I’ve suddenly become obsessed with this song. Own it here.

For decades now, Merle Haggard has been pining away for the past. He sang “Are The Good Times Really Over?” in 1981, and years before that, he was celebrating places where squares could still have a ball. In 2010, he’s still pining. I Am What I Am, released two weeks after his 73rd birthday and 17 months after he had part of a cancerous lung taken out, opens with him reminiscing on news he’s seen come and go. He remembers Neil Armstrong walking on the moon; four songs later, backed by a trumpet, he intentionally confuses Neil with Louis. The album’s got plenty of jazz — in “Live and Love Always,” a Western Swing duet with his wife Theresa, Merle bends notes right along with the slide trombone. Two songs talk about couples recharging batteries after kids are grown. In “We’re Falling In Love Again,” Hag’s singing gets creaky and, well, haggard, appropriately emphasizing his age.

Mostly, though, it’s amazing how much beauty is left in his voice, when so many singers 40 years younger have already forfeited theirs. This is, at very least, the solidest album he’s made since his politics seemed to shift left on 2003′s under-acclaimed Like Never Before. There’s even a good new train track. Three of the best songs come at the end: one where he resents a home-wrecking temptress in the city; then a bilingual border waltz where “early mañana/ I’ll smoke what I wanna/ And listen to Mexican bands”; then a spare statement of purpose where Hag believes “Jesus is God/ And a pig is just ham” — just in case you’d thought he’d converted to Judaism, or outgrown his sense of humor, or something.

— Chuck Eddy

Download “How Did You Find Me Here?”

In addition to the deluge of WMG and affiliated titles on the site yesterday, I wanted to call out a few indie releases well worth your time and credits!

Vijay Iyer Trio, Historicity: Unanimously chosen as one of the best jazz records of 2009 (but, sadly, arriving on the site too late to make our poll), Iyer & co. deliver a set of smart, restless piano jazz, the most intriguing of which is a spin through MIA‘s “Galang” (!) “Smoke Stack” is another gem, giddy, restless piano lines and darting-all-over bass. Sounds great even to these untrained ears.

Laura Veirs, July Flame: Latest lovely outing from Oregon singer/songwriter Laura Veirs. This one really stuck with me: her voice reminds me of Kristen Hersh — smoky and oaky and mysterious. eMusic’s Melissa Maerz sez:

After seven albums of rootsy folk hymns carefully plucked on a nylon-string guitar, it’s about time the Portland singer-songwriter is finally getting recognized, just in time for her best album yet. Recorded in a barn, July Flame feels as organic as a Fair Trade coffee bean, with banjo, piano and guitar wicking together a woodsy, fresh-air sound. These are naked love songs, though they’re less boy-meets-girl than girl-falls-hard-for-the-world stories. Exulting in tiny moments of beauty, Veirs celebrates the firecracker-orange of a summer peach (“July Flame”), the rustle of snakes in the grass (“I Can See Your Tracks”), the sight of sap that drips like “blood trapped inside the maple tree / the sunlight trapped inside the wood” (“Make Something Good”).

Owen Pallett, Heartland: He used to be Final Fantasy, now he’s just Owen, but that hasn’t changed the nervous sprawl of his music one iota. Heartland features Pallett’s usual intricate orchestration in the support of prim and stately pop songs. Rich in little details, Pallett comes through with another weird winner.

Billy Bragg Reissues: In addition to Bragg’s Anti- record, Mr. Love & Justice, we’ve also got Billy’s whole back catalaog remastered and reissued with bonus tracks. Bragg is a songwriter without equal, and this is the perfect opportunity to explore his stubborn, singular work.

Cold War Kids, Cold War Kids at Fingerprints: Short, live EP from indie faves CWK.

Mike Hale & Mike Reed, s/t: I don’t know anything about this pair of Mikes, but this single is rustic and rich — fans of acoustic folk and country would be well advised to invest a pair of downloads in this one.

Anything else we missed?

The Avett Brothers have a new record out, the Rick Rubin-produced I And Love and You. And while we aren’t currently offering that record on eMusic, we thought we’d provide the next best thing. Starting today, in the U.S., all Avett Brothers catalog titles are on sale. You read it right! You can go here for a handy hub to introduce you to the Brothers. From there, you’ll notice that all Avett Brothers full-lengths are now 6 Credits, while the EPs come in at just 4 Credits. Ladies and Gentlemen, meet your new favorite band.

So… any good new releases today?

Obviously, today is Sony day, which sees a slew of popular — and not-so-popular — titles hit the site. There is a kind of giddy rush that comes from seeing, say, Bitches Brew or the first Stone Roses record turn up, and I’m already figuring my personal Save for Later list is going to grow exponentially in the days to come.

I don’t want to dwell too long on specific titles. Instead, I thought I’d point out a few of the broader features we assigned as a part of this label rollout.

Our coverage of the Sony catalog breaks out a couple of different ways. First, there’s our Six Degrees series, which explores the often unlikely connections between popular records and indie favorites.

The first batch of eMusic Six Degrees includes:

The Clash, London Calling
Sly & the Family Stone, There’s a Riot Goin’ On
Bruce Springsteen, Nebraska
Glenn Gould, The Goldberg Variations
Arcade Fire, Funeral
Carole King, Tapestry
Jeff Buckley, Grace
Miles Davis, Nefertiti
Kings of Leon, Aha Shake Heartbreak
Dolly Parton, Coat of Many Colors
Spoon, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Nas, Illmatic
Panda Bear, Person Pitch
Michael Jackson, Off the Wall

We’ve also launched a series called eMusic Icons — guided, curated discographies of musical giants. On this tip, I have to make special mention of Douglas Wolk’s exhaustive, unblinking look at the career of Bob Dylan. Douglas reviewed every Bob Dylan album — the good, the bad and the embarrassing — and broke the catalog out into a guide sure to be valuable to Dylan newcomers and long-timers alike.

Kevin Whitehead gives similar insight to the Miles Davis catalog — records I, for one, have long wanted to check out but have been stymied on where to start. In the coming weeks, you’ll be seeing Icon hubs from longtime favorites like Pavement and the Pixies. Our Icon series right now is as follows:

Bob Dylan
The Clash
Miles Davis
Leonard Cohen
Leonard Bernstein
A Tribe Called Quest
Bruce Springsteen
Michael Jackson
Simon & Garfunkel
Elvis Presley
Harry Nilsson

Daily “I-don’t-know-nearly-enough-about-music-or-life” confession: I’ve spent no time with the music of Willie Nelson. Apart from a dim knowledge of the “classic status” of the album Red-Headed Stranger and the vague belief that the dude MUST have written a string of unimpeachable classics in his life or I wouldn’t see him all over award shows all the damn time, I have next to no personal familiarity with the man’s music. So when I saw that Phosphorescent, whose 2007 album of drug-fogged campfire hymns Pride remains an enduring favorite of mine, was releasing an album of Willie Nelson covers, I wasn’t exactly sure what I would think.

I was TOTALLY unprepared, though, for the lonely, lingering ache of this record. Honestly, and I’m sure I’m the only one in this particular crowd who was unaware of this, but I had just NO idea that even a portion of Willie’s catalogue was this deeply melancholy. It’s an out-of-the-pores kind of sadness, of the unglamorous, nagging, and all-too-relatable variety. I know that Willie had an upbeat, goofy-cornpone side, but I was hugely and criminally ignorant that the man wrote anything as devastating as “The Last Thing I Needed (First Thing Morning).” I’m sure some of this has to do with the tremulous quaver in Matthew Houck’s open, yearning tenor, but the way he just skirts sounding piteous when he sings “then I laid down beside you/cuz I wanted your lovin/cuz your love makes my life complete,” the hint of a tremble in his voice, the abject vulnerability, is one of the most “oh-shit-I-just-caught-a-lump-in-my-throat-what-the-fuck’s-going-on” moments I’ve had with a song in awhile.

The spidery fragility of Houck’s singing voice, and the drowsy feel the band has for a pulse, does a lot to set this tone. At this point, I think Phosphorescent are hiding in plain sight for me: I reach for them time and again, almost reflexively. Music nerds are often likely to (or maybe this is just me?) name as their favorite band the one they find their thoughts most consumed by when they are not listening: taken to an extreme, this can lead to records in the critical canon that almost no one has made it through (everyone will cite a different record, but my two personal examples of this are Trout Mask Replica and Zen Arcade). By contrast, I never really find myself “thinking” about Phosphorescent: they don’t really demand to be puzzled over, just enjoyed. I just kinda love them. Anyone else love them as well?

P.S. All of his columns are of course required reading, but I particularly enjoyed Lenny Kaye’s recent take on Phosphorescent, along with other newer country-influenced acts like Laura Cantrell and Jason Isbell.

P.P.S. Here’s the record.

File under: beautiful discoveries. I don’t know a whole lot about the band Hurray for the Riff Raff. I know that they’re from New Orleans and that this is their first record. More importantly, I know that their songs are beautiful, built from broke-down banjo and centered on Alynda Lee’s gorgeous, aching voice. It’s almost like the “sister” to the Strand of Oaks record I’ve been so gung-ho on. Lee’s voice is dark and dusky — fans of She Keeps Bees, Heartless Bastards and even Cat Power will find a lot to love here.

I should also add that this dalliance with country and folk is wholly new and surprising for me. Is this what I’ve been missing, spending so much time with twee and reggae? Shame on me!

Doc and Merle Watson’s Elementary Doctor Watson, released in 1972, maintains a very deep, special hold on me, and has since I was about eight years old. Though Southbound, released six years earlier on Vanguard, is the superior album — one of the best folk revival albums ever made, in fact — Elementary is one of my father’s favorite records, and I’ve listened to it countless times with him, and over the years he has taught me many of these songs on guitar as well. He has the album memorized — guitar parts and lyrics — from start to finish. Once upon a time, I did as well.

Doc is from Deep Gap, North Carolina, pure Appalachia. I grew up about 150 miles to the north in a similar terrain, and the songs that Doc and his late son Merle play on Elementary are known by any and all pickers who have settled in those hollers. (Go visit the Galax Fiddler’s Convention if you don’t believe me. Check that: visit it, period. It’s amazing.) Doc, who is still living and performs regularly, is a deceptively smooth picker, a man who learned to play from listening to Merle Travis (Doc’s son’s namesake), and who perfected the flat-picking style in a way that makes it sound unbelievably simple. It’s as if there are no motor skills, no moving parts, just little flutters of clean sound that come from his fingers like caterpillar silk.

Merle, who died in a tractor accident about ten years after this record, was maybe even a more skilled player. Whereas Doc stays straight and true, never asserting his prowess, Merle was a good deal flashier, taking the little licks and twirls in every song, his fingers seemingly planted in the highest frets. On Elementary you can hear the father and son come together perfectly in “The Last Thing on My Mind” (for their best moment, try “Windy & Warm,” which you can find on the Vanguard Visionaries collection, which is, start to finish, incredible). Doc takes the open chord finger-picking, and Merle mirrors him in octaves, the two encircling like leaves lifted by the wind, the dance showing the full circumference of the current, the fullness of sound.

My father played “The Last Thing on My Mind” on his Hummingbird so often for years I thought that he had written it, and with lyrics like, “I could have loved you better/ I didn’t mean to be unkind/ That was the last thing on my mind,” I searched in my father’s face for deeper meaning, hopeful and pained, a kid fresh off divorce. “Summertime” evokes the same emotions. There’s no song that my father and I played more often together than this, and I’ve always loved Doc’s version more than any other (everyone else’s sounds wrong to me). Who else can sing about the catfish jumping and make it feel so true? Who else’s soft tenor, so eroded and worn by age and sadness, could make the words feel so genuine, so deeply held? For years I wanted little more than to be able to sing “Summertime” as Doc did. Maybe I still do.

There are playful moments, too: “Worried Blues” and “Freight Train Blues” and “Three Times Seven” (I adore that one). And even “Going Down the Road Feeling Bad,” with its up-tempo bluegrass jitter, betrays its lyrics with a bit of a bounce, Doc turning his back on the “bad luck all [he's] ever had,” looking up, looking forward, waiting to ditch Saul, become Paul once and for all.

Elementary Doctor Watson is the album that made me a guitar player (since shamefully abandoned), the album that brought my father and I together on so many nights, an album whose presence on eMusic today literally made me yelp with delight. It might not be an album for you, but for me, few will ever have as much meaning.

Everything from gurgling electronic music to buoyant kiddie pop hits the racks at eMusic today — here’s a spin through some of the notable titles!

Nobody Presents Blank Blue, Western Water Music Vol. II: So I’m going to frontload and hard-rep this one, because I’ve been playing it pretty solid for about a month now. Nobody is the alias of producer Elvin Estela. He’s made a bunch of eerie and vaguely psychedelic records on his own for a while now, which I’ve liked just fine, but WWMII (as I’ve decided it should be abbreviated) suckerpunched harder and longer than any of his solo work has. On this one, Nobody teams up with vocalist Niki Randa to create songs that fall fairly close to the kind of milky mood pieces perfected by the Cocteau Twins. WWMII is a concept record: something about an earthquake and the end of civilization, poisonous mushrooms and killer whirlpools (for more on that, see Hua Hsu’s eMusic review). For me, the record plays like a 45-minute dream — gauzy bands of sound, lightly rolling percussion and Randa’s spirit-like voice. It’s a record about mood, mostly, and fans of the haunting and the vaguely ominous should find much here to enjoy. It’s my pick of the week.

The Long Blondes, Couples: Not sure where to begin with this one. I loved the last LB record (as my glowing eMu review attests), but Couples is a pretty radical departure. A collaboration with dance producer Erol Alkan, Couples is a lot more dependent on synthetic rhythms, neon-like synths and twitchy guitars. It’s really not for me, I’m sad to say, but Anna, our UK Editor, is a big fan, so I’m hoping she chimes in to stick up for it.

Barneaked Ladies, Snacktime: I’m tempted to quote Kristina Feliciano’s eMusic review in full here, because I think she makes a great case for this record. This is the BNL’s first foray into children’s music and…well, I’ll let Kristina take over from there:

Though BNL are beloved by many — the band has been going strong for some 20 years — to me, they’re a little annoying. But it turns out that what seems corny in records aimed at adults is actually super-charming in the context of a kids’ disc. On Snacktime, BNL’s first foray into music making for ankle biters, the Canadian quintet combine kidly goofiness with parental teachiness — as well as their own undeniable gift for spinning winning melodies — and wind up coming across as the cleverest thing ever. Any form of children’s entertainment that activates the imagination is aces in my book, and Snacktime excels in this area… Packing 24 tracks in just under 55 minutes, Snacktime changes its tune often enough to keep young ones’ attention from drifting. How to explain the band’s name, though, is all on you.

Edith Piaf, La Vie en Rose: A great introduction to the legendary French vocalist. eMusic’s Elisabeth Vincentelli explains:

Despite the absence of “Milord” and “Non, je ne regrette rien,” this compilation makes for a good intro to Piaf, starting off with 1936’s “Les mômes de la cloche” (her first record) and “J’suis mordue,” on which the 21 year-old singer already shows the miraculous gift of empathy that makes her sound as if she’s carrying all the sorrows of the world on her shoulders. Piaf could shine in a romantic mode (“J’m’en fous pas mal,” “Les amants de Paris”) or be downright playful (“Rien de rien”), but she was at her best singing on the beautiful anguish of love or depicting fate’s cruelest twists with sad resignation. Like Judy Garland in America, Piaf was drug-addled and unlucky in love: a bottled tragedy. But what she poured out on stage was nothing less than life itself.

Matmos, Supreme Balloon: Visionary sound architects Matmos return with another collection of exquisitely cobbled-together pop. eMusic’s Michaelangelo Matos holds forth:

Drew Daniel and M.C. Schmidt, a.k.a. the electronic duo Matmos, have probably sampled your mom. Why not? They’ve sampled everything else: a cow’s uterus, shuffled cards, latex fetishwear, stepped-on rock salt and semen hitting paper, to limit it to five. [On Supreme Balloon] Daniel and Schmidt leave the concepts behind and stick entirely to analog synthesizers, inviting along a number of guests (Sun Ra vet Marshall Allen, fellow Wire-mag regular Keith Fullerton Whitman, classical pianist Sarah Cahill) and tweaking everything till it’s indubitably Matmos.

16 Horsepower, Live 2001 I used to be crazy in love for 16 Horsepower — the fire & brimstone lyrics, the thundering scorched-earth country, the unholy power of David Eugene Edwards voice. They were like Swans to me before I knew who Swans were. This live set from 2001 captures the band at the peak of their primal power. For one thing, it contains the magnificent “Clogger,” its tension and anxiety ratcheted all the way up. The other songs are just as good, though; this is gothic music for people who thought they outgrew gothic music. Not as good as the still unfuckwithable Low Estate, but still mighty mighty.

Firewater, The Golden Hour: Firewater is back with the stylistic smorgasbord that has made them so beloved. This one mixes western twang with world music for songs that are ragged and one-of-a-kind.

A pair of singles, one from Black Moth Super Rainbow, which sounds like an acid-drenched Daft Punk, and one from My Brightest Diamond, which is as light and lovely as her last record. It took me a while to come around on MBD, but there’s something about her melancholy voice and that hits my secret Tori Amos soft spot.

Impossible Shapes, 9 An all-free advance teaser for the forthcoming Impossible Shapes record. This should make fans of Bodies of Water and recent-vintage Flaming Lips very happy. Lots of upper-register singing, some gang choruses, some orchestration.

Sascha Funke, Mango: Where’s Todd when you need him? This is the kind of situation where I just write about how much I love mangoes. The fruit. Seriously, though: Funke is good enough at what he does that even dance neophytes like myself can dig his songs. Todd can elaborate on the specifics of this better than I ever could, but Mango seems to boast more of what Funke does well: low, thumping beats, slightly ominous washes of synths and songs that build and build and build instead of detonating outright. Man, that was some of the worst dance writing ever.

So to answer the question on everyone’s mind: the new Stephen Malkmus will be here. Hopefully by tomorrow. We had a slight glitch that kept it from being posted today, but all systems should be ‘go’ for tomorrow’s delivery.

In the meantime, here’s a quick roundup of some titles that did arrive today, many of which are worth investigating…

Gary Numan, Replicas Redux: Numan’s classic album gets the remastered-and-expanded treatment. Disc 2 features fine early versions of Replicas classic tracks, and they sound even weirder and more primitive than the ones that made the cut. It’s weird to me that Numan is considered by many a one-hit wonder. His music still sounds, to these ears, dark and threatening.

White Hinterland, Phylactery Factory: Some of you might already be familiar with singer/songwriter Casey Dienel. White Hinterland is Casey’s full-band project, and I’m pretty into it. It’s getting compared to people like Regina Spektor and Nelly McKay, but the word “quirky” isn’t anywhere in Dienel’s vocabulary. Phylactery, lyrically, is dark — really dark — meditations on destruction and death and decay. The music is free-wheeling piano-pop, kinda richly ornamented and deliberately constructed. I interviewed Casey for an upcoming eMusic feature and she had quite a few fascinating things to say about the songs and their inspiration. Phylactery Factory is a fine, wintry little record worthy of a spin-through.

Mount Eerie, Black Wooden Ceiling Opening: This EP finds the always-fascinating Phil Elvrum turning up the volume knob for a series of songs that are a bit louder than his usual fare.

Chatham County Line, IV: The latest from country/bluegrass outfit Chatham County Line is lovely as usual. I know Yancey is a big fan; a quick skim through this one, and I can see why.

The Hysterics, Hysterics: When I first heard that the members of the Hysterics were still in high school, I wrongly assumed this would be a record of sloppy, bratty punk rock. As usual, I am an idiot: this is a lovely collection of ’60s-styled pop — full-on jangly guitars, woozy melodies, incense, peppermints, etc etc etc. The vocalist has a startlingly clean tone, and the harmonies are outta sight. Our own Amelia Raitt is a big fan, and I second her endorsement.

Behemoth, Satanica: And speaking of loud. This is the fourth record from Polish metal band Behemoth. The record is called Satanica, which should tell you everything you need to know. It’s incredibly brutal, like all Behemoth releases, and definitely worth it for fans of the genre. Somewhat related, a piece in the Washington post on the black metal scene in Virginia

Screaming Trees, Clairvoyance: This is the first Screaming Trees record, a group that my fiancée personally reps hard for. I can see the appeal: this is brash, grimy rock & roll. The Screaming Trees seemed perennially poised to benefit from Seattle-mania in the ’90s. They didn’t, and became yet another band that was written about more than listened-to. You can help reverse that trend today.

Adam Green, “Morning After Midnight”: New single from the half of the Moldy Peaches that isn’t featured in Juno. Perhaps Diablo Cody will follow Juno with a remake of Junior, starring Jonah Hill. Should that happen, Green is ready to go.

The Black Hollies, Casting Shadows: Ex-members of Rye Coalition serve up kinda psych-y, kinda mod-y rock record. The second song is called “Paisley Pattern Ground,” which kinda sums up the sound.

Skillz, ’07 Rap Up: Every year, Detroit rapper Skillz releases a single that summarizes the year’s major events in hip-hop called, appropriately enough, the ‘Rap Up.’ His 2006 Rap Up was particularly good — you can hear it here. I’d been waiting for weeks back in January for the ’07 Rap Up to drop. It’s…not as good — though I don’t know if that’s because of Skillz or because there wasn’t a whole lot of notable hip-hop news in 2007. Inexplicably, we have two versions of this. The Digital Blink version is built around a piano part that sounds like the labyrinth music in The Legend of Zelda. The Digital Rose version is a bit clubbier. If you have an extra download this month and are a hip-hop fan, it’s worth checking out.

On that same note: there have been a number of really good hip-hop releases so far this year — making up, perhaps, for last year’s incredible dearth. Since I missed ‘em when they came out, let me take a few seconds to recommend the following:

Blu & Exile, Below the Heavens: A Kanye-esque vibe dominates this fine, fine album. Blu is the rapper, Exile is the producer; the tracks all have that great, soul-sample-based vibe: scratchy, dusky, smooth. Blu’s flow is clean and conversational and the rhymes are tight and introspective. Highly, highly recommended.

Edo G & Da Bulldogs, Life of a Kid: Edo G is a Boston rapper who released a few major-label singles in the ’90s that failed to generate a whole lot of heat. This compilation gathers up B-Sides and rarities and, guess what, it’s fantastic. I’m a sucker for that ’90s sound, and this double-disc is bursting with big boom-bap, crackling vinyl and incredibly adroit rhyming. Another highly recommended album.

Substantial, Sacrifice: I notice that there’s an also an artist called Substantial on the Holy Hip-Hop label, but a quick spin through this one makes it pretty clear that this is not the same Substantial. Substantial’s got a deep, rolling voice and the tracks fall somewhere between club and classic R&B. Solid throughout, and definitely worth investigating.

Uncut Raw, First Toke: This one was pointed out to me by a fellow eMusic employee. Super dusky, great jazz-and-soul based production (at times kinda Madlib-esque) and speedy, eager rhymes.

Also, in a few weeks we get the debut from EMC; that record, along with Nicolay & Kay’s Timeline, are in constant rotation on my iPod.