American Radical Patriot is a treasure that’s flat-out perfect. Music doesn’t get any better than this.

Another Self Portrait is absolutely essential listening for Bob Dylan fans. It may contain the best music you’ll hear all year.

Hurray for the Riff Raff not only expands the umbrella of “Americana”; it challenges the very structures on which we hang it, and the legacies of pain that accompany them.

Carrie & Lowell is a demonstration of why Stevens sings songs, of why we listen to songs: to feel less alone, to make sense of the things that are hardest to make sense of.

The record is an absolutely evil stunner from front to back, top to bottom, head to toes and everywhere in between, and whips up the same kind of radiant, strange awe that the band’s overdriven catalog has so generously perpetrated album after wicked album.

Here in the Pitch is a serenade of our own unique endtimes, packed with rollicking, sugar-sweet verses and vocalizations you can twirl your body to and curl up and anguish over all the same. And, at a mere 27 minutes in length, Pratt wastes no time with us. The whole project is tight as a wire.

The result is an unspooled revelation, a supplicant’s distorted glee—a celebration which Hayter leaves pointedly open-ended.

Sunshine Rock is bitter and hopeful, full of rage and promise. It’s an album that defines a moment in all its ugliness and the rare moments of beauty that we have to keep fighting for.

A Man Alive is an endearing listen and has all of the elements of a complete work—even pop-centric singles in “Astonished Man” and “Nobody Dies.

Girl Band’s latest is a startling upending of any and all expectations you would dare place upon a modern rock group.

Currents is a record you should be excited for, paying attention to and ready to consider the best of the year.

Moments of levity (“The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite” and “Man On The Moon”) and righteous anger (“Ignoreland”) cleared the sinuses but otherwise, the tone of Automatic is marked by doughy pressure and woozy beauty. The remastered version of the LP brings that to the fore as well as emphasizing the skin-tingling intimacy of Michael Stipe’s vocals throughout. ... This expanded edition of the album (three CDs and a blu-ray disc featuring all the promotional videos and the album mixed in Dolby ATMOS) offers a more fully-rounded understanding of Automatic.

Taken as a whole, Girly-Sound to Guyville is a dizzying deep dive into Phair’s world before her breakthrough, and at times, it comes off like one of those bulletin boards in a cop drama, covered in photos and colorful push pins, with string connecting the dots. For folks who’ve loved and lived with Phair’s music for the past quarter-century, it will be endlessly fascinating. But even for the unfamiliar, this is a foundational work of indie rock worthy of careful attention.

On Dark Twisted Fantasy, West surrounds himself with gruff collaborators like Pusha T of Clipse and Raekwon of Wu-Tang Clan.

Barring some future set that includes vials of the musicians' blood, sweat, and tears, this will stand as the definitive version of Icky Mettle-an answered prayer to new and old fans that makes these songs sound startlingly present.

Invisible Hour is poetic singer/songwriter fare at its best, and this is Joe Henry’s masterpiece.

MIA is so assured here... The critical party line is that MIA’s previous effort ///Y/ was an artistic failure. ... Surely those naysayers will declare this a fine return to form.

Ty Segall has made a massive album that not only celebrates that freedom he’s carved out for himself, it also effectively summarizes the journey so far. And it’s pretty darn listenable to boot. It may very well be his greatest accomplishment yet.

At 26, Musgraves has kept her wonder, honed her focus and remained true to her core.

It’s another glorious achievement for an artist who has created so much amazing art since arriving into the world fully formed way back in 1982.

Beautifully more simple than any of our mythmaking delusions, Blonde is Ocean’s life as he experiences it: fluid and fluctuating, one man in motion. This is what freedom sounds like.

It's just so utterly satisfying.

One of this record’s biggest achievements might be building out the character of Jenny while managing to not sacrifice her central mystery.

For the ruminating about the world and wanderlust, lullaby’s potency comes from affairs of the heart, love lost and sought, and the jagged loneliness of failing to stay bonded.

Each track deserves mention. Knowing Superchunk, Diarrhea Planet, Ben Kweller, Andrew Bird & Nora O’Connor, Mike Watt and the Missingmen are just a few of the other stand-outs shows why Bloodshot, two decades in, remains so compelling.

Indie rock may not be dying, but it’ll be hard for people to make it sound as alive as Toledo does on Teens of Denial. This is the sort of record where you wish like hell you could hear it again for the first time and that’ll keep rewarding return visits for years to come.

Cramming what should be an unworkable heap of concepts and sounds into a deliciously volatile 35 minutes, Nothing Valley is a bracing blend of scraping noise and tender melody, not unlike the recipe used by Speedy Ortiz.

The production overall is impeccable and the sequencing shrewd; the tracks feel visceral and visual--you can almost see them as they hurtle by. The album’s overall effect is less deafening than blinding.