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New Music Friday: The best albums out April 11

Bon Iver lightens up on his new album, SABLE, fABLE.
Graham Tolbert
/
Jagjaguwar
Bon Iver lightens up on his new album, SABLE, fABLE.

It's Friday, and that means dozens of new albums magically appeared on your favorite streaming service at the stroke of midnight — including the return of Bon Iver. SABLE, fABLE is the band's first album in almost six years and finds Justin Vernon in a markedly less dour mood.

NPR Music's Stephen Thompson welcomed fellow Wisconsinite Erin Wolf of Milwaukee public radio station 88Nine to discuss the new Bon Iver album, as well as a handful of other new releases worthy of your attention.

New Music Friday is a feature of NPR's All Songs Considered podcast. Subscribe on the NPR App, Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.


The Starting 5

  • Bon Iver, SABLE, fABLE (Stream)
  • Valerie June, Owls, Omens, and Oracles (Stream)
  • Gerald Clayton, Ones & Twos (Stream)
  • Real Lies, We Will Annihilate Our Enemies (Stream the singles)
  • Kills Birds, Crave EP (Stream)

The Lightning Round

  • Turnpike Troubadours, The Price of Admission
  • Daughter of Swords, Alex
  • Jadu Heart, Post Heaven
  • Casper Skulls, Kit-Cat
  • Nell Smith, Anxious

The Long List

Rock/Alt/Indie

  • Air & Vegyn, Blue Moon Safari
  • Bedridden, Moths Strapped To Eachother's Backs
  • Cassia, everyone, outside
  • Clutter, Loves You EP
  • Cold Specks, Light for the Midnight
  • Dead Pioneers, Po$t American
  • Eyedress, Stoner
  • fantasy of a broken heart, Chaos Practitioner EP
  • Grandmas House, Anything for You
  • HONEYMOAN, Pink Hell
  • Idle Heirs, Life is Violence
  • Johanna Warren, The Night of the Wind
  • Joni, Things I Left Behind
  • key vs. locket, i felt like a sketch
  • Magnolia Park, Vamp
  • Mamalarky, Hex Key
  • OK GO, And the Adjacent Possible
  • Painting, Snapshot of Pure Attention
  • Public Body, Finger Food
  • Spin Doctors, Face Full of Cake
  • Tapeworms, Grand Voyage
  • Tara Nome Doyle, Ekko
  • Teen Mortgage, Devil Ultrasonic Dream
  • The Album Leaf, ROTATIONS
  • The Mars Volta, Lucro Sucio; Los Ojos Del Vacio
  • The Wrecks, Inside EP

Country/Folk/Americana

  • Billy Strings & Bryan Sutton, Live at the Legion
  • Jon Pardi, Honkytonk Hollywood
  • Kolby Cooper, Love You, Goodnight
  • Muscadine Bloodline, ...And What Was Left Behind
  • Trousdale, Growing Pains

Rap/Hip-Hop

  • Berner, Carbon EP
  • Deem Spencer, yung EP
  • Ken Carson, More Chaos
  • LaRussell, MAKE HIP-HOP FUN AGAIN!
  • RXKNephew, Slither Not Slime
  • V/A, Gangster Music Vol. 3

R&B/Soul

  • Galactic and Irma Thomas, Audience With the Queen
  • ADJA, Golden Retrieve Her

Global

  • Charif Megarbane, Hawalat
  • FloyyMenor, YTSQS
  • HHY & The Kampala Unit, Turbo Meltdown
  • Kuunatic, Wheels of Omon
  • Kwashibu Area Band, Love Warrior's Anthem
  • Salif Keïta, So Kono
  • Savina Yannatou, Watersong

Electronic/Out There

  • Briain, Cognitive Dissonance
  • Carlita, fabric presents Carlita
  • Guilherme Granado Goat Unity, Ghost Parades
  • isolee, Chopstick! EP
  • James Bright, Imaginal
  • Konalgad, Club Dream
  • Larum, The Music of Hildegard von Bingen Part Two
  • Lullahush, Ithaca
  • Martinou, Linked EP
  • Olivia Font, Invictam
  • Riccardo La Foresta, ZERO,999…
  • Röyksopp, True Electric
  • set dressing, i can't be alone tonite EP

Classical

  • Kyiv Virtuosi, Alexey Shor: Composer's Notebook, Vol. 3
  • Leif Ove Andsnes, Liszt: Via Crucis & Solo Piano Works
  • Nicola Benedetti, Beethoven: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 61

Jazz

  • Ingrid Laubrock, Purposing the Air
  • Poppy Daniels, Keep On Going

Credits

  • Host: Stephen Thompson
  • Guest: Erin Wolf, Radio Milwaukee's 88Nine
  • Producer: Simon Rentner
  • Editor: Otis Hart
  • Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
  • Vice President, Music and Visuals: Keith Jenkins

Copyright 2025 NPR

Stephen Thompson
Stephen Thompson is a host, writer and reviewer for NPR Music, where he speaks into any microphone that will have him and appears as a frequent panelist and guest host on All Songs Considered. Thompson also co-hosts the daily NPR roundtable podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour, which he created with NPR's Linda Holmes in 2010. In 2008, he and Bob Boilen created the NPR Music video series Tiny Desk concerts, in which musicians perform at Boilen's desk. (To be more specific, Thompson had the idea, which took seconds, while Boilen created the series, which took years. Thompson will insist upon equal billing until the day he dies.)
88Nine Music Director / On-Air Talent | Radio Milwaukee