While Trinity is consistently engaging, it never quite achieves Dutty's immediate, overwhelming pop appeal.

Despite its title, Rock & Roll Time actually ends up making a better case for revisiting Lewis' oft-ignored legacy as a country hitmaker.

Sometimes the album slips into haziness. But the best songs are unsettling in a good way.

Tyler rages at his absent father, scowls through uncomfortable fan encounters and--true to form--spews tons of supposedly ironic sexism and homophobia. If you can get past that tic, there's plenty to admire on Wolf.

Sounds a bit like a stripped-down version of Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

Crisp Florida bass beats from producers like DJ Khaled and Boi 1da and sharp guest spots from Lil Wayne and Future keep things rolling, but his big heart keeps it real.

It's a simplistic but intoxicating roots fantasy - full of Dylan mysticism, spidery acoustic Dead jamming, tasty 1970s rock moves and evocations of high-plains drifters with itchy trigger fingers drinking from jam jars.

The best thing about Habitat is how much less seriously Austra seem to be taking themselves than they often have. It's a promising sign for their future.

On their second album, Radio Wars, the Bells deliver billowy dream pop accented with atmospheric guitars, string arrangements and digitized beats.

Check the track by Sobanza Mimanisa, who add guitar and more melody to the mix, as well as the accompanying DVD, which beautifully documents the recording of the CD.

Although Both Sides of the Sky--the third volume in a vault clearing that began in 2010 with Valleys of Neptune (close to a must hear) and continued with 2013's People, Hell and Angels (a little less close)--repeats songs and fragments found in more fully developed versions elsewhere, it still offers plenty of thrills, as, time and again, Hendrix pushes solos along the knife-edge that separates this world from another.

The Neptunes don't necessarily need guest MCs to make a great album of their own, but if they want their rhymes to keep up with the strength of their tunes, they need to dig a little deeper than this.

Aside from a couple of ponderous, buzz-killing instrumentals, Forever is one long rave.

They sound like they sincerely believe the greatest thing that ever happened to rock & roll is Sammy Hagar's solo career.

White Pepper, their seventh studio album, could be Ween's most accessible release yet.

On their eighth album, this roots-music party band still acts as if electricity was never invented.

The third Quasimoto LP is a jumble of rare and unreleased tracks but still a fine stoner-rap set.

A likable disc -- but no reason to get hot and bothered.

Even this seasoned songstress occasionally gets stuck in unglamorous midtempo muck.

The songs aren't terribly memorable, but several cuts offer imaginative mash-ups.

Cursive haven't sounded this crazed and inspired since their breakthrough album, 2003's "The Ugly Organ."

Moorer's handsome voice is remarkably twangless here. Also remarkable is that the most indelible of her goth-chick musings is the happiest-sounding.

The quartet's first record in a decade is a surprisingly vital viva-la-grunge manifesto.

Patrick and cohorts haven't left behind big, dumb obviousness. Thrashy, trashy tracks such as "Columind" still weigh the album down with anonymous groans and heard-'em-before riffs.

It all seems spazzy, but it's actually meticulous and crisply rendered: order through chaos.

Morcheeba make a lovely sound, but they seem to be broadcasting from a very bright and pretty hell.

With Rick Rubin co-producing, there's a bluesy toughness to the anti-capitalist jeremiads "Big Boss Man" and "Gold Digger," while "Cat & the Dog Trap" recalls the simple folky prettiness and direct, easeful messages that made him a Seventies icon.

Their crafty wordplay of yesterday has been filed into more pointed jabs, bolstered by deliciously 2000s gang vocals.