Music

Peter Gabriel's new video, for his song "The Veil," pays tribute to former CIA employee and whistleblower Edward Snowden. The video features footage from military training exercises, real-life combat images and surveillance tapes, mixed in among scenes from director Oliver Stone's new biopic Snowden. Snowden himself also makes a surprise appearance in Gabriel's video.

Since Angel Olsen's first album in 2010, she's carved out a smoky, country-flavored corner of the indie rock world for herself. Her distinctive voice delivers taut meditations on love and loneliness, sometimes with a shout and other times with more of a whisper. Her music earned her critical acclaim, but also a reputation as a tortured soul — one she wasn't really looking for.

Lucy Dacus needs another suitcase.

The gang's finally back together! And by gang we mean hosts Bob Boilen and Robin Hilton, who find themselves in the studio together for the first time in a month. With the summer break finally over, the two return with this week's essential mix, from both veteran artists and new discoveries.

Don't Google Sex Stains unless you add some keywords: Allison Wolfe, '90s riot grrrl, Bratmobile. Formed in L.A. a couple years ago with Wolfe and choreographer Mecca Vazie Andrews, plus former and current members of Warpaint and Prettiest Eyes, Sex Stains just released its self-titled debut. This is hilarious, raunchy, sneering feminist punk rock to inspire spastic dancing — and everyone else can just piss off.

It's tempting to assign personal signifiers to music once we acquire it and make it our own, and thus it remains an attractive goal of making music to create something that can hold all of that meaning. This is well-worn territory for Marching Church leader Elias Bender Rønnenfelt, whose other notable musical outlet, the punk band Iceage, issued its debut into a storm of social media hype and sideways questioning — a lot for a group of 18-year-olds to weather, and a proposition that bands of their kind from generations before did not need to endure.

There's a new album from Phish coming on Oct. 7, the band's 13th, titled Big Boat, and this news is always met with some conflicted opinions from fans. Throughout an impressive career that now spans 30 years (including a couple hiatuses -> breakups -> reunions along the way), Phish is still known best for its epic live performances rather than its albums. For at least a portion of the diehard concert-collecting fanbase, new songs are more of a refined framework for the lengthy improvisations to come.

Every so often, you run across a collection that opens up an entirely new way to think about an artist. Jack White's new, 26-track retrospective, which focuses on his unplugged, less raucous songs, does just that. The unreleased songs, album tracks and B-sides that make up Jack White Acoustic Recordings, 1998-2016 offer a fresh window onto the work of the creative, prolific rock musician.

Middle Kids, a three-piece band from Sydney, Australia, is just starting out — but, as you'll hear from its first two singles, it's already come quite a long way. Lead singer Hannah Joy's voice has the emotional range to carry these fine, accomplished songs. Listen in the player above and get in on the ground floor with Middle Kids before the band releases its first EP later this fall.