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Now that she\u2019s released the deluxe edition \u2014 in honor of her 78th birthday, on Friday! \u2014 Dolly Parton\u2019s already sprawling double album \u201cRockstar\u201d<\/a> runs nearly three hours long and clocks in at an indefatigably rockin\u2019 39 tracks. This makes finding the album\u2019s buried treasures that much more exhausting, but luckily one sparkles out from the heap of newly released bonus tracks: her ornately arranged and deeply felt cover of Billy Joel\u2019s 1974 single \u201cThe Entertainer.\u201d Joel\u2019s version was full of a young upstart\u2019s gimlet-eyed cynicism \u2014 \u201cIf you\u2019re gonna have a hit, you gotta make it fit, so they cut it down to 3:05,\u201d he sang on a kind of spiritual sequel to the earlier \u201cPiano Man\u201d \u2014 but Parton sings it from the opposite end of a long career, finding fresh meaning in his words. \u201cI know the game, you\u2019ll forget my name,\u201d she sings, with a slight ache in her voice. \u201cAnd I won\u2019t be here in another year, if I don\u2019t stay on the charts.\u201d Given that \u201cRockstar\u201d became the highest-charting album<\/a> of Parton\u2019s career just a few months ago, that fate seems, blessedly, unlikely. LINDSAY ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The unlikely pairing of Mumford & Sons with Pharrell Williams has yielded a decidedly un-folksy song. After a brief head-fake intro of acoustic guitar, it\u2019s a foot-stamping, tambourine-shaking vow of solidarity, revival and burgeoning power: \u201cGood people been down so long\/And now I see the sun is rising.\u201d Biblical language and church-choir harmonies insist on a return to righteousness, but they leave it to the listener to decide exactly what\u2019s righteous and who the good people are. JON PARELES<\/p>\n The guitarist and songwriter Fabi Reyna, who led She Shreds in the 2010s, now records as Reyna Tropical. In \u201cCartagena,\u201d from an album due in March, \u201cMalegr\u00eda,\u201d she sings about finding oneness with nature. A lilting beat, ricocheting percussion and layers of intertwined guitars and marimbas hint at Congolese soukous as Reyna enjoys \u201ca moment of peace\u201d and exults, in Spanish, \u201cLet the environment caress me\u201d; it sounds like sheer delight. PARELES<\/p>\n Two Atlanta rappers \u2014 the rising star Anycia and the trusted hitmaker Latto \u2014 join forces on the brassy \u201cBack Outside,\u201d both sounding utterly unbothered. Anycia\u2019s low, laid-back rasp provides a fitting foil for Latto\u2019s bounding exuberance; \u201cI don\u2019t know how to sing, but I\u2019m her,\u201d Latto spits, taking a quick breath as the punchline lands. ZOLADZ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Bitter cynicism \u2014 or is it realism? \u2014 courses through \u201cDanzig With Myself\u201d; the punny title is the song\u2019s only hint of comedy. With Frank Black (a.k.a. Black Francis) from Pixies to drive home the grunge connection, the song harnesses a blunt riff and all sorts of guitar noise to back observations on a dystopian, disinformation-saturated moment: \u201cI can\u2019t believe how many people want to deceive us\/And I can\u2019t believe how many people want to receive it.\u201d PARELES<\/p>\n The acoustic guitarist Julian Lage has worked in all sorts of styles as a leader and as a sideman with John Zorn, Charles Lloyd and others. \u201c76\u201d is from \u201cSpeak to Me,\u201d an album due March 1. It\u2019s a jauntily asymmetrical tune that rides a bluesy riff and a backbeat from the drummer Dave King of the Bad Plus. Lage takes some modal and chromatic detours, and the pianist Kris Davis flings around free-jazz clusters, but the track never loses a rowdy roadhouse spirit. PARELES<\/p>\n The duo from North Carolina that records as Magic Tuber Stringband connects Appalachian tradition to Minimalism, meditation and perhaps post-rock, carrying forward the ideas of musicians like John Fahey and Sandy Bull. In \u201cDays of Longing,\u201d Courtney Werner on fiddle and Evan Morgan on 12-string guitar share a waltz that transforms itself from folksy warmth to harrowing dissonance to an unfinished resolution, refusing easy comfort. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n What would Philip Glass sound like with a beat to kick his music forward? The electronic musician Jlin provides a definitive answer in \u201cThe Precision of Infinity\u201d from \u201cAkoma,\u201d an album due in March. She chops up bits of Glass\u2019s solo-piano arpeggios, two-note ostinatos and wordless singers and sets them to quick-changing but insistent programmed and sampled percussion, as she relocates his long dramatic arcs into an era of fractured attention spans. PARELES<\/p>\n \u201cI felt God in your touch,\u201d sings feeo \u2014 the English songwriter and producer Theodora Laird \u2014 in a song about sublime physical communion. Her backup is sparse, pulsing electronic sounds that come together as chords, pull apart and realign; she sounds fulfilled, fascinated and enthralled. PARELES<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nReyna Tropical, \u2018Cartagena<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Anycia featuring Latto, \u2018Back Outside<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Julian Lage, \u201976<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Magic Tuber Stringband, \u2018Days of Longing<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
feeo, \u2018It Was Then That I<\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n