Aside from grand moments like "All Hands on Deck - Part 1: Raise the Sail" and the orchestral wall that builds on "The Sweetest Wave," you don't get the feeling that a continuous story binds the album together.

These songs simply don't stack up to their predecessors.

The group has abruptly cashed in a good deal of its personality for an unflattering, generic modern-rock sound.

The band tries to stretch but trips over its own convictions.

"The Good, the Bad and the Queen" seems to be waiting for a payoff that never materializes.

Things start out strong... [But] the rest of the material is basically an easy-listening version of the band, with vocals weak enough to be distracting and an over-reliance on multilayered, kitchen sink production. [20 Aug 2005]

It is hard to hear much difference between each cut. [24 Sep 2005]

It simply isn't his best work.

The music fails to gain any momentum until track seven, and by then, Train's lucky the listener's still spinning the CD.

Despite hitmaker Linda Perry co-writing half of the album's original tracks, something is missing.

Aside from a few catchy club tracks, there is nothing all that exciting about Chingy's third album.

If crude tales of incest, child abuse, drug abuse and just about every other type of abuse are your thing, then... "Hannicap Circus" is for you.

Taking no risks, "Nightcrawler" shows little growth and makes one wish for the morning after.

Beyond a few faster songs ("Paper Jesus," "Falling"), the album gets lost in its own blandness. [13 Aug 2005]

Overall, worth a spin or two, but one hopes there's a better stash left to sample. [16 Dec 2006]

Snow Patrol suddenly sounds like a cross between Goo Goo Dolls and Train.

He talks about the fire he used to possess without rekindling those flames.

Barenaked Ladies play it straight with mixed results...

Paint-by-number grooves, coupled with nonexistent hooks and forgettable melodies, do not result in an album that requires repeated plays; that is unfortunate, since a few Timbaland-produced tracks demand just that.

16 songs of stalwart Stones riffs that almost compensate for generally embarrassing lyrics. [10 Sep 2005]

This song-by-song re-creation of Judy Garland's iconic 1961 Carnegie Hall performance, staged there by Rufus Wainwright in 2006, seems better-suited to a cabaret act.

An uneven collection of synthesized experimentation that relies too heavily on familiar and cliched electronic tricks to sound original.

A gigantic step backward.

While there's not necessarily a bad song to be found, Gough is capable of much more than the pretty yet bland compositions that dominate "One Plus One."

Too often his songs fail to captivate beyond a curiosity factor.

Live has settled too comfortably into the skin of a middle-of-the-road rock act. [17 Jun 2006]

"The Return of Dr. Octagon" suffers from the classic case of "too little, too late."

Things hover uneasily somewhere between wholesale reinvention and mere superstar vanity project. [28 Oct 2006]