Charlie Sexton Returns. Iron & Wine collaborate with Calexico. Paul McCartney produced by Nigel Godrich.

What a day for new releases!

Charlie Sexton's new album Cruel and Gentle Things gets a big fat rave from Thom Jurek at the All Music Guide.

Jurek goes out of his way to celebrate individual tracks. For example:

"Gospel," a slippery, languid acoustic blues testament to faith in times of trouble. The sheer skeletal beauty of the track is striking, and Sexton's vocal is full of a relaxed conviction that gets right at the heart of the lyric. Daniel Lanois would kill to have written this.

And he concludes:

Cruel and Gentle Things

Meanwhile, Tim Sendra at All Music is raving about the new collaboration between Iron & Wine and Calexico... In the Reins.

The record manages to blend the best aspects of the two groups and comes off a winner in all respects. You get Iron & Wine's melodicism, emotional depth, and literary grace backed by Calexico's desert-bleached C&W orchestral splendor.

And it doesn't stop there. Nigel Godrich, the brilliant producer of works by Radiohead and Beck, has produced the new Paul McCartney album: Chaos and Creation in my Backyard.

And the new Switchfoot album? All Music Guide's reaction basically amounts to "Not great, not awful..."