Thundercat on Vinyl: A Guide to Drunk, It Is What It Is, and Distracted

Stephen Lee Bruner was born in Los Angeles on October 19, 1984, into a family that already worked for a living in music. His father, Ronald Bruner Sr., drummed for the Temptations, the Supremes and Gladys Knight. His mother, Pam, played flute and percussion. His older brother Ronald Bruner Jr. became a drummer, and his youngest brother Jameel played keyboards in The Internet. Thundercat took the bass, and he plays a six-string Ibanez tuned low to BEADGC, which is most of the reason his records sound the way they do.

The path to the solo albums went through other people's bands. At fifteen he was in a boy band called No Curfew, and about a year later he joined the Los Angeles crossover thrash group Suicidal Tendencies, replacing bassist Josh Paul. In 2004 he played in the Young Jazz Giants alongside Kamasi Washington, Cameron Graves and his brother Ron Jr. Then came the session work that made him a name among musicians before he was one among listeners: bass for Erykah Badu on New Amerykah Part Two, including "Window Seat" and "Turn Me Away (Get MuNNY)," and bass across Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly on "King Kunta," "These Walls," "The Blacker the Berry," "i" and "Mortal Man." Badu is the one he credits with helping him find a stage presence of his own, and Flying Lotus is the one who pushed him to sing and make his own records.

All five Thundercat studio albums came out on Brainfeeder, the label Flying Lotus founded in 2008, and the run from 2011 to 2026 traces a fairly clear line: fusion workout, then grief and falsetto, then a wide-open pop record. We carry all five. Here they are in order, and what each one is actually good for.

Thundercat - The Golden Age of Apocalypse

The debut, released August 29, 2011, produced with Flying Lotus. It is the most purely instrumental record in the catalog and the easiest place to hear the jazz-fusion training underneath everything that followed. The Golden Age of Apocalypse is stacked with the West Coast players he grew up around: Ron Jr. on drums, Kamasi Washington on saxophones, Austin Peralta on keyboards, Cameron Graves on keys, Chris Dave on drums, Miguel Atwood-Ferguson on strings, and Erykah Badu singing backing vocals. We have it on the clear vinyl tenth anniversary pressing.

Why it's worth purchasing:

• The debut, and the clearest look at the fusion foundation under the later singing records
• Kamasi Washington, Austin Peralta, Ron Bruner Jr. and Erykah Badu all on one album
• Clear vinyl tenth anniversary pressing

Thundercat - Apocalypse

Released July 9, 2013, twelve tracks, with Flying Lotus producing nearly all of it. This is where the voice arrives: "Heartbreaks + Setbacks" is the first Thundercat song that works as a pop song rather than a showcase. It closes on "A Message for Austin/Praise the Lord/Enter the Void," named for Austin Peralta, the pianist who played on the debut and died in 2012. Apocalypse is on the shelf as the translucent red tenth anniversary deluxe edition.

Why it's worth purchasing:

• The album where the singing arrives, built around "Heartbreaks + Setbacks"
• Flying Lotus produced nearly every track
• Translucent red tenth anniversary deluxe edition

Thundercat - Drunk

February 24, 2017, and the record that turned him from a bassist other people called into an artist people came to see. Dozens of short tracks, some under a minute, stacked so the jokes and the loneliness sit right next to each other. The guest list is the reason it travelled: Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald on "Show You the Way," plus Kendrick Lamar, Pharrell, Wiz Khalifa, Mac Miller, Kamasi Washington and Louis Cole. We carry Drunk as the box set, pressed across four 10-inch records, which suits an album built out of fragments better than a standard LP would.

Why it's worth purchasing:

• The album that made him a headliner rather than a session credit
• Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald on "Show You the Way"
• Four 10-inch records in a box, a format that fits the short-track structure

Thundercat - It Is What It Is

April 3, 2020, fifteen tracks, executive produced by Thundercat and Flying Lotus. Shorter and heavier than Drunk, written in the years after his friend Mac Miller died, and better for it as a late-night record. "Black Qualls" pulls in Steve Lacy and Steve Arrington, "Dragonball Durag" is the one everybody knows, and the rest of the cast runs through Childish Gambino, Ty Dolla Sign, Lil B, Kamasi Washington, BadBadNotGood, Louis Cole and Zack Fox. It Is What It Is is here on clear vinyl and also on a red pressing.

Why it's worth purchasing:

• Tighter and sadder than Drunk, and the better record to put on alone
• "Black Qualls" with Steve Lacy and Steve Arrington, plus "Dragonball Durag"
• Two color pressings to choose from, clear and red

Thundercat - Distracted

Out April 3, 2026, six years after the last one, and the most outward-facing album he has made. Fifteen tracks in about forty-seven minutes, executive produced by Thundercat with Greg Kurstin, who handled most of the production, and with Flying Lotus and the Lemon Twigs turning up across it. The features reach well past the Brainfeeder circle: Tame Impala, Lil Yachty, A$AP Rocky, Channel Tres, Willow, and a posthumous verse from Mac Miller. Distracted is here on the indie exclusive black marbled smoke vinyl and on a red pressing.

Why it's worth purchasing:

• The first Thundercat album in six years, and the widest-reaching one
• Tame Impala, A$AP Rocky, Channel Tres, Willow, and a posthumous Mac Miller verse
• Two pressings on the shelf, indie exclusive black marbled smoke and red

Where else to look

"No More Lies," the Tame Impala collaboration that became track two on Distracted, first came out as a single in April 2023, and we have it as a cheetah color 7-inch. Between Apocalypse and Drunk he put out an EP in 2015, The Beyond / Where the Giants Roam, which sits outside the five-album run above and is not something we keep on the shelf. His playing is all over records you can already find here, though: the Kendrick Lamar guide covers To Pimp a Butterfly, where he is on five tracks, and the Flying Lotus guide covers the other side of the Brainfeeder partnership, including his vocal on the Yasuke score.

If You Like Thundercat

• Flying Lotus: the producer on four of the five albums above and the man who founded the label, working the same seam from the programming side.
• Kamasi Washington: his bandmate since the Young Jazz Giants in 2004, and the player who makes the jazz half of this equation explicit.
• Hiatus Kaiyote: the closest thing to a sonic cousin, Melbourne rather than Los Angeles, same appetite for odd meters under soft vocals.
• Anderson .Paak: a drummer who sings, coming at the same funk and soul material from the rhythm seat.
• Robert Glasper: the pianist running the parallel project of making jazz players and rappers share a record.

If this is your corner of the store, the Jazz Funk and R and B shelves are where the rest of it lives. To browse everything by this artist in one place, head to the Thundercat collection.