Mechanical engineer and sculptor Tristan Shone, who records as Author & Punisher, is a master of machines. He's built a robotic entourage — throttles, knobs, rails and all — that responds to MIDI/USB controllers and makes for-real industrial doom metal.

Like Pavement, Speedy Ortiz inverts the notion of rock stardom, while also taking its twisted heft from Polvo, its bummer distortion from Dinosaur Jr. and its gleefully noisy pop sensibility from The Breeders. Hear the oddly hummable "Tiger Tank" from the band's debut album, Major Arcana.

The American Primitive-style guitarist wrote My Garden State while caring for his mother in New Jersey. A bittersweet record, it reminds us that our roots are stronger than we remember — and that wherever you end up, it's about the home you make.

The guitarist, who died Thursday, understood that metal works in darkness, rooting for something, anything that makes sense of this ugly human existence. Hanneman channeled it into a band that exemplifies pain.

Unlike Glenn Jones, who builds around melodies, acoustic guitarist Chuck Johnson builds his work around patterns that ripple and rattle like the guitar strings themselves. Sink in, and "On a Slow Passing in Ghost Town" becomes a haunting prayer that unravels before your ears.

The guitars on the metal band's aching second album chime like classic U2. Hear the nine-minute opener from Sunbather now.

The doom-metal band's "Valley of the Dolls" sounds as if the Fab Four finally took a trip too far.

The uncategorizably heavy duo endures an unnerving broken-bottle ritual for "Absurdities & Echoes."

For this video, Jones performs "Bergen County Farewell" in singer-songwriter Meg Baird's living room in Allentown, N.J. It's the same place he recorded his fifth solo album, My Garden State.

On "Stigmatized," the German thrash metal band still has plenty of thundering riffs to deploy.

Members of Agalloch, YOB, and Hammers of Misfortune form this raw and adventurous metal band. But VHÖL's self-titled debut is a thunderous album that doesn't sound like the sum of its parts.

The Brooklyn-via-Boston composer and multi-instrumentalist is used to making a huge racket, but here she finds melancholy in still simplicity.

"Crucial Velocity" will move the earth beneath your feet if you aren't already moving them yourself.

"Spring fra Livet" offers shimmering poptimism in the face of commercially unpopular heavy music.

"At the Mouth" incorporates metallic chaos, swarming blast beats and woozy guitar fractals.