Hurley sums up like a consumer guide of all the musical directions Weezer has explored throughout the years.

While the concept of exploring new horizons seems like a perpetually Megafaun thing to do, it's a case of too much too soon and of a band reaching for places they have no business going toward.

Inasmuch as they continue to build upon The Velvet Underground's Warhol-ian art rock daze and the psychedelic blues of hometown heroes The 13th Floor Elevators, The Black Angels attempt clarity with Phosphene Dream, revelatory guitar playing that owes more of itself to the garage gems associated with The Kinks, The Monks, The Troggs and even The Doors.

It is broad in its appeal, yes, but it is miles deep in its longevity.

Root For Ruin is an album of decent, somewhat disappointing Les Savy Fav songs, but as its come to pass in the indierealm, any batch of Les Savy Fav songs is better than no batch of Les Savy Fav songs.

It's great when artists learn to produce work that has more than one dimension to it. Robyn's has two. I'd just like to see her develop one or two more.

Fortunately, The Thermals like to venture into unfamiliar territory--songs sound more spacious when they need the breathing space; bass lines will override a song when guitars ought to blend in. And then there are the lyrical themes--listeners take their so-called simplicity for granted, provided they come up to the requisite standard of conceptual excellence.

I guess I'm the contrarian here, but I think Interpol deserve a significant amount of respect for taking the risk and mustering the sheer talent to create something so deeply submerged in melancholia you can't even see light.

Carrying features stellar glockenspiel work and a beautiful chorus, but uncharacteristically poor drumming and a gaudy ragtime piano solo. Perhaps the most damning indictment is that the worst songs are all similar enough to blend into each other.

It's a fine record on its own terms, but the it's just not possible to circumvent the expectations that come with his dayjob.

Save for a few tracks, you get exactly what you'd expect from a band like Dead Confederate: middle of the road alternative rock music with seemingly little depth and a whole lot of cliches.

Magic Kids do pull off a winner with Summer, a sultry delight of abounding strings and tropical strums that, sadly, sounds out of place with the obvious eye winks scattered throughout. Memphis may borrow from such an imaginative time period, but their explorative range remains very limited.

Cloak and Cipher is unpretentious in every respect, escalating their previous subtleties with furious, transcendent melancholic moments. While many Canadian bands find themselves teetering on the edge after much premature praise, it comes as a pleasant surprise that Land of Talk keep getting better.

Ra Ra Riot's focus on overall listenability may have produced an album lacking some of the excitement found on their first record. While The Orchard is certainly a pretty record, it's not always the most thrilling.

They play directly to the people willing to get swept up in a communal euphoria, and they do that very, very well.

In the love affair of listeners to this EP, an overly ambitious singer-songwriter who seems to be far more into growing artistically then creating genuine songs will force fans and detractors alike into the arms of another.

You could call it inconsistency, but you can tell they never signed up for the mission of steering the chasm of modern rock music. Instead, they're four guys doing what they want, culling their influences and breathing life into whatever construct emerges. But regardless of where it falls on the spectrum, it's always fun.

Even though King Of The Beach marks a dramatic step forward in Williams' abilities as a songwriter, he's still the same lonely dude that can't keep his friends, can't get a girl, and can't catch a break. Except it seems like maybe this time he finally has.

The Suburbs is about a search for home, for a place in the world when the home you knew is gone.

Transit Transit justly follows the digitalized distortion their debut paved, keeping a decidedly drab mood that permeates throughout the entire production.

It's cohesive, it's tight and it illustrates the band's continuous depth and attention to subtlety.

Infra is a pensive and deeply involving achievement, which rewards long after the credits have finished rolling.

As it stands, there is a lot to like here and a lot to digest. One advantage to having so many vocalists is that each song can be separated and dealt with accordingly, giving the record the sort of film soundtrack feel I think the principle authors were aiming for. Other than that, this unburdens Sparklehorse fans slightly of the wait between albums by providing a mainly interesting and, at times, genuinely moving distraction.

M.I.A. has now made a trilogy of inventive, engrossing records, but for the sake of music we'd all better hope that MAYA isn't the beginning of the end.

Admiral Fell Promises sits somewhere in the middle of being a series of musical pieces and being an album. It's brave, but Kozelek's grace and musical deftness means he never risks alienating his audiences and makes Admiral Fell Promises another essential addition to Kozelek's remarkable catalogue.

As the name may suggest, it's a daring, sprawling effort that simultaneously ventures beyond hip-hop and celebrates the genre's very history.

Expo 86 emphasizes the fact that novel beginnings are meant to prosper whilst winking at the past from time to time.

It's another rock-solid album from one of rap's most consistently great collectives, with no discernable weak spots to attack.