The reason Father, Son, Holy Ghost is so uniquely, imperfectly swell is because the band plainly give fuck-all about convention or stylistic uniformity.

This album is infectious.

Though Daybreak generally fulfils that longing for the simpler days of 2001's Stay What You Are, it's ultimately hard to understand why it's taken almost three years to make such a simplistic record.

The fact that Paley and Francis wrote this album together over the course of three afternoons and then recorded it in two is part of its charm. There are no big guitars and not much percussion. What you get is two compelling performers and their songs, backed by a couple of Muscle Shoals aces, bass player David Hood (yes, Patterson's dad) and Spooner Oldham.

On its own, Pierce's clever lyrical ache resonates; but in extended play, his yearning and preening against twee surf-pop and minimal electro-pop can grow tiresome.

So many wonderful things happen on Lenses Alien that you can't possibly remember them all. The only solution, of course, is to listen again.

F*ck Hurricane Irene - Hurricane Grace is this year's force to be reckoned with.

Almost dreamlike in his flow, Thundercat totes us along by way of his agile bass-neck work, sly Rhodes riffs, and vocals that sound filtered through daisies and sunshine.

World Wide Rebel Songs is Morello at his most confident and musically expansive.

Gold Leaves go about their dreaminess the au naturel way, and they're all the better for it.

Indeed, although she's best known for those late-'70s Hotel Chelsea/CBGB-era fringe-punk albums, Outside Society illuminates some of Smith's underrated pop-minded phases.

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

By album's end, CSS are back to their old irreverent ways, screaming that title lyric repeatedly, nearly drowned out by sax blasts and cowbell.

Closer to Closed is a testament to the decline of Braid's teen angst, but those who grew up with the band may not recognize this aging friend.

He'll never be as good as he once was until he hooks up with funereal Balkan scales again, but imitation Magnetic Fields on "Santa Fe" is better than nothing, right?

Although Scattered Trees get emotionally expansive throughout this full-length debut, there's a distinct lack of production (and even playing) here, and that colors the proceedings with an anonymous hue.

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

Mirror Traffic is the first time he's tried to make a Jicks-as-band record digestible.

While mostly a California creation, Still Living echoes the sounds reverberating across the Pacific from New Zealand - think '80s/'90s bands like the Chills and the 3Ds, whose splashy reverb tanks were almost louder than their amps ("Call Me"). Or even Galaxie 500, whose Dean Wareham is a native Zealander ("Bradley").

His words are layers of palpable atmospherics; subtle and pleading at times, worried and demanding at others, mainly steeped in a falsetto that rarely wears thin - note "rarely" - it occasionally causes the eardrums to glaze over.

Bridges has talented friends and mentors who help bring out the best in him, which is surprisingly good.

Comfortably normal, the War on Drugs make for a nice tonic to the sometimes overly weird attitudes of modern indie-psych bands.

Martyn's early-'70s blend of romantic blues and eerie valentines remains potent, and on this double-disc tribute, 30 participants give him a smooch of respect, trying to update the hazy passion he brought to his best work.

Jay dawns that ever-frustrating mush-mouth flow throughout the LP's duration, and only sounds awake when his bars are bookended by Kanye.

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.

No one song here will change your life, but there are some that could come close.

Family of Love is strong, with songs that suggest rather than demand, but nonetheless maintain Dom's glossy, candy-coated summertime sound.

Even when Fountains of Wayne are phoning it in, they're never less than professional. Think of this as a thoughtfully-written greeting card of an album.

The real weak link is Hawk's airy falsetto, which is too underwhelming for its own good. But give him a hairbrush, a mirror, and another couple of years and we'll see how it sounds then.

Cautiously, I submit that Join Us, their 15th album and first non-children's release in four years, has that old-school TMBG feel, as if the Unlikely Rock Band ditched the self-conscious weirdo-geek shtick for a more genuine weirdo-geek non-shtick shtick.

Vannucci as a vocalist and lyricist lacks the star power to keep up his larger-than-life showboating over the course of 40-plus minutes.

It's supposedly winnowed down to seven excellent tracks you can pay for, versus an album-of-the-year candidate you can cop free legally (for now).

Galactic Melt is entertaining in a novelty sort of way, but the vintage (or vintage-sounding) equipment produces such over-the-top sonics that it sinks the record, unless you're super starved for some already-been-done nostalgia.

Two-Way Mirror produces a handsome cacophony as is, but cutting away some of the gunk would have made it sweeter.

The thread that tethers I'm Gay to the rest of Lil B's immense, sprawling catalogue is his earnest loyalty to the central tenets of the "based" movement: love and positivity in the face of adversity.

For the most part, it's like a time-travel expedition back to when My Bloody Valentine ruled the land of college dorms everywhere - and pretty in pink was the way to be.

When Fish Ride Bicycles doesn't have the same old-school shine to it. Instead it feels caught between a few different directions, as personified by its guest list: Travis Barker, Asher Roth, Bun B, and the irreducible Ghostface Killah. But even with the help, none of the tracks stretch particularly far from the Cool Kids' limited palette.

After the brilliant five-track sweep that opens Ritual Union, which peaks with the entrancing "Please Turn," Little Dragon take an unfortunate turn toward light experimentation and hard-nosed repetition, emphasizing pocket-sized click-clack rhythms and downplaying

Though the Random Axe effort is relatively high-profile, these three conjure one another's grimiest gusto.

Within and Without is chillwave 2.0. It takes the same hazy late-night bedroom synthpop, but amps it up exponentially, with live instruments (cello, bass, violins, drums), guidance from superstar producer Ben Allen (who co-produced Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion and Deerhunter's Halcyon Digest), and more meticulously crafted songs.

Compared to 1996's Harmacy, Barlow's maudlin tendencies are relatively reined in throughout Bakesale's 15 straightforward rockers.

Although it's an imperfect effort in some regards, the somewhat conceptual OX 2010: A Street Odyssey testifies to Vast's highly developed steez, and does so with complements from MCs who effortlessly jibe with his arcane rhyme selections.

As Unknown Mortal Orchestra wears on, there is some loosening of the pop reins, ending the album on a wandering psychedelic journey reminiscent of Grizzly Bear. A nice trip indeed.

In all, Ninth is a striking return to form.

Segall spent six months writing and recording Goodbye - his longest investment in a record yet. The time spent soaking in the classics has paid off.

It makes for their strongest work yet.

The production from Steve Albini ensures that it's not too slick or processed. These short, humble pop songs amble along like the Wedding Present if David Gedge had a wrist injury that cut his inhuman strumming speed in half.

It's at once majestic and gentle, a deep breath and a sigh that declares Vernon's transcendence of the turmoil and technique of his unique breakout record and establishes him as an artist who knows exactly what he's doing. Hallelujah.

At 52 similar-sounding minutes, It's All True is a bit of a robust meal to digest all in one sitting but, served in moderate portions, it's irresistibly tasty. Junior Boys: still itchy after all these years.

Returning after 11 years of officially not existing, what's left of ATR could've focused their energies on kicking lots of ass. Instead, they indulge spoken-wordy, freshman-year non-profundities that mostly siphon energy from the get-up-and-f*ck-some-shit-up ethos present on a few okay tracks like "Activate" and "Codebreaker."

It's difficult to decide whether Butler's thing is psychedelic thuggishness or thuggish psychedelia, and he probably doesn't intend for us to figure it out. Either way, he's done the near-impossible in creating a sound that's wholly fresh and grows richer with every listen.

In Light is an impressive step forward--it seriously contends for the title of this summer's go-to indie-pop record.

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

Past Life Martyred Saints is more focused and confident than the work of many of Andersen's peers. It's likely we've not even heard her best yet. And even if not, this is pretty sweet as is.

See The Light has an airy feel that is more suited not only to actual dancefloor dancing (rather than the thump-until-blackout oblivion of most current electro) but to the gentle torch-song pull of Ruiz's emotive bleat.

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.

For a densely layered, expertly produced dance-rock album, this second full-length from British three-piece Friendly Fires is perplexingly bland.

The melange of old sonic idioms doesn't say anything remarkable about their sources or feel particularly original. White Denim sound ready to craft a groundbreaking record--D just isn't it.

It's all good fun, but (mostly) all been done before.

Gloss Drop is another infectious, drug-induced carousel ride in which electric guitars sound like short-circuiting circus organs and drums punch through the mix like atom bombs--but there's a distinctly multi-cultural vibe here.

The trio's strongest asset has always been inspired, thoughtfully crafted pop songs, which Share the Joy should finally make clear.

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.

Carry on, ye bearded gods.

Argos's unrepentant superstar imitations aside, Brilliant! Tragic! holds some well-written standouts.

The songs, a handful of covers and about a dozen originals, aren't terrible, but the ukulele gets really old, really quick.

Hooks are competent and decent but never demanding enough for you to race out to get a song's lyrics embedded into your skin.

For anyone bored of being bored of being bored, strap this one on and ride away.

w h o k i l l may be strange on first pass, but only by its uniqueness, a music whose microgenre would disappear in a whiff were Ms. Garbus to have never stumbled upon it within her.

Diotima is poetry, classical allusion, the consideration of platonic love and our place in history. It is searing shards, intricately arranged, forward-moving, stretching to infinity--lurching, faltering, and then thundering for passages that stop time and levitate your world.

The smooth shape of this album - there's no rising or falling action - and lack of a big concept won't replace 2005's Black Sheep Boy for diehard fans, just as the superior The Stand-Ins didn't in 2008. But Elvis Costello fans should holler.

Man Man fans probably weren't expecting "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head"–levels of optimism from the happy-titled Life Fantastic, but the vibe on the Philly-based band's fourth album is pretty morbid, even by their standards.

All Things Bright and Beautiful, 12 sterilized laptop clunkers that are indeed bright but far from beautiful. There's no maturity in sight.

Hard Bargain is a gorgeous album.

Ditch the first 20 minutes and open the album with the stunning, nearly seven-minute "The Violent Bear It Away," which is tucked away toward Destroyed's end, and here's a career-defining work.

The pointlessness is grating. XI Versions' final three songs do show signs of life--Animal Collective, Walls, and Pantha himself manage to work up a buzz--but they can't compensate for time killers by Lawrence, Carsten, and Efdemin that make inoffensiveness offensive.

Thirty-some years in, the Beasties are as sharp, hilarious, funky, and escapist as they've ever been.

At times, the album draws more from drum and bass than from UK funky or any other bass music du jour.

Although his results can be flimsy, when his creations get legs under them, Terra is the bomb.

Building levees of emotion and tearing those bitches down - Explosions in the Sky have never sounded more thrilling.

It's infectious, and though the album is heavy in inspirational debt, Passive's highs are tantalizing enough to lure you to come for a bright-eyed joyride.

The tunes are repetitive in the vein of Oakey's earliest industrial post-punk '70s rants, but with the angry friction of those heady times cooled off, like a trip to the corner after a heated outburst. And if the album doesn't quite attain the life-altering awesomeness of Dare--well, what album does, really?

T Bone Burnett's trademark production has the rhythm section thumping as if you were listening to the whole thing from a booth at your favorite pub. Which suits Earle fine.

House of Balloons is a gorgeous album that pairs moody beats and samples with morbid lines about drugs and late-night encounters, all of it caulked with sex.

The continuous hitmaking of Present the Paisley Reich might be gone forever, but Dancer Equired offers up enough catchy pop jams to warrant a listen.

Although a three-song offering that sounds like something scraped together using leftovers from a four-year-old album may seem a letdown, it's not, if only because, in those four years, many have tried to mimic Burial's sound but to no avail.

Tomboy is a tricked-out, big-budget epic built for IMAX.

It's taken Isbell three albums to find his comfortable post-Truckers solo-artist groove, and on Here We Rest, he settles in quite nicely.

Bringing in Nevermind producer Butch Vig risked dangerous nostalgia, but his analog recording gives a fresh, warm feel to the proceedings.

As perfect as Twilight is, though, Surtur Rising houses it handily.

In Love with Oblivion finds the band more upbeat than ever, channeling Flying Nun–era sounds with melodic riffs, handclaps, and chugging bass.

This fifth studio album is a humbly gorgeous collection, propelling an already dynamic band into even more dramatic, heart-wrenching territory.

The only real sore spot is Wes Eisold's overdramatic Robert Smith singing style -- his pain sounds fashionable and forced instead of penetrating and raw.

It's all well and good, but this experiment works best when Ditto showcases her snarly pipes, as on the break-up-themed cruncher "Open Heart Surgery." Otherwise, she's just awash in layers of electronica that dilute her Southern bite.

As long as Brit keeps the ballads to a minimum and plays to her strength as a willing pop renegade (which she does here more than on any of her previous albums), she will continue to make exciting, groundbreaking modern music.

Safari Disco Club is unlikely to find itself in the speakers of many dance parties on this side of the Atlantic in coming weeks.

Whether he's in onomatopoetic punch-line mode or scratching the Cee Lo end of his terrific range, Monch is hip-hop's superlative talent, and now he has a solo stripe to prove it.

Something To Die For has the Swedish dance/pop outfit awkwardly dipping a toe into the pool of trance music.

Here's one of the few first-quarter releases of 2011 that people will still be listening to in 2012.