Starting Over finds Stapleton not only maintaining his momentum, but also opting for diversity as well. While his influences are as obvious as always, he breaks out of the Southern rock mold he established early on.

[Kevin Barnes] sounds like he’s gotten more comfortable here, and while that doesn’t always make for the best music, in the case of Of Montreal, it resulted in one of their best.

A fine comeback by any measure. Some 60 years on, the Stones are rolling as effortlessly as ever. Welcome back, boys.

Overall, the hardest part about listening to Noah Cyrus’ The Hardest Part is turning the album off.

His singing partners, all of whom bring their “A” game. They help make what could have been a forgettable, tossed off, commercially driven, contract fulfilling item into one of the singer’s more memorable projects. And with a catalog as rich and deep as Van Morrison’s, that’s high praise indeed.

Living in a Burning House‘s 13 songs pay tribute to his influences without sounding like any of them.

The reunion was a long time coming and exudes the tasteful sophistication and sympathetic camaraderie you’d expect from this pair of veterans reveling in each other’s presence.

U.F.O.F. is a beautiful album, but one that finds Big Thief a little more willing to push their limits, both in terms of abrasiveness and grace. Perhaps Big Thief are no longer a secret, but they continue to draw the listener ever closer.

Joni Mitchell is working in a basic acoustic folk idiom here, albeit with some wonderful compositions. While the “buyer beware” warning isn’t needed since the contents are clearly noted in the box’s title, suffice it to say this is geared toward historians, hardcore folkies and/or Mitchell fanatics; basically those willing to fork over nearly $60 to explore her musical back pages.

Silver Tears is an achievement that would make any singer-songwriter proud.

Why it took ten years to craft is unclear, but if this qualifies as a comeback, The Hives have returned with a thunderous buzz.

What Happened To The LA LAs is a bit different, though hardly so different as to alienate its core fan base.

Western Stars is erratic in the first half, as Springsteen’s need for exposition sometimes grinds uneasily against the sweep of the music. But the second half is a profound pleasure. ... It makes you wish that Springsteen could dash off an album full of such country songs. Until then, Western Stars will have to do, and it does just fine.

With Earth to Dora, Everett adds another emotionally edgy chapter to his artistic and spiritual journey that existing fans will appreciate, even if he still does need Novocaine for the soul.

There aren’t many surprises on My Way, but that’s unimportant. Nelson’s in terrific voice, he clearly loves the material and delivers each of the 11 tracks with beautifully nuanced authenticity.

Few acts inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, as Cheap Trick deservedly was in 2016, are cranking out music as fresh, honest, energized and explosive as these guys have released in the past two years.

This long-awaited comeback of sorts for Cooder is a joyful, intense and occasionally humorous experience that any Americana fan will enjoy.

Even if the sound is perhaps slightly slicker than fans might expect, Redemption & Ruin is a wonderfully successful foray that solidifies and expands the band’s already impressive credentials around a concept that’s a natural extension from their existing catalog of originals.

Dude, The Obscure gets stronger as it goes, its second half filled with laments both specific (the complaint about a big-city wannabe in “NY”) and vague (the overarching malaise of “Lit By Midnight”).

This tribute may do a better job of conveying Clark's power than his own recordings.

With Goodnight Rhonda Lee, Nicole Atkins gets all the pieces to fit. The singer may not have been made for these times, but she creates a defining portrait of an artist whose grasp of the past creates ageless, enduring music for any year.

This is another compelling example of Lavette's finely tuned interpretative talents taking songs to places you might not have imagined.

Save some production switch-ups, 1989 (Taylor’s Version) doesn’t provide too many revelations, but that is the point. Moreover, we will have the Vault Songs on repeat until we are gifted even more new music from Swift.

Kamikaze is another solid entry in a catalog that’s put So So Glos in a league with fellow punk rabble-rousers Titus Andronicus and Joyce Manor.

With guest artists like '60s organmeister Booker T. and Americana legends Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings, Jones and Johns have made a real statement in the same way that Rubin, and of course T Bone Burnett, do almost every time they produce an album. That statement is that the same people who set the bar decades ago for so many of today's acts to measure up to are still making a lot of today's best music. Praise and Blame raises that bar just a little higher.

The crooning background vocals rise and trade phrases with a simple guitar solo that follows the melody of the main vocal line. It's a flush and full sound in perfect pairing with a sentiment that defines the entire album.

A Treasure is full of little disclosures like that, deeply personal without being confessional, engaging without trying to be, and revelatory because of his small observations and his uncommon insight into ordinary detail.

Inclusions is a thoughtful and thoroughly imaginative album about what a huge and complicated undertaking it is to truly relate to other human beings, what with all our mismatches in expectations and differences in background, experience and belief.