They care not a whit about market share, EDM remixers or having annoying YouTube stars and/or rappers guest on their sessions, choosing instead to light up psychic votive candles for Joe Strummer, Desmond Dekker and Lemmy in order to capture the very same spirit those artists conjured all those decades ago.

One of the brightest and catchy offerings for Sub Pop all year. [Nov 2006, p.188]

Lound insanity is sexy; quiet insanity is sexier. [Sep 2003, p.118]

Like most good thematic albums, or films or books, for that matter, it's hard to put the pieces together on Album Of The Year, and just when you think you've got the narrative unraveled, you'll rediscover another lost passage or double entendre. [Sep 2004, p.122]

The Mars Volta have created the first great record of 2008. [Mar 2008, p.145]

[They] clearly sound alive with the possibility of redefining punk song structure by writing 11-minute flamboyant guitar dirges that have as much in common with My Bloody Valentine as they do with '70s arena rock. [May 2005, p.170]

As edgy as singer-songwriter pop gets. [Oct 2005, p.158]

The irony police already have an APB out on these dudes... but in reality, the old guard are just jealous because they didn't think of it first. [Dec 2005, p.206]

It's the urgency of [Dizzee's] brash Brit patois that dares you not to decipher it. [Jan 2005, p.114]

The Dolls' music... is as gripping as ever. [Jun 2006, p.188]

As is the case whenever [Kurt] Wagner's velvet croon wraps itself around a night that ends so late it's already morning... there really isn't a critic in the world who can touch him. [combined review of both discs; Mar 2003, p.94]

Long live the king of hip. [May 2005, p.132]

The words are as bleak as ever, and the songs still cut like coal-black shards of anti-pop bitterness. [Apr 2006, p.204]

Reznor sets his machinery on "kill" and points it toward authority and herd mentality. [Jun 2007, p.158]

“Without Any Words (Only Crying And Laughter)” harkens back to the magnificent Gun Club, while “This Life Is Old” will have Jack White wondering who the hell these guys are, anyway. Because Scogin and drummer Michael McClellan bring the noise in the most righteous ways. ... Two Parts Viper is the best record of the year.

Riskier but not totally out of character; it's the more holistic right brain to Wide Awake's rational left brain. [Feb 2005, p.81]

There isn't one song on Elevator as undeniable as "Bandages"... No, there are 12 of them. [May 2005, p.172]

This revisitation of the band's canon burns brighter than a thousand nuclear-rector accidents. [Nov 2005, p.218]

A full-on party record. [Nov 2005, p.201]

The band update a tired synth-pop sound with purring guitars and just enough punked-out drum and vocal flourishes to give texture to what might otherwise have become new-wave wallpaper. [Nov 2003, p.114]

Walker has gone as far into the atmosphere as one can travel while still being earthbound. [Jul 2006, p.210]

The duo have crafted a disc that grafts underground rawness (garage rock, no wave, electro, classic '80s goth) to their taut dance grooves. [Sep 2004, p.140]

Sing The Sorrow soars with the kind of melodies hit singles are made of, yet it somehow persists with AFI's esoteric darkness. [Apr 2003, p.69]

The eight tracks here defy formula, instead feeding off of one another in a cannibalistic frenzy of samples and constantly shifting beats... This is a deceptive and brilliant album. [#147, p.98]

Equally adept with paradiddles and software plugins, these digital-age surrealists have birthed a musical hybrid all their own. [Nov 2003, p.100]

Indestructible is the document of a band retaining their energy and refining their vision to be honest to themselves and their fans, while spitting venom in the eyes of their detractors. [Oct 2003, p.115]

Elan Vital is easily the band's most adventurous disc to date. [Jun 2006, p.178]

A raw portrait of a 20-something disenchanted with his city, his country and his life. [Feb 2005, p.81]