ALBUM REVIEWS

SNOOP DOGG Neva Left Doggy Style Records/Empire

The West Coast rap legend is aided by almost 20 guests, including KRS-One, Redman, Charlie Wilson, Method Man, Wiz Khalifa and October London. Go On is an R&B treat and Bacc in Da Dayz, which samples early Tribe Called Quest, was designed to make your car shake. Big Mouth doesn’t just sound like a blast from the past — you’re listening to the Big Bang of rap.

The two public sides of the rapper are on show — the strapped thug ready to bust your door down, as well as the pleasureseeking host of summer pool parties. His nasally voice is characteristically unrushed and distant, his lyrics precise, his flow coolly menacing.

LINKIN PARK One More Light Warner Bros.

Hold onto your tattoos: The metal-rap genre-benders have followed up their heaviest album, The Hunting Party (2014), with something so different it may give listeners whiplash.

On their seventh studio album, One More Light, the alternative rock band has turned positively pop.

Here’s the thing: They’re so good they’ve created a fine, up-to-the-minute pop album. An airy Nobody Can Save Me resembles something from Owl City. Good Goodbye, featuring Pusha T and Stormzy, is reminiscent of ‘NSync’s Bye Bye Bye, and Sharp Edges wouldn’t sound out of place on a Shawn Mendes album.

TAJ MAHAL AND KEB’ MO’ TajMo Concord

The first collaboration by Taj Mahal and Keb’ Mo’ — the trailblazer and his disciple — is an easy listen.

It is as a blues album when TajMo sounds best, like Mo’s resonator guitar on Sleepy John Estes’ Diving Duck Blues, Billy Branch’s harmonica on Don’t Leave Me Here and the gruff vocal combination on She Knows How to Rock Me.Mo’s songs often go other directions. Om Sweet Om features exquisite guest vocalist Lizz Wright and a refrain with a sunny, James Taylor-like disposition.