Listen to these albums before February ends

February may be the shortest month, but there was no lack of great music released during its 28 days — and that's beyond high-profile titles from the likes of Drake, Imagine Dragons and Bob Dylan. Brian Mansfield and Patrick Ryan have identified some of the month's lesser-known highlights. Don't let February end without giving them a play.

Mono, The Mavericks

Imagine happening upon a treasure trove of early- to mid-'60s singles made by a band that seemed to have absorbed everything — country music, Latin grooves, folk-rock, the British Invasion — without noticing for a second the various cultural barriers that separated them. Play those records through a vintage sound system, and you've got Mono. — Mansfield

Terraplane, Steve Earle & the Dukes

Earle set out to pay stylistic tribute to the blues greats who helped shape his music — Lightnin' Hopkins, Freddy King, Johnny Winter, ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons, Jimmy and Stevie Ray Vaughan. By the time it filtered through him, it wound up sounding like a Texas version of what the Yardbirds and the Rolling Stones came up with during the '60s — raw, blues-based rock, with a fiddle taking the role that an organ or an extra guitar might have played for the British bands. — Mansfield

Y & Y EP, Years and Years

Leading BBC's annual "Sound of ..." poll for 2015 (an honor achieved so far this decade by Sam Smith, Ellie Goulding and Jessie J), U.K. electro-pop trio Years & Years is poised to join the ranks of those chart-toppers, if this rapturous four-song EP is any indication. Obvious single King is a shimmering, propulsive dance track driven by frontman Olly Alexander's soaring vocals, while Take Shelter skirts between heartbreak ballad and club-ready slow jam, with its sadly submissive lyrics and alluring, tropical beat. Desire is a lovelorn, drum-and-bass confection, and Memo puts Alexander's velvety vocals front-and-center for the EP's downtempo finale. — Ryan

Don't Lose This, Pops Staples

Wilco's Jeff Tweedy helped Mavis Staples finish this final album from the patriarch of the Staple Singers, the initial sessions recorded shortly before Pops Staples' death 15 years ago. With his tremolo guitar and authoritative vocal delivery, Staples played what Duke Ellington once called "gospel in a blues key." That's what's going on here on tunes like Nobody's Fault But Mine, Will the Circle Be Unbroken and a cover of Bob Dylan's Gotta Serve Somebody. Some tracks, like No News Is Good News, feature Staples daughters Mavis, Yvonne and Cleo, which means these are also the final recordings from the group that made gospel-pop classics like Respect Yourself and I'll Take You There. — Mansfield

Let the Good Times Roll, JD McPherson

Let the Good Times Roll is full of sounds straight out of the 1950s — reverb-heavy guitars, honking saxophones, piano triplets — but McPherson is no revivalist. He works with vintage sounds without ever coming across as derivative or nostalgic. Hearing the title track or You Must Have Met Little Caroline? give the same thrill as discovering Eddie Cochran or Link Wray for the first time, and McPherson wails like Little Richard on It Shook Me Up and Everybody's Talking 'Bout the All-American. Bridgebuilder, written with the Black Keys' Dan Auerbach, is a gorgeous, haunting ballad that would have been a flat-out great record in any decade. — Mansfield

Our Own House, MisterWives

When a band bursts out of the gate with a first single as euphorically catchy as Reflections, you can't help but wonder if it's all just a fluke or if they really do have that magic songwriting touch? Thankfully, the latter seems to be true for MisterWives, a New York indie-pop outfit whose exuberant energy radiates from your speakers, thanks in no small part to singer Mandy Lee Duffy's high-pitched, powerhouse voice. Teaming with producer Frequency, Our Own House shows that MisterWives has a slew of other potential hits in its arsenal, starting with the deceptively melancholy title track, schoolyard stomper Hurricane, decidedly feminist anthem Not Your Way and the unabashedly smitten No Need For Dreaming. Even if they do lean on the sugary hooks a little too heavily at times, you'll probably be too busy dancing around your bedroom to care. — Ryan

Outlaw Jazz, Erik Deutsch

Country music and jazz can make for strange bedfellows, but musicians who love both sometimes create fascinating hybrids, like vibraphonist Gary Burton's ahead-of-its-time 1966 album Tennessee Firebird and guitarist Bill Frisell's bluegrass-infused Nashville. Add New York-based pianist Erik Deutsch's Outlaw Jazz to that list. Deutsch, who spent part of his childhood in Nashville but now tours with the likes of Shooter Jennings and Phillip Phillips, leads a band that includes a three-piece horn section and a steel guitarist through a set that includes a jumping blues, a shuffling Bo Diddley cover, a forlorn instrumental version of the Rolling Stones' Wild Horses and a version of Shel Silverstein's Whistlers and Jugglers with Jennings adding vocals. — Mansfield