Now and then you get a glimpse of ideas that could’ve made the album more powerful if they’d been further explored. ... But the songs are so spiritless and phoned-in that those moments are too little, too late.

It all adds up to a whole that’s somehow less than the sum of its parts.

In lieu of artistry or any semblance of lyrical spark, DST offers monotonous production and relentless chanting.

These 14 purpose-punk "anthems" (songs with loud multi-tracked vocals during the choruses) sound like Anti-Flag hastily thawed them out of mid-90s cryogenic stasis in a moment of frenzied conviction that we've never needed them more.

Songs you'd expect to swell and boil over--which is what Modest Mouse are good at--often end up trudging humourlessly (Ansel, Be Brave), and things get far worse in the moments where humour is actually the goal.

This album belongs chained up in the vaults.

The album wobbles between Timberlake-style sexy-time R&B, Bublé-light standards and flat attempts at sincere John Legend-type balladry.

If maturing means 14 (regular edition) tracks of footy-stadium-worthy anthemic choruses ad nauseam, I don’t want 1-D to grow up.

The most listenable song is the Chavril duet Let Me Go, which has zero of either musician’s “edge” and a whole lot of adult contemporary schmaltz.

Authentic is ridiculous right down to the heavy-breathing interludes, which worked for Usher circa 2003.

There's nothing musically redeemable about My God Is Blue.

[An] utterly vacuous, unlistenable album.

Past the dancehall signifiers (Paul's increasingly strained lilt and tepid syncopated pulse), the new record is brazenly mediocre.

Lulu sinks to almost unimaginable lows.

You'd figure we'd at least get a one-off novelty track, but the flat, repetitive melodies and gimmicky rhymes even fail to do that.

Not sure what's more embarrassing: the Good Charlotte/Atreyu sleaze rock take on Dr. Teeth's Night Life or the idea that this tribute's hope is to make adults want to feel like kids again. Either way, the whole thing deserves a Miss Piggy karate chop.

Here I Am concerns itself with the kind of bland, radio-friendly R&B pop that equates sex appeal with self-confidence.

Over-emoting at every turn, she obliterates otherwise innocuous soul, R&B and reggae-inflected songs with gimmicky vocal histrionics, strident attempts at melisma and the kind of callow self-help lyrics that are apparently mandatory for all young pop stars nowadays.

Despite their brevity, the songs are repetitive, wanky and almost impossible to differentiate. They make you yearn for the days before genre cross-pollination.

Topping off this overproduced, underwhelming effort are Roberts's over-enunciated lyrics. Even at his best, he comes off like a guy crashing an Of Montreal album.

This is not an observation about theme--the record is unremarkable in both sound and execution.

While a hip-hop album that’s not a complete kielbasa festival is refreshing, Luda’s feminist intentions are horribly misguided.

The closest this popportunistic foursome comes to satisfying songsmithery is "The Getaway," whose title is sound advice for potential buyers of this album.

Robert Smith, Franz Ferdinand and Wolfmother offer glimpses of what this project might’ve been, but then along comes 3 Doors Down-clone Shinedown and it’s off with the heads of everyone involved in this nightmare.

Rebirth is – without qualification – the most embarrassing album of the last 10 years. Embarrassing for him, for his audience, for rap, for humanity.

The newest disc from the once-innovative Vancouver group assaults you with 18 contrived, lazy tracks. The best is a seven-year-old re-release, 'Red Dragon,' from when Moka Only gave this outfit some class.

The problems that litter No Line fall into two categories: mind-numbing blandness on the part of the band or embarrassing, face-palm-inducing vocal choices by Bono.

He rushes through the tunes, slurring syllables as if enunciating the lyrics would be too much work even if he could remember all of them. And clearly, one day wasn’t enough rehearsal time for his hired band, who are so often in vamp mode while trying to figure out where Morrison’s going that they lose track of the tunes.