With Supermodel, his goal is not to make you like him, but rather to give you a sense of what it's like to be him. He pulls it off, and he throws in plenty of hooks along the way.

As strong as this album is, it’s hard to pick out a standout track.

Lyrically, Louder is rather one-sided, as she often sings about the perils of relationships, over and over, in ways that we've all heard many times at this point. Still, it's a solid effort that shows she has promise as a bona fide pop artist.

The album is loaded with luscious orchestration, motivational mantras and playful sex metaphors. Its taught 10 tracks bring to mind the record Justin Timberlake could have made last year, if he had dared to leave anything on the cutting room floor.

While Lamar dazzles with precise storytelling, Q conjures attention with brusque physicality. Both MCs are aiming for different marks, and although Q's style is too unkempt to produce an album full of clean shots, his misses on Oxymoron are often just as compelling.

[Morello's] contributions feel inventive, versatile and natural, like an extension of the direction Springsteen was already moving in.... Aniello's production work definitely enhances and does not distract from or obscure the tracks.

Once the initial novelty and shock wears off of Beyoncé's impressive stealth-release feat, the brilliance and creative audacity of the album itself can sink in.

Britney Jean, her first album released in her thirties, is a subtle shift away from frantic bangers and into more forthright songwriting.

Midnight Memories, the third full-length from the "X Factor"-formed quintet, follows up on what worked best on last year's "Take Me Home," and tosses in some proficient new ideas to keep listeners eager for the band's continued evolution.

Coherently channeling R&B, techno, disco and rock music as a pop artist while discussing sex, drugs, lust, God, fame and creativity, Lady Gaga has offered fans her most sonically and lyrically diverse album to date.

For the most part, Lavigne's fifth full-length encapsulates everything worth loving about the 29-year-old's long-running artistry.

Clocking in at an hour and twenty-five minutes, Reflektor drags in parts, though it contains plenty of moments (most often in its uptempo, dynamic first half) that sound ready to breathe life into the middling state of commercial rock in 2013.

With a string of hit singles under her belt, Perry has aspired to create a multi-faceted full-length and has consummately succeeded.

How did they do? Very well, to be honest.

Sometimes, the 20-year-old's vision needs to be adjusted, as on the manic French Montana collaboration "FU" and on "Someone Else," which feels like the album's hundredth dramatic breakup song and plays for nearly five minutes. But more often than not, Cyrus' daring attitude guides her to invention.

September has been a profoundly great month for new female vocalists in popular music, but Lorde is easily the most vocally striking and lyrically thought-provoking. Pure Heroine is honest and addictive.

He makes up for the lack of addictive anthems and playfulness with his impressionable stream of sentiments--our kryptonite, his superpower.

This Is... Icona Pop, like Carly Rae Jepsen's "Kiss," may someday be viewed as a full-length that included one pop masterpiece, but that underscores the delectability of the treats Icona Pop has sprinkled around that triumph.

She may be changing direction, but that swagger is still intact.

It allows listeners to refamilairize themselves with the Weeknd's aesthetic, which was striking and singular to begin with.

Ariana Grande's debut LP is a surprisingly varied affair for a 20-year-old Nickelodeon star with a devastatingly strong voice.

What follows is Doris, a slow (rarely rising above 70 bpm), introspective album where Earl Sweatshirt combats pressures when returning to a life of stardom after time spent at a Samoa-based boarding school for troubled youths. 


Singer-songwriters Joy Williams and John Paul White brought in more instruments, added deeper textures and, in general, upped the intensity of the songwriting for their second effort.

The album finds the 36-year old singer trying to take advantage of his newfound spotlight by striving to become the full-fledged pop star he's never quite been.

What's left, then, is a collection of 11 shinily produced pop songs that find Gomez trying on a series of different personalities with her slight-yet-capable vocals.

Bareilles' new album was the result of unrest, but as its title suggests, she has positively embraced her dissatisfaction and subsequently grown as an artist.

The journey of its latest change has been bumpy, but by blending its storied past with the musical present, Queensrÿche's members prove the band as a whole is indeed greater than any one person.

Those looking for vintage soul sounds or even full-on raps from start to finish will be thrown several curves here. It’s an album with numerous emotional layers as well.