Can making and listening to music save the world? It’s a lofty question and maybe easy to dismiss as overly serious. But the songs in this week’s mix consider the power of creativity, how it can lead to clarity and calm, or maybe just provide a temporary respite from whatever ails you.

Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy takes this idea to heart with nearly two hours of music on a new, triple solo album called Twilight Override, an opus he says is designed to overwhelm an overwhelming world with goodness and light.

We’ve also got the singer and guitarist Jay Som, who collaborates with Jim Adkins of Jimmy Eat World, for her first new album in more than six years. John Vanderslice and producer James Riotto team up for a band they’re calling Google Earth and (we’re not making this up) a new album called For Mac OS X 10.11. We’ve also got the sludgy, introspective rock of Goon, and drummer and producer Kassa Overall reinterprets classic hip-hop tracks by artists like Wu-Tang Clan, OutKast and Digable Planets as jazz instrumentals.

NPR Music editor Sheldon Pearce joins host Robin Hilton as they update their running list of the year’s best songs.

Featured artists and songs:

1. Jay Som & Jim Adkins: “Float,” from Belong
2. Google Earth (John Vanderslice & James Riotto): “meow meow,” from For Mac OS X 10.11
3. Goon: “For Cutting The Grass,” from Dream 3
4. Jeff Tweedy: “One Tiny Flower,” from Twilight Override
5. Kassa Overall: “Rebirth Of Slick (Cool Like That),” from Cream

‘All Songs Considered’ 25th anniversary segment: Our No. 1 songs from 2021

Weekly reset: Twilight at Nags Head, with crickets and barking dog in the distance

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Questions, comments, suggestions or feedback of any kind always welcome: allsongs@npr.org

Hear new songs from past episodes in the All Songs Considered playlists in Apple Music and Spotify.