Nicole Willis & the Soul Investigators, "Light Years Ahead"
With the strings here, this is reading very "late Stax" to me, or perhaps Curtis Mayfield. Interestingly, it's an era of soul that for the most part hasn't seen as much of a revival as earlier Stax or Motown. I'm not sure why that is, exactly, although perhaps the lusher arrangements are just harder to put together for independent artists.
The Queers, "Drop The Attitude Fucker"
You first, the Queers!
Indian Handcrafts, "Starcraft"
squints This is very early Baroness, isn't it? That sort of groovy kind of thing, but with a bit of classic rock kind of feel to it? No? Just me?
The Gutter Twins, "All Misery/Flowers"
The Gutter Twins are Greg Dulli (Afghan Whigs, The Twilight Singers) and Mark Lanegan (Screaming Trees, tons of collaborations under his own name). They put out just this one album, Saturnalia, which sounds pretty much like Mark Lanegan singing for the Afghan Whigs. You've already decided if that's a good thing or not.
No, instead, I'm going to instead contemplate which record named Saturnalia I like better: this one or the one from the Wedding Present. Discogs suggests there are plenty of other albums called "Saturnalia" out there, but I haven't heard them, so I assume they suck. So, which do I want? Greg Dulli in his "wandering the wilderness" phase, or post-peak Wedding Present? I think if I had to keep just one, I'll probably keep this. Mark Lanegan is a distinctive enough singer that this does things that Dulli's other work doesn't, whereas other Wedding Present records are just better than their Saturnalia.
Skeleton Key, "Panic Bullets"
This record doesn't sound like it's from 2002. It sounds like it's from 1994. (That's a good thing.)