Earle plumbs the carnal underpinnings of the blues: feasting on what can be, never mourning what’s done. It is frisky, with musicians thumping and plucking in what feels almost like a jam.

It’s an album that understands the value of both journey and destination and when the going gets weird, amazingly everything is right where it needs to be.

Vinyl collector or not, it’s ultimately the strength of Segall’s songwriting that makes this four-songer a must-have for anyone who only has, like, seven of his dozens of releases in the past five years.

This is an album that is custom-built to be experienced in one 41-minute sitting, either with a pair of headphones on marveling at every sonic swan dive or laid in the background to guide you through a task. In either setting, Vision Fortune is your ideal soundtrack.

Sonically, Honeybear finds Tillman in a ruminative mood, favoring lavish strings, sweeping layers of voices and acoustic guitars. But he still has a knack for unexpected flourishes.

Vulnicura marks a bold return for such a storied singer.

On the whole, Tetsuo and Youth is a shaky album by a newly energized Lupe Fiasco who is newly energized. This energy isn’t always wielded coherently or even interestingly, but he seems to have found comfort in his murals and dots and lines.

This is an album for anyone born and raised with the inherently youthful and yearning spirit of rock ringing in their bones.

Every performance on Shadows In The Night expresses a level of vocal maturity and intuition that he’s never quite reached before.

Ultimately, B4.DA.$$ is a lackluster album with little appeal beyond its dry technical flourish and fleeting moments of vulnerability.

Side B of We Are Undone calms down with a few bewildered ballads, but ultimately, Two Gallants’ return marks the most polished release of their long and diverse 13-year career.

Most of Then Came the Morning shows a confident band stepping more fully into a compelling sound.

While the jams on this seven-track EP aren’t as extravagant as the winners on Dominae, you get the feeling that this is merely Episode 2 of a continuing project.

Armed with little more than a guitar, some rudimentary tape-tracking recording materials and a a treasure trove of inventive vocal harmonies, Pratt’s darkly ambitious compositions are fleshed out into alcoves of aural mischief, served mystical and with a kind of dark magic, vacillating as they do between optimism and pessimism.

After just a nine-song introduction, we care about Natalie Prass.

Individ maintains that energy and precision throughout its 40 minutes--adhering strictly to the band’s core approach, offsetting a lack of surprise with sheer sturdiness.

Like every Punch Brothers album, The Phosphorescent Blues is defined by technical chops. But its lyrical focus offers a vibrant edge over its predecessors.

Ronson’s Uptown Special is his best work yet and one of the best funk albums you’ll come across in recent memory.

Even at their most technically complex, Twerps still maintain a low-key, laidback, indie-rock appeal. They pull off charming pop that sounds tender and thrilling at the same time.

The most fascinating aspect of this collection is how the artistic scales within the band tipped back and forth in these early days before they found the true balance that carried them through the six studio albums they made post-1984. Within this box set, it takes all eight discs to get to that point, but the moment-by-moment journey is a fascinating one marked with some remarkable pop songs.

AB/AP is more intriguing when the band follows their wackiest instincts.

While the rhythm section is fairly basic throughout the album, there are a few bright moments when simplistic rhythms turn into entrancing bass lines or brisk drum fills. So while these moments of musical clarity might make Moonlight worth a listen, they likely won’t warrant a plethora of repeat spins.

On Sleater-Kinney’s eighth album, the band sounds as vital, composed and necessary as ever. In just 10 songs and a little over 30 minutes, Sleater-Kinney does so much more than revive an old band. They craft an argument for having improved in its absence.

Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance is far from the best Belle & Sebastian album, and it signals more a distraction for their sound than an evolution. Still, just as everything is with them, that distraction is both pleasant and polite.

What A Terrible World, What A Beautiful World is just another chapter in the already punctuated saga of one of rock’s best modern lyricists and his talented band.

While the album’s primary appeal may come from the rich storytelling in Earle’s songs, the musicality on display is nothing to balk at either.

To say Panda Bear Meets the Grim Reaper is a textural album is probably stating the obvious, but it very much is, in a way where the individual tracks feel simultaneously adventurous and tamed.

Coming in at only 11 songs, SremmLife is a lively surge of hedonism and recklessness.