Calling Los Super Elegantes' version of "Dance" (ESG's underground party classic) a "cover" would severely undersell this band's approach to the song. Without doing anything to undermine the basic appeal of the original's minimal bass groove and vocal hooks, the Los Angeles-based group translates all the lyrics to Spanish and adds new verses and melodic elements that sound so natural and seamless that it seems shocking that these parts were not there all along. Los Super Elegantes have improved on a time-tested DJ staple, both by amping up the urgency of the signature rhythm and by veering off into unexpected directions. Note the gorgeous "woo-hoo" break straight out of an old Beach Boys LP.

"Though Alan Singley & Pants Machine are ostensibly making music for children, their records come much closer to sounding like alternative rock in the style of Beck or The Flaming Lips than what you might expect from the likes of Raffi or Kidz Bop. "Highways Of Our Mindz" is the sort of endearingly sloppy and casually catchy tune that would have been a modest indie rock hit back in the '90s with one difference: his approach is intentional while many of the bands of that era accidentally resembled music from "Sesame Street" and "Schoolhouse Rock." Though Singley and his band deliver strong material throughout their latest album, "Highways" is the record's highlight, a song so tuneful and big-hearted that it will transport parents back to the innocence of their youth while entertaining their children enough to keep them from repeatedly asking "Are we there yet?"

Before single-handedly putting the city of Edmonton in Canada on the hip-hop map, Rollie "Cadence Weapon" Pemberton was a professional music critic, which would seem to make his career as a rapper/producer only that much more improbable. Unlike most music writers who are, and I say this as both an indictment of myself and with total respect for my peers, incredibly geeky people, Pemberton is an effortlessly magnetic and confident character whose background in writing seems to have honed his gift for wordplay. "Black Hand" originally appeared on the debut Cadence Weapon mixtape, but now serves as the lead single from the debut album "Breaking Kayfabe." Pemberton sets an uneasy tone by contrasting mangled acoustic guitar grooves with a mildly claustrophobic beat, but the main attraction is his mellifluous voice and the pile-up of exquisitely composed bon mots that he tosses off with enviable ease.