Dent May has a firm grasp on his ukulele, debuting his skill through an adept, kitschy, brief, and rarely but sometimes resplendent album, but he’s still forevermore a novelty.

Though the thesis of this remix album restricts remixers to only one album, the remixers limit themselves further, and seem afraid to do too much more than reaffirm certain dance touchstones already done away with by Weber himself. They've missed the sanctity for the structure.

It regresses to the essence of an increasingly stale sound with a series of second-rate tracks and bored performances. This is co-option at its base; you were a few years too early, Nick.

Problem is, In Space isn’t a Big Star album. Or particularly good, for that matter.

LotusFlow3r achieves nothing so much as reliving the glory and joy of emulation, which is saddened by the image of Prince nudging our shoulders, urging us to relive with him.

The point being that this album isn’t “terrible,” just sort of dull and boring.

This is as fully realized an example of the Friedberger vision that exists, which is why it’s so frustrating that Winter Women never really gets off the ground, or that Holy Ghost wallows in its creator’s own pique.

You wanna hear a mediocre hip hop album with a few decent songs? That’s the T.I. I’ve come to know and love.

Every track on this record grows into some such perfectly orchestrated climax, surging as a function of the production alone and with nary a hook or clever turn of phrase or structural complication in sight.

Sadly, the only true victories on Dumb Luck are Tamborello's own title track and Oberst's "Breakfast in Bed."

I have the distinct feeling I’ve heard most of the songs on this album before. Nothing here is particularly original, and nothing moves me in the way that Gough’s earlier work so did.

This Youth Group record is a diluted version of already watered-down music; not only is it not as good as their first album, I’m not sure it’s as good as Keane’s first album.

Ludacris has created the most uneven album of his career, so frontloaded it might as well be an EP.

Zeitgeist isn't a good record, but it is good work.

Sitek’s technique is, successfully, fascinating and unexpected. But so many purposes and conceits, both avoided and embraced, collide over the course of the album’s eleven tracks that technique simply overwhelms melody and Johansson’s voice both, but mostly whatever it is about the song that Waits nailed to the wall in the first place.

Would be much better if it came with an option to turn the vocals off.

Whether or not Human After All - which of course, has not a single purely human voice in its midst - is supposed to be some great stroke of pop irony or self-reflexive wink is irrelevant. Boring, empty music that thinks it’s making a point is condescending and pedantic.

In all, the languidness of Rules has its own odd charm—since WBA never aspire to be much beyond a wistful dance pop quartet, they don’t fall down the stairs too embarrassingly.

Golden Delicious confronts, rejects, and reinterprets his own past, which simply leaves me longing for a return to it.

Sound[s] less like the work of an actual band than a sterile concoction created by scientists in white lab coats.

Here’s hoping Sweet Sister is the sound of a talented group shaking out some superficial songwriting ideas before getting down to it.

The hook aspires to nothing, and so its nothingness is an anthem for do-nothing/think-nothing slacker types we like to imagine were listening to the Beastie Boys and Nirvana in 1994, but were probably listening to the aforementioned Dave Matthews.

It shouldn't come as a shock that Bionic is not a very good record. What should is that the conversation about how bad it is has become one of the most vitriolic and fascinating conversations pop music has recently provoked.

It's not so much that he's over his head as much as just past his prime, and though his love of creating music that aims to communicate a very simple and honest message is respectable, he's ultimately unconvincing and awkward with tepid melodies, gimmicky guest spots and subpar lead vocals.

The net effect here is that Super Animal Brothers III is the stem of a great dance record with some irony smeared on it, shit-on-canvass style. Sure, it ends up making a statement, but…why?

Mother of Curses feels suffocating: it’s experimental but constrained and bleak but not humanistic or relatable.

Although Pressure Chief isn't a bad album, several of its songs come off like b-side compliation fodder rather than a batch of fresh material.

Weirdly, while each of the songs is too short, the album itself is too long.