The results are hit-or-miss.

These on-record musings never reveal the off-record Marnie, which is a shame, but the sprawling, chimerical Marnia brings you close enough to be captivating anyhow.

Welcome Oblivion tracks like techno-folk haunter "Ice Age" and the doom-pop jaunt "How Long?" make uncredited cameo appearances in your nightmares until you go insane and eat your own hands.

Hit the Waves is so heartfelt as a pastiche of '80s alternative music that it almost muscles its way into being brilliant.

Four records deep, Pissed Jeans may have trimmed some heaviness, but they open space for discovery.

New Moon is their most purposeful beast yet.

It's easy to imagine her getting very famous, because Torres doesn't wash the songs out with its prettiness.

AMOK is as heady and immersive as any great Radiohead album, but those comparisons eventually wilt: Yorke's new band has discovered a symmetry all its own.

While lukewarm as a whole, The Messenger doesn't suck nearly enough to bruise Marr's status as a guitar deity on wheels.

It ain't exactly Bill Shakespeare (or Trojans), but it gets the job done.

The beauty of Beach Fossils has always been in the tension between Payseur's disaffected deadpan and the band's super-visceral live shows (before Beach Fossils, he spent years playing in hardcore bands) and on Clash much of that post-punk energy translates seamlessly.

Push the Sky Away feels heavy on breath-taking and woodshedding, an album of waiting for sparks to ignite.

The lyrics resonate hard, though, felt most strongly when Rønnenfelt sings with broad expressive shouts.

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

The Scottish outfit have delivered again with jangly pop full of skittering guitars, self-flagellating lyricism, and whimsy under a pall of darkness that no amount of the big spotlight can dispel.

Foals haven't lost their math-rock edge; they've infused it with fun.

Somebody needs to boot Nielson off his why-fi connection: beneath the murk is the work of a riveting craftsman.

Bleeding Rainbow provide tunes to which one could satisfactorily gaze at his or her shoes during any point of the year.

The History of Apple Pie aren't exactly breaking new ground in the world of indie rock, but they are the sort of band who win you over in seconds.

It's not as challenging as previous Ducktails recordings, but a pleasant pop record nonetheless, and the band's most universally accessible yet.

Beta Love is the best of both worlds: surprisingly slick and danceable, while subtly amplifying their art-school charm.

Anything in Return is his most melodic album.

Tortoise's John McEntire steps in for long-time producer Roger Moutenot, but any of these songs would fit perfectly on the band's last half-dozen albums.

If there's a knock to be had against the Harlem rapper, it's that he lacks an original presence. So it's curious that for his major-label debut he's opted to further venture down the rabbit hole of references, loading Long.Live.A$AP with a bevy of guests with personalities far more distinctive than his own.

Love Sign dips a little too far into the Fountains of Wayne kiddie pool.

Lysandre inevitably feels a bit skimpy. It's still an unnervingly tuneful warm-up: freed from his hipster shackles, Owens is harnessing the power of the incredibly uncool--and he's all the cooler for it.

For the jaded among us, this is regressive and full of genre-contrivance.

Fascinating speed-bumps aside, it's a mission still very much accomplished.