Examining the duality of our motivations and emotions elevates Parquet Courts above most of their peers. Not only do they avoid the Vinyl-style embalming of their source material, but the songs transcend the romanticized hipster baggage that the city--and Brooklyn in particular--currently carries with it.

Time Off takes its time getting where it’s going, but deftly reaches its destination.

Once again, The War on Drugs have crafted an album of the year, built not upon flash or novelty, but a new take on traditional rock and roll that is always pushing forward.

With Easy Pain, the trio go full fang on this fourth LP, harkening back to the most extreme aspects of Louisville loudness.

It’s a gorgeous, unreal place that Mount Kimbie evokes on Love What Survives, but dissonance leaks in through the crevices.

There are certainly times when a bit more instrumentation (a cello, some percolating percussion, a lyrical guitar solo) would have enhanced the presentation.

With Adore Life, Savages have built on the visceral, gut-shock impact of their first album with stronger songs and more varied writing. It’s an impressive step up for an already promising band.

Only 8 songs here so they don’t wear out their welcome and know how to keep the fans wanting more.

Whether they’re tearing through a raucous house burner (“Buffalo Nickle”) or serenading in quieter moments (“St. Anne’s Parade,” “This Ride”), Shovels & Rope manage to deliver a nearly flawless record. Yet again.

Cut the World isn't a major new statement from Antony Hegarty, since only one of its 11 songs are new and he's no stranger to using string arrangements. But the material is mostly the cream of his four studio albums.

There's power in these grooves, but there's a message too, and it spells a better day for everyone.

The lack of a rhythmic anchor sometimes gives the songs more free form than they actually need--there’s a difference between playful interchange and self-indulgence. But most of the music simply translates deep musical respect and chemistry into moments of artistic fire and great beauty.

This latest album is still a fair amount bubblier than early works, with the electronic part more prominent than on Mother’s Daughter or Good Arrows, yet it has the same recognizable magic as Tunng’s best work, in hectically complicated arrangements that melt into simplicity and sleek modern surfaces atop centuries-old modalities.

Vile’s drawl communicates isolation with a contradictory urgency. Somehow, Pretty’s spiritual resignation sounds like an invitation.

Chapman’s songs range from bleak to wryly humorous, but they’re dark and lonely at the center, and it’s a pleasure to hear him in such good company, for once, and not alone.

The whole project is haunted by mournfulness and death. And that of course suits a Nico tribute well.

The raw, mellow, hip-hop, electronic, jazz infused solo return of Neneh Cherry is an enjoyable ride; some songs are immediately addictive while others slowly become more appealing after several listens and sonic osmosis.

Call it a comeback. Call it a rebirth. Welcome back Barrence. Dig Thy Savage Soul rocks.

Populated with smartly crafted, passionately performed songs, No Way There From Here stands as Cantrell’s best work to date and leaves the listener hoping that she doesn’t take as many years to make do her follow-up album.

These are songs that brush up against you softly, swirl up around you like a sweet smelling breeze and leave you wistful for things you can’t quite put into words.

What he does best is craft heart-string cautionary tales.

The easiest way to say it is that there’s no barrier between despair and euphoria in these songs--which contain both, equally, simultaneously and without contradiction.

There’s a Bluebird in My Heart is the sound of a great artist coming back home.

The Next Day is complex, pissed off and crafty.

The level of familiarity turns out to be one of the records strong suits, and something that distinguishes it from the Bragg/Wilco records.

This is the third album Stuart has done with this band, and they continue to find surprising and delightful ways to rev up Stuart's performances.

The Alvins don’t tamper with Broonzy’s basic template, and truth be told, their feisty renditions of “All By Myself,” “Key to the Highway,” “Big Bill Blues” and practically every other song on this set sound as if they’re of a vintage variety.

It’s hypnotic in and of itself, and all impressions are purely in the ears/mind of the listener.

Bellowing Sun is one of Fennelly’s best and most brightly colored albums yet.

Ambitious and inviting, Siberia puts Polvo in a more accessible place while remaining faithful to its artistic vision.

With Tarpaper Sky, he can clearly claim one of the finest albums of a sterling 40-year career.

Ivy Tripp is more of a “This is what I can do,”’ album, worthy enough, and intermittently excellent, but not as shocking, not as eye-opening, not as much of a sock in the gut as the predecessor.

With her almost stream of consciousness talk-sing, some melodies on Somewhere Else are better formed than others. Like Patti Smith her songs can be as strong ultimately as the care invested in her hooks.

His vocals are delivered with such breezy casualness, you almost miss the poetry in the words. Pair that with the brilliant musicianship and it’s simply confounding that Bare and his band aren’t as big as groups like Arcade Fire and My Morning Jacket at this point.

Researching the Blues is a goddamn gem, crackling with energy, that totally celebrates the pure bliss and joy that rock 'n' roll can, and should be. In short, it's everything that you were hoping it would be.

Northern Passages shines as yet another jewel in their crowning achievements, setting hope against hope, that it’s follow-up won’t take as long to arrive next time.

Unison chants (“Kaani”) and stray bursts of percussion (“Nouvel”) punctuate the multi-lingual songs, but the dominant timbre is a delicious, delirious clang.

The lift-off and liberation come subtly, bearing the masterful marks of men who've learned the value of compositional patience (it's no coincidence that Cave and Ellis have also forged a successful partnership as film scorers). This, ultimately, makes the emotional devastation you experience once the record has spun all the more remarkable.

He knows exactly how to build and sustain interest in a song, even the ones that don't hit you over the head with obvious hooks.

SB makes hermetic/occult music by design, made to appeal to cults and that’s what makes them so proudly unique. Nevertheless, here’s hoping that next time, their ambitions include stretching out their songs and their ideas stuffed inside each tune.

Pushin’ Against A Stone is an impressive calling card to the rest of the world that this, until now, under heralded artist is both an adept student of American folk music traditions and a modern day practitioner with perhaps preternatural talents.

This is a very enjoyable round-up of shoegaze, shoegaze influenced and vaguely-similar-to-shoegaze bands, including some material you’ll know well and some that will likely be less familiar.

The music is superb, but it’s Mead’s subtle, witty lyrics that really take center stage on this record (like all his previous solo offerings).

This isn't the sound of a once-renowned band trying to cash in on their glory days; it's the sound of a band invigorated.

Jurado still seems fully intent on liberating his music while evading expectation.

Though there are still plenty of the Fleet Foxes-meets-Beach Boys elements to much of this new record, it also finds the band branching out with new sounds.

If your idea of African music is Paul Simon playing out his colonial lord fantasies amid a bunch of syrupy melody and chipper rhythms, well… this note’s for you. And there are some surprises awaiting.

Though only nine songs long, Saturn’s Pattern is as close to heavenly as Weller’s ever been.

Lyrically, the album is pretty mediocre, but the band has always seen their playing overshadow the words; Black Beehive is no different.

Devour is a completely impressive collection from start to finish.

Buy It’s Her Fault, a 12-pack, then enjoy the ride.

Berkeley To Bakersfield is the perfect shotgun rider for any road trip. With the breadth of its variety no other music passengers need be invited along for the ride.

He's a vibrant and, indeed, impassioned performer and Bad Ingredients is filled with enough passion and conviction to spark an entire orchestra. And a rousing ensemble at that.

Manipulator represents a defining statement from a musician that should enjoy a long, healthy career to come.

Why Make Sense revels in ‘80s dance, R&B, hip hop and pop throughout straddles between sheer musical delight and melancholy as the upbeat music balances earnest lyrics.

Though solid throughout, without hooks like the best ones on Goes Missing, Untouchable suggests the more random approach suits Kelly and his fans better.

For a primer in what went right in the ‘70s prior to punk and hip-hop, you won’t find many LPs as successful at recapturing the diversity of those rich sonic playgrounds as Mangy Love.

These nine songs are dusty and determined, stoic ruminations on hard luck and happenstance.

Like its MCA spiritual predecessors, Modern Country shows what a great musician can do when he decides his skill is the least important part of the package.

Lullaby and... The Ceaseless Roar is the all-encapsulating masterpiece we all knew Robert Plant the solo artist had in him the entire time.

Country Funk II is an archivist’s delight.

Sweeping and stirring in its emotional depth, Sing the Delta happily finds DeMent testifying to her beliefs with feeling.

The last song, a sparse electric guitar ballad, identifies another dualism: it's called "Get It Wrong, Get It Right," and like most of the rest of this unsettled album, it gets it right.

It may not carry quite the swagger of Sweet Apple’s first album, but The Golden Age of Glitter still proves to be shiny indeed.

Here’s an album from guys who have been making trouble for more than 20 years, and if they haven’t gotten better behaved with time, at least they’ve gotten better at it.

It’s not as bleak as it may sound, though--there is freedom and catharsis in the acceptance of those human traits, a key element in Eve.

Unseen alludes to The Handsome Family’s darker realms, but the beauty it boasts is so unerringly mesmerizing, it begs repeated hearings simply to soak it all in.

While there are some great intimate moments (especially the beautiful “Wayward”), ultimately that lack of a more consistent balance between upbeat and slow tempo drags the album down a bit.

Though not as visceral as previous outings, WIXIW has its charms.

Regardless of the narrative you attribute to the running order of an album after listening to this record, I felt as if I had genuinely experienced something groundbreaking, elemental, and thoroughly thought-provoking.

The music that survived war, immigration and poverty flourishes even among the hipsters, a happy ending for a tale of struggle.

She long ago proved herself worthy of the family legacy, but Carter Girl would be a highlight of her substantial discography regardless of familial stamp.

Dire and descriptive, You Can’t Go Back If There’s Nothing To Go Back To numbing melancholia is uncommonly compelling.

Consolidation more than innovation, The Glowing Man still presents the current incarnation of Swans in its best light, as if this is the record the band has been working toward these past seven years.

Almost by accident, it seems, you can hear memory, skill and poetry converging in a lonely kitchen with a baby sleeping nearby.

Williamson’s voice is arresting, a haunted amalgam of Karen Dalton and Tanya Donnelly, but don’t it distract you from her very fine guitar work.

A sense of quiet triumph pervades: this may be the prettiest Mountain Goats album yet.

That's the modesty and humility typically missing in all those acclaimed geniuses. But it's precisely what allows Henry access to the truths that make his songs unforgettable.

Scholarly stuff this, but also an intriguing reinvention that makes this an ideal marriage of folk and finesse.

It’s obvious that a trip up to Memphis was just what the doctor ordered, as it most certainly has injected a new, creative energy into the band. Of course, the chemistry imbued by the helping hands and producer were significant to the end product.

Sweet Heart's melancholy tunes are still grand, their orchestras soaring and their choruses rousing, even Phil Spector-orian in the epic kink, but they're more tightly wound than on previous efforts.

Bradley and his band are such great interpreters and expanders of the soul tradition that you don’t mind the nagging feeling that you’ve heard these cuts before.

More studio sympathy and less technical trickery might've made The Bravest Man in the Universe a minor classic.

The album opens, confusingly, with an electro-funk groove that becomes a trippy, multi-vocal chorale. Most of what follows is sprightly power-pop with psychedelic touches, dreamy asides and occasional dance-club thumps.

An unassuming venture, but capable and well executed one regardless.

Votolato’s new album, inexplicably titled Hospital Handshakes, offers yet another example of his considerable skills, a collection of songs that fires up an urgency that extends from first song to last.

Whenever they appear close to becoming unhinged, that rowdy, reckless approach is even further affirmed.

There’s no need then to furrow well below the surface; with Waffles Triangles & Jesus, White’s reconciled mischief with melody with exceptional results.

The 14 tracks here rank among some of the best Bird's ever done.

There's a dose of the otherworldly in these evocative tracks, but laced, in all but a few cases, with recognizable bits of ordinary life.

Singer Brittany Howard’s vocals are as pliable as ever, a high pitched squeal one moment, an irascible growl the next. Yet, in this case, it’s the band--bassist Zac Cockrell, guitarist Heath Fogg and drummer Steve Johnson--that have evolved most this time around, providing a shifting set of circumstance varied in both tone and texture.

This is one of the best albums of the year.

Both revealing and resilient, Spring and Fall could be deservedly called an album for all seasons.

They’ve been in the long-form, drone-and-drift mode for a while now. It’s nice to hear them rock out a little, too.

The overall mood, however, is thoughtful and somber: unlike You Are Not Alone, this is a contemplative late-night album rather than a celebratory Sunday morning one. It’s wonderful.

The sounds that seem most real and certain disintegrate as you listen to them, while the ones that might be an illusion drift into proximity, obscuring all else.

Though he avoids dissonance for its own sake, Bleckmann amazingly never descends into treacle, nor does he indulge in the usual nonsense syllables of typical scat singing. Instead he forges his own distinctive path on Elegy, taking the concept of the human voice as instrument to new and shimmering places.

These 12 songs run a mere 33 minutes, but cover a lot of musical and thematic territory.