Saadiq, the former leader of Tony! Toni! Toné! and keeper of old-school R&B flame, delivers a deliciously good set of playful yet engaging songs that nods to the past while sounding thoroughly of the moment.

She applies her ever-mesmerizing mix of vocal heat and instrumental chill to images of longing, falling, searching, raging, and despair on her deeply emotional and soul-stirring fourth solo album, Songs of Mass Destruction.

The tracks are impeccably manicured, super-tuneful, and offer lyrics about the various agonies and ecstasies of love that are unremarkable in and of themselves but reach nuclear-threat levels of desperation thanks to Lewis's voice.

Edwards succeeds in stepping out of the Americana territory where her first three records resided.

It's that sprawling sense of humanity that makes Dear Science such a rich listen.

The songs are bigger, the production is bolder, and Hop Along is more confident than ever, expertly weaving fresh, unexpected elements into its sound.

It is a strong, welcome detour in the artist’s recent discography. Or just call it a return to form since the album is her most satisfying effort in a decade and nimbly connects the dots between Madonna’s various eras and guises.

The band has never sounded more relaxed, with a lived-in confidence.

His second album is confident and hooky, spanning funk and reggae and psych.

Terminology aside, it’s a sprawling, star-studded release, and an impressive achievement--one that signals a new level of ambition for Drake.

Overall, this is a satisfying return to Booker T.'s classic instrumental soul and funk.

It’s definitely more expansive sonically than Monroe’s previous work, which doesn’t mean it sounds disjointed; rather, it comes across as presenting different sides of the same artist.

It’s a short, casual release, so much so that it’s easy to miss just how expertly crafted these songs are.

Ingredients from those progressive forays ensure that the new tunes sound fresh even as the album is marked with such Sonic signatures as artful contrasts and angular arrangements.

Ghost Notes unsurprisingly reflects (and reflects on) the band’s maturity, but retains the confidence and playfulness that made it an alt-rock touchstone.

You can feel the giddy fun Parker was clearly having in the studio.

Deftones frontman Cheno Moreno shows up on “Embers,” but sounds tame next to the recharged Blythe.

A pop album that operates on its own terms, partly thanks to the way the white-hot notoriety of the star at its center allowed her to, after all these years, rule her own pop fiefdom.

All of it's a terrific listen.

The music draws on two decades of musicianship to showcase the indie veterans’ trademark versatility. Anthemic “We Were Beautiful” melds euphoric horns with programmed drum machines; elsewhere, “The Girl Doesn’t Get It” floats its lyrics across a sea of synths. Best of all is delicate opener “Sweet Dew Lee,” on which Stuart Murdoch’s honeyed delivery posits him as the missing link between Simon and Garfunkel.

Berberian Sound Studio is like a notebook filled with a lost love's handwriting.

All of the tracks are produced by No I.D., with a fluid, melodic head-bobbing nod to R&B, giving Common plenty of room to weave his dreams.

They recorded this in James’s studio in Louisville, Ky., and nearly each song has a compelling depth.

There’s enough variety here that you understand why the whole shebang needed to come out--and vintage audiophiles will just about bow down before the quality of these tapes.

The singer-guitarist's mien is again that of a siren dressed in black mourning and white lace, beckoning lovers and loners through the misty moors.

The performances finally have weight, if not depth.

The shimmering War & Leisure, the singer’s fourth LP, finds him operating in a similarly creative groove [as on 2015's Wildheart] but tamping down wolfish eroticism in favor of breezier, tropical vibes.

The Lips return with a moody, industrial, and hypnotic CD that’s probably what Major Tom would be listening to, sitting in his tin can.

This isn't pop music in her sister's obvious, melismatic, and melodramatic mold; rather it's pop music for people who didn't know they were looking for pop music.

Exit, which was mixed and recorded on a laptop, using a popular program called Pro Tools, is a tribute to the unexpected beauty of everyday things.

It's a back-to-basics collection of beautifully sung and arranged tracks emphasizing romance and devotion.

Deschanel comes from the tradition of singers not technically impressive but charismatic enough to cast a spell. Ward’s fretwork is excellent throughout, and it’s nice to hear his voice on a spirited duet of “Baby.”

The veteran duo and its guests are challenging and provocative throughout Born in the Echoes, even as they creatively blow up dance floors.

With such a sweeping sonic palette, it's a pleasant surprise that the record doesn't crumble under its own auspices.

The Boston-accented mash-up of Irish folk and punk is still infectious.

Eraser Stargazer is exactly the sort of album that pushes a local scene to be greater.

With Tassili, Tinariwen reasserts its leadership through a return to roots - setting aside electric guitars and leaving off the female singers who added drive and bustle to previous albums, and going lean and acoustic in sessions recorded under a tent in the Algerian desert.

The King Is Dead is the Portland, Ore., band's most streamlined effort since 2005's "Picaresque," and it's a welcome reminder that frontman Colin Meloy can write evocative songs where the words stand on their own.

Funny, poignant, melodic, and warm, Miller shows that his travels have served him well as a songwriter.

Masterful... this new album marks a return to the pop chops and killer hooks that initially made Wainwright so celebrated.

It’s fascinating to hear how some songs started in one direction and darted into another one entirely.

While it's naive to think PE will ever have the same impact it did back then, there's still too many strong moments on Evil Empire to dismiss it.

Dave Grohl and company have assembled a strong assortment of the band's familiar, well-built tuneage, from muscular rockers and sinuous ballads to good-natured power-pop and riff-heavy radio anthems.

Apollo Sunshine still aspires to create a self-contained immersion experience, an attitude that, more than any particular strain of their dabbling, makes the band a welcome kind of happening.

Refreshed and uplifted. Those are two things that the best pop records leave you feeling, and that's definitely the end result of listening to Manners, the debut album from Passion Pit.

Her latest has a surplus of them [uniformly great songs]. It suggests Cyrus, at 22, has figured out how to present her views in a way that’s still powerful but also musically interesting and cohesive.

Edwards brings on none of the filler that watered down her earlier albums as she moves steadily from scathing to soothing, from rocking country to Gothic sketches, from strength to strength.

As it stands, Stevens’s words drive these songs, and not always in the most linear fashion. Lyrics that meander in unruly metric on the page are parsed into eloquent couplets that, somehow, sound conversational.

Well, there’s no doubt that he delivers with a rigorous, intelligent set, but let’s not go overboard. Attention Deficit proves there’s still room for growth.

That theme stays consistent, but our heroes are far from complacent. Indeed, much credit goes to 7L, whose inventive productions provides cannon fodder for the rappers to blast apart with witty punch lines, clever metaphors, and agile flows.

An impressive array of musicians - Chris Isaak, Brian Setzer, Billy Corgan, Dick Dale - help make it a fitting tribute to Campbell's accomplishments.

There’s true beauty in this disc as Dico soulfully and honestly negotiates her way through the vagaries of love.

Despite comparisons to Bon Iver and Sufjan Stevens, Lee creates folky, orchestral, synth-pop soundscapes that are uniquely his own. Where similar music can sound overproduced, Mutual Benefit has an organic, intuitive quality, more like a hearth-side jam session with friends in a woodsy cabin.

What has marked Tracy Chapman's work over the course of her two-decade career is her emotional intensity and clarity of vision, and both are in evidence on this fine new disc, her first in three years.

Punch Brothers have crafted a deeply meaningful and downright gorgeous record that takes the world for what it is, but doesn’t use that as an excuse to give up.

In other words, classic Guy Clark.

After 34 years of recording, the brothers think it's their best collection yet. Again breaking the artistic rule, they may be right.

Raising Sand is the stuff of which music lovers' dreams are made: an unexpected collision of two distinct but complementary worlds that transcend the sum of their parts to create something unique and mesmerizing.

At first it sounds like scratchy old vinyl, but actually it's the crackle of fire that leads off the warm and sumptuous new album from Brooklyn's Widowspeak.

What drives Super, though, is the duo’s overarching vision, which helps the album flow together like a night at a club: one that Pet Shop Boys exist inside and above, simultaneously.

Country star Keith Urban's sixth release gives lie to the idea that angst is the best fuel for songwriting. On this lean but enjoyable eight-song set, Urban and his fellow songwriters are mostly in high spirits.

Embryonic is not as strange as "Zaireeka,'' the Lips' play-four-CDs-at-the-same-time experiment, but it's up there. On the other hand, Embryonic is completely absorbing. It grows on you in a way that the earlier records simply cannot do.

Sonically, Working Man's Café is also a triumph.

It makes for an often remarkable synthesis of the visceral and ethereal. The nine streamlined, artfully structured songs are patient and less dense, frequently relying on the separation between beats for power.

Less overtly than elsewhere, perhaps, Second Hand Heart still demonstrates Yoakam’s peerless ability, album after album, to graft new shoots onto classic forms.

The songs are meatier and dimensional, emboldened by whirling electronics, taut guitar solos, harder drums, disparate textures and moods, and a lyrical self-awareness that perhaps life isn't just one big basement dance party.

With her second album, "Where Country Grows,'' Shepherd merges her deep-country style with a contemporary country sound, setting a modern groove to her rural Alabama persona.

The pleasures of Is Your Love Big Enough? are unquestionably immediate, but the real excitement is in wondering where her curiosity takes her next.

Real Emotional Trash isn't "Slanted and Enchanted" or "Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain," but hey, you can't have a perfect sound forever. Besides, there are more than enough old-school indie touches here to flash you back to the halcyon daze of '94, or give you an idea what your older sis had on her headphones.

This isn’t a blockbuster--no Drake cameo, no Dr. Dre co-sign--but that’s the beauty of it.

Underneath is crisp, clean, smooth, and smart.

Channel Orange stands strong on its own merits.

Bare Bones is a beautifully slow-cooked album that encourages us to look on the bright side. Not a bad message these days.

Dylan has never sounded more convincing--and any true Dylan lover will have to seek out this album.

As on 2009’s “Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix,” the elite pedigree of these bright, well-mannered Frenchmen shows in their impressive aural plumage.

[Banga] is a classic Patti Smith album in that it mixes pop panache with punk sensibilities and poetic ruminations.

What’s surprising isn’t that the band takes such leaps, but that it nails its landings so surely.

Ultimately, it's the love songs that make the biggest impression on this nicely balanced disc.

The sincere, average-Joe appeal of Just Who I Am--the whole to which Chesney's various personas add up--will likely resonate with fans in the back row of the stadiums he favors, long after all of the records slide down the charts.

The years away may have recharged Staples's batteries, but the music itself sounds much the same, which is a good thing.

The new album, immersed in a soul-funk sound with guest spots from the Stylistics and the Last Poets, is contradictory at times, but the idea of building hope through about an hour's worth of music supersedes any effort to brew controversy.

Canning's effort, however, is a bit of a departure, as he assumes the mostly unfamiliar lead-vocalist role. It suits him well.

With a voice so capable of effecting pathos as the veteran K Records artist’s, the canvas on which it colors is almost beside the point, but while the tone remains largely lachrymose here, there’s extraordinary variety in its musical accompaniment.

Young reignites melodies and lyrics sadly frozen through years of rote recitation.

While there are a few silly love songs in the batch, some of us still haven’t had enough.

Profane, lecherous, loaded with head-trip tape loops and guitars that sound like power tools melting in the sun, this is late-night, howl-at-the-moon-outside-the-punk-club stuff.

When he sings surrounded by a straight-up, horn-fueled electric blues sound ("Tears, Tears, Tears," "My Love Is Your Love"), the results are interesting enough, but when he's accompanied by Burnett's rootsy signatures--ghostly reverbed guitar, gauzy brushed snare, thunking acoustic bass--the effect is mesmerizing.

Platinum is a worthy follow-up; Lambert wrote or co-wrote half of the album’s 16 tracks, which bounce from humid honky tonk to glossy arena stage to rustic front porch with sass and ease.

Pearl Jam’s not just still alive, it’s kicki

Lonely Avenue is musical nirvana for lovers of the deft balance of sassy snark and sincere sentiment.

For a taste of the power of positivity, look no further than Martina McBride's splendid new album, Shine.

A tight set of well-slung tunes that show the elements of a classic quartet outing in nice balance.

It’s the love-struck youth of their typical songs striking out against the disappointment, and, like the album itself, coming out on top.

There’s plenty here--the sinuous “Drunk Like You,” anthemic “Graffiti,” sly “Ship Faced,” and crunchy “Peace Love & Dixie”--to prove the Cadillac Three’s figurative truck has plenty of gas in the tank, its dog still hunts.

Years of Refusal is Morrissey's third album this decade, and it is easily his most vital and engaging and maybe even heartbreaking since 1992's "Your Arsenal."

This album is an extremely provocative effort.

Dylan, as a songwriter, may have lost interest in grand rock-band arrangements but not his sense of melody or storytelling.

Upping the studio gloss, turning the amps up--way up--and reining in their more twee impulses, the Montreal bloggers' heroes unleash their inner beast, growing by taking a page out of their colleagues' playbooks.