Not quite of this world and not quite over the edge, these earthy, epic songs aren't meant to save us, only to supply some monumental crescendos and a wide-screen view on the way down.

Suffice to say that if you have enjoyed Griffin's repertoire of considered and emotionally precise songs -- as fans from the Dixie Chicks to Solomon Burke to Jessica Simpson have -- you will find your life enriched by "Children Running Through."

Magnificent.

[It] seems like the album the 66-year-old singer was born to make

This easily ranks among the top rock records of the year.

It's untamed, topsy-turvy, elliptical - and one of the most exciting albums I've heard all year.

The result is the best, most cogent album of her career.

This album is not just a revival, but a complete rejuvenation for John Fogerty. It's easily his best solo record, and what makes it so special is that he embraces his swamp-rocking Creedence Clearwater Revival days.

Not content to merely shake up the music industry by releasing Consolers with only one week's advance notice, the Raconteurs have also had the nerve to drop a near-classic album.

On one of this year's smoothest and best discs, Hunter makes The Hard Way go down so easy.

Ten exuberant, tender, casually elegant tracks later you realize - much to your surprise, if you're like me--that the pairing of the grizzled country star and the suave jazz master is an unmitigated, ear-tickling success.

This is a stroke of genius.

Backspacer, the band’s ninth studio album [is] one of its most cohesive and satisfying in terms of brevity, crisp production, and a sharp focus.

This is industrial-strength Beach House with its hallmarks intact, just bigger and better. With co-producer Chris Coady, Legrand and Scally lift some of the haze that has often enveloped their music...now the band has given us this year’s first classic album.

The result is a record that alternates between fuzzy and crisp; those who like to get lost in their headphones should approve.

Much like a riveting movie keeps you in your seat, you’ll want to pay close attention to Joanna Newsom’s astonishing new album for fear of missing too much of the plot.

The album bubbles over with insidious grooves, inventive samples, and lissome rhyming about things frivolous and fraught.

If there's a lesson to be learned from The Way Out, it's that we need little more than the sounds of each other's voices to find comfort--or in the Books' case, to crank out yet another masterwork.

You barely detect it at first, but something miraculous happens on Arcade Fire's revelatory third album. The songs breathe--occasionally in long exhales, sometimes in staccato gasps.

An “anything goes” approach to recording, which included opening up to let his bandmates collaborate on the songwriting, pays off in this captivating collection.

Solo is Iyer's grand statement, and with it he has fulfilled his promise.

The Guitar Song comes grouped in two parts, a "Black Album" and a "White Album," structured, according to Johnson, as a progressive movement from a dark and sordid beginning to a reassuring and redemptive end. That structure isn't always discernable in listening. What is immediately evident, though, is that this is a phenomenal collection of country music.

Everything in Between is a triumphant leap forward from an already solid foundation, and one that cements the duo as one of this era's incontestably exceptional indie-rock acts.

Halcyon Digest is as comforting in its familiar feel as it is startling for its sonic variety.

Anyone who doubted that Green is one of today's most commanding vocalists simply needs to hear how he negotiates moods here and turns phrases with subtlety, wit, and style. Killer stuff.

Maybe it's not surprising that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is so seamlessly his personal best.

Northern Aggression rocks as ferociously as anything Wynn has ever done.

It is an exceedingly agreeable collection of ultra-catchy garage-pop complete with slash-and-burn guitars, wheedling psychedelic organs, gauzy ballads, dollops of Motown stomp, and loads of love laments both despairing and fidgety.

Her latest album marks yet another sea change, a clanging, clamoring work of art that's as disturbing as it is moving. Let England Shake is staggering, from its seasick melodies to its visceral imagery of soldiers falling like "lumps of meat."

Where In Rainbows was mellow but brisk - an album that felt on its way somewhere - these songs are eerie and insidious, creeping like shadows - and, often because of the haunting voice of Thom Yorke, the occasional chill.

The result is Vile's best record to date, an idiosyncratic amalgam of intimate performance and communal expression - and one that continues to reveal new layers upon repeated listens.

Add in a clutch of terrific songs that perfectly balance leader Grohl's gift for pairing earworm melodies with both chunky power-pop guitars and thrashy screamers and you've got the most vital, stem-to-stern enjoyable Foo Fighters album in quite some time.

Steve Earle's stellar new album, produced by T Bone Burnett, takes its name from the final Hank Williams single (as does the multitalented Earle's debut novel, out next month).

The great, and only, disappointment with Rome is that once you've heard the album, you'll want to watch the movie it accompanies. Except there is no movie.

"Emma" was gorgeous in its austerity, but its follow-up is staggering for its vision. Bon Iver's self-titled sophomore release will go down as one of this year's most arresting albums, drunk on its own impressionistic charms and oblivious to anyone's expectations but Vernon's.

It is a stunning achievement in contemporary pop. Yet, unlike so much of contemporary pop, it's timeless.

His latest is the closest he has come to making a masterpiece in a very long time.

The result is a stunning reboot.

A set of 12 songs overflowing with bile and sonic invention.

Apple has been here before, but it makes her new album no less arresting.

Way Down Low, is one of the greatest vocal albums I've ever heard.

Ripe with propulsive tempos, drum machines, and electronic embellishments, the album sounds like nothing else she's ever done.

The Compton MC's long-awaited major label debut is a breakthrough, as he both resurrects and reinvents West Coast hip-hop.

This sensual song suite about the ephemeral nature of love and what it takes to sustain happiness should end up among this year’s finest efforts.

While outstanding songs ("The Catastrophe") stand on their own, this is a song cycle that demands to be absorbed whole.

Trouble Will Find Me is the Brooklyn, N.Y., indie-rock band’s sixth and most deft album yet, a haunted and lugubrious meditation on loss and despair.

Harcourt's fourth album certifies his musical genius with songs that are catchy enough to be plastered all over the summer airwaves, bathing us in sweeping melodies and infectious beats.

These gauzy songs are an ideal fit for Gainsbourg's dreamy, impossibly light voice.

A collection of songs that proves nearly as personal, as socially aware, and as deft at intertwining the two, as was Pulp’s 1998 opus, ‘‘This Is Hardcore.’’

Unlike previous efforts at stylistic hop-scotch, "Phantom Punch" is Lerche's most comfortable album since "Faces Down."

Twee or not, there is a brilliant simplicity to Svanangen's music, though the tunes are never sparse.

Fortunately, the alt-country singer-songwriter’s gifts of soul mining are so acute that the songs — inspired by her mother’s passing and a wrenching breakup — enrich as well as exhaust, and engender cautious optimism.

Call it emo for adults.

The album casts the duo in a new light that may not quite eclipse their former work, but it has set them well on their way.

The album is sophisticated and layered with deft orchestration. And yet, the band's songwriting and delivery display an earnestness and lack of pretension that's pure rock.

Leo manages to skip from tender, unadorned romantic pop crooning to full-throttle punk yowling to Celtic-flavored folk-rock without losing the listener, the beat, or the message.

The music can be enjoyed apart from the story, but either way, this is a must-have for true Cooder fans.

Rarely has spilling one's heart been such a colorful affair.

"Cassadaga"... delivers on the wildly unlikely promise that very young, very gifted artists can grow up without losing their balance.

"23" furthers the group's recent fascination with a sleeker presentation that favors sheen over squall.

Captivating.

Forget about the dreaded decline. Arctic Monkeys have moved from their alarmingly evolved infancy into rock toddlerhood with glibness, swagger, and whip-smart songs intact.

It's classic Nine Inch Nails with a few extra-disturbing flourishes.

Grand conceit aside, "American Doll Posse" is a great art-pop album.

Amazingly, "Beyond" picks up where 1988's "Bug" left off, with only slightly more streamlined polish but with the old love of volume and excess still sweetly intact.

They take prime garage rock and global beats from past works and flirtatiously commingle them to craft a gossamer rock - steady creation.

Far from a compilation of rough mixes and rejects, any of the songs on this disc -- as spare in sound as they are elegant in form -- would have fit beautifully on a mid-'90s Elliott Smith album.

It's fantastic.

Together, they have their tricky, intricate flow intact, and the songs are supremely melodic, sharply arranged to remind you of how tuneful and infectious hip-hop can be.

With nothing particularly unusual to recommend, non-fans will miss out on yet another in a long string of superb collections.

The music? Thrilling as ever.

The album traverses Ray Charles-like country soul, smoky late-night jazz, lush Western swing, and even a bit of Rockpile-style rockabilly.

The foreboding melancholy of "Turn on the Bright Lights" has eroded into a sound that's less idiosyncratic; by design or accident, that broad-brush aesthetic coincides with the band's move from an indie label (Matador) to a major one (Capitol).

The band's sophomore disc, which teems with drama and dark dollops of piano that swarm beautifully around singer-guitarist Tom Smith's clarion-call voice, continues to make good on the hype while again drawing on the past.

From the terrific pulsing opener, "Don't Make Me a Target," to the curt horn and acoustic-guitar stomp of "The Underdog," these wonderfully produced and arranged songs brim with optimism and are pounded out purposefully.

Layers of production can obscure the organic--or at least faux-organic--sounds of a ripping performance. That's not the case on the debut full-length album from French house duo Justice, whose complex, dark, and heavily pop-rock-influenced dance tracks span banging disco grooves to instrumental electro-funk space operas to minimalist hip-hop.

Finding Forever finds Common at his best lyrically, which means at his most basic, bending beats to fit his deliberate delivery.

It's a dark, personal record that holds big promises for the future.

Almost every song is a gem, the lyrics thoughtful and melodies memorable.

The Seattle boy-girl duo of Grant Olsen and Sonya Westcott fashions narcotic, melancholy pop songs that would make the band's influences proud (Neil Young and the Velvet Underground in its quieter moments chief among them).

Even though Khan's music is not yet as ambitious as [Kate] Bush's best work, it has enough arresting moments and unique beauty to suggest that Khan is an indie songwriter and chanteuse to watch.

This time, the energy is clear from the start, giving tracks like 'Heart It Races' and 'Lazy (Lazy)' the momentum to burst into the sonic equivalent of confetti.

For a sophomore effort, Combinations makes for yet another strong debut.

Her vivid miniatures of complicated intimacies and everyday inadequacies slip between the cracks of country, folk, and rock, and they're as graceful as they are unflinching.

Aesop's verbose mike heroics take center stage here, but there's ample creativity to be found in the tasteful and striking accompaniment as well.

These are high-flying songs in search of a place to land, and the warmth and seeming innocence of Pfunder's voice combined with all the familiar electro-disco trappings make this a record worth hearing for anyone not ready to let the past go without a fight.

'Cold Cold Heaven,' the 15th--and last and best--track on "Mentor Tormentor is the kind of cozy hymnal Earlimart does best: a wash of strings, the major-key wail.

Using her piano, guitar, and rhythm tracks as both weapon and comforter, Nash skips lightly from ultra-contemporary hip-hop grooves to jaunty pop melodies that harken back to Motown and the Fab Four, all while retaining a keen lyrical eye for her own sense of joy, doubt, and power.

It's a beautifully composed disc that Harper fans should love -- and it should also convince boomers, especially, that there's still great new music out there.

On Proof of Youth, the samples are made-to-order--Chuck D chips in on 'Flashlight Fight,' and Brazilian artist Marina Vello shows up on the riotous 'Titanic Vandalism.' Precious else has changed.

Wilson's voice has aged; once-effortless high notes stay out of reach. But like a hard-living blues diva who subs soul for sweetness, Wilson makes those whiskey tones work.

The production creates a Joe Henry feel of gently deconstructionist pop--warm and relaxed even as the instruments occasionally struggle against their leashes--giving the album's best material an extra spin.

The bulk of the record follows suit, with straightforward club songs, none too obtuse.

The music is positively spectral, as if she's set up her sound board in the spaces where her absent lover, unborn child, and grandmother used to be.

He's made a better disc as he shows growth and depth. In a surprisingly obscenity-free set, Chamillionaire pays increased attention to the world and its contradictions while setting aim at those who have crossed him.

Meanest is everything you want in a Murphys record and a great inauguration for the band's newly minted indie label, Born & Bred Records.

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.

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.