CX Kidtronik

Krak Attack

Sound Ink

Crack is a plague on our streets, in our schools and sometimes even at home. But CX Kidtronix, who usually DJs for Saul Williams and whom you may have seen jumping around in bunny ears while opening for NIN a few months ago at Ford Center, isn't talking about the crack you smoke. He's talking about the pervasive crack element commonly found escaping from the backside of girls' jeans. Actually, he's not talking at all, but rather providing some of the grimiest tracks this side of Alec Empire for guest rappers like MF Grimm, Kong, Dr. Mad Vibe and other underground rappers to rhyme over. Straight grimey. If Oscar the Grouch rolled with a crew and produced beats, then it might sound something like this. It's dir-tay. The production is raw and punky, and the album's 32 tracks clock in at just over an hour. There's some pretty funny skits, too, that sample from drug awareness videos and anti-crack public service announcements to promote CX's fight against (or for?) "krak." The album dropped May 9.

-- Josh McBee

Dangerdoom

Occult Hymns

Adult Swim

DJ Danger Mouse and villainous rapper MF Doom return for a follow-up EP to 2005's "The Mouse and the Mask." Much like that debut, "Occult Hymns" features the duo alongside a cast of characters from Adult Swim, the Cartoon Network's programming block for mature audiences. Seven tracks include skits, remixes and new songs. Appearances from "Squidbillies" characters and Madlib's remix of "Space Ho's," which sounds like a '70s Brit-com theme, mark the EP's highlights. It's all very funky, though, and Doom's unpredictable lyrical flow is great for remixes because things that were unintelligible the first time around become more legible over a new musical bed. The best part of the whole thing is it's all free, including album art, for legal download exclusively from Adult Swim's Web site: adultswim.com. Some have complained about the quality of the mp3 files being 64 Kbps, but my iTunes labels them 128 Kbps and they sound great. The EP has been available online since May and will be up for a supposedly limited time.

-- JM

Trent Tomlinson

Country is My Rock

Lyric Street Records

Trent Tomlinson may be Missouri's answer to Merle Haggard. His songs are mostly about drinking and the attendant truth or consequences. Loving mama and daddy is right up there, too. Women mean trouble: "It's angels like her/that send guys like me straight to hell," and "No more drinkin'/no more sinnin'/no more kissin' bow-legged women." Tomlinson's radio single, "Drunker Than Me," chastises a main squeeze who's gone from being a one-wine cheap date to a hefty bar tab lush. "I never thought it'd come to this when I said have another/cause baby you've turned into me/and I became my mother." If you can ignore Tomlinson's misogynistic streak (outlaw country receives no get-out-of-jail-free card on this count) and over-production on saccharine songs such as "A Good Run," this album is fun as drinking clear corn at the Cleveland County Fair. The music is all Nashville bad-ass guitar band and could just as easily been titled "Rock is My Country." The album dropped March 7.

-- Doug Hill

Zero 7

The Garden

Atlantic/Wea

There's something remarkably refreshing about the effortless manner in which Zero 7 rides upon the gentle currents that course through its third studio effort, "The Garden." Although the group (Henry Binns and Sam Hardaker, a pair of veteran record producers from the U.K.) still envelopes its ambient pop within an array of R--B-derived textures, it fundamentally has altered its sonic palette by more fully embracing the breezy, '60s-meets-'70s craftsmanship that long had been buried beneath the surface of its work. The opening "Futures," which also is the first of four wildly successful collaborations with Swedish songwriter Jose Gonzalez to grace the project, essentially crosses Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, and Crosby, Stills and Nash. The subsequent "Throw It All Away" scatters Bacharach-ian horns around the flirtatious purr of returning vocalist Sia Furler. "The Garden" is immediately intoxicating, but also that its beautiful magic repeatedly beckons the listener back for another round. The album dropped June 6.

-- John Metzger