The Chicago outsider-soul howler Willis Earl Beal got his start singing on Chicago street corners and in train stations, and he’s always sounded like someone struggling to make his inner pain audible over L train clackity-clacks. Last year, he made the aboveground leap, releasing the lo-fi major-label album Acoustimatic Sorcery. And now he’s following it up with the relatively lush — but still raspy and dark and urgent — album Nobody knows. We’ve posted the early tracks “Everything unwinds.,” “Too Dry To Cry,” and the Cat Power collab “Coming Through,” and now you can stream the entire album at NPR.

Nobody knows. is out 9/10 on XL.