Call it two EPs of material from two gifted frontmen combined into one LP--nothing more, nothing less.

Fantasies flows seemlessly from song to engaging song, with less focus on the dance-based instrumentals of "Old World" and greater attention to frontwoman Emily Haines' thoughtful lyrics and lilting voice. [May 2009, p.112]

As always, Loveland's eye for details elevates Candy Hearts' songs. [Jul 2014, p.100]

The nine songs ooze out with floating bits of atmospherics and noise appearing and receding in the murk while hypnotizing listeners via insistent synth and drum loops. [May 2013, p.88]

This self-titled album is a reflection of Adams’ continued growth as a songwriter, and is completely relatable to anyone who has managed to survive in a marriage--creative or otherwise--long past the honeymoon phase.

Sole's willingness to bust lyrical caps in the asses of the left as well as the right make him a fairly revolutionary revolutionary--one whose musical journal keeping, for all its excesses, is worth deciphering. [Apr 2003, p.85]

It's still early to see if they'll transcend the hype, but Dying In Stereo bodes well by keeping it real over simple old-school beats. [Aug 2003, p.108]

Organically building upon thier contemplative-rock base, Lucky is full of intricate melodies and bridges, intense while at the same time awash with the delicate touch of human experience. [Mar 2008, p.144]

One of extreme music’s most adventurous bands continues blazing its own path. [Nov 2015, p.97

Sonically, Knopf has never sounded more confident. [Jun 2012, p.82]

Les Savy Fav received high marks before, but this album proves this oft-comical band are no joke. [Oct 2010, p.116]

Most of Valende's songs have that creepy nursery-rhyme thing that people who read too much Lewis Carroll would call "whimsy." [Mar 2005, p.132]

Prepare to be blown away.... Emotional Mugger is an out-of-this-world psychedelic venture meant to be listened to--and listened to very loud. [Feb 2016, p.98]

Epic-sounding and true to that signature AFI sound, AFI (The Blood Album) will be a record that stands out for hardcore fans, while picking up some new ones along the way. [Feb 2017, p.78]

New Again leaps forward as the best album of Taking Back Sunday's career to date.

A rapid barrage of sludge-rich bass, scalding guitar distortion and wrist-popping drums fill atop frontman Drew Thomson's infuriated black humor. [Nov 2014, p.98]

Represents the best of British pop music.... A lilting, suave and grandiose near-masterpiece. [Dec 2001, p.80]

Toth makes a greater effort to rein together all these different musical approaches into a crystalline whole. By doing so, he's inflated his songwriting even further, helping it reach greater altitudes. [Feb 2013, p.94]

On offers tight musicianship, intimate lyrics and a wider sonic berth in comparison to indie pop's lyrically trite mistake celebrations. [May 2002, p.90]

FC Kahuna tracks revel in the duo's simple blurbs of sound and less-is-more sonics. [Jan 2003, p.91]

An admixture of Stax soul, raw-boned punk rock, and California beach-pop that sounds more focused than their previous outing, 1998's R.F.T.C. [#154, p.84]

His honky-tonk piano ballads are a little less haunted and more memorable. [June 2003, p.104]

On the whole, these are fast paced, highly-charged ska-punk songs, but they’re riddled with musical flourishes and nuances–not to mention impossibly catchy hooks.

As great as At War With Reality really is, it is nothing but expectations, and for a band that shattered preconceptions and spawned an absolutely unbearable number of copycat bands with their last album, that's actually a bit disappointing.

A varied set of songs that's imbued with the mysticism of folklore and the romanticism of rock 'n' roll, this EP is a chance to take stock of the long journey that Frank Turner has taken so far, before he sets off once more into the future unknown.

Mentioning these ASG cats in the same breath as riff-rockers Torche or Queens Of The Stone Age is not only misleading, it might even be an understatment. [Jun 2013, p.92]

Sure the plot has been done to death and you know what's going to happen; but the personalities involved draw you in like a rubbernecker gawking at a highway accident fromth safety of his car. [Nov 2009, p.105]

Though it has a couple great cuts that are in the running for Britpop song of the year, With The Tides lacks definition, making South more a group in the midst of a movement than one defining it. [Oct 2003, p.138]

Boasts the accessibility and ambition of a true star. [Jul 2003, p.124]

A laser-sharp collection of songs written with two things in mind: rocking hard and having fun. [12/2000, p.110]

The tracks on Steal come off as much more assured and comfortable than those on Toxicity. [Jan 2003, p.81]

While these songs are closer the band's beer-in-the-air beginnings, greater sophistication and songcraft are evident from the crisp melodies and infectious choruses to earworm anthems with direct, bumper-sticker sentiments. [Feb 2013, p.88]

Take Care, take Care, Take Care is their most lush offering to date, with the layers of instrumentation blurring together so sublimely, it's hard to discern what instrument might be making such a wondrous sound. [May 2011, p.92]

When they do attempt to play things straight, it hits the mark with impressive accuracy, commanding your attention--and a few of your most limber-limbed dance moves. [Feb 2011, p.87]

Walks the fine line between indie and lo-fi rock, encompassing the best elements of both genres. [Mar 2006, p.136]

Better than its predecessor. [Dec 2003, p.150]

If Go is any indication of their future, MCS will have plenty to say, five albums from now. [Jul 2012, p.100]

It's songs seem somewhat aimless at times, but Repave is worth the journey for its riving consistency and moments of hook-laden greatness. [Oct 2013, p.94]

The lullaby-like "Death" feels too on-the-nose, but it doesn't detract much from Carrier's bittersweet power: an atmosphere of loss, contemplation and return. [Sep 2013, p.88]

The songs on The King Is Dead don't collapse under the weight of their lite-FM armor; conversely, they endure in spite of it. One way or another, the Decemberists write good songs, regardless of how they're gift-wrapped.

This is a great album, one that carries the burden of growing up on its shoulders, but uses it for good instead of endlessly fighting against it, which punk bands need to do as they grow up.

Chicago's The Atlas Moth have taken definite and deliberate steps to flesh out their wall of sound on album No. 3, accentuating their sludge roots with waves of psychedelic counterpoint. [Jul 2014, p.96]

They're at their best, though, on moodier fare like the suitably hymn-like 'God Loves You The Best,' with a Beatlesque snatch of orchestration fit for their old buddy Elliot Smith. [Sug 2008, p.170]

The result is aural perfection. [Feb 2003, p.68]

Frontman Tom Dougall offers guitar distensions, pedal abuse and disaffected vocals, while synth op Alejandra Diez is called upon to deliver gorgeous melodies and sinister noise. [Oct 2012, p. 92]

Characteristically, Mogwai surrender just enough melodic nuance to sustain superficial interest--without forfeiting the abstractions necessary to save the whole affair from sounding like Enya for art school kids. [Mar 2011, p.96]

Celebration represent the Baltimore trio's arty fringe-rock obsessions in sleeker, more resonant forms. [Feb 2006, p.120]

Transcending genre, Interiors is Quicksand in 2017, a time where no one is quite sure if we’ve moved backward.

Its peaks make Whitechapel the band's best album yet by a wide margin. [Jul 2012, p.98]

The end result escalates The Lucky Ones into one of the finest albums Mudhoney has ever produced, as well as one of the best albums of the year thus far. [July 2008, p.158]

This debut will pour plenty of gas in the band's tank. [Nov 2014, p.94]

Hesitation Marks, the new album from Nine Inch Nails, is both business as usual and remarkably prescient.

Philadelphia sideshow punks Man Man have reached a newfound crispness with the production guidance of Bright Eyes' Mike Mogis on their fourth album, Life Fantastic.

The group's ability to layer long, melodic arcs over squibs of dissonance has never been more surgical or soulful. [May 2011, p.92]

Perhaps the only surprise about Violent Waves is how strong and focused, creatively fierce and yet cohesive Circa Survive sound.

There are minor lulls here, but enough highs to majorly please.

Though the songs are certainly longer than on Floor, Oblation actually harnesses greater energy than its self-titled predecessor. It's also tighter, its melodies more confident and stable than Floor, while buzzing along with their familiar, sludgy foundation, Sleep-y, Sunn O)))-y tone and all.

This is as meandering and shoegazing as Sub Pop indie folk gets. [Sep 2001, p.92]

The album's transition between punk-rock madness and mid-tempo melodies keeps Rush To Relax from getting redundant, and while you may have heard this sound before, it rarely sounds this good.

Vital [is] the most we;l-rounded Anberlin album to date. [Nov 2012, p.86]

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

While the album may not move you the way their first album does, maybe it'll just take a minute for the second one to sink in, too. [Apr 2011, p.120]

MacNeil delivers a riveting, throat-destroying performance that owns every moment [Oct 2012, p.88]

Bulldozer lacks outstanding highlights, but is consistently enjoyable. It feels impossibly intimate, guarded and playful, all at once. [Nov 2013, p.88]

In spite of the somewhat dour tone of this album, there’s plenty of musical depth and light to be found throughout.

Keep You certainly reaches for a hefty, developed sense of self beyond the grounding the band's held in contemporary punk, hardcore and emo some years now, but in doing so, it actually strikes the absolute perfect balance, enfolding the listener in honest and cathartic glory while enhancing its edges with just the right effects pedals and auxiliary instruments.

Full of hopelessness and destructive defiance. [Mar 2004, p.94]

This is Iron & Wine's most resolute statement, and what a wake-up call. [Feb 2011, p.87]

Hot Shots II recalls the repetitive excellence of 1998's The Three E.P.'s, with still more chant-like repetition and scarcely a change... [Aug 2001, p.76]

The sound is a little too consistent, as every spastic outburst starts to sound like the last midway through the album. [Apr 2003, p.86]

If the vocals on Electric Sweat were produced as flawlessly as the guitars, and perhaps a different song order were arranged for a better flow, this album could be a retro-rock classic alongside other "hindsight visionaries" like the Vue or the Strokes. [May 2002, p.94]

Has a curiously timeless sense of eclecticism. [May 2006, p.166]

Living With The Living takes steps back to New Jersey, with the sort of big rock 'n' roll, free of subcultural claim, that'd make the Boss proud. [Apr 2007, p.176]

Threads is compelling. [Apr 2012, p.98]

Chasing Ghosts won't win any awards for originality, but this is definitive victory for smart songwriting,, heart, and passion. [Oct 2012, p.84]

The music is--and should be--the primary focus, and that's a quantum leap beyond what they were doing four years ago. Essential.

No new ground is broken, but it's enjoyable, cathartic mosh pit fodder. [Feb 2013, p.88]

Everything that has made Boysetsfire an essential hardcore band since they formed in the mid-’90s fits into the right spots on this new album.

Mike Hranica’s voice is as gut-wrenchingly brutal as ever, too (“Gloom”), and some songs find the band writing music outside their comfort zone.

They're sometimes lost attempting to balance clumsy choruses with fleet fingered flash. At other moments, however they absolutely nail it. [Nov 2013, p.84]

.5 is a fitting tribute to a musician who can never be replaced. [Nov 2014, p.88]

This album aims straight for your hips and doesn't miss. [Dec 2014, p.104]

They've made an undeniably great record that hits the sweet spot between distinction and accessibility. [Mar 2015, p.93]

As elements of dark pop fuse seamlessly with dance beats, Every Open Eye will convert even the staunchest non-believers. [Oct 2015, p.98]

While Turner's penchant for experimentation is impressive, his ability to juxtapose all of these genres without losing his sense of identity is ultimately what makes England Keep My Bones such a grand success. [Jul 2011, p.108]

On Bromst, Deacon's confidence shines through as he effortlessly combines extremes. [Apr 2009, p.142]

Ultra Beatdown is a relentless explosion of power metal serving as a superb master class for fledgling shredders on any instrument. [Sep 2008, p.152] [Sep 208, p.152]

The one thing the album really lacks, though, is an obvious single. While many songs are memorable, there is nothing that suggests any of the tracks have the classic quality of "Juneau," "History," "Streetcar" or "Into Oblivion (Reunion)."

The Go! Team's folluow-up is densely packed enough to make Phil Spector's Wall feel like a screen door. [Oct 2007, p.160]

Their most challenging album to date. [June 2003, p.98]

This is a seminar in how to age gracefully and still rock like demons. [Mar 2004, p.106]

Creatures has a medieval majesty.... Yet such pastoral conjuring doesn't mean the band can't rock. [Aug 2002, p.82]

Unlike most of his contemporaries, singer-songwriter Gough is willing to explore all sorts of styles while allowing himself to be as playful or serious as he wants. [Dec 2002, p.74]

A miasma of retro cool. [Sep 2003, p.116]

As good as anything out there. [Nov 2005, p.220]

The breathable production and quality arrangements allow the band's instantaneously familiar melodies to glow. [May 2010, p.102]

An album that's for neither hardcore hip-hop fans nor punk rockers, but for everyone. [Nov 2005, p.224]

Slowly, Bogart is inching closer to mainstream appeal. [Aug 2013, p.88]