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Backspacer is Pearl Jam's first studio album since the musicians became free agents, finally fulfilling a seven-album contract with Sony. That process took 15 years. The band is now on its own, striking distribution deals with major corporations, a turnaround for the once very anti-corporate band.

The United States has often been hostile toward Black gun ownership, but African Americans are the fastest growing demographic of armed weapons buyers in the country.

He has been making music for 50 years now. He played with bluegrass great Ralph Stanley when he was still in his teens, went on to have a streak of country hits and then went back to bluegrass. Now he's returned to the songs he learned from his father when he was a young boy in eastern Kentucky.

NPR Music's Song of the Day features a new track every weekday, with analysis of the music, links to each artist's Web sites and, of course, a chance to hear the song itself. Here, Song of the Day editor Stephen Thompson talks about recent selections by Malcolm Middleton, Japandroids and My Morning Jacket's Jim James.

What differentiated the Ramblers from the commercial folk groups was their interest in the music's origins. They were tireless chroniclers and ambassadors of vernacular music, the blues, bluegrass and Cajun music of rural America. Hear the entire first disc of the band's new 50th anniversary, three-CD compilation.

On its sophomore album, The Low Anthem offers an inventive and surprising survey of American folk and roots music, featuring everything from Appalachian ballads to full-throated bluesy stomps.

NPR Music's Song of the Day features a new track every weekday, with analysis of the music, links to each artist's Web sites and, of course, a chance to hear the song itself. Here, Song of the Day editor Stephen Thompson talks about recent selections by A Hawk and a Hacksaw, John Forte and Volcano Choir.

All summer long, we've been hearing personal stories inspired by songs of summertime from musicians, writers and listeners. The series comes to an auspicious end with submissions from two listeners, who offer memories of music overheard: The Four Seasons' "Sherry" and The Four Preps' "Big Man."

A re-mastered, newly released back catalog of six albums by the Brit-punk band The Subhumans will remind you why people were knocked out by punk in the 1980s.

When Heap composes a song, you never know what she might decide is an instrument. For Ellipse, she used every piece of her elliptical-shaped house as a sound. Her fans followed along online as she wrote the album.