When Sharon Van Etten sings, "You're the reason why I'll move to the city or why I'll need to leave," you want to gas up the car and help her pack. Her last album, Epic, was a downer-folk gem; here, she and her double- tracked voice sound bigger, thanks partly to help from dudes in Beirut and the National. Tramp plays like a female version of Beck's Sea Change, setting spacey guitar hum, tidal rhythms and pass-the-Xanax melodies against lyrics about silent love and bad timing. "Serpents" rotates on a two-chord vamp and then pumps up the anger, and "Leonard" waltzes around the room, unsure whether to give over to desire or walk away whole. Your soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend will have this on blast.

Listen to "Serpents":   
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• Photos: Random Notes

“Ambling Alp”

The "Ambling Alp" was the nickname of the six-and-a-half-foot-tall Primo Carnera. Though the song is named after the Italian-born 1930s heavyweight champion, Yeasayer are actually paying tribute to boxing legend Joe Louis with this first-person psychedelic dance-rock tune. “I was always interested in writing a song that had boxing mythology in it,” Yeasayer’s Chris Keating said. “It’s pretty fascinating: There were so many amazing characters, and it was so closely entwined with 20th century history.” Yeaseyer also invokes German champ Max Schmeling and hints at the historical significance placed on the historic bouts between the Nazi-era boxer and the African-American Louis.