Streaming melodies ("Liar"), Sam "Quasi" Coomes' organ ellipses ("Gone"), and the top down, spark-throwing "Conventional Wisdom" rush head-on into the 21st century like Hunter Thompson's hovercraft.

Fans of Calexico's darker, rougher, and more cinematic work will pine for just that, even though the band's clearly evolving on Garden Ruin.

Those farty sounds and the guy with the deeeeeeeeeep voice on "It Overtakes Me" are called "bells and whistles." That's what bands do when they don't have anything to say.

The Loon is an exercise in heavy-lidded ballsiness.

Gone is the glitzy art-punk, spastic freak-out, and unfathomable screaming. Here now instead is simple melody, nasal singing, and familiar songs, which begs the question: Y Control?

Fishscale's tail-end reeks ("Jellyfish," "Big Girl," "Momma"), but then first cuts are always the deepest.

T.I.'s Southern drawl bends pedestrian phrases into irresistible melodies hotter than the summer streets to come.

Born Again in the USA is playful, proggy, and built for black lights.

One expects more from Prince than this "futuristic fantasy."

They've constructed a menagerie of animal references and escape fantasies that encompass acoustic reverie and snappy Motown-like bounce.

Fuses the chavvy charm of working-class Britain to a stream of anthemic, pure pop melodies in the service of pissed and pissed-off youth worldwide.

While Mr. Beast may not sound as fine Happy Songs... or Rock Action, it no doubt kicks ass live.

Demonstrates... that artists are rarely more inspired than when creating for themselves alone.

There's no question Miller can wring plenty of twisted emotion out of tender love songs. He's one hell of a songwriter. Problem is that even when working with uber-producers Jon Brion and George Drakoulias, Miller misses his bandmates.

Ten tracks equal one very explicit diary entry of lust – for life, as much as intimacy – nearly every single line worthy of another song cycle.

Anyone on the fence after 2004's Your Blues need only hear Bejar bark, "I tried to enjoy myself at the society ball" on the luxurious "A Dangerous Woman up to a Point" to see his strength as a songwriter.

Compared to their eponymous EP-compilation debut, Future Women demonstrates more judicious restraint, maturity even.

The Life Pursuit is certainly nothing new in the pop lexicon, but Murdoch's keen observational eye gives these songs vivid life.

It's intimate, home, and it's never felt more comfortable.

Free from the constraints of perfunctory pop structure, Dee funnels seemingly dissonant patterns into pulsing tides of harmonious congruence.

Though the lyrics are light ("Could We") and often banal ("The Moon"), the warm, Mazzy Star minimalism and neon-roots groove are fairly irresistible.

Sennett's lilting accusations resemble buddy Conor Oberst minus the anti-Bush venom, but the homogeneous honesty, resplendent on "Not Going Home," ultimately grows tedious.

Using acoustic country gospel to explore the doubt-ridden downside of faith and her weakness to "my own destructive appetites," Lewis enlists Nashville twins Chandra and Leigh Watson to soften her sharp words with sparkling harmonies.

While Pollard's nothing if not prolific, if ever he needed an editor to cut some passages and refocus others, it's here on From a Compound Eye.

Though the Strokes' first two efforts clocked in at the low- to mid-30-minute range, First Impressions of Earth orbits 52, and definitely should've split the difference ("15 Minutes"). Impressive nonetheless.

An exuberant return to old-school form.

This is Kate Bush's domestic album. Listen to it stoned on a Sunday afternoon.

Seventy-three crack-in-the-earth's-crust minutes liquefy into the same basic miasma as the sophomore LP that inspired them, yet more streamlined, less apt to wander into the ambient dead zones like "Caviglia," a problematic disconnection of the disc's overall forward thrust.