Gordon Lightfoot Book, Music and More!

Halifax heroes Wintersleep keep venturing deeper into alt-rock space. On its third album, the band jettisons its Pearl Jam affectations for more experimental sonic explorations. Although there’s a bit too much R.E.M. influence in the rollicking “Astronaut,” ambitious songs like “Dead letter & the infinite yes” and “Miasmal smoke & the yellow bellied freaks” are strikingly original. And “Oblivion,” with its talk of light rays and cosmic dust, is an infectious anthem about humanity’s dubious role in the universe.

Now that he’s fulfilled his dream of becoming Jim Morrison, performing in The Doors tribute band Riders on the Storm, singer Ian Astbury is back to doing what he does best: rawking out with Cult axeman Billy Duffy. The reunited goth-rock band’s eighth album is chock full of gutbucket vocals and monster riffs on tracks like “I Assassin” and “Dirty Little Rockstar,” which depicts backstage excesses in Spinal Tap fashion. And Astbury delivers some Morrison-style mysticism with the solemnly pretentious “Holy Mountain.”

There’s nothing serene about the sophomore album from Milton, Ont.’s young art-rock sextet. Although the band, which shares a record label with Broken Social Scene, favors dreamy, atmospheric soundscapes, there’s a disquieting, David Lynch-like undercurrent running through much of its work. Songs like the mellifluous “Present of Future End” and the cascading “Sherry and her Butterfly Net,” highlighted by the sweet harmonies of Adrian Jewett and Emma Ditchburn, lull listeners into a dark, distinctly dystopian world.