Over girl-group incantations, reggae lilt and courageously dinky old-school hip-hop allusions, Gartside searches for his emotional car keys, each comely coo abstracting him further from the truth he seeks. [Aug 2006, p.117]

Creatively cast, bonkers as ever--it’s a bright spot in the Bobby Digital series.

When Caleb evokes God's wrath on the "crucified U.S.A." or describes lost-highway lonelines, the batter-fried U2 atmospherics and portentous Dixiefied grunge makes his worry as real as Brimstone. [Oct 2008, 2008, p.80]

Her dream-cinema tales can meander, but Case’s voice will lay you flat, sure as any storm.

Perkins freewheels through American music traditions—Haight-Ashbury folk ('Hey'), New Orleans brass ('Doomsday'), junkyard blues ('I’ll Be Arriving')--with arrangements as rich as a pawn-shop display.

These are among the most rivetingly unconventional vocal performances she's ever offered. [Mar 2004, p.116]

When these Swedes get whacked by romance, they cushion the blow with a reed-kneed bedroom boogie that shimmies while evoking decades of great escapist groove music. [Mar 2007, p.141]

[Dents] is, by Buckner's standards, gentle. [Nov 2004, p.130]

Their hard-bitten Calvinist worry and storm-a-brewing' guitar tangle feel earthier than most back-to-the-land hipster escapism, especially when threshed out by roundhouse drummer Greg Anderson. [Sep 2007,p.129]

They invigorate brainy pop by adding slight belligerence. [#18, p.134]

The 2005 AIDS-related death of Extra Golden cofounder Otieno Jagwasi shades the follow-up to last year’s rough yet lovable "Ok-Oyot System."

Forth is that rare comeback record--unafraid to show its age, and better for it. [Sep 2008, p.85]

If recession-era Jeezy sounds a lot like boom-time Jeezy--describing coke cooking and the cars one gets in reward—that’s because he has always fancied himself an educator, a Learning Annex lecturer, an inspirational-desktop-calendar hustler.

Their first protest record. [Oct 2006, p.137]

His perkiest album yet. [Sep 2003, p.132]

Aubert’s dude-sings-like-a-lady tenor conjures false hope for a relationship he knows is doomed. SSPU salute misery as a kind of ideal, the opposite of love but just as beautiful.

These B-boys are as forward-thinking as they get. [Oct 2004, p.122]

Panic's cherry-picking yields several good songs, and a few brush up against greatness. [Apr 2008, p.76]

A heartfelt batch of art-pop that never sounds snobby. [Mar 2004, p.117]

The sound matches lyrics about isolation and despair, achieving a freeze-dried catchiness in the opening songs. But by the end of the album, cleverness gives way to the bleak and the drab.

It's like School House Rock for hip kids. [Aug 2006, p.117]

Benefits from a fatter recording budget, with swooping symphonic arrangements and dazzling melodies. [Aug 2004, p.138]

The result is a happy souvenir, best experienced among 12,000 of your closest, Ecstacy-popping friends. [Dec 2007, p.144]

Now and then, the energy lags. But mostly, Sugarland’s shameless mining of VH1 Classic hooks keeps their more tepid tendencies in check.

The Kills have put some machine-generated flesh on their bare-bones style. [Apr 2005, p.123]

Because he clearly aced his Beatles/Beach Boys classes, Noir's elaborately multitracked recordings... make his gentle bitching irresistible. [Aug 2006, p.113]

There's little unity of sound, but more than enough passion and unity of purpose. [Oct 2004, p.125]

Rae's music sticks in your mind like a pleasant scent you wish would linger. [Jun 2006, p.143]

Almost every one of these twangy, homespun gems finds him in the heat of romantic battle--taunting, eviscerating or pleading with a lover or an ex.

Doves' best songs are full of life and genuinely moving, like an older, wiser Coldplay. [Apr 2005, p.113]

Over the top and steadfastly retro, but in a good way. [Dec 2005, p.155]

For years, Smith has excelled in her profession as rock's great heroine; at its best, Trampin' sounds more like leisure time, but it still pays off. [May 2004, p.132]

It's protest music gone gleefully psycho. [Jul 2005, p.122]

From the way gently twanging guitar builds to toxic fuzz on 'Man Made Lake' to the whistling in 'El Gatillo' that nails the stranger-in-town vibe, the band’s best stories are in their music.

Over skeletal guitar and drums, An Horse balance scruffy musicianship with offbeat melodic beauty as Cooper narrates the day-to-day drama of a flailing relationship.

Their sixth album sticks close to what they know best. [Nov 2007, p.153]

Angrier than ever, Bad Religion aim punk's adolescent fury at grownup targets. [Jun/Jul 2004, p.134]

He switches styles and moods nearly every song, but his caramel harmonies and swirling guitars are reliable constants. [Apr 2005, p.113]

Things get almost crushingly heavy, but he fights through his nightmares like he's one spastic stab in the dark from flicking on a night light. [Apr 2008, p.77]

On his solo debut, Bradford Cox sinks, phantomlike, into lush, highly processed arrangements of organ, drum machine and (evidently) whatever instrument is laying around. The disappearing act really can be magical.

Like [Norah] Jones, Mayer never lets his personality talk over his elegant melodies, but unlike her, he has range. [Oct 2003, p.112]

This is dramatic, radio-loving rock primed to outlive the current I Love The '80s infatuation. [Apr 2005, p.113]

Here, he seems more comfortable in his pasty skin. [May 2008, p.76]

Moves seamlessly from ironic cock-rock and steel guitar-kissed hymns to crisply melodic pop and full-on hippie freakouts. [Oct 2004, p.116]

It's quite a feat: crushing, weighty themes conveyed via music that floats in a netherworld a few steps off the ground. [Dec 2003, p.144]

Coldplay barely scratch these levels of exultation and agony. [Apr 2007, p.111]

At once intimate and far-off... like a beautiful broadcast from a room down the hall. [Apr 2005, p.125]

They're fascinated with rhythm, repetition and duplication, like early-'70s German experimental bands Neu! and Can. [Mar 2007, p.136]

As a songwriter, Carrabba is growing: this album shows more melodic and tonal variety than his previous efforts. [#18, p.118]

The band's warm way with weirdness remains; it's just flashier now. [Oct 2005, p.140]

The music is dominated by the same pounding pop-disco beats and thick textures that have defined all her record. But now Lennox sounds like she's been rubbed raw by life. [Oct 2007, p.111]

Most of their songs gallop by in a minute or two, erupting with new beats the moment they start to itch. [Apr 2008, p.83]

The songs are more blustery than ever. [Jun 2007, p.108]

Even the otherworld instrumental 'Oceans of Venus' can’t counterbalance Venus’s ballad-heavy bottom half.

A set of tuneful, atmospheric doom-pop gems that appealingly swirls stiletto-heel beauty and black-leather brawn. [May 2006, p.108]

The music follows in the ruby-slippered footsteps of the first album. [Oct 2006, p.134]

While straying from metal's path, they uphold its legacy of conservative politics. [Nov 2007, p.148]

The doggedly retro approach ultimately muzzles the Noise COnspiracy's radical bite. [Nov 2005, p.136]

Thompson's pure, effortlessly soaring vocals feel undimmed by time. [#9, p.156]

The best songs have concise melodies and a likeable punch. The worst just sound like sketches, riffs a more traditionally ambitious group would have discarded. [#8, p.116]

The bonus disc of dance remixes merely piles another layer of fastidiousness atop the already epically fussed-over tracks. [2007 Aug, p.120]

Think 1993's hit "Regret," but with tougher guitars, rockier grooves and a more up vibe. [Oct/Nov 2001, p.113]

Even though there's nothing new, the album offers enough in the way of big-beat guitar and sing-along choruses to keep Smash Mouth on the charts for another two years. [#4, p.123]

The results range from stupid to sexy to irresistably stupid. [Jan/Feb 2005, p.103]

Occasionally overblown... [Aug/Sep 2001, p.132]

Most of the tracks don't quite rise above their obvious influences, Radiohead and U2. [#10, p.118]

Continues Cash's no-fun, high-literary period. [#15, p.121]

The soundtrack is faultlessly authentic, though you might wish it weren't so damned reverent. [Mar 2004, p.130]

Paired with the Kids’ fidelity to verse/chorus pop, Pryor’s boyishly confident, hopeful delivery can sound pro forma, even mindless.

For an album almost four years in the making, it's frustratingly half-finished, like a series of preliminary sketches. [#27, p.142]

Sits squarely in the middle of B&S's comfort zone: never bad but rarely inspiring. [Mar 2006, p.109]

Exactly zero songs on Spirit come close to matching 'Bleeding Love.' On the album, she fares best when not allowed to overindulge in her sterling voice as on the haunting electro kiss-off 'Take a Bow' and the svelte power ballad 'I Will Be,' co-written by Avril Lavigne.

Occasional flashes of brilliance transcend the deja-vu pastiche. [Apr 2005, p.113]

The songs aren't strong enough to hold the disparate influences together. [#13, p.91]

This Is Not A Test lacks feeling--besides beats, what else what does she care about? [Jan 2004, p.102]

A letdown after Chicken-N-Beer. [Jan/Feb 2005, p.111]

While their new album never thrashes, it at least keeps its pretty bare feet on Mother Earth.

Negativland's chugging cacophony seems a fitting and grisly tribute to human road kill. [#11, p.138]

Split[s] the difference between guaranteed hook appeal and a decent simulation of emotional truth. [Oct 2004, p.129]

The title song is killer, but built of such familiar musical materials that when it comes around the third time, it’s plumb tuckered out. The track is one of three standouts that run over five minutes, and all three are too long.

Unfortunately, the ticked-off one breaks up the most consistently grooving album of his career with too many well-meaning but intrusive conspiracy-minded skits. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.110]

Osborne clearly believes that her love for this material gives her the right to make it her own--which she does, convincingly. [#10, p.125]

Brainwashed suggests that Harrison's last years were largely comfortable, slow-paced and unaffected by any worries about his relevance. [#12, p.144]

An instrument-juggling, one-man-band approach that recalls the romantic, psychedelic pop of the Zombies and the textured electronics of Radiohead.

His flat baritone suggests he’s still new at this whole “getting angry” thing, but the dude’s got the damaged part down.

[The instrumentals are] a curious bonus for his fans, but not much more. [Feb/Mar 2002, p.113]

Singer-guitarist Ryan and Gary Jarman comport themselves ably through these dozen distortion-cranked, rhapsodically sung bits of power pop. [2007 Aug, p.110]

This album about the seamy, scary side of Bushland, conceived after Davies was shot in New Orleans in 2004, is a mixed bag of pointed personal reflection (Good Ray) and facile social critique (Bad Ray).

Some sublime songs prevail over the adornments.

He's got some solid grooves... but a lot of them are borrowed. [Sep 2004, p.136]

Her lyrics drown in anti-gangsta correctives... but her best tracks transcend daily affirmations. [Jul 2006, p.96]

Generally, they’re smart and musical enough to turn rhetorical gestures into convincing rock & roll. But when they subtitle the whole schmear “A Love Vision!” you wonder who they’re trying to kid.

Overly somber. [Aug 2004, p.131]

Only on the album-closing "Summer Never Ends"... do the gals sound like they're relaxed and doing their own thing--not trying to make Paula's Boutique. [Sep 2004, p.140]

It feels like a record assembled by a focus group. [Oct 2007, p.107]

Unfortunately, most of The Eraser is half-finished sketches, dressed up with a few of Nigel Godrich's subtle production tricks. [Aug 2006, p.105]

Her haunting voice is perfect for these downcast dirges. [#11, p.139]

While Eyeball is essentially a breezy gloss on the blend of idiosyncratic pop chops and exotica that characterizes much of the Luaka roster, it's buoyantly lightweight nonetheless. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.106]