain.

- Karl Stark

Budapest Festival Orchestra, Ivan Fischer conducting.

(Channel Classics ***1/2)

nolead ends nolead begins Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Marin Alsop conducting.
nolead ends nolead begins (Naxos ***)

nolead ends nolead begins Southwest German Radio Orchestra, Baden Baden, Francois-Xavier Roth conducting.
nolead ends nolead begins (Hanssler Classics ****)

nolead ends Yes, more Mahler, with the best of it coming from the least-known party, the Baden Baden orchestra under Francois-Xavier Roth, who has a growing reputation in Europe, often performing works by Stravinsky on original instruments. This Mahler 1st isn't one such performance, but shows how much musicians from this camp can reinvigorate standard repertoire. Everything has an extra sparkle, sharpness, and sense of discovery that's particularly appropriate to Mahler's first outing in the genre he would transform. It's well recorded with world-class playing.

The others have their place. The Ivan Fischer recording is a deluxe, super-audio package, played with refined solidity in an interpretation that's thoroughly examined, deeply considered, and just a tad bland.

The Baltimore recording is a calling card: Though the engineering doesn't flatter the orchestra's string section, Marin Alsop leads a particularly good second movement that's daringly deliberate, but (unlike Gustavo Dudamel's similar approach) finds relevant, seldom-heard details. Elsewhere, it's a perfectly fine if not-so-original performance showing that good things continue to happen in Baltimore.

- David Patrick Stearns