While Compass, due partially to its longer track list, features a few duds that prevent it from surpassing the superior Jim, the album still shows Lidell as indie’s best answer to Robin Thicke and his compatriots, artists Lidell bests on a regular basis.

In spite of the album's potential obesity at 18 tracks of wildly different musical ideas, the three [Monae and her production partners, Charles "Chuck Lightning" Joseph II and Nathaniel "Nate 'Rocket' Wonder'" Irvin III.] keep the weight off by welcoming coherence and by evenly spreading out their interests.

While lack of tunefulness has rarely been an issue for noise-rock fans, A Small Turn of Human Kindness's abstractness makes it a little less satisfying than its predecessor. But it's still a fascinating product of one of the more fascinating bands working in the bowels of rock 'n' roll today.

From its painstaking production to its dense lyrical constructs to its mammoth choruses, High Violet is likely to be one of the year's best.

Here's to Taking It Easy is a fine debut of sorts for Phosphorescent as a band. To Willie was the preamble to this, the band's new direction. And good as Houck was as a singer-songwriter, "band leader" is a role that suits him just as well.

It's OK to play with enthusiasm. Oh, and also, it helps to have an album with 12 fantastic songs, the way the do on Nothing Hurts.

For a debut album oozing with influences, Stuck on Nothing is doubly impressive in the way that it not only makes a definitive mission statement for a truly exciting new band but also manages to keep such a strong sense of itself in spite of itself.

Make no mistake, there is still plenty of rock--it's just doled out selectively instead of consistently.

Essentially, Forgiveness Rock Record finds Broken Social Scene trading "big and loud" for "wide and warm" and as a result sounding like they've really just settled further into their identity as a band.

Yet, even though the steady presence of featured performances helps beautify Cosmogramma, this is essentially Ellison's crowning achievement. The album is sequenced with a sense of purpose, evidential from the promo being presented as a long continuous track.

On the whole, Together smartly meshes thick orchestration with their lean energy really well, picking up where Challengers left off and improving in a lot of ways.

The good thing is that for any misstep here, there's a success that overshadows it. But for those of us waiting for him to really knock another out of the park the way he did on The Animal Years, it might be a let down to realize So Runs the World Away isn't that.

While collaborator conductor Aldo Sisillo's orchestrations deserve a healthy dollop of credit for the overall sonic success of the album, Patton's voice is clearly the centerpiece.

Like all Gogol Bordello albums, Trans-Continental Hustle is instantly enjoyable, but even more lyrical and musical layers emerge on repeat listens that show you just how smart and (simple) Gogol Bordello can be.

The album sticks very much to the template of ambient keyboard pop and an atmosphere of disappointment that past Lali Puna and Notwist albums traded in. That said, it's effective in what it sets out to accomplish and has a silent ambition that is fairly admirable.

This is a great record, full with a daring, hard-earned hope, and a deep emotion. And that's something a lot of records could really use these days.

Thistled Spring, more nuanced and poised than its much-lauded predecessor, signals the ongoing work of a band far from finished, far from plumbing the depths of which it is capable.

Weathervanes is a darling, coherent, and certainly radio-friendly (if at times sugary) record. But on their next attempt, Freelance Whales should tone down the maudlin, veer away from Sufjan territory, subtract a few bells and whistles and grow up with the college crowd.

While I See the Sign might not quite measure up to the staggering "All Is Well," this is still a hell of an album. One that, like the songs that populate it, could resonate for a good long while.

While this record may not be one that I listen to end to end, over and over, there is little doubt that it is the perfect soundtrack to a serendipitous, still-to-come, drive into the unknown.

What makes Marling engaging is that her music presents scenarios without deliberately sounding like poetry or art. Her songs do not emphasize the beauty of sounds or musicality of words so much as clip insightful observations from conversations.

Jones deserves special credit for treating her subject matter consistently and with an even hand throughout I Learned The Hard Way. She can express both hurt and her trademark, take-no-shit defiance.

The album has no song that truly feels like a single, and thus no particularly strong cuts ground the album.

The Dum Dum Girls’ debut, I Will Be, plays like a veritable best-of of current trends in lo-fi rock ‘n' pop. In fact, the disc’s (admittedly exhilarating) fidelity to the budding-but-already-overdone genre nearly weighs it down.

Sure, this record doesn't quite match their best work, on 2002's ...and the Surrounding Mountains, but it is just as strong as anything else in their discography.

It seems impossible that the same band that started out so ramshackle could deliver an album as splendid and tighly wound as this.

Let's Wrestle may, in all their zeal, cram a couple songs too many onto this record, but it's a minor setback for a pop record that carries as much melody as it does personality.

Under Great White Northern Lights is a perfect explanation of the band's significance to doubters, now and in the future.

While this does fall in with a pretty crowded lo-fi movement going on, Happy Birthday is also an unabashed pop record unafraid to wear its grainy heart on its sleeve.

He never panders to them; instead, Plastic Beach's guest vocals are anchored by Albarn's own melodic flair. His falsettoed ennui shines through, and the songs are loaded with Albarn's pet sounds.

Sisterworld is their first album that fits in soundly with the work of other bands. Whether or not that’s a good thing for Liars is a matter of debate.

Although the album is listenable and even uplifting at times, no songs readily stand out as particularly important or poignant in the way that “Keep Yourself Warm” or “Old Old Fashioned” from The Midnight Organ Fight do.

The fundamental difference between The Monitor and the group's debut, The Airing of Grievances, and the reason why the former shines less bright than the latter, is in the attitude.

He's smart enough to know what's to be done, sincere enough to do it free of distraction, and nice enough not to impose his will on you. Ted Leo has literally seen his success as an artist become a life or death experience, and he's here to tell you how to treat it like a grown-up.

The main thing preventing Big Echo from being a very good (or even a great) album is that the bulk of it is clearly and undeniably influenced by the quieter moments from Grizzly Bear’s oeuvre.

That such a glorious and previously unheralded collection of tunes could appear so far into what seems like a decade plus wave of reissue fever is a wider comment about how much great music still out there waiting to be unearthed. The Method Actors deserve to be placed alongside the very best acts of any scene or era.

Hidden won't change British indie, but it should obliterate all expectations as far as These New Puritans are concerned.

The album is pure Groove Armada pop at the end, but the decision to be slightly less saccharine means that it's not nearly as disposable as some previous outings.

They could have retread the same musical territory, but instead they deliver a record that’s remarkable in its maturity and--most of all--its ability to be replayed again and again.

Going Places is one of the heaviest, haziest, and densest records you're likely to hear in any genre. It also fulfills one of the promises of Yellow Swans career that was most apparent in their live shows -- namely, a marriage between the liberation of pure noise and the intellectual appeal of headier, more sophisticated experimental electronic practices.

Without the threat of squalls of feedback (like on Palo Alto) or serious climaxes (like on Rook), most of Golden Archipelago ends up as beautiful as the cover of the album, but with as little context.

Pepper finds the band attacking a multitude of oddball genres--the disc spins from post-rock to electronica to rock to sheer noise--with a frightening focus for such sonic stream-of-consciousness exploits.

Dear God, I Hate Myself packs enough of a wallop that it is worth sitting through some dross to get at the choice bits, which, as is the case with any of the best work by Xiu Xiu, are uncomfortable, uncompromising, and easily hummable.

This Addiction is interesting and ultimately noteworthy because it finds a way to continue on with the band’s winning schematics while tweaking the blueprints in such a way that it's almost hard to notice that you’ve been duped by all the seeming predictability.

Have One on Me isn't at all a ploy for greater likability. It's an affecting, indulgent, and thoroughly fleshed-out monument to Newsom's considerable ambition.

Shout Out Louds have long been a case for the positives of going singles-only, and they probably keep that reputation here. But by a minor degree, Work is Shout Out Louds' finest album-length statement.

Quasi's reappearance with their most consistent album in a decade feels appropriate.

This ability to remain reverent to its influences without compromising its personal vision or sounding like a dull tribute act is White Hills' greatest strength, and it's on display throughout the album.

While not the definitive Tindersticks album, Falling Down A Mountain is a compassionate, delicately rendered collection of songs that warrants repeated listening.

The best tracks here still feature his distinct blend of surrealist poetry, but the music does not even meet it halfway.

They're onto something with the blistering, bluesy, punk direction, but the sound will never gel as long as the songs keep getting stretched beyond their logical breaking points. It's time to move on.

By turns exuberant and hushed, intricate and occasionally frenzied, Gorilla Manor more than lives up to its title.

The tracks span from 2003 to 2009 and encompass all of the band's fascinating, frustrating, illustrious stylistic progression. If it is truly Excepter's last release, it is an excellent send-off.

Throughout its padded 40-minute run time (like "All Hour Cymbals," it’s got a decent amount of filler), Odd Blood makes a stronger case for what’s up next for the band’s sound than where it is now.

The thing One Life Stand has going for it though is its thematic cohesion. This is an album about demanding commitment (from your bros, partially, but mostly from your lovers) or at the very least hoping for it.

In short, I'm New Here is the perfect comeback album, deploying modern production in the service of timeless songcraft and personal vision.

Despite its basis in a genre with an expiration date, Causers of This is nonetheless an album worthy of consideration. While lacking in straight-ahead pop sensibility, it redeems itself by simply being interesting.

It is not at all clear where you are heading when you board, and it becomes less and less important as the journey progresses, beauty on all sides, comfortably lost in the violet noise (more appropriate than black) suffusing everything at hand.

By description, Earthology may seem like an exercise in music dabbling. But at the heart of the Whitefield Brothers' sound is deadly solid funk.

These musicians came into their own and have created another standout record without repeating themselves.

Traces of other San Diego bands like Pinback and LaValle's own Tristeza and the Black Heart Procession are distinctly here, culminating in mellow harmonies, relaxed bass lines and subtle ambient effects.

Adventurous listeners ignore Blackjazz at their peril, but be warned that there's quite a bite of filler to go with the killer.

No longer firmly fixing their gaze upon past, The Brunettes have begun to turn their lights toward the future with Paper Dolls; moreover, these bouncy little bedroom discos should be more than enough to ensure that the band’s present (and future) remain bright as well.

Strange Keys to Untune God’s Firmament is classic Skullflower, a set of tunes that pays homage to the band’s history while still finding new inspiration in feedback, drone and monochord assault. This record puts them back in the game, and at the top of the class.

Romance Is Boring might sound, in description and on wax, very similar to the band’s work, but there’s a palpable confidence here that wasn’t present just an album ago, and it makes Romance Is Boring the key entry in an already ballooning discography.

It helps that Teen Dream, Beach House's third album, is the best thing the band has done. Legrand and her bandmate, Alex Scally, have been ready for a homerun shot since 2006's selt-titled debut, and they cracked this one into the stratosphere.

There Is Love in You is expertly sequenced, played, and produced from start to finish. It's the work of a restlessly creative auteur circling back and turning out his most confident, definitive work to date.

Down to the minute details, epic pop should center on creating a tiny, vibrant world that begins and ends within the space of the song, and Eggs’ best songs truly achieve this aim.

Damian Abraham's vocals are still the star of the show, but the cleanness of Couple Tracks shows how, with the right kind of engineering, Abraham's behemoth-unleashed singing, rather than alienate non-hardcore kids, ices the cake on an already great band.

Heart of My Own sounds more produced than Oh, My Darling, but not for lack of quality. Despite the yearning lyrical plotlines, the warmth exuded from the woodsy harmony of Bulat’s voice mingling with the amalgamation of guest instruments cozies even the bitterest of winter days.

Calcination does not lack sincerity or focus, but that doesn't make it any easier to digest.

This is Spoon at its most Spoony.

The album rewards those who listen with songs that are confessional but also insightful.

Real Life Is No Cool is essentially all pop structures. It's maybe an accident that Lindstrøm and Christabelle's project so successfully feels like something hip and modern, like a photograph hung in a museum or cut from an obscure magazine that's suddenly become part of the landscape.

There may be moments of repetition that indicate a bit a creative bankruptcy, and even for an EP this is perhaps all too brief an outing. However, Behave Yourself easily topples most of Cold War Kids' previous endeavors.

The members of Dinowalrus deploy an eccentric series of sonic strategies on %, and this diversity is the album’s greatest strength.

As the watery floating of "I Think Ur A Contra" draws the album to a close, it becomes clear that not only did the members of Vampire Weekend succeed in creating an excellent sophomore album; they've managed to survive long enough to outlive their hype and its attendant backlash.

Lyrically, it's all sort of inscrutable and encumbering to follow, but the music is so good it scarcely matters what he's on about.

The major criticism of Animal Collective has been the band's proclivity to bewilder listeners more than give them the pop songs they want. It's difficult to criticize Merriweather on those terms, but it applies a lot more to Fall Be Kind. What's worse, that bewilderment prevents Fall Be Kind from being what the best Animal Collective releases always are: fun.

Given the track record Clipse have maintained through this decade with their other two albums and three mixtapes (I’m not counting the official Re-Up Gang album, and neither should you), this is a fine album, but it's still a letdown, plain and simple.

Malice N Wonderland is not, by and large, very ambitious.

What Untitled lacks, is focus. In the world in which R. Kelly operates, what's required of a great or even pretty good album is either several singles or a feeling of overwhelming personality from the artist. Most of the time, the two things accompany each other.

Obsession with detail is one of the most appealing qualities of his work, but it's also one of the most frustrating. Echo Party bears this out in painstaking detail.

Kid Sis has elected to keep things simple--so when the album works, it becomes clear that it really works.

Some of these songs do, of course, belong on the radio: They’re saturated with production effects catered to a generation that calls its designer drug “ecstasy,” all wrapped around indulgent hooks, sentimental lyrics, and a sweet voice airbrushed into flawlessness. But Annie flaunts too much.

Despite its short shelf life, Real Estate, if it hits you at the right time, can be splendidly transcendent.

The result was as smart and refreshing as any rap release of the last two years. Felt 3: A Tribute to Rosie Perez, despite its droll title, is similarly serious minded.

The rookie blunders are kept to a minimum, and Wale’s mesmeric talent--the left-field punchlines, the charmingly laid-back flows, the nakedly emotional storytelling--is enhanced by lively beats that juggle eclectic synth-pop with throwback soul.

With In Love & War, Amerie has adopted to trying times with spunk and style, grace and flair. And, yes, swag.

Listening to Bleach now, the main thing that comes across is how little it sounds moored to a specific time.

Look, if you’re seeking out the latest flavor of the month or are looking to see where this chillwave shit is going, Love Comes Close is probably not high on your list. But spin this thing once and it’s hard not to become engulfed in the aesthetic gloominess and seedy milieus Cold Cave are delivering here.

Although it's a stylistic elephant in the room compared to Invisible Girl's other offerings, it's a welcome indication of Khan and BBQ's scope and talent, testifying to their expanding interpretation and application of garage rock's attributes.

Banhart clearly gets bogged down in that freedom, as the amount of sheer hokiness on some of his albums can attest to. But with What Will We Be, Banhart gets back to earning that right for total creative freedom.

What We All Come to Need is a largely successful display of Pelican’s well-defined sound with the invigoration of guest star peers and promising glimmers of growth.

You won’t get the same thing twice on Kids Aflame, and Goldstein keeps the surprises coming with subtle changes to his vocals, adding layers of horns in unexpected places and by simply choosing not to be safe.

It’s also worth pointing out that as good as White Denim is at riling up your inner animal, they can also charm its socks off with tracks like the jaunty, upbeat 'Paint Yourself,' which opens with a lively acoustic chord progression that soon erupts into lo-fi pop bliss.

Logos, while just the second solo album from the frontman for a band of marginal fame, represents the latest and greatest chapter in Cox’s ride to indie stardom.