The 10-track album is heavily front-loaded--while the texture and tone remain relatively consistent, the writing "relaxes" a bit about halfway through, and there's little in the record's second half that's as intensely arresting as any of the aforementioned songs.

This is far from an album that will appeal to all, but it's a hell of a lot more fun than the Hold Steady's previous two efforts.

From the lavish orchestration courtesy of Van Dyke Parks to the richness and sheer abundance of language at Newsom's disposal, Ys is a supreme achievement.

Here, they sound polished and crisp, which is a remarkable change from other issues of these recordings. Presumably the band is happy sounding this way, but it often feels a little too clean.

Strange Mercy is her best yet, a deft mixture of self-confession, master class musicality, and downright unshakable songs.

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.

It's his finest work yet, which is saying something, and the kind of record that will resonate for years not just because it's reveres history, but because it understands it and isn't afraid to demand answers from it.

The rest of Wind’s Poem plays out slow, shimmering, and really just classic Phil Elvrum, even if the album’s tone is darker, well produced and generally well executed. But once an experimentalist folk musician, always an experimentalist folk musician, and kudos to Elvrum for experimenting even further outside of the realm.

Kind of like the whole idea of a disco album, a collaboration with a visual artist about African-Americans' tragic history is something you would never expect from Destroyer, and yet once you listen, it seems perfectly authentic, inspired, and essential.

Radio Dept. caught flak for being derivative early in their career, but Passive Aggressive posits that they may have sounded like a lot of different bands during their run so far, but they've always just been themselves: an overlooked band deserving of more attention than the little they've received. This comp should fix that.

Rather than the stripped-down or lonely songs that so often accompany the bill of "solo effort," these five songs are as polished, highly wrought, ornamental--take your pick--as any on Veckatimest.

Serena-Maneesh sounds like the kind of record many bands spend their entire careers trying to create.

Flower Boy is a fascinating, singular effort from Tyler, The Creator. He’s crafted a record that finally measures up to a promise that has always been there.

Ghostface can rest easy in the fact that Apollo Kids shows that the drop in quality on Wizard of Poetry was just temporary, and amongst rappers who are 40-years-old or older, he's the definite champ. There aren't even many graying rockers making art as vital as Apollo Kids, radio play or not.

The true brilliance of Cancer For Cure is its refusal to find common ground, to come to the middle and meet anyone.

This Is Happening is a record that knows -- made by a band that knows -- that disco is better when it's just not so satisfied with itself.

Donuts is a big black pot of sonics, comparable only to Madlib's 2002 effort, Blunted in the Bombshelter, the difference being that this is all original material.

The best part of Treats is that it makes you rethink the possibilities of this kind of music. It is possible for a former girl-group member and a former hardcore guitarist to get together to make an album that is more daring and more fun than anything you'll likely hear on Top 40 radio this year.

The addition of vocals may initially turn off some, but in time the new style melds with the old, much in the same way that what has come before sits comfortably next to what is yet to come throughout this forty-two minute album.

By investing a now-classic catalog with immediacy, freshness and a delicate, humbling charm, Sugar Mountain not only stands as the best argument for the Archives series and illumination it could provide, but as a classic live record in its own right.

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.

Half of the album is rambunctious and full, driving and manic; the other half charms us with melancholic lullabies fueled by a single sip from the purple bottle. The result: With Feels, Animal Collective has created its first pop masterpiece.

They've found the blueprint to the instantly memorable rock song - and Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga contains several - and continued to follow the instructions.

Eluvium has crafted an album that is at once immediate and accessible while deceptively complex.

The songs sound as modern and fresh as if they were recorded last year.

Not only have Brion’s strings been replaced by an indescribably awkward alt-rock guitar riff and a misplaced drum beat, but Apple’s vocals have lost all of their bite and passion. On Brion’s work, she seemed hungry, ready to get back into it all. Here she retains the emotion that such a talented singer can muster on a good day but none of the rawness that signifies her best work.

Those who stick around will be treated to a sort of musical security blanket, jam-packed with hooks and an overall sound that should appease to fans of both the lightly melodic and relentlessly heavy.

I think The Shepherd's Dog is probably Iron & Wine's best record to date (Beam has never once even made a mediocre album, so this says a lot).

Office Of Future Plans reveals itself as quite possibly one of the most brilliantly sequenced albums of 2011.

Tronic isn’t quite hip-hop’s "Smile," but Black Milk is certainly open to pushing similar boundaries of possibility.

Total immersion in the passion of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah reveals the true power of music as a means of artistic expression.

15 Again hits more than it misses, and its hits push all the right buttons, musically and emotionally.

The bulk of El Camino keeps that approach fresh by twisting their rock sound into a pop sensibility that may feel nostalgic, but here--in this concentrated, potent dose--reveals itself to be just as eager to move forward as it is to revel in the past.

Tha Carter III soars because of Wayne’s to-date under-appreciated ability to turn himself down.

The Body, The Blood, The Machine is the holy grail of anti-political/anti-religion records to come out in the last seven years.

Wake Up The Nation comes across as a lean, physical record with enough lucid zingers to make you hungry for more.

The Letting Go benefits as much from diversity as from Valgeir Sigurosson's recording.

As the name suggests, the tracks on Early Fragments are disjointed in terms of their release date and the band’s maturity. But this is to their credit, as the juxtapositioning only adds to the unpolished, lo-fi nature of their material.

Instead of spoon-feeding you how you’re supposed to react, they challenge you to understand them.

Carrion Crawler/The Dream captures the band in psychedelic bulldozer mode instead, delivering ten blistering cuts at a furious pace.

Taken as a whole the album is great slab of rock and roll music.

Celebration Rock is raw frenzy, tender love, and foolish cacophony.

The tuned-down Melvins-like squall from their earlier records is still present and accounted for, but Torche have managed to shove their guitar work into unexpected places that balance limber melodicism with punishing heft.

It's an album that marries the buzzsaw abrasion of past Swans' albums with the country-cum-death-blues feel of his work with Angels of Light. That's an easy way to explain it, anyway.

Ugly is ultimately an album that finally finds the Screaming Females completely confident in their own identity, no longer trying to straddle the line between their headier rock aspirations and the DIY punk scene that gave birth to them.

Food & Liquor is the best hip-hop album of 2006.

This is not his best record, but it does have a couple songs that rank with his best.

Old is Brown’s best work. Complex beyond its two-sided structure, it is filled with narratives that collide, sentiments that conflict and resolutions that come to nothing.

Hospice mixes the personal and fictional in a way that few indie albums outside releases from Arcade Fire and Neutral Milk Hotel tend to do. Granted, Antlers aren’t in that league yet, but Hospice positions them as one of the more exciting young bands in indie rock today.

We're now at a place where we can pretty well look at Dylan's career as, essentially, an entire body of work--and, even when considering all of the obvious highlights of his past half-century, Tempest still stands out.

Control System is one of the better mixtapes to come out this year.

The Modest Mouse influence is apparent but in no way detrimental to Wolf Parade's sound.

It's an album that purges the nastiness of its predecessor and switches things up enough without sacrificing its power, a template that hopefuly they remember to follow.

Cloud Nothings have produced a transfixing head rush of a release and one of the well-wrought examples of '90s revivalism.

Brevity is the buzzword throughout Skeleton. No track goes over four minutes, and five don’t even hit two minutes. But brilliance emerges within those constraints.

Lisbon is another great record in an admirably consistent discography. It's got a drive and precision to it we didn't see on the last record and it reminds us that, for all their intricacy and texture, The Walkmen are one of the great rock bands going.

If this isn't an instant classic, it's only because it takes some time (and ears) to appreciate.

Blueprint could have cut-and-pasted his way through 1988, recycling hooks, beats and samples, but he clearly took his time and laid out his vision.

The album is likely to find favor with clubbers looking for downtempo tunes to soundtrack their comedown. But Clayton’s knack for unearthing wildly disparate compositions, and seamlessly melding them together, will likely induce a few smiles in the blissed-out warmth of the post-club hours.

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

Whereas Helplessness lived up to its title through a narrator that found inspiration in leaving childish things behind, Misty treads the same notions of spirituality in a decidedly earthier manner.

Majesty Shredding is one of the finest rock records of 2010.

The album is an extremely satisfying listen, but if Common is to lead the revolution, he has to make more of a statement than a great bass line and some tight rhymes.

It's apparent they're looking to construct a big tent for everyone to fit in, and unsurprisingly they're succeeding wildly.

John Neff’s expert, dreamy pedal steel and Shonna Tucker’s soothing, pitch-perfect harmony -- somewhere between Lucinda Williams and Neko Case--make Brighter another solid entry in the band's catalog.

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

Wild Flag is the creator of an absurdly good album, one of the most vital of 2011. Wild Flag is not a supergroup. They are a super group.

Unsettling and unexpectedly ravishing in equal measure, Prurient’s latest is as accomplished an album as his followers have come to expect.

The members of Art Brut manage to infuse humor without pushing it too far. Or maybe they do push it too far, and that's why it feels more important.

Except for the intense, melodramatic middle mentioned above, every other track on this album could be a successful single.

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.

The album is just as solid as Franz Ferdinand’s 2004 eponymous debut, and it shows that the group clearly knows its sound -- maybe a little too well.

With Visiter, the Dodos have made one of the year's best albums, one that mixes folk traditions with impressive sonics and texture. It only hints at what they may be capable of.

Instead of it being just another Earth 2.0 album though, the completed Angels Of Darkness, Demons Of Light is a successful experiment in sounding absolutely huge while doing so little, and the confirming masterstroke of Carlson's new direction.

The about-face may be a turn off for the “neo-soul” crowd, but it also represents a confident stride toward individualism.

So while there’s very little that’s surprising about obZen, the album finds Meshuggah’s strengths filtered through tighter song structures and more approachable grooves than we’ve heard from them in a long time.

Koster's ability to create charmingly imaginative song cycles out of instruments you might find in your grandparent's attic has granted him a fan base that has waited nearly a decade for his sophomore release. It was worth the wait.

Darnielle’s lyrics never let nostalgia float off in the ether. There’s a geography to Goths that adds complexity and specificity.

The beat selection, personal insight, wit, and overall coherence surpasses that of "Kingdom Come" and fulfills many of the expectations that the latter album failed to meet.

This vocal sound gives Whitmore authority with his words, and, more importantly, we believe him when he speaks.

23 is one of the more enjoyable musical experiences I have encountered this year.

If there's been a better album, hip-hop or not, out this year, I haven't heard it.

Although such swaths of varied, nebulous beauty obscure Snaith's musical core--if there is one--the music is so joyful in its rag and bone cherry-picking of the best of Britpop's history that such concerns are rendered pointless.

Svennson was noted for his freethinking mixing of pop and jazz genres and styles, which is why the work on Leucocyte feels fresh and enticing for just about any audience.

The Whole Love has the band giving more than in the recent past, but the combustible musical debate at the band's core seems largely to have ceased. Wilco may still have the ability to thrill, but they've lost the ability to surprise.

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.

Maybe it's time to alter our exercitations for new TV on the Radio albums: We might not be blown away, but TV on the Radio's sonic environment is still one of the most interesting venues in music.

Yes, it feels like she's lost some of the youthful pop and punch that she had almost a decade ago, but the reason why Mirah's sincerity feels like such a big deal is because her songs are like friends.

METZ is, in short, an almost-amazing album, an album of extremely well built and executed rock songs undone by a production that all too often calls attention to itself.

The album is at once sparse yet warm and layered, lush and thick lipped, engorged with beauty. The Church have proven yet again they are masters of dreamy and dark rock, prolific and inventive.

As an album, Epic is disjointed in places, but as a collection of songs it's strong enough.

The record’s overwhelming scale cuts both ways. There are so many artists, voices and instruments begging to be heard that trimming is as much an injustice to the collective nature of the group as leaving in the excess is to the final product.

Build a Rocket Boys! sounds very much like an Elbow record, but it doesn't sound like any Elbow record we've heard before.

For all the talk that's been made recently of Bazan's own struggles with alcoholism and faith, it's telling that on Branches the strongest, most evocative tracks are those that, in the singer's beautifully worn and warm delivery, choose, in essence, melody over meaning.

As you listen to it more and more, the music begins to make sense, the hooks come into focus and everything appears in sharp resolution, manifesting itself in a giant pop animal created for your indulgence.

We Are Beautiful might not be the pinnacle for Los Campesinos!, but it does prove they’re rapidly on their way up.

Come for the shrill dopamine triggers like you knew you would, but stick around for the miles and miles of quiet rolling country rendered in this multitalented artist's flooring instrumental sweeps.

Favourite Worst Nightmare is tempered by a few duds -- "Balaclava" and "If You Were There, Beware," please stand up -- but more than that, it's kind of joyless.