The band refuses to stick to simple, repetitive rhythms; the guitars regularly squeal with feedback, humming with distortion as they lay down thick 'n' meaty power chords.

It's classy, but also honest. Not a single emotion seems overplayed or exaggerated; you'll dance and sway to it because each song feels as organic as life, and the life it documents is nicely lit.

The music is just as pure and personal and unintermediated as before, but it sounds better in every conceivable way.

Picks up, astonishingly, exactly where the band left off, not exactly retracing old paths but branching off of them into new and exciting vistas.

Summer Make Good blurs the distinctions of digital and analog to the point of opening new categories.

By the time "Our Mutual Friend"'s symphonic percussion and hammering cellos reach their crashing apex, the album begins to feel a little like the fourth consecutive hour at a well-stocked party full of musical theater majors.

Taken as a group, Heroes to Zeros' slower songs are the musical equivalent of a month-long sinus infection: heavy on the repetition, sleepy detachment and sensory deprivation.

Their songs routinely beg for a spoken message, to the point where their originals sound like dub versions.

Whether the band is shakin' its collective art-rock ass to syncopated beats or barreling through treble-infused dueling guitar throwdowns, there's never a dull moment here.

A band more fixated with guitar solos and drunken fist-pumping than in the more nuanced, desperate territory of their former incarnation [Lifter Puller].

Yes, Lali Puna are taking the Radiohead Route. Not just thematically, either: the tone and ambience of Faking the Books is as detached and cold as Amnesiac was, though more straightforward: there are more "straight" guitars and "actual" drums on this album.

Walking emphasizes songwriting over gimmickry; even divorced from the studio fireworks, the tunes are engaging, hummable, memorable, and will only grow more so with repeat spins.

A charming, if often bewildering, set of psychedelic junk-folk ditties.

As ordered as it is wild, as gorgeous as it is gruesome, Lay of the Land is indeed a ballsy record.

Tortoise have created another batch of distinct, inimitable songs that strike a perfect balance between the academic and the playful, the immediate and the eternal.

There's not quite enough to justify the addition of another album to the Blondie catalogue.

These new stylistic change-ups give Of Montreal a contemporary edge, but dull the pastoral chaos that made them so charming to start with.

The Silent League weave lush musical tapestries with a real humility at heart, preventing themselves from ever taking this orchestral deal too seriously, while remaining focused just enough to produce an album of stunning sonic quality.

Deliberately slow in tempo, delicately arranged, emphatically "dreamy" in tone, Misery is a Butterfly is lovely, but also difficult going for Blonde Redhead fans.

Our Endless Numbered Days won't knock you off your seat with ribald lyrics or rambunctious riffs, but its confident, measured chords and precise tones will hold your attention long after they've grabbed it.

The group creates an ornately atmospheric resonance throughout Ambulance Ltd., but their light-weight compositions place the album at serious risk of floating away.

Madvillainy isn't really an inaccessible record. It may take a couple of spins for you to get involved, but once you've passed that initial adaptation, it stays with you.

Truly unlike anything else you'll hear this year, hip-hop or otherwise.

Seven Swans plays like a stripped-down, less thematic counterpart to its predecessor. It's also strong enough in its own right to keep fans arguing for months over which album is better.

Another eclectic, bold and idiosyncratic concoction of modern jazz.

Finely crafted, if modestly affecting, froth-pop that bubbles over with dreary sexual overtones and loads of youthful paranoia.

If you've heard the group's last few albums, Milk Man won't seem like a notable refinement or a grand statement of purpose; they're just breaking the pop song mold, over and over again, and doing consistently inventive things with the fragments.

Though it might be a difficult listen in spots (especially for the rave-ier set), the disc definitely shows Jenkinson stretching his musical limbs, and it's a fascinating sight.

Pawn Shoppe Heart is the most electrifying album to have trawled its way out of the Detroit gutter in ages, effortlessly showing up [The White Stripes'] White Blood Cells in the process.

To their considerable credit, TVoTR don't run out of innovation before they run out of songs, so even "Wear You Out"'s final minutes, during which a flute, a sax and various oscillating tones bang away at each other, are inventive and enticing.

It doesn't always work.... But when it does, in the blended tones and dark piano chords of "The Fox and the Hound", the result is magical and otherworldly.

The first thing that really jumps out at you about Two Way Monologue is that it lacks its predecessor's exuberant, puddle-jumping panache. But when you stop and look at things closely, you realize that the progressions Lerche has made on the songwriting front more than atone for any zeal he's trimmed off the back end.

This is a terrifically exciting debut, imbued with a zest, energy and songwriting flair that warrants -- perhaps even commands -- some sort of attention.

Although the Cooper Temple Clause pack plenty of celestial firepower and darkwave ambiance into their six-minute movements, by the time they unveil the epic "Written Apology", the sheer compositional weight is too much for a mortal listener to handle.

Time and time again throughout Panda Park, 90 Day Men prove themselves a rare breed -- a band capable of embracing tradition without becoming overburdened by it.

A fascinatingly cinematic, image-laden and claustrophobic album that feels like the someone else's nightmare.

With an approach that seems so clinical, the album sounds cold and soulless -- and, well, boring.

On Virginia Creeper, he shows a sharpened sense of Midwestern melancholy that is really quite appealing, despite the sometimes hackneyed musical arrangements.

Mercifully, Frusciante has toned down the screechy howl that made his earlier work almost unbearable, and while his songs aren't quite diamond-sharp, they have evolved into soft-focus pop tunes that display a keen melodic intuition and gift for beautiful torment.

As a political album, Liberation may only be half-successful, but I'd still take angry Trans Am over the schlocky Trans Am of TA any day.

Aficionados of WGC's autumnal, melancholy sound will find this fifth full-length release comparable to the group's previous four, only more refined and maybe a little more assured.

There's far too much nondescript strumming and far too few meaningful hooks.

They now trade in a world of startlingly bleak, matte-black liquid-crystal experimental pop perfection pitched somewhere between John Cage's frightening austerity and the bittersweet squall of Swell Maps. Art-pop doesn't get any more accessible than this.

Their bouncily hummable tunes and tortured lyrics about girls might evoke thoughts of groups like Weezer, but these guys aren't nerd-rock clones.

It's a remarkable album.

Though it's fair to question their sense of tradition, they succeed where other blues-aping artists, like Gomez and Arnold, have failed, because they're not wholly indebted to the customs of the blues. They've merely co-opted its grisly spirit and transformed it into something unique.

Not only has Grohl released a fantastic album, he has done a wonderful job giving several aging metal vocalists another fifteen minutes of fame.

The music is fantastic, but the sinking suspicion that there's something else going on that you can't possibly fathom becomes pervasive by album's end.

The Power Out's most impressive feature is the musicianship and songwriting skill on display.

Darnielle's willingness to throw himself so completely into collaboration is what makes this effort such a triumph.

A discernibly West Coast-influenced affair, it's an album of anecdotal moments set to a glorious country-rock backdrop: graciously sun-kissed melodies, vocal harmonies, neat arrangements and refreshing, varied instrumentation.

This is one of the breeziest, catchiest discs I've heard in a while.

A vibrant, engrossing album by a seasoned band whose best years are still ahead of them.

Margerine Eclipse isn't a revelation, but it offers a number of minor departures from the established Stereolab standard -- and given the weighty expectations that surround each new 'Lab album, that's probably the best we can hope for.

Secret Wars is more than a good album. It's an incredible experience, taking you out of your daily life into a mysterious and mind-changing space.

Punk Rock bears little resemblance to the commodified dross that passes for punk in 2004; it's proud, smart, defiantly working-class stuff that'll remind you why the movement mattered.

Statistics... come off like an emo version of Coldplay.

Compelling listening.

An exciting return to the days of the imaginative songwriter.

While Educated Guess may not be her best album to date (a near impossible-to-achieve expectation for an artist 21 albums in), it marks yet another transformation of her talents.

Upon first listen, it seems easy to say that you've heard this before -- but if you take the time to let it sink in, it is obviously not the same band or sound as Belle and Sebastian.

If Boy In Da Corner marks the beginning of distinctly British hip-hop, the genre's standards are already impressively high.

Rarely has rampant misogyny and self-hype sounded as fantastic as this.

This is a disc that springs to life under closer inspection but also serves quite capably as background music -- the kind that draws in casual listeners and gets them asking questions.

Dangerous Magical Noise is rock and roll at its pure, shaggy best. If you're tired of that, you're tired of life.

Ghosts of the Great Highway easily ranks among the very best of Kozelek's dense discography, and it seems fair to suggest that it will become the measuring stick against which any future non-Red House Painters material is compared.

In spite of its apparent split personality, Skull Ring is a righteously bombastic affair, and easily the best Iggy record since Brick by Brick.

As beautiful as much of the album is, it all starts to blend together after a while.

The Instinct is a showcase for an amazing voice and a band that knows how to build around it.... One of the best albums of 2003.

There's a little something for everybody hidden within this mysterious box.

Today Is the Day! is much better than most between-albums rehashes.

I can't imagine a single Westerberg fan being displeased with Dead Man Shake.

Wherever I Am, I Am What's Missing remains grounded in electronic composition, but the subtle distinctions between spacy trip-hop epics (see "Diamonds and Stones) and booty-shaking dance-floor numbers help to keep the band's dynamic fresh, even after ten years.

An album of didactic power and limitless ambition.

The Stills have always shown promise, but Logic Will Break Your Heart ascends far beyond anyone's wildest expectations.

Even taking into account his work with the Replacements, this is the album on which every song is truly worth hearing.

Although much of the album sounds amateurish, and sometimes painfully so, the Unicorns regularly remind us that it's all shtick.

You say you don't give a shit about lyrics? That's good; most of Echoes' lyrics aren't worth giving a shit about.

The Shins' second effort sparkles with a clarity that was not always evident on their debut and energizes with a spark and an enthusiasm that previously seemed forced.

By forsaking professionals for amateurs, the Plan has narrowed the scope of their artistic vision; for every stunning reworking, like Deadverse's "Automatic", there's a stinker like ASCDI's predictably bland mix of "Time Bomb" or Cynyc's blasé beat-slapping "Following Through".

Despite its handful of flaws, Systems/Layers is rife with ideas, and delivers its message, however encoded, with elegance and ingenuity.

This spruced-up EP is devoid of the rampant stylistic deviations that have ruled their later work, instead trading upon simple acoustic song structures and soulful vocal leads that recall the strummy days of I Hope Your Heart is not Brittle.

It seamlessly combines the choicest bits and bobbles of other acts into an overwhelming patchwork of sound and fury, but in the process, the band occasionally loses sight of their own identity.

8,000,000 Stories is not a perfect album, but it's an all-around crowd pleaser that doesn't stoop to the lowest common denominator.

Anyone searching for a wholly absorbing listening experience should look (and listen) elsewhere.

Murdoch, finally free to take charge of his band, has done so in spades, and the result is a confident, assured affair...that, to many listeners, will seem utterly out of character.

The Ladybug Transistor's relative lack of instrumental bravado suggests renewed confidence; the group doesn't make an obvious attempt to hook us with atmosphere or instrumental stunts, because the album already has enough going on to keep us listening.

Call it the exclamation point on Gibbard's stratospheric year.

One of the few discs I've encountered that not only attempts to be something more than a simple album, but succeeds.

An album of rich melodies, aggressive percussive breaks and richly textured atmospheres that intelligently synthesize the whole of electronic music history.

Though it's not the emotionally draining follow-up many were expecting, Seven's Travels succeeds. Its saving grace is the fact that Slug and Ant remain ignorant of, or choose to completely ignore, the hip-hop conventions that have handcuffed similar artists for almost a decade.

It's filthy, low-budget fun that's still plenty fucked up, whether you're a first-timer or a hardcore Peaches fanatic.

Bazooka Tooth not only gets better as the disc goes on -- the beats get thicker, the songs come together more fully and Rock stops proselytizing long enough to let your head bob and relax -- but it actually improves with repeated listens.

It pulls from a grab bag of influences, from Bob Dylan to Broadway, The Who to honky-tonk, and tosses them around with apparent abandon. In spite of this (or maybe because of it), The FFs spin all of this into a sound that's consistent, yet almost magically unique.

The melodies are hauntingly memorable; the band is smart enough to add just enough supporting touches to augment and support, without ever threatening to overwhelm.

Where Stellastarr's debut hits the jackpot is in their gutsy decision to wipe the slate clean by declaring the years 1981 to 1996 a single era, synthesizing the sounds of that fifteen year stretch by playing every band on the soundtrack to a mid-eighties John Hughes gem with the knowledge of the nineties college rock boom.

The passion that once seeped from the group now appears manufactured.

I can respect the need to innovate in hip-hop, but variety here comes at a cost -- there's no coherent or consistent melodic through-line.