For those devoted to this rock band's increasingly artistic gear, Gibbard's a bard spinning pop-song sonnets that cause such constituents of fandom to reel real deep in some crooning-along swooning induced by the lithe lyrics.

Whether you listen closely, for the sonic textures, or in a cursory fashion, scouting out the allusions galore, with each listen you'll likely appreciate something different.

Atmosphere are clearly at the top of the emo-rap game; it's just not necessarily a game true schoolers will want to play.

The album largely treads the same brazen minimal-electro territory; and most of the dick/tits/cunt-centric songs will be familiar for anyone who's seen Peaches' girlie-show shows in full-frontal effect over the past couple years.

There's no question Aesop Rock makes essentially no sense half the time. The other half, he's painting abstract art all over fractured soundscapes. The music is smart and progressive; it's also pretentious and challenging.

While some of their songs deliver nothing more than noisy twaddle, British Sea Power are a formidable band when they choose to simply stop making sense.

Swings like a pendulum from playful dance beats, cutesy female vocals and spacey synth effects to feedback-drenched, guitar-heavy rock fronted by a raspy male singer. And it does so with such affection that the unique power of their contagious, inventive sounds cannot be denied.

Pierce seems to have lost the magic that he once seemed in total command of.

Meloy's words stir your insides like good poetry, his imaginative tales climb into your mind, set up camp and stay awhile. But without the enchanting, heart-wrenching and totally affecting power that is the consequence of The Decemberists' music, the words would not have ever found life.

With all four members taking the mic, cohesion should hardly be expected. Yet, for all the different styles the band employs on this album, all but the closing number seem indelibly stamped as this band's work, uniquely The Wrens.

On this disc, which bustles with other artists' flashes and flourishes, the different personalities sometimes vie for attention.

Cold and lifeless.

What easily could have been a tired retread of rock snob classics instead makes use of the past to provide a recognizable framework in which to deal with the emotional rescue necessary after a damaged romantic relationship.

While the orchestration and production are impeccable and finely crafted, it's not hard to pick out influences from the 1980s, ranging from brooding rock to pulsing synthetic pop.

A sturdy reminder of why Warren will be missed.

In the midst of all this Neptunian mastery, there are two absolutely unlistenable "rock" songs that no fan of modern productionist fervor could possibly stand listening to.

This whole is a sum of 14 songs that adds up to an estimable artistic much, the kind of album worthy of nestling in for months.

The tunes are tepid, but that's not to say they aren't enjoyable to listen to -- in fact, the songs aren't bad at all, but they're not exactly great either.

Boy, is it a sprawling mess.

A welcome return to that good stuff Gang Starr has delivered over the years.

Even the non-Matricized songs are full of useless keyboard riffs, tacked-on guitar solos and loads and loads of overdubbed Lizclone background singers. Never before has so much work been put into making somebody sound so ordinary.

One of the most original-sounding albums in a long while.

Tindersticks have always made music that conjures up smoke: songs that are elusive, wispy and ephemeral, sung by men with somewhat rough smokers' voices. With Waiting for the Moon, unfortunately, little remains once the smoke clears.

This is exactly the album that should be blasting from car radios all summer.

Sumday's only real flaw is the creeping sense of professionalism that is starting to emerge in the band's songwriting and playing.

Sprawling, overwrought, unkempt rock music.

Like so many great singles of the past, this is the sound of a good band getting great. Don't miss the moment.

This band's playing is so tight you wonder if the members aren't cogs in a machine.