True Love is at times haunting and ecstatic, memorializing Erickson's long history while swaggering into a shaggy kind of hope.

Any doubts that the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are a band for the ages are wiped from the face of the earth three fragile piano chimes into 'Runaway,' one of the most epic and heart-ripping mediations on loss and loneliness ever. [Sprin 2009, p.91]

Solo, Ramsey doesn't need suspense to conjure beauty; just riff like The Byrds and sink serenely into the grass.

The aptly titled Brothers isn't just another Black Keys album; it's the musical product of a cohesive symbiotic partnership. [Spring/Summer 2010, p.103]

This album has the beauty of controlled chaos, it's emotive yet carefree and secure. [Spring 2009, p.103]

Every album tells a story and, thankfully, Wolfe’s story changes all the time, a morphing type of self-expression with completely pure intent.

It retains Califone’s signature continuity effect--with slowed acoustic guitar and droning, industrial electronics--burning a 50-minute album into a grand, cinematic waft.

Boldly, magnificently, unabashedly sappy. [#12, p.104]

Banga finds the artist more robust than ever-ageless, even.

The closest cousin to Odd’s sound is M83, but siphoned through the American ghetto instead of the French countryside. [Filter Mini, May 2005, p.16]

With Siberia, their first effort in four years, they’ve reversed their polarity, finally hardened into simple, elemental rock goodness.

While not as fresh as Happiness, Love is another strong set of raucous riffage painted over confessions of a lovesick pup.

Even when you can't quite understand what she's on about, you are happily lured into a world where classic myth yearns for modern ritual, and you're quite happy to be in a place nobody will quite understand. [Winter 2009, p.106]

As soon as AM’s 12 tracks are over, you’ll be lunging for the play button again--it’s that good.

A record with a few inspired moments that is otherwise uneven, incomplete, a little muddled and sonically hollow. [#16, p.86]

Weightlifting isn't unusually exceptional; it simply keeps the chain of magnificence unbroken. [#12, p.101]

An entire record of scorching wordplay, groovy soundscapes, jaw-dropping cadence and Aqua Teen Hunger Force cameos. [#17, p.93]

Continue to muse, and this strange, wonderfully unexpected work of art becomes one of the most mature (and stirring) narratives on intimacy, fidelity, and hesitant honesty heard in a long while.

Precise dissonance has long been Stern's strong point, and when paired with a super-human stamina she careens through a 10-track album without any sense of relief until it's all over; every note is climatic, every vocal a yelp.

Beck produced Morning Phase himself, and while that makes for a cohesive listen, consulting with another trusted producer could have coaxed out some of the freewheeling unpredictability that once characterized his music.

Just put on Researching the Blues, the band's first album in 15 years, and you'll still hear their juvenile sense of romanticism and fascination with American pop culture.

The tunes are almost more like short stage scenes than mere songs about people, but the band does well to prevent them from coming off as cheesy allegories so that even the illiterate boors out there can enjoy their downright pretty moments. [#15, p.101]

Straddling the line between wooshy Sega Genesis menu music and cinematic Pink Floyd maelstrom, Deep Politics is creepy and grand, and at its core is a sonic feast.

Public Strain evokes such questions about genre and instrumentation, recalling heavy hitters like late-period Sonic Youth. But, don't take them for imitators. What the men of Women are crafting is all their own--guitars strung over an abyss.

It aims to summit purple mountains's majesties with Titanic-sized tracks, such as "Change Of Time," "Rattling Locks" and "Another New World," and they are only sporadically successful. [Spring/Summer 2010, p.108]

Ramblin' Jack Elliott has teamed up with producer Joe Henry to deliver a starkly dimensional and soulful collection of dark blues. [Winter 2009, p.94]

The Antlers maintain the poignancy that becomes them and the result is an album bursting with richness.

There is an unhinged, maniacal desire to cross on over into the cosmos on Comets on Fire's (frankly) totally awesome new record. [#21, p.100]