(Troubleman Unlimited)
***

Now that everyone from !!! to the Rapture takes cues from the mutant disco days of early '80s NYC, how's a band with propulsive, punk-funk party jams supposed to distinguish itself? If you're Tussle, four San Franciscans with dub on their brains and disco in their blood, you simply record an instrumental album so ridiculously danceable that it has everyone too busy cutting rugs to give a rat's ass about the predictable comparisons to ESG and Liquid Liquid. On their first full-length, Kling Klang, the band one-ups its dime-a-dozen contemporaries with snaking bass lines, dueling drum kits, and electronic bric-a-brac, making for warm, insistent grooves like "Here It Comes" and "Fire Is Hot" that rarely lose momentum (though a few could benefit from torch-laden female vocals) as they set a course to unleash every last hipster's inner dancing queen. In other words, Tussle gonna make you sweat. JIMMY DRAPER

DIZZEE RASCAL

Showtime

(XL)

***1/2
How do you follow up a debut album (2003's Boy in da Corner, that won Britain's Mercury Music Prize) when you're 19, and everybody wants a piece of you? You crank out Showtime, an aurally audacious rejiggering of electro and hiphop with rampant gangsta braggadocio ("I'll give you the loveliest beating you ever had"), bitter jabs at haters, and pathological demands for respect. Bucking tremendous pressure, East London MC/producer Dizzee Rascal not only avoids a sophomore slump on Showtime, he surpasses his fantastic first full-length, especially sonically. Showtime's 15 tracks sound much more defined and punchy, busting out of the grime ghetto with inventive, Pro-Tooled stabs at rhythm and texture. Diz' production style is all about extremes, stressing warped bass dirges, mock-East Asian percussion, and bleepy video-game tones. Showtime's more accessible than Boy, but Diz seems destined to become a Wu-Tang Clan-like figure in America who straddles underground and overground realms, passionately loved by his fan base and baffling to others. DAVE SEGAL

BJÖRK

Medúlla

(Elektra/Asylum)

**1/2
Everyone's favorite eccentric Icelandic whatever-you-do-don't-call-her-a-friggin'-chanteuse delivers some of her most chilling, interesting sounds yet on Medúlla. You probably know by now that, save for a spare piano, the record's composed entirely of layered vocals--some sounds have been heavily processed, but most haven't, and the level of artistry throughout is pretty staggering. The best songs are the simplest, like the creepy hymn "Vokuró," or "Oll Birtan," which brings to mind the Animal Collective covering a Moondog tune. There are no human beatboxes or native Icelandic choruses on "Birtan"; it's slowly building, fucked-up, intense, and powered simply by the beauty of Björk's alien-register vocals. Björk is hyper-knowledgable about many styles of music, and she's able to mix and match at will. This is not always a good thing, though. We also discover, for instance, that pairing a big choir with Biz Markie sounds like shit. MIKE McGONIGAL

SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE

The Manifestation

(Strange Attractors Audio House)

****
The Manifestation is Six Organs of Admittance's (Bay Area six-string sorcerer Ben Chasny) sincere, gorgeous ode to the sun. The 22-minute title track originally came out in 2000 on limited edition, one-sided vinyl. It begins with kinetic bongos, shaken bell trees, and stoned-monk chants, conjuring the most intense scenes in Alejandro Jodorowsky's 1973 acid-trip existentialist film The Holy Mountain. Four minutes in, Chasny's acoustic guitar churns into earshot, and the music shifts onto a more terrestrial plane, but the mood remains entrancingly Eastern and shamanistic. The track alternates between soulful, swirling drones that spur microcosmic reveries and rambling Tyrannosaurus Rex-style folkadelia. On "The Six Stations," Chasny looses a stream of crystalline chords on his acoustic (accompanied by stylus-on-etched-vinyl static) that empties your mind of the world's horrors and transports you to a place of natural beauty. DAVE SEGAL

LITTLE WINGS

Magic Wand

(K)

***
Kyle Fields is one wispy, whimsical dude. He's also probably stoned quite a lot. And this is just speculation, too, but I betcha he loved The Last Unicorn when he was a kid. The result of his hippied-out, boyish dreamer brain is earthy, hicky folk music about pine trees, caves, and mountains that look like whales. Kyle's last record as Little Wings, Light Green Leaves, was sparse, warm, and felt like back-porch sunset, stress-case meltdown jams--the kind where you put your feet up on the deck railing and chill the hell out. Magic Wand is a little denser, with more piano, sighing lap steel, tangled up backup vocals, and lyrics full of great evocative mind pictures. Put this on a summertime mix-tape with M. Ward, Jolie Holland, and Neil Young, and you'll be golden. ADAM GNADE

**** SpaghettiOs *** Twistaroni ** Pepperoni Pizza-zaroli * Beef-A-Roni