The Pietasters, "Without You"
You know, for a dude who claims to not like live albums, I sure have a lot of live albums. The Pietasters only have one good studio album, Oolooloo, but it's tremendous. I bought this album because it was the next thing they put out, and I wanted more. This live album captured them at about the same time as their studio masterpiece, and it finds the band in roughly the same form. As a result, it's probalby their second best album, which doesn't say a ton about the rest of their career.
Vince Guaraldi Trio, "Skating"
Folks of a certain age will listen to this and go "hey, that's the Charlie Brown Christmas music!" Most of the folks reading this are probably in that demographic, so: hey.
The Dillinger Escape Plan, "Unretrofied"
If you've heard any Dillinger Escape Plan (you can check the tags here for more), you're probably kind of crouching the entire time during this song, waiting for it to get bonkers. But even at the three minute mark, when it clearly shifts into the second part of the song, it still doesn't take off the way you expect. But the Dillinger Escape Plan made their career on defying expectations, so here they go again.
Fennesz, "Caecilia"
An ambient/glitch masterpiece, Endless Summer is the sort of album that is fantastic for putting on in the background as atmosphere, but rewards paying attention for stretches to hear what's going on. Just a real mellow, pleasant time.
Yola, "Shady Grove"
I don't remember getting this. This is nice! I wish I were better about actually listening to the things I pick up.