A danceable yet heavy album.

A finely observed, immaculately produced work, full of diversions, hooks, and charm.

Grief’s Infernal Flower is heavy in the best, most gratifyingly melancholy way.

There’s little apparent by way of concept, lyrical wit, and aesthetic quirk — qualities that illuminate the work of many of Duterte’s colleagues — but ambience, style, and ingenuity are well at work, making the album a vibe-y classic worth hanging onto.

The Monitor more than cements Titus Andronicus's place in the indie rock arena. At its best moments, it reminds you of just how durable--and dangerous--a beast like rock 'n' roll can still be.

Wide Awake! is the album in which America’s most consistent punk band once again distill their myriad influences, this time with a whole new list of reasons why their minds never push the brakes.

To the outsider, this album certainly feels like a defining statement, one that has considered each and every molecule that this abstract marvel might assume.

Field of Reeds may initially come across as inhumanely taut, straining, and indistinct to begin with, but this is the sound of precociousness finally arriving at a purpose.

The entire first half of Eagle shows Callahan as a much more evolved and mature musician. He appears more comfortable expanding his musical space, and he exercises tasteful restraint with Beattie’s strings.

If Tempest was hellfire apocalypse romance, prophesied steampunk armageddon, then Shadows in The Night is the revelation of the true nature of the American songbook.

BSP aren't going for a concept album here (or concepts at all, really), but you'd be forgiven for expecting one given how beautifully the collection of songs coheres into a singular piece of work and retains momentum through its movements.

Harvey Milk never quite match the achievement of their canonical works, but, nevertheless, they've succeeded in stretching the running joke without dissolving into self-parody. Or perhaps more aptly, they've delivered on the promise of self-parody with a record of genuine insecurity, unsettling pessimism and inherent, indisguisable humanity.

A Vintage Burden is well-executed, spare, and in the simplest terms, makes wonderful Sunday morning background music.

That she is able to incorporate these technical talents into solid songwriting is what makes This Is It the success that it is.

This is easily Saint Etienne's best album since 1998's Good Humor.

It's perhaps not as immediately satisfying as their early work and not nearly as charming as their intimate mid-career efforts, but, after several careful listens, the album feels as powerful and urgent as anything else in their discography.

Too Many Voices is an immersive experience that builds on the artists’ past without once holding them back.

Half a good album, half disastrously wrong.

While I am not one to fault Kilgour for slowing things down a little, an impatient listener might argue that Frozen Orange shows Kilgour's age in the same ways Yo La Tengo's Summer Sun belied theirs.

If you get a kick out of The Fucking Champs riffing on Bach with "Air on a G String," you're on the road to Panda Park.

This is one of the albums of the year: completely out of left field and completely solid from start to finish.

Elverum is reveling in his honest moment of awe. In doing so, he has sloshed away the Norwegian frost with a mittened hand, a frost that kept these songs so chilling.

Doris hits a couple more high points when Earl flirts with horrorcore.

Dawson doesn’t obscure his political predispositions, which are quite understood on tracks such as “Civil Servant” & “Fulfilment Centre,” for example. But 2020 is far from a soapbox, despite being clearly inflected by contemporary anxieties. Dawson’s characters speak for themselves through their lived experience.

The finished product is brilliantly, beautifully schizophrenic.

As gorgeous and misstep-free as it is, the soundtrack risks a bit of that souvenir, collector’s item feel native to score-based soundtracks. That being said, it’s nowhere near as padded-out as those typically are. While melodies and tones recur, track to track, it plays out with an ear toward immersion.

By the end of the album’s blissful, sparse, empty-Saharan-landscape closer 'The Kids Don’t Stand a Chance,' perfection doesn’t seem to matter much anymore--especially when your mind’s too preoccupied on starting Vampire Weekend again from the beginning.

Thankfully, such peeks of inhibition are brief, and Cox spends far more time confidently beckoning us into the glorious world he's created. For the first time, this is a place where we're to be cohabitants, not merely invitees.