These beautiful, beguiling melodies make for an album that’s so rich and regal in both style and shimmer, it’s simply stunning to say the least. Prepare to be enticed.

A raw and solid debut, Basic Behaviour translates anguish into an intense yet catchy album.

With One Drop of Truth, The Wood brothers have put out a career-defining album. But they’ve been just as brilliant from the beginning; now it’s time for the rest of the world to finally realize that.

A defining blend of assurance and intrigue makes Calexico’s music come across as both so sumptuous and so surreal.

Those unawares of Deer Tick’s five preceding efforts ought to make every effort to catch up. Likewise, those who appreciate the band’s quality and consistency will find Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 to be a perfect pairing, as compatible as their titles imply.

Those unawares of Deer Tick’s five preceding efforts ought to make every effort to catch up. Likewise, those who appreciate the band’s quality and consistency will find Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 to be a perfect pairing, as compatible as their titles imply.

This Is Glue is several orders of magnitude better than the already quite enjoyable Metalmania. Without changing the formula much, Sampson has somehow increased the impact of his ramshackle, ear-wormy songs and made them matter more.

The result is an album of uncommon strength, not necessarily due to the individuals involved, but rather because of the sheer force and fury of the unified thrust. Filthy Friends never waver from this mission, making this one Invitation well worth heeding.

Four albums in and Turnpike Troubadours show no signs of writer’s block.

This certainly seems like his most accessible effort yet, a sign perhaps that after years of being regarded as an odd man out, he’s ready to find that balance between talent and tenacity. Well done, old boy. Well done.

Small Town is a master class in chemistry, creativity and the joy of making music for no other sake.

What a remarkable record--weird, yet compelling, in equal parts dissonance and luminosity; a seductive tease that nevertheless exudes the kind of warm familiarity that marks the best indie rock.

The easiest way to say it is that there’s no barrier between despair and euphoria in these songs--which contain both, equally, simultaneously and without contradiction.

It’s a gorgeous, unreal place that Mount Kimbie evokes on Love What Survives, but dissonance leaks in through the crevices.

The words are as smart as they come, full of sudden puzzle-twists and casual apercus, the showy part of this musical enterprise. Yet the music is just as polished and fine, even if it takes a supporting role.

Seventeen tracks makes for an extended listening experience, but there’s enough variety that you’re never bored. In fact, the second half seems to hit a little harder than the first.

There are plenty more excellent guitar janglers like The Pooh Sticks doing my favorite tune “On Tape” plus Pale Saints doing the dreamier “Colours and Shapes” and Choo Choo Train (Ric and Paul from Velvet Crush) doing the righteous “High,” all of which is one disc one. Moving right over to disc two The House of Love start things off with “The Hill.”

Here in his first solo full-length, he sands down the edges of the jazz-man’s axe, denaturing the sound until it evokes rather than presents itself. Almost all these songs have the drifting, half-heard, hard-to-pin-down sense-memory quality of music drifting in from other rooms, long ago.

Instead of dramatic tempo shifts or sing-along choruses, the songs rely on subtle texture and tempo changes that, in context, wind up carrying far more weight than they would in another setting.

Life Is Fine boasts some of Kelly’s best lyrics in years.

Iyer really makes an effort here to highlight all sides of his musical skills, letting two decades of experience boil into an exceptionally tasty dish. Iyer has already proven himself a jazz master, but with Far From Over, he takes his talent as composer, player and bandleader to new heights.

Don’t look for fireworks here, but rather smaller, quieter revelations that take time to unveil themselves.

As always, Mulcahy’s pastoral pop stirs up a delightful brew, both easily accessible and undeniably irrepressible all at the same time.

With Positively Bob, Nile manages to make one of the few cover albums worth owning.

Superbly performed, the show is recorded with perfect clarity by NPR’s engineers, and packaged with an extensive booklet of essays and photos. Truth, Liberty & Soul is no barrel-scraping collection of effluvia, but a vital addition to the slim catalog of a genius.

Kids in The Streets is just as charming and powerful as its predecessors.

It all sounds like the best kind of disco, but warmer and funkier and rougher around the edges.

It’s a good sign that Jones is open to anything on Super Natural, and that he can easily enhance his usual firebreathing rock & roll passion without diluting it.