January is historically a slow month for new music. The record industry is recovering from the holiday season and attempting to get its ducks in a row for the new year. It seems as though January 2015 is significantly more busy from a new music perspective than it’s been in any year for as long as I can remember. Here are a few albums coming out this month that I’ve got my eye on.

Guster Evermotion (1/13); The new album from jam band faves Guster has been getting ink on this site ever since they announced a Pledge Music drive last spring/summer. If you’ve already donated to the creation of the Evermotion project, then you’ve already heard a good chunk of the album. Even if you haven’t donated, you can get an early listen via Spotify (see below.) All indications so far point to it being a solid piece of work. There are a few poppier/more electronic-sounding tracks, but most of Evermotion stays true to the solid songcraft that has been Guster’s calling card for almost two decades.

Jazmine Sullivan Reality Show (1/13); Guster and Jazmine Sullivan come from two completely different musical worlds, but they do have one thing in common, at least as far as my enjoyment of them goes: I willfully ignored both artists for a few years-despite the pleas of fellow music lovers-before eventually falling in love with them. Sullivan’s insistence on having Missy Elliott scream all over her hit singles kept me from fully appreciating her for a minute. However, all of the music that has emerged from Reality Show thus far has been stellar, and I’ve already gone back to her first two albums and gained a new respect for the music contained on them-at least the songs that don’t have Missy Elliott screaming all over them. Reality Show won’t contain Jazmine’s  stunning cover of Whitney Houston’s “I Have Nothing,” but it will have the heartbreaking ballad “Forever Don’t Last,” which I profiled on this site a few months back.

Lupe Fiasco Tetsuo & Youth (1/20): Lupe’s fifth album has been warming up in the kitchen for a while. The rapper’s frustratingly inconsistent output so far has me a little nervous about his new album, but you can’t deny that Lupe has skills. It’s the production that has me worried more than anything else-Lupe is a good emcee that doesn’t always have the benefit of good music. A cut released a while back that features Ed Sheeran doesn’t seem to have made the track listing, which certainly impedes the potential pop success of Youth, and it doesn’t appear that there are any other big-name guests or producers.  The second volume of Food & Liquor was a decent bounceback from the horrid Lasers, so here’s to hoping that the Chicago MC can continue the upward momentum.

Jamie Cullum Interlude (1/27): The latest album from the British singer/songwriter/pianist has been out in the U.K. for months (why do people still stagger international release dates, by the way? Doesn’t make any sense.) It’s the most straight-ahead jazz release of his career, and features cameo appearances by talented vocalists Gregory Porter and Laura Mvula. Jamie won’t be covering Pharrell or Rihanna, as he has in the past, but I’ve already heard the album and it’s a good’un. Fantastic Sunday morning music.

Ne-Yo Non-Fiction (1/27): Ne-Yo’s another frustrating case. He’s probably the closest thing we have to a modern-day song and dance man in the Michael Jackson sense, and is a better songwriter than just about every other pop and R&B act out now (actually, he’s probably a better songwriter than MJ was.) However, like Mike, Ne-Yo wants to stay relevant in the pop music scene, so there have been EDM experiments, collaborations with Pitbull, and other moves that have kept Ne-Yo on top 40 radio, but haven’t exactly pleased his original fan base. Ne-Yo is touting Non-Fiction as his “return to R&B”, but the rapper-heavy guest list is giving me some serious pause. Not that I object to a little hip-hop in my soul music-not at ALL. But when you’re recording with the likes of T.I., Juicy J and Young Jeezy (listed in descending order of garbage-ness), the expectation is that the music is going to be wack. I’m highly skeptical, but still somewhat hopeful that Ne-Yo’s album will perform up to his standards qualitatively and commercially.