Photo: Kopaloff/FilmMagic
Leading the charge of new releases this week are the Jonas Brothers, who have improved upon last year’s A Little Bit Longer with Lines, Vines and Trying Times, their kickiest and catchiest CD yet. As Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield writes in his three-star review, “They write their own tunes, showing off the tricks they learned from their Stevie Wonder and Neil Diamond albums, trying U2-style rock, country and Eighties hair metal.” The JoBros hit a weird moment on a collaboration with Common on “Don’t Charge Me With the Crime,” a gangster-rap tale featuring machine guns and police sirens.

Danger Mouse and Sparklehouse have also released a blank CD today titled Dark Night of the Soul. Why the blank disc? The release is in danger of a lawsuit from EMI, so the Gnarls Barkley producer and U.K. band are still selling their package — which includes artwork by David Lynch — with a little nudge to locate the album where it is currently residing: on the Internet. The record features Wayne Coyne, the Shins’ James Mercer, the Strokes’ Julien Casablancas and many more special guests. “It’s engrossing and organic in a way other all-star drive-by projects rarely are,” Jon Dolan writes in his three-and-a-half star review.

Another highlight on shelves is Major Lazer’s dub-and-dancehall party album Gunz Dont Kill People, Lazers Do, a collaboration between producers Diplo and Switch under the guise of a renegade Jamaican general named Major Lazer who fights vampires and zombies. If the plot line sounds like the duo are having fun, the music proves it, with guests like Santigold, Amanda Blank and many of dancehall’s finest all lending vox along the way. “The biggest fun is hearing Diplo and Switch go off the leash, mixing surf guitar and horse whinnies, bong burbles and air horns,” Will Hermes writes in the album’s three-and-a-half star review.

Also out today:

•
Sarah Jorosz – Song Up In Her Head