Popcast: New Albums by Laura Mvula, Bassekou Kouyate and Savages This week, Jon Pareles, the chief pop critic for The Times, discusses albums he's written about in this Sunday's Playlist column, including new recordings by these artists: The English singer and composer Laura Mvula, whose ambitious first album "Sing to the Moon" suggests, among other things, gospel, a cappella pop, Gil Evans, Nina Simone and Björk. The Malian ngoni (West African lute) player Bassekou Kouyate, whose driving new album "Jama ko," recorded in Bamako during last year's military coup in Mali, includes his four-ngoni band, Ngoni ba; his wife, the singer Amy Sacko; songs of tolerance and unity; and much display of string-bending, tone-distorting, fast-fingered technique. Savages, the all-female London band whose vigorous first album "Silence Yourself" is descended from noisy, spindly, trebly late-70s post-punk and fills those forms with energy and provocation. Jon Pareles's Playlist column.