Over time, the Mountain Goats have explored different emotional territory. Here they prove they can still make humble, evocative music.

Of all the possible directions the band could have taken, they decided on generic coffeehouse folk pop, with predictably pleasant-yet-dull results.

Meric Long, vocalist/guitarist for San Francisco duo the Dodos, makes a lot of broad statements on the band's fourth studio album. Fortunately, the music fills in the blanks.

The Return of Mr. Zone 6 is an album pared down to the elements Gucci knows best - sinister beats fueled by snare pellets and twisted, carnival-like synths, deadpanned prioritization of cash over women, and collaboration with a slew of Brick Squad compatriots and friends (we hear everyone from Birdman to Master P to Waka Flocka Flame, many times over).

Given its origins, this could have been a morbid, self-indulgent exercise. Instead, it's a fine indie-pop album.

Scandalous, though a natural progression, takes some surprising turns that attest to a tightened-up band still figuring out just how much dy-no-mite they're capable of exploding.

The cumulative effect can be like listening to a church choir doing canons while simultaneously crushing OCs on your bicuspids, one at a bloody time.

Here, Dolls II make their move, surging forward while simultaneously nodding to a time that predates even that first über-influential incarnation.

So the Death Set essay a Jekyll/Hyde routine of dramatic contrasts, pitting lightning-fried guitars, unpredictable computerized effects, and goofy bullshit against mellow hooks and relative subtlety.

With Collapse into Now, there's enough reason to keep celebrating.

This Pleasure is known, but in the end it overstays its welcome.

The Luyas do supply some exquisite instrumental ingredients--a French horn sent through pedals, an obscure zither-like contraption called the Moodswinger, and various electronic effects--but they have a tough time making anything memorable out of them. Timidity eventually renders their work tedious.

There might be something deeper rolling around here than "There's nothing that will change me/There's nothing sure as shit" ("Bring the Fight"). Probably not, but if you want to bang your head, this will do the trick.

Mostly The Human Romance is just Darkest Hour reiterating a formula they already know. There's no need for a drastic overhaul, but some risks would enliven the flavors they're clearly intent on keeping.

He's mastered the tuneful shrug, the song that sounds unfinished and tossed off but sticks fast to your brain and keeps revealing a depth you hadn't noticed.

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.

The King of Limbs, a breezy exploration of the depths of subliminal glitch-folk, is this band's admission that the labyrinth of post–OK Computer zigs and zags they've led their audience through may never again lead to an arena-rock goldmine.

Beady Eye's eagerly awaited debut represents Liam Gallagher's uninspiring foray into the spotlight without Noel, his battle-weary brother and Oasis's chief songwriter.

The fact that Greatest Story didn't drop on a major just attests to how perverted the industry is. That said, the delicious and anthemic Just Blaze beats, money cameos, and precise orchestration that spoiled deals afforded render this the last great major-label rap album of all time - even though it's on an indie.

Pyramid lacks the spark a document of this importance deserves.

It lacks the playfulness of the early Faust records, where the band's experiments with jazz, folk, and raunchy rock and roll were coated with acceptable degrees of avant-garde theatricality.

The track's sonic cousin, "Burn Bridges," still stands tall on sparkly synth loops and bumper-sticker lyrics ("Burn bridges/Make yourself an island"), but the rest of the EP soars mostly on lo-fi surf pop made by landlocked youth using Casios and Fruity Loops in bored bedrooms.

The one-woman choir may seem eccentric, but by the last of these nine vignettes, Barwick has accomplished what few purveyors of such pristine beauty can. Through its oddities, The Magic Place shines.

There are synths that buzz, synths that whiz, synths that glow in the dark--the luxurious texture may put you in an electro-psych trance. But Young Galaxy are greedy. Not satisfied with being masters of atmosphere, they also aim for hooks--most of which are not sticky enough to jolt you back to the waking world.

So what subgenre tag is appropriate now? Is this discogaze? Funkwave? Only time will tell.

Smart Flesh won't just set many a lonely heart aflutter - it will stick around in the morning to make breakfast.

Degeneration Street is a bit of a tease, a solid alternative-rock album with some exciting sounds that afford only a peek into the Dears' potential.

The contrived sheen marring much of the album dissolves, and things get industrial real quick. That dark and uncharted - for Cut Copy - territory might be the way to go heading forward.

Amid the carnage and the stink of loss, PJ Harvey creates inspiring beauty.

But that's just it; much here is good, even great, but it's all too familiar.

This music is more about ambiance, with the luscious haze recalling a mood rather than shaping something distinctive. Has anything ever been so perfectly gorgeous and perfectly inconsequential all at once?

The album stutters heavily in the middle. Hercules are a 12-inch outfit, and "Boy Blue" and "Blue Song" are failed attempts at varying the mood with some despondency. As if they wanted to make Blue Songs more than a collection of singles, which it isn't.

Suuns' debut LP is pieced together from a few decent ideas and a lot of bad ones.

Rhys is the ex-Britpopper making music that doesn't sound like dreary London fog - and as any New Englander reeling from a long hard winter's ass kick will tell you, that's an advantageous distinction.

Full of airy vocals and synths, the album sounds as if it could lift off at any moment if not for the drum thumps tethering it down. But the beats sound weighty only in contrast.

If Esben and the Witch don't quell their sonic histrionics, they may not get a second curtain call.

Minks floats along like a Sofia Coppola movie - delicate and listless, topped with a glossy and charming overcoat, but lacking in substance.

Sticking mostly to his usual tenor sax instead of adopting Parker's alto, Lovano isolates the strands of Parker's musical DNA and shows how they're part of the music's ongoing regeneration.

On Kiss Each Other Clean, Beam's muse must have told him to pull back on the reins.

Nearly a quarter-century in, Faith isn't timeless, but it fits into an '80s time capsule where horns, cheesy-sounding drum machines, and four-day-old stubble were the standard.

What Spiritual, Mental, Physical documents is a group kicking around possibilities that could go somewhere great, but as they appear here, only a handful of these half-cooked ideas deserve an audience.

The group often stretch their net too wide for their own good. Rolling Blackouts is more indecisive mixtape than flowing album.

Nary a tippy toe strays from the well-trodden path; it's as if Lemmy and the boys spent every couple of years locked in a studio with their own discography and no outside noises that might besmirch the purity of their brand. There are occasional hints of self-awareness.

On Mine Is Yours, everything is bigger. King's reverb-tinged production puts the focus on the band's surprisingly tender melodies and slow-burn rock arrangements; the result is 11 melodic, economical tracks that deliver huge hooks without sacrificing instrumental dexterity.

For a proper introduction, Cloud Nothings leaves much to be desired. But talk about highlights: if you can get through the sing-along chorus of "Should Have" without a big, dumb smile on your face, you might just be a heartless bastard after all.

Ritual is so grandiose that it rarely has room to breathe.

The King Is Dead is ear-openingly different for the Decemberists, but the pretty country-rock might soothe even the hardest of cowboy hearts.

There aren't many punk stalwarts who can weave a tale of being down and out quite like Mike Ness, and for the most part he's in top form on this seventh studio release from Social D.

Don't expect anything in terms of experimentation--this makes stellar mixtape fodder for an indie-pop prom night also scored by Dum Dum Girls and the Morning Benders.

Dye It Blonde slows down a tad, too often eschewing bright, spot-on hooks in favor of washed-out '60s texture. But when they get it, they really get it.

The constants are there; the group come off as authentic in their earnestness, even with lyrics ("I love your celebrity/the VPL in the SUV") that might look slipshod on paper. But no new ground is being broken.

It's a broad spectrum of styles, but sometimes that's just another way to describe the comfort of being your (multiple) selves.

It's more like the album we should all discover after they've broken through with their second or third long-player, when we'll all be a lot more forgiving.

If Apollo Kids is a warm-up, we can expect monster things from Ghost in the New Year.

It's an atmosphere-setting collection, with little in the way of memorable riffs or melodies. But that's the point: Earth has needed to slow its roll for a minute now. Here's the inspiration.

Still, like the lovable Muppet, Flaws is just a little too green to have any major impact.

Everything feels dead in the desert, but Return is rife with life.

Sublime production quality and danceability aside, this mix scores as a chronicle of American pop music that elicits a dual layer of nostalgia: the first for the sampled songs themselves, the second for the thrill of the novelty of early mash-ups.

From the opening "Variation 1" to the acoustic closer, "Sous le ciel de Paris," Ribot's phrasing is slow and contemplative, so each elegantly chiseled note stands as a beatific example of his virtuosity.

There's nothing particularly wrong with what Minaj has given us - her pipes are worthy of wide-ranging pop stardom - but the album is a misallocation of the talent and quirk that thrust her into the spotlight in the first place.

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.

I can feel my IQ slipping a few notches with the passage of each track on this disc, and gloriously so: it takes brains and balls to make pop this smart sound so dumb.

Fantasy is the sound of an artist who is so far from shunning the spotlight that the firepower of the wattage pointed at him is a full-on supernova.

If the down-and-out, early-MCR-worshipping emo set need the equivalent of an "It Gets Better" video to remind them how awesome life can be, no document could be more spirited and persuasive than Danger Days.

We'll never know what goes on behind the helmets, but who cares? The sheer audacity of this action-movie-reboot soundtrack is its own reward.

The result may surprise some just looking to get lost in Glowstick Land: sure, there are plenty of K-hole zone-outs, but just as often Zimmerman puts songcraft and danceability ahead of the usual sci-fi-filter tricks.

The shoegazy noise genre is again slowly creeping toward the pop spectrum, and Sports might push it even farther toward the indie mainstream, but it needs a new tag - let's call it blackout pop.

Inasmuch as Stereolab have accomplished pretty much everything they could, Not Music feels like a passive retread.

WYWH is a darker, thinner, more digitized affair whose only compelling moments come courtesy of a new-found sex appeal of the disco variety.

At this stage, Small Black are a charming but undeveloped outfit. Moving from an aquarium to a sea (or even a pond) would be an intriguing next step.

Though no new ground is broken, the classically trained pianist and Berklee alumna shows her confidence and talent with this strong break-up record right after the quirky cool of last year's Taller Children.

Part of the problem is Rihanna's essential blandness in a post-Gaga/post-Idol pop market, but mostly it comes down to the siren-song nature of her amazingly recognizable voice.

For the Ghosts Within descends into a strange netherworld bordered by art pop, jazz, and classical that few seek to visit.

Like everything Eno touches, the album is riddled with baffling and stimulating forays into unexpected territories.

National Ransom isn't the midlife masterpiece that obsessives have been pining for, but its finer points are worth seeking out, in all their sepia-tinted glory.

For evidence as to why labeling subgenres of electronic music is tedious, look no further than this debut LP from UK collective Darkstar.

Down There harnesses the core duality upon which the AC empire is built: a warm and pure pop æsthetic folded harmoniously into layers of murky swirls and drips.

The Fool feels like a séance, with guitarist Emily Kokal and her fellow female vocalists focusing their ghostly calls on a mysterious you.

As the obviousness of Write About Love's title implies (it could have been called Play and Sing!), Belle & Sebastian are looking to get back to basics with their first album since 2005's tremendous The Life Pursuit.

Ferry is as cool and debonair as ever on his first collection of new material in eight years.

They seem hell-bent on pleasing everyone, and at times they succeed.

When Old 97's are on--which they are most of the time on their eighth studio album--they're very, very on. Rhett Miller's writing is the definition of neatly sculpted songcraft, with every piece firmly in place, and not a bit of fat.

It's all a lot to wrap your head around, and depending on your mindset, you could either follow the sound collage down the rabbit hole or simply ride the surface-level groove.

Although the occasional inspired lyrical hook pokes through, all too often the need to match the amped-up production leads to generic blah in the words department.

1,000 Years--the record Sleater-Kinney might have made at the very beginning if they'd been ambivalent about whether to turn up the volume and the attitude--is a meditation on age, timelessness, and nostalgia that could elicit a glass-half-full/half-empty decision from fans.

The surgical-mask costumes help in that regard: coupled with their herky-jerky brain-scan riffs and malevolent aura, Clinic look more likely to perform torture surgery on your ass in some water-logged basement than give a concert.

Telephantasm is a solid retrospective for a Seattle metal band who got wrapped up in flannel, became an MTV staple, and left the game before ending up like Nirvana or, worse, Pearl Jam.

It's an effortless move to help firm up No Age's place as one of the most bi-polar party bands around.

The band do fluidly navigate between ideas and structural experiments here, only occasionally overdosing on their newfound taste for moping and melancholy. In short, Crush turns tropical punk into a simplistic and inaccurate characterization.

Halcyon Digest is the perfect LP to spin twice, love unrepentantly, and walk away from. This refreshing tonic (poured from the cash bar of overrated newer bands) is straight from the heart of Mr. Bradford Cox, poet and purveyor of Deerhunter's zen pop psych.

In short, it's a triumph. Yes, it's still messy, and yes, Patrick Flegel's apathetic nasal vocals are too saturated, or buried in the mix, or both, but the intricate musicianship and songwriting take this from "yet another lo-fi garage album" to mini masterpiece.

Lewis may be covering territory that a lot of other artists tread, but he's earnest and soulful, injecting the romantic lyrics with a smoothness that reminds me of Avalon-era Roxy Music.

The songs on this debut album are lethargic, syrupy, and sinister, with the rough-edged peaks of a maxed-out mix.

It's all a very pretty sequined package, but moving forward, the Hundred in the Hands might find their music as cornered as Captain Fetterman's troops were off the Bozeman Trail.

Les Savy Fav's fifth studio album finds the veteran Brooklyn quintet further channeling the gonzo energy of their live show, and with winning results.

It offers a peppy antidote to You and Me, their especially downbeat 2008 offering, walking you through all the requisite Walkmen emotions: chipper resentment ("Blue As Your Blood," "Woe Is Me"), resignation ("All My Great Designs"), hung-over longing ("Torch Song"). But it's "Juveniles," the opener, that consolidates in one track all we expect the Walkmen to deliver.

Brandon Flowers has gone on record saying he brought the songs on Flamingo to his fellow bandmates for the next Killers album and was given the brush-off.

Sleep Forever is about accepting mortality, and if its skill represents the possibilities of their earthly journey, long live Crocodiles.