A good mix of weird pop and airy singing and good beats. [#24, p.92]

But without a doubt the change on White Chalk is steps beyond those we have seen from PJ in the past, which makes one question her intent.

Dulli and Lanegan, two of today's greatest underappreciated frontmen, are hypnotic; narcotic. [Winter 2008, p.96]

While Auerbach may or may not be keeping anything removed from sight, what he's revealed so far will keep us coming back for more. [Winter 2009, p.92]

Pajo clearly knows how to tinker without overcrowding, losing or insulting the pleasant, acoustic backbone of his songs. [#16, p.91]

Chvrches and Mayberry have a weirdly mannered way with smartly penned romanticism.

Super Taranta! cements further the untouchable status of Gogol Bordello.

Goddamn if the entire mess doesn't sound great. [#12, p.93]

Largely favoring grayscale tones and sedated sentiment, Lower Dens' highs achieve with an understated ability to evoke emotion.

Manages to artfully encompass all that sucks about post-pubescent life... within an exquisite ball of heady poetry, cold composition, and the kind of warm brilliance that comes from only the most inspired of collaborations. [#15, p.96]

The result is a vibrant 13-song album that is overlaid with chanted lyrics that sometimes turn dull.

The Con is a startlingly dark, yet characteristically vibrant offering, featuring a band that’s learned to harness the energy-highs, while tempering pretty (even pastoral) pop-folk with a new, deeply-affecting brand of melancholy.

Unlike Cave, who drags all those poor characters of his down into that gruesome purgatory he calls a soul, Calvi simply lays hers unabashedly bare before us. Never have the aesthetics of doom been called to the service of so much exuberance.

An unflinching major label debut, as well as a straight rock album that straddles confidently that tricky space between rawness and posturing. [#10, p.95]

Yet another firework-filled post-modern work of true art. [#24, p.89]

Although it perhaps lacks the wasted acrobatics and distracting volume that populates today’s popscape, Give The People What They Want nevertheless reminds us that it’s both range and heart that helps compelling soul music survive both a century of cynics and existential close calls.

Many songs here warrant praise, but those spontaneous wild riffs have sadly been sacrificed, along with a bit of singer James Petralli’s gnarled, impassioned bite.

For the most part, the popping bass and booming horns keep Ya-Ka-May simmering smoothly, refelcting NOLA's rich musical history while still manageing to sound unmistakably out of this world. [Winter 2010, p.98]

Listening to the record as a whole is sort of like meandering through an exhibit of miniature, spasming wire sculptures.

A charming if adolescent collection of bubblegum harmonies and none-too-complicated pop. [#17, p.101]

Silver Age [is] his strongest, most searing collection of songs since Sugar.

This is stately, gentlemanly music--the sound of aging gracefully.

Borrows the Afghan Whigs' ballsy romanticism, Velvet Underground's late-night cool, Peter Gabriel's raw passion and a few post-punk riffs for good measure. [#17, p.100]

May be one of their best. [#5, p.90]

A beautiful album with an amniotic vibe, Dive can be a bit repetitive.

{Awayland} tends to feel without reason or necessity, as if thrown together more in effort to get something down than to say something that needed saying.

It's simply one of the best rock records of our so-far shallow year.

The brevity is a disappointment and the songs at times feel like B-sides of something more un-inked, but Radiohead are (and definitively always will be) musicians capable of emotion at the rawest base and somehow binding it to melody and lyric-forever haunting and influencing future generations too numerous to count or imagine.

Awash in trippy reverb and surf-rock riffs, Arabia Mountain is further proof that the Lips have matured.

It's everything we love about Blackalicious, but with a little more neo-soul vibe than we're used to. [#17, p.94]

Amidst the fuzz and noise, Segall has turned out a raucous blitz of an album that deserves your play, if it doesn't break your speakers first.

While Breaks takes a few tracks to pick up traction, Bachmann's true grit comes through.

Our six-string savior not only makes his guitar do things that will have you forgetting that Page and Plant are never to take to a stage together again; he is also keen to remind us in just whose hands now rests that Hammer of the Gods.

Visions refuses to rest on its laurels.

While On the Water may be a slow burn, the album grows only richer upon second and third listens.

when given the space, the music is alternately compelling and peaceful; unfortunately, the words get in the way.

The channel still churns on Swing Lo Magellan, but Longstreth has built sturdy songs with solid foundations here, trapping his confusion in a container.

As Anthem's zithers, pump organs, oil drums, and tibetan singing bowls thrum like summer insects, scientists and spiritualist alike can't help but bow to these haunting paeans to America's heartland. [Summer 2009, p.100]

Oneida have blossomed into a welcoming landscape all their own. [#21, p.102]

The 19-year-old’s sound combines retro folk with elements of Britpop that’s as raw as it is original, which equals one of the more exciting debuts in some time.

They maintain the patient emotional tone that has drawn fans to their music over the years while refining their sound into something even deeper.

This is My Morning Jacket's shining moment. [#22, p.94]

Shield's stark and shimmering shoegaze guitars expand and contract like colossal organs under Smith's chameleonic spoken word. [Summer 2008, p.97]

Furr's tight structures and stripped bones soar. Not that they've abandoned that record's ["Wild Mountain Nation"] sonic spectrum entirely; there's plenty of buried headphones treasures throughout, and they still steal gleefully from your parents' best records. [Fall 2008, p.92]

Their most realized album yet. [#15, p.101]

Think Aqualung on codeine, sans flute, swapping vagrants for couch potatoes.

The entire album segues from one loopy thrill to another. [#15, p.100]

A proudly odd hybrid always on the edge of destruction. [#25, p.104]

A remarkable work overall, Swanlights proves-yet again--that this odd duck has always known true beauty.

Wenu Wenu is a jubilant seven-track song suite that showcases the genre’s rhythmic and lyrical versatility.

When the band shines, it reaches stunning heights. [#22, p.102]

What Cymbals Eat Guitars does best is to constantly toy with the highs and lows of song construction: soft, loud, acoustic, reverb, shout, cymbal or guitar.

Their most triumphant mix of fuzzed-out fury, face-melting fretwork and merry-but-messy melodies.

On Son, Molina's electro-acoustic compositions have grown from the artful backdrops of her first two records into nearly sentient stand-alone creations. [#20, p.92]

The band’s self-titled fourth record takes only seconds to signal the triumphant homecoming of the guitar.

The feel is melancholic and reflective, despite being punctuated by a few uptempo tracks, but the urgency of Sheff's vocals and rich, layered arrangements make I Am Very Far both fascinating and memorable.

Polvo hasn't failed to enrapture like the old school on this comeback release. [Fall 2009, p.95]

A welcome noise to these mandolin and Simon & Garfunkel–influenced days, Lost Songs is anything but: muscular songwriting, enviable melodies, ferocious playing, dazzling production.

As on 2004's Last Exit, their arrangements are deftly drawn, precisely executed and drenched in pretense-free pop. [#22, p.96]

The challenging but exceedingly rewarding Biophilia is at its heart a deeply moving, mind-expanding tribute to how that most ineffable of human achievements.

Runner is The Sea and Cake's most unusual album, in spite of being so rhythmically conventional, and altogether gorgeous.

Hold Time marks Ward's third, and best chance to skip the three-peat pattern for sneaking under the radar with his name near the top. [Winter 2009, p.92]

No More Stories... glitters with ethereal beauty and optimism that has been absent on Mew's prior releases. [Fall 2009, p.91]

With Taveniere choosing to feather dust his Rear House recording tendencies for this go-round, Bend Beyond comes off as a bold, bright statement.

The best live music doesn’t attempt to just mirror the recordings, but expands upon them, highlighting a performer’s chemistry with the band and audience. When Waits does that, the illusion works; when he doesn’t it’s like seeing the cards tucked up a magician’s sleeve.

The xx has refined its sound, creating an even sparser atmosphere. But there is strength in this minimalism.

Has everything we've come to expect from Leo: it's clever, earnest, wry and literate, all delivered with his trademark falsetto flourishes. [#13, p.100]

In comparison to... Ta Det Lungt, Tio Bitar trades much of the immediacy for multi-dimensional empiricism and fringe atmosphere. [#25, p.98]

4 shows Dungen has a vision unmatched in music today, and an album their larger peers in rock experiements could only dream of producing. [Fall 2008, p.94]

Album is an astoundingly good record in its own right, but the omni-directional growth showcased on Father, Son, Holy Ghost is nearly overwhelming.

A seeping, heaving summer album through and through.

Banhart's most straightforward recordings yet. [#17, p.94]

Pedestrian Verse is an album made up of melodies, lyrics and verses that are completely, well, pedestrian.

The group's music is ghostly and ethereal, creating a sonic wall that is set against some of the lovelist, shimmering retro-electro-disco you've ever heard. [Spring 2008, p.102]

The fearsome, intellectual vitality of her funk-metal-electro freak-outs would surely put any teenager to shame.

There's not nearly enough of Aesop living up to his impressive talent.

Exploding Head is another raucous ode to My Bloody Valentine meets The Jesus and Mary Chain shoegaze. But that’s what’s indicative about this band--although its references are often cited; Exploding Head has that passion needed in reinvigorating a sub-genre.

FUZZ is commanding and infectious--this could be the project Segall was born for.

Cyclone might lack the raw beauty of her last project, but Case's emotional honesty is surely a sign that more meaningful transformations are in store. [Winter 2009, p.92]

Drenched in echoed vocals and layered synth lines, Howlin maintains an incredibly optimistic, carefree tone.

Comprised of tracks recorded with Rick Rubin right up until Cash's death in late 2003, American VI is a fitting send-off for the Man in Black.

Blessed certainly isn't a curse, but it doesn't exactly leave you feeling a higher power, either.

Not for the fainthearted or short of attention, several of Psychedelic Pill's tracks drag on--wildly and intoxicatingly, of course, so there's little room for boredom to set in.

A beautifully wrought collection of ballads for the brokenhearted. [#11, p.96]

Despite their penchant for over-the-top tribute, Kings of Leon recycle classic rock 'n' roll with such earnestness and ebullience, that it's hard not to sing along. [#6, p.88]

They've certainly found a solid niche with the Big Star/Byrds bubble and pop. [#16, p.91]

Gone are the fun hooks of [Nixon], and the genre jumping majesty of 1999's What Another Man Spills. [combined review of both discs; #9, p.108]

Get Color may not be as revelatory as its predeccessors, but its slight merits gradually ooze into the wounds it so fiendishly creates. [Fall 2009, p. 102]

Stainless Style is a head-scratcher that should heat up the club just fine. [Winter 2008, p.94]

One long ridiculous story/art project gone horribly wrong. [#19, p.92]

Where do these ever-evolving Portlanders go from here? It's anyone's guess, but their latest effort sends them off in the right direction. [Summer 2009, p.106]

A poster child for all things 1970s, Friedberger’s obsession with the decade colors the album with a breezy charm.

While his latest may not be as triumphant as his debut LP, Shallow Grave, The Wild Hunt is a worthy effort indeed.

The electronic wizardry is impressive, but it’s the entrancing vocals of this record that will keep you coming back.

A brilliantly subtle string section and sparkling production make this walkabout even more visual and complex. [#17, p.102]

The Stills manage to sound quite a bit like Wire Train or House Of Love, all jangly, mournful guitars and sparkling melodies... oh, and lots of reverb. [#8, p.106]

An astoundingly complex, deeply evocative pop record. [#13, p.98]

Supernature will not assist you in unlocking life's great mysteries, but for a good bout of fashionable rutting, well... [#19, p.90]