From the charging electric blues of “Change” to the modern soul protest of “Brothers and Sisters,” Staples’ further refines of the type of socially-conscious artistry she rediscovered on 2017’s If All I Was Was Black, in the wake of horrors like Charlottesville and Trump’s child separation policy.

Igor is a heartfelt album that finds Tyler lowering his guard and revealing himself to be a shape-shifting artist who is still growing, and who has fully shed his skin as a vulgar internet cowboy.

“Deutschland” is the only song of any lyrical consequence on Rammstein--the rest piddle between the benign and letchy. But because it’s all in German, it’s not entirely clear which is which. Some of the record’s milder fare sounds seedier and filthier than they would if Lindemann weren’t crooning breathily and hooting and hollering.

With all its polish and production, Dedication can sound less like an artistic benchmark and more like throwing gum drops at the ceiling to see which ones stick. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.

On I Am Easy to Find, another standard-bearing indie dude brand has reconfigured itself with multiple women’s voices at the LP’s core, a portion of the roughly 77 musicians that temporarily explode the band’s quintet. ... They pull it off without diluting their National-ness.

Mostly you can hear the transcendence of Big Thief as they grapple with characters who come and go, not knowing if they will ever be back, bravely embracing death, and revealing a vulnerability that becomes their biggest strength. Though they travel through the darkness spellbound by life’s biggest mysteries, they manage to emerge more at peace than ever.

Two years ago, on This Old Dog, DeMarco upped his game, taking his time to expand a set of songs he’d written quickly with home-studio polish. Cowboy is closer to the four albums of demos he’s released: dead-simple expressions of mellow-gold melancholy suspended over plaintive guitar plucking or bossa nova smoothness.

Young Enough is poppier than its predecessor but not always as immediately catchy. Sometimes that feels intentional and it can often be a good thing, often slowing down the band’s torpedo tunefulness to negotiate trauma in real time. It’s the mark of a band deepening the feelings of real personal struggle beneath the churning guitars and sheer melodies.

Like The Social Experiment project, as well as her last record, Legacy! Legacy! is about community, about legacies as heritage but also as that which is forged on the ground in the moment. Woods is a teacher and organizer, so it’s not surprising she encourages her guests to shine.

Rico Nasty and Kenny Beats operating at full throttle can be almost unbearably intense sensation to behold, like looking directly into the sun. Anger Management finds them working in tandem to pair the adrenal bangers everyone expected with an abundance of slightly more sensitive and playful material.

It’s hard not to wish for a few more moments like that on There Is No Other, where old-school songcraft takes precedence over the album’s bravely collaborative spirit. But Gidden’s new album, yet another fine entry in her outstanding current run, is ultimately the most distilled and sui generis display of the unique artistry that defines her still-blossoming career.

On Scatter the Rats, L7 return as a bloodthirsty gang (just check the L7-branded motorcycle club leather jackets they wear on the cover) and live up to their legacy.

Although Tucker’s lyrics err on the didactic side (the snarking about the president sipping white Russians and Moscow mules on “November Man” feel a bit forced), she and Buck have composed a mix of lush and hard-rocking backdrops for her screeds. ... The best tracks, though, are the harder rocking ones, simply because they match Tucker’s anger.

The singing’s less mannered, the vocal production lighter, the arrangements more varied, the rhythms more fidgety and expressionist. Maybe it’s too easy to say it’s the sound of a faker getting r

Ultimately, despite its divine themes, the pleasures of Oh My God are pleasantly transitory, less a reckoning with the Almighty than the religious experience of casually browsing a well-stocked used record sale in a church basement.

Fever Breaks is a moving exercise in reshuffling and restating what a long-time talent does best in a just-new-enough guise.

Vampire Weekend were late arrivals, lacking the Strokes’ switch-blade attitude and the art-punk edge of the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s. But Vampire Weekend now look like the smartest guys in the room, marshalling a sumptuous, emotionally complex music perfect in this pop moment.

Darnielle and his excellent backing band (who recorded the album at Nashville’s storied Blackbird Studios) vary the musical mood gracefully.

In the End is a moving album and a worthy epitaph for O’Riordan and the band’s legacy, but it leaves you wanting something more, something you’ll never get to hear: the comfort of knowing everything worked out OK. It’s a reminder that grief lingers.

The album cuts on Honk include monolithic classics like “Start Me Up” and “Brown Sugar,” but it’s the more recent material that makes this compilation interesting. ... But no matter how skilled the band became in the studio, it’s on the road where they earned their “world’s greatest” mantle, and the bonus live cuts here prove their vitality.

In a vaguely concept-album move, the pacing of Hurts 2B Human is telling. Pink sings “I abhor reality” on the sugary dance song “Can We Pretend” featuring Cash Cash. But when she digs into what’s getting her down, it’s the most brazen and heartbroken she’s ever sounded.

Her quizzically beautiful third LP, where she pivots artfully from folk eccentric to pop eccentric.

Finn’s stories channels truths that are timeless and universal. This trilogy shows he’s doing more than moonlighting from his main gig, along with a body of elliptical tales that deserve a fuller telling.

She’s got a sly sense of music history, which is how she can reach so far on Cuz I Love You.

This is a cratedigger mixtape to rock virtually any party, and spur digging of your own.

An awe-inspiring greatest hits set.

If this is an old story, Social Cues is a dynamic, uncommon telling.

This is one of BTS’ droopier releases.

There will be time for Blackpink to experiment—ideally in a full-length project. Until then, the women are deepening their brand of K-pop for a quickly growing, language-agnostic fanbase eagerly anticipating every fierce new beat drop.

While the songs aren’t top-shelf Sia, for a session that comes across more like an arcade game than a coherent album, that’s fine.

Paak’s output is keeping pace with his ambition. But good as his records have been, this set included, you still get a sense that the best work still lay ahead.

The album’s feel and sound is resiliently explosive, especially on the three-song mini mega-mix of sorts that kicks things off. ... The rest of the album feels a little more perfunctory, never quite being of a piece a la their euphoric 2010 return-to-form Further, or offering uniquely memorable high-points a la Born in the Echoes’ “Tomorrow Never Knows”-tinged face-melter “I’ll See You There.”

Always an underrated vocalist, he delivered lyrics with two-pack-a-day gravitas, gruff aggression and flashes of fraying soulfulness. Musically, he doubled down on vintage earthiness and living history. ... The deluxe edition includes six bonus tracks that show just how much fun these guys were having at the time.

It’s a strangely addictive mix, comfort-food nostalgia that telegraphs knowingness without sarcasm, parody or airquotes.

The LP isn’t overly burdened by the bold-faced guest spots you’d expect on a follow-up by an artist coming off a Top 10 debut. Instead, it gets tripped up by a different sophomore pitfall: Now that he isn’t an underdog, Khalid lapses into a little too much new-star introspection, exploring an ivory-tower aloneness that can recall the Weeknd’s goth-‘n’-B.

The music fits the expansive mood, at once dreamy and pointed, suggesting a psychedelic mutation of Southern indie-rock gods Pylon’s agrarian art-disco or David Bowie’s Scary Monsters toughened up on a Factory Records budget. As with the greatest anti-fascist ranters, Priests’ critiques hit home hardest when they are singing from inside capitalism’s and sexism’s matrices of exploitation, turning impassioned theory into resonate practice.

Eighties pop shine cut with pedal steel/fiddle poetry, Texas swing, cantina blues and achingly-crooned nostalgia that generally doesn’t feel hard sell, even when things gets treacly. Which of course, they do.

It’s an album full of dressed-down avant-pop with D.I.Y. immediacy and intimacy that can still hold its own amid Top 40 maximalists like Ariana Grande and Halsey. Eilish’s sound is hyper-modern, but still feels classic.

Recorded near Joshua Tree, the LP loses itself in the desert and finds timely survival metaphors everywhere. And it burrows deep into desert mythology without invoking any of the hoary narratives above (they’ve already done a Bono tribute, after all).

As glorious as the sound of this thing is, glinting with letter-perfect ‘70s-’80s rock sonics and touches of 21st-century psychedelic irony, the songs are the show, written by a woman of a particular age from a perspective well past jaded--she’s been there done that--swung back around to a wide-eyed, faintly zen reportage. Poetic images pop.

Snider has heart, which is why his wit and erudition virtually never sounds smug, patronizing or overtly self-serving. He’s got hooks, too.

While the sound of Lux Prima feels unexpected based off these artists’ distinct histories, Karen O and Danger Mouse have unlocked a new creative force within each other. They reach their shared destination with little turbulence and quite a gorgeous view to boot. Plus on this trip, all the seats are first class.

Recording with members of My Morning Jacket, Showalter sounds re-energized on this dynamic collection of spaced out power pop and dreamy psych-rock that owes a bit to fellow Philadelphians War on Drugs.

It’s rough terrain, but Timony refuses to sulk or back down; this is a record about fighting to stay connected, a commendable impulse right about now. Fittingly, the energy never flags, with plenty of familiar gestures to trainspot.

Not everything on Groove Denied works, but it’s gratifying to see a great songwriter still busy being born.

Dusty Notes isn’t without one or two overly screwy misfires, like the Traffic-gone-prog-metal mess “Vampyr’s Winged Fantasy.” But the balance of strangeness and comfort remains the hallmark of their vision.

On Sky Blue, Van Zandt rarely sounds as perfectly in command of his material as he would just a year or so later, on 1977’s Live at the Old Quarter, Houston, Texas. Instead, in this private home recording session-turned-album, full of pain and beauty, he merely sounds like himself: tormented, tremendous, forever trying to break through his chains with a song.

Beware of the Dogs is a triumph on its own terms, going from high point to high point as she maps the pains, pleasures and anxieties of her personal patch of twentysomething bohemia.

Death Race succeeded in its most fundamental mission, which was to prove that “Lucid Dreams” was not a fluke. Songs like “Fast,” “Ring, “Hear Me Calling” strike a dynamic balance of raw charisma and profound anxiety. ... While his melodrama tends to grow old over the course of a 22-track, 72-minute album, it is captivating in small doses.

Blurring pop and folk, while singing with concise phrasing that feels jazz-schooled, she moves between genres with ease.

She might be on her best behavior on this LP, but the liveliest moments come when she gets out of line.

Bless ‘em for their ambition, and too bad it didn’t yield more than this muddled set.

Solange’s growth as an artist has been one of music’s most fascinating stories, and, like A Seat at the Table, When I Get Home serves as a thrilling reminder that this is just the beginning of the futures she still has yet to unpack. If she can make a party-friendly album so meaningful, we’ve barely even witnessed the tip of her vision.

Even if he primarily composed on pan flute, it’d still be what it is--another edition of their signature precise, poker-faced California pop-rock. ... Though this time out the sense of irony is somewhat less blanched and the music a great deal more fun.

Wasteland, Baby! has enough encouraging displays of maturation to feel like a transitional moment for Hozier. At its best, the album carves out a space for the singer to work out his creative tensions as he finds new ways to make his straight folk influences more accessible without losing anything along the way.

Cochemea makes omnivorous music, antsy and tough to pin down. As you’d expect from a Daptone production, it has a crisp, clipped vintage-gear airiness and an earthy rare groove feel.

Predictably, Father of 4 falls prey to the bloat that characterizes most Migos’ projects. ... Father of 4 is decidedly still a trap album, but it bucks the current conventions of the genre. Offset is attempting, often successfully, to showcase the humanity behind his frequently misguided choices — it’s a piece of art that likely wouldn’t exist if we didn’t already know about some of his transgressions.

At 17 tracks, This Land feels packed with too many ideas, only some of them landing. At its best, though, the album points to a new way forward for Clark. It’s a crucial stride for an artist who’s long been searching for direction.

When Jacklin isn’t waxing philosophical on mind-body duality, she’s simply showing the special way she processes the world around her. The result is a profound statement that stands as an early candidate for this year’s strongest singer-songwriter breakthrough.

Like the work of another artist who recently envisioned a velvet Elvis, it’s songwriting that doesn’t pander to mainstream country, alt-country, so-called Americana, indie-folk, or what-have you. It just tells its story, indelibly.

The Lavigne heard at the beginning of the record is almost an entirely different person by the end; the hard part is figuring out which part you like more.

The result is an uneven record that leaves country’s most irreverent hitmakers sounding needlessly cautious.

This is one of the year’s best pop albums so far, even in a 2019 that’s already turning out to be a great one for new music. Thank U, Next makes you suspect that the best Ariana is yet to come.

Among the album’s most ferocious songs is “Thirty Dozen Roses,” a hairshirt thrasher about being a “lousy prick” which steamrolls over questionable puns with a Hüsker-ish hardcore attack. The most delightful might be “Send Me A Postcard,” the album’s sole cover. ... It’s totally awesome, tortured and joyous in perfect balance, and it does what Mould’s music has always done, even at its bleakest--exorcising demons through rock noise.

It’s deceptively chill music that, like most of McCombs work, honors the past while steeling itself for the future.

The record’s nine songs clock in at just 28 minutes total, which feels just right, the samey-ness among songs playing as a strength, conjuring a mood and maintaining it, yet never feeling predictable, in part because it’s hard to get a bead on precisely what each song is about.

There’s a down-to-earth sense of crisp, hooky economy à la Mendes and Puth, gentlemanly horniness mixed with bittersweet innocence they wear well, even as grown men who know what it’s like to soldier their way to hard-earned redemption.

With signpost singers Terry Hall and Lynval Golding in place, and Horace Panter holding down the bass lines, the classic sound is fairly intact, as is the spirit.

Condon’s built an entire world with globetrotting horn charts at or near the heart, and Gallipoli revisits it with some of his most emotive songwriting and singing.

Throughout the album, Girlpool illustrate the struggles of navigating expectations amidst the personal and musical changes Tucker and Tividad have undergone in the past few years. The result is an impressive balancing act, a sound grounded in the band’s tradition that is nevertheless constantly pushing forward.

The duo harmonize beautifully, Oberst’s voice often just a brooding floorboard creak behind Bridgers’ brightly bloodshot confidences (see “Chesapeake”). As personas, they’re a duo of damaged survivors, a more dissolute version of Please Like Me’s Josh and Arnold.

The Wizrd is the last album in Future’s current major-label deal, and it’s effective at reinforcing the qualities that turned him into a star, as well as outlining his rags-to-riches story one more time for those who weren’t paying attention.

Her fantastic new album, Remind Me Tomorrow, ups her ambitions even further, pushing toward a grand, smoldering vision of pop that can bring to mind Lana Del Rey and St. Vincent (producer John Congleton has worked with both), and the New Wave warrior-queen spirit of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Karen O.

Rogers never once loses sight of that story [perpetual self-change] on Heard It In a Past Life, and the result is a laser-focused statement with nary a wasted lyric or synth line.

Bad Bunny conquered the singles game with ease. On X100PRE, he cements his place among the elite in Latin pop--and in pop music writ large.

Songs for Judy lets us join Young in experiencing rock’s new world disorder.

It’s a record that’s bold, catchy and arresting.

The result is by turns audiobook, podcast, and live album, and at its most potent when it becomes a hybrid of the three.

Morrison’s latest is further proof that he’s still one of the most moving, unrivaled singers of his generation, but it’s hard not to wonder what would happen if he embraced his inner-mystic songwriting voice once more.

His blend of garish Day-Glo net art and brawling homage to the glory years of DMX and Onyx may be a commercially effective millennial update of Rotten Apple thug rap. But aesthetically, his distinct lack of lyrical talent and annoyingly hyperactive presence often undermines the whole thing.

On Blow., McCaslin and fellow Blackstar collaborators Jason Lindner, Tim Lefebvre, Mark Guiliana and Ben Monder, among others, step boldly into hybrid, tough-to-classify musical terrain, grafting their trademark sleek, emotive electrojazz onto lush, proggy art rock. That the mix feels largely seamless owes a lot to guest singers and co-songwriters Ryan Dahle and Jeff Taylor--who lend their high, idiosyncratic voices to four and two tracks, respectively--and Gail Ann Dorsey.

Some Rap Songs is the rare album by an immensely talented lyricist who deigns not to pull out any fireworks, opting to sink into the cushion’s of a therapist’s couch in the search for an honest work of art. It’s a delicate statement of restraint, and in this case the process shows more of the artist than ever before.

The 1975 take on that overwhelming anxiety with nerve and aplomb, and the result combines the fist-raising inspired by anthems with the gut-punch provided by precisely described longing.

The ultimate result is an inspired release that hearkens back to the Roc-a-Fella days of the mid-Aughts, full of diaristic writing, song-cry beats and ridiculous skills.

The second disc’s first take of “Summertime” captures a brilliant performance that would have been a thing of legend if the band hadn’t fallen apart at the end. Other standouts include the foot-stomping “How Many Times Blues Jam,” an extended, wailing take on “I Need a Man to Love” and a charging, soulful take of “Combination of the Two.”

If his longstanding difficulties and insecurities were always present just barely beneath the surface on Wilco’s classic records, they are starkly prominent and central to what is often a deeply moving new LP.

As with all great dance music, this set is more about the journey than the destination.

She seizes the role of pop auteur, venting with a jaded wit that feels totally fresh.

This collection (or any compilation for that matter) can’t come close to defining who Cornell truly was. He was multi-talented and a cipher; in some ways, he was impossible to know. But most of his truth appears to be in the music. The challenge is putting the puzzle pieces together.

Eden certainly doesn’t shy away from her unique, occasionally weird filth ... Though her naughty, audacious, sideways, silly lines keep her cutting a unique figure in the dour, depressive world of modern rap

There are plenty of moments where Oxnard clicks, like the chugging, bum-rush rhythm “Who R U?” ... Still, there are missed opportunities.

On an album with 14 songs, there’s certainly some filler (see the sleepy “When You Leave”), but for the most part, Knopfler’s blues-roots blend, infused here with a fresh dose of jazz and funk) remains sturdy.

She remains hard to categorize, refracting country alongside rock, folk, and other elements befitting a longtime resident of New York City’s melting pot. And her most beautiful work can lean into the abstract.

An honest album, full of truths and delivered as only she can.

The Mums were much more likable back when they were pretending to be coal miners who churned their own butter. Compared to this stuff, that was a decent look.

There are songs that have defined Oldham (“Ohio River Boat Song,” the Johnny Cash-certified “I See A Darkness”), deep catalog items (“So Far and Here We Are,” “The Way”), and of course, being the charming kook he is, some curveballs.

Rosalía’s new album, El Mal Querer, is less rigorous than its predecessor, though even easier to like. ... It’s also extremely effective.

Unfortunately Imagine Dragons’ actual vision is one that is milquetoast, formulaic, nearly anonymous, free of any real lyrical insight. ... The one place where the Dragons themselves really shine is an outlier in their catalog: “Zero,” made for Ralph Breaks the Internet, is a giddy college rocker that does for the Cure, David Bowie and Jimmy Eat World what Bruno Mars and Mark Ronson did for Prince, Gap Band and Zapp.