Their third record proves that even the most militant punk songs are often best served by a stripped-down aesthetic.

True to its title, Violence Begets Violence is the Philly powerhouse's most aggressive effort yet, a morally polluted playground that no sane unarmed person should dare to frolic in.

Despite its disparate influences and multi-handed production approach, All in One never feels less than cohesive.

With Room(s), Travis Stewart has somehow managed not only to wrangle in the off-the-cuff tendencies of the genre, but also create one of the more fully realized dance LPs in some time.

Lonerism is a life raft for the abyss of song-induced self-reflection it inspires.

At the end, after his inevitable untimely death, all anyone will care about will be the stately grandeur of the opening (and closing) music coupled with the star’s eternal blank stare: unknowable, unfathomable, and ultimately tragic. We’ll have to wait for the movie; fortunately the soundtrack is already here.

Fuller than usual of slow songs and piano ballads, One Life Stand is their mellowest, most thoughtful effort so far — which means it carries the risk of also being their most boring. (Contrast is one of their secret weapons, though it didn't seem like such a big deal until now.) But keep listening: slow to reveal, its charm is just as slow to fade.

This ninth studio album finds long-timers Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley regaining their focus with their best set of narratives since 2006's A Blessing and a Curse.

Its stories of survivors and struggling lovers have a wistfulness that spills from the lyrics into the tone of David Hidalgo’s vocal performances and the warm guitar lines, which draw on blues, classic rock, and traditional Mexican musical flourishes.

Yeah, the alternate/alternating track sequence is screwy for the first seven songs or so — Deerhunter build momentum only to lose it. But it gives the album’s backside something of a black-and-white-to-Technicolor moment.

One of his best, no doubt, and arguably one of the best-sounding records so far this year.

Attack on Memory is simultaneously abrasive and sentimental; it's a self-deprecating soundtrack for a new generation of adolescent loneliness.

A triumphant sequel.

All rappers ride on the claim that they’re the best, but on III Wayne makes his case.

Throughout Love on the Inside, Nettles and Bush trick out their twangy tunes with shiny new-wave guitars, creamy pop harmonies, and robust rock beats.

This is Stevie Wonder or Yo La Tengo territory, fearlessly approaching touchy-feely domestic ground where many fear to tread. They own it, too.

Calculated yet impulsive, Young Fathers prove Scottish hip-hop's viability.

Ancient Romans is not an easy listen, but for those with the attention span, it's a worthwhile trip.

Black Thought comes as brutish as ever, and their now-standard cast of collaborators (P.O.R.N. and Dice Raw) sound more at ease over these lanky beats than they did on more combustible previous efforts.

Endless Now is a record that will appeal equally to fans of the Buzzcocks or Blink- 182, and that rules.

Huismans has always fought the good fight in his attempt to fuse dubstep with comparably hard-nosed genres of electronic music, and Fever is his most fully realized effort yet.

Rough-edged and overdriven in the right places, super-slick as their Reagan-era new-wave touchstones elsewhere, this pomo-funk concoction from Xavier de Rosnay and Gaspard Augé is like a French kiss from Sonny Crockett.

Here you get an hour’s worth of top-notch disco-house jams crammed together into a non-stop megamix that emphasizes both the duo’s tune sense and their body-rocking beatcraft.

It's a refined sense of balance that sets her apart from Grouper and Julia Holter, artists to whom Evans is too often compared.

Whether telegraphing heartbreak, world-weariness, or menacing intent (the latter especially on the Psycho-meets-Bad-Seeds nightmare of "Sooner or Later"), Badwan and Zeffira excel at heightening their musical senses simultaneously to the graces of the Heavens and the billowy depths of Hades.

It'll inevitably be pigeonholed as post-house or something equally asinine, but for now, it exists without definition, and for that we can be grateful.

Brushes with the law and a cocaine habit sent his personal life on a turn to the dark side, something that's soon evident over the course of Mr. Rager's 17 remorseful tracks.

Like the Go-Betweens or the Field Mice, Europe is top-notch indie-pop, with upbeat music and literate lyrics coated in a wistfulness that can be debilitating if you indulge in it too often.