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Grammy-winning singer and songwriter Lucinda Williams has released her eighth CD, West. The collaboration with producer Hal Willner is mostly a meditation on the death of Williams' mother, and the end of a turbulent love affair.

From the vaults comes "Let's Just Get Together," a phenomenal, never-before-released David Sea song. The track showcases his powerful voice and roots in gospel singing, but his impassioned vocals are practically drowned out by the guitar playing counterpoint, almost in competition with Sea.

It's hard to decide what to make of The Bad Plus, whose sound has no pretense of operating at either extreme of jazz and rock, but instead plays with the colors in between.

It's a truism that the drum is the heart and soul of African music. But not so fast: Over the past century, guitarists have redefined the sound of the continent. Two new releases, by Zimbabwean guitarist Louis Mhlanga and a Toronto-based group called the African Guitar Summit, prove that.

The smoldering "The Air is Thin" functions as a simmering, beautiful lament, evoking the feeling of sitting at the end of the bar in a lonely, dimly lit dive.

Former Luna members Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips revel in the opportunity to explore and experiment. Cover songs and obscure '60s throwbacks dot their releases, showcasing the singers' love of Joy Division, Serge Gainsbourg and especially The Velvet Underground.

Saxophonist and clarinetist Ned Rothenberg has always been a musical cosmopolitan. Early on, he studied jazz with George Coleman and shakuhachi flute in Japan. Rothenberg's new album, Inner Diaspora, sends him back to his roots.

For its contribution to the Band tribute album Endless Highway, Widespread Panic offers neither a faithful cover of "Chest Fever" nor a recasting. Instead, the group takes an approach so obvious, and so unlikely to succeed, that few ever try it: They try to beat the original at its own game.

Funerals celebrate life as much as they mourn the departed, and Robert Glasper's poignant requiem "Tribute" — assembled in honor of his mother — makes no secret of that. Glasper and his bandmates initiate a plaintive piano-trio hymn that soon underscores Rev. Joe Ratliff's poetic eulogy.

Though Lura fully discovered her Cape Verdean heritage later in life, her music is deeply rooted within those island traditions. M'Bem di Fora incorporates the rhythms of her parents' homeland, with vibrant stories of love and loss pouring out of every syllable and song.