Cincinnati's Wussy play hard-boiled, shabbily tuneful indie rock about relationships and middle-age ennui that might be look-the-other-way uncomfortable, if it weren’t so suck-you-in good. Chuck Cleaver and Lisa Walker are a married couple who evoke marriage on the edge of collapse – "Your head is pounding much too hard to change your mind/And I've got time to kill without you in the way," Walker sings on "Fly Fly Fly." Their fourth album is their most compellingly dire-sounding, not as grabby as their 2005 debut, Funeral Dress, but rocking out in a frayed, mordant way that makes every stick-in-your-head chorus they share seem like a small triumph.

Listen to "Fly Fly Fly":

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• Photos: Random Notes

“Everyday People”

"Everyday People" managed to trailblaze in two different ways -- it was one of the first pop hits to deal with the subject of racial harmony, and it utilized Larry Graham's "slap" technique on the bass guitar, which would soon be copied by countless other bassists. Graham once said about his pulsating style, "I'd never done that before … that's where the freedom of creativity came in for the band, that we'd be allowed to do that." In 1978, the song's line "Different strokes for different folks" would be borrowed for the title of the hit television show Diff'rent Strokes.