What is evident is the astonishing consistency of Streisand's tone, her sometimes goose-bump-inducing interpretative gifts, and her stunning power over 45 years.

Apollo Sunshine still aspires to create a self-contained immersion experience, an attitude that, more than any particular strain of their dabbling, makes the band a welcome kind of happening.

The band’s fifth record operates with a mercurial, decade-spanning dishevelment.

The result is another engaging, club-inspired nightmare. This one, though, doesn't ever jolt you awake.

While the touchstones are evident--you can hear wisps of everyone from Vince Gill to Steve Earle to Lynyrd Skynyrd--Blackberry Smoke has assuredly carved out its own spot.

The album is ambitious and brimming with all sorts of stray ideas, but it's also suited to Gonzalez's expansive gifts.

McCombs’s well-mannered missives certainly aren’t cheery, but they manage to stir up disarming warmth nonetheless.

The Cult reunites with two former collaborators--producers Bob Rock and Chris Goss--with satisfyingly brawny results.

Northern Aggression rocks as ferociously as anything Wynn has ever done.

Never is frank, fearless, and restless--a 14-song rattle bag of damaged samples, uneasy hooks, intuitive melody, and dry humor.

While the writing has a tight focus and singer John Baldwin Gourley sounds like he’s whispering his thoughts directly to you, the rest of the record bursts with all manner of sonic color.

Real Emotional Trash isn't "Slanted and Enchanted" or "Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain," but hey, you can't have a perfect sound forever. Besides, there are more than enough old-school indie touches here to flash you back to the halcyon daze of '94, or give you an idea what your older sis had on her headphones.

While speaking politely by punk standards, Rise Against still brims with a dissident perspective. Ultimately, Endgame keeps pointing toward a hopeful break from the status quo.

The Seattle boy-girl duo of Grant Olsen and Sonya Westcott fashions narcotic, melancholy pop songs that would make the band's influences proud (Neil Young and the Velvet Underground in its quieter moments chief among them).

Overall, this is a satisfying return to Booker T.'s classic instrumental soul and funk.

The music can be enjoyed apart from the story, but either way, this is a must-have for true Cooder fans.

Street Songs of Love is among his very best and a worthy successor to 2008's "Real Animal."

Aiko’s producers, including No I.D. and Dot Da Genius, create expansive, inventive tracks that mirror the allure of her lithe vocals and intimate phrasing.

Side Pony is a confident, expertly played statement from a band that’s been honing its approach for more than a decade, and it clearly shows that Lake Street Dive is ready to make itself known to whatever audiences have yet to succumb to its many charms.

It's classic Nine Inch Nails with a few extra-disturbing flourishes.

That ghostly sensibility dances perilously close to dirgelike in a few of the album's more droning, melancholic, and low-energy corners; but the band never lets the mood slacken beyond grasp, always offering a sharp vocal edge or mesmerizing interlude to keep listeners leaning in.

Some couplings are brilliant.... Too often, though, the sheer familiarity of Girl Talk's building blocks detracts from his particular accomplishment.

From its length (18 songs, 66 minutes) to its guest list (Kanye West, Rod Stewart, Danger Mouse, Lil Wayne, Yasiin Bey, M.I.A.), the album is as much a large-scale production as his debut was. But it’s done on Rocky’s terms, with every element enhancing the sound that he laid out on his initial mixtape.

If you are a Beach House fan and want a shimmering soundtrack to serve as a backdrop for daydreaming, then Depression Cherry should fit the bill. For everyone else, your mileage may vary wildly, even within the span of one listen.

Thankfully, though, the singer-songwriter imbues his work with real soul, and classic country fans could do worse than to worship at the altar of this Church.

Country star Keith Urban's sixth release gives lie to the idea that angst is the best fuel for songwriting. On this lean but enjoyable eight-song set, Urban and his fellow songwriters are mostly in high spirits.

She wanders back to Nashville for her seventh release, Thorn in My Heart, and doesn’t miss a step.

With a voice so capable of effecting pathos as the veteran K Records artist’s, the canvas on which it colors is almost beside the point, but while the tone remains largely lachrymose here, there’s extraordinary variety in its musical accompaniment.

Stelmanis’s voice, as ever, remains the focal point, swooping down hard on notes with a tremor that belies just how sturdy her songs are.

The veteran rock 'n' roller manages a few neat tricks on this sprawling head-spinner.

This album is an extremely provocative effort.

This overflows with ideas and intricate synth patterns while maintaining the emotional resonance of the band’s best work.

While they may stretch out for improvisational flights in concert, Made Up Mind is concise and compelling.

Refreshed and uplifted. Those are two things that the best pop records leave you feeling, and that's definitely the end result of listening to Manners, the debut album from Passion Pit.

His new Together Through Life seems to be more a chronicle of how love actually feels at different stages than an outright celebration of it, and the grizzled-old-soul-man patina Dylan layers over his barbed-wire croak offers the familiar passion and despair of every relationship.

It's Robyn's detours from these tough-gal tunes that offer genuine surprises.

After four self-produced albums, the Ohio-based duo enlists Gnarls Barkley's Danger Mouse to infuse their guitar-and-drums minimalism with a fuller roots-rock feel, and the results are fresh, intriguing, and often inspiring.

This good old-fashioned rock and soul quartet make good on their buzz with a debut that not only shakes, but also rattles and rolls.

The music draws on two decades of musicianship to showcase the indie veterans’ trademark versatility. Anthemic “We Were Beautiful” melds euphoric horns with programmed drum machines; elsewhere, “The Girl Doesn’t Get It” floats its lyrics across a sea of synths. Best of all is delicate opener “Sweet Dew Lee,” on which Stuart Murdoch’s honeyed delivery posits him as the missing link between Simon and Garfunkel.

Rice’s Fantasy, coproduced by Rick Rubin, is often dark and beautiful, featuring dramatic orchestrations, intricate arrangements, and hushed, swooning vocals.

The transition is subtle - the reconstituted tracks of Belong remain vehicles for near-perfect pop melodies, gentle self-deprecation, and wistful sentiments

Even in Mould’s volume-crazy Hüsker Dü and Sugar days, his songs breathed; on Beauty & Ruin, they just exhale.

The 12 songs are untamed thrill rides that recall some of New York’s rock innovators, particularly Lou Reed and Television.

[It] seems like the album the 66-year-old singer was born to make

Like with many good rock records, bits of whimsy, melancholy, confusion, and joy swirl around the songs of Wilco (the album). So while it may not feel as groundbreaking as previous releases, it’s just as human.

Perhaps it's because the Kentucky rockers went home to record, or because they recorded live as a band; but whatever the reason, the result is eminently listenable.

When the album finished, I immediately wanted to hear it again. And then again.

The warmest songs are the least compelling, but in their way, they strengthen Sugaring Season for varying up the tone.

For many listeners Webber’s descent into Cat Power-style calamity will be the hook; others may find it a precious affectation. Then again, some people can’t see any beauty in a lonely overcast day.

Now with her debut album, Immunity, Clairo has found her sound, one more elaborate and fitting for the lyrical prowess that made “Pretty Girl” such a hit. The album hits a gorgeous peak with the fifth song, “Bags.”

Luckily, Sia also puts those pipes to good use on her own material, including her dynamite new album, 1000 Forms of Fear.

The album feels stunningly fresh and cutting edge; expect to see it on some Top Ten lists later this year.

The album glides through styles, maintaining a slightly menacing yet sexed-up vibe throughout.

Finn’s second solo album is packed with songs rich in street intelligence and wry humor.

Keith is nothing if not competent, but seems to have held back from letting fly.

Snaith has made himself at home on the dancefloor, but he's never come more off the grid.

An underwhelming middle stretch aside, this cellar is worth exploring.

Their new debut album, Watkins Family Hour, retains all the homespun intimacy of a bunch of musicians enjoying one another’s company and talent.

Their fifth album, Like An Arrow, isn’t reinventing any wheels, but it is a solid collection of punchy tracks, their loping guitar solos and growled lyrics shot through with last-call urgency.

A satisfying mix of adult pop-soul love songs that evoke his early work. These amiable, adroitly produced and arranged songs confirm his inimitable knack for graceful melodies and effortless hooks.

When he sings surrounded by a straight-up, horn-fueled electric blues sound ("Tears, Tears, Tears," "My Love Is Your Love"), the results are interesting enough, but when he's accompanied by Burnett's rootsy signatures--ghostly reverbed guitar, gauzy brushed snare, thunking acoustic bass--the effect is mesmerizing.

The Everything But the Girl gal follows up her superb 2010 solo album, "Love and Its Opposite," with this gently lovely seasonal release.

They recorded this in James’s studio in Louisville, Ky., and nearly each song has a compelling depth.

The album casts the duo in a new light that may not quite eclipse their former work, but it has set them well on their way.

They still sound like two solo rappers. But there's an undeniable synergy that they embraced for this project.

Coproduced and primarily co-written by Auerbach and Michels, Yours, Dreamily satisfyingly careers from gauzy, reverb-soaked late-night soundscapes to raucous, fuzzy freak-outs.

These guys, backed by R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck, don't flash too much leather; they make the routine plays and put good wood on the ball.

While it's naive to think PE will ever have the same impact it did back then, there's still too many strong moments on Evil Empire to dismiss it.

A highly listenable rebirth.

Sometimes the pair slips into an uncomplicated groove, and the results transcend the duo's deep, signature whimsy to lift Gnarls Barkley into the realm of classic.

Having gotten an Édith Piaf tribute (and a baby) out of her system since, she reorients herself admirably with Come Home to Mama.

It takes a few listens for this space oddity to come into focus, but Tranquility Base gradually proves itself a rather daring reinvention. It’s poetic and expansive, subdued yet spellbinding--altogether, one giant leap for Monkey-kind.

Deer Tick Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 the rare double helping that doesn’t feel excessive or bloated. They’ve got the tunes; whether they’re acoustic or electric is beside the point.

The results are pleasant enough, if you're paying attention, but there appears to be something about Air France's music that inspires a waking form of narcolepsy.

Bare Bones is a beautifully slow-cooked album that encourages us to look on the bright side. Not a bad message these days.

As the age-old debate of what constitutes country music continues in some quarters, Son Volt leader Jay Farrar quietly, and compellingly, makes a case for the classic sounds on the beguiling Honky Tonk.

Simply put, Love Songs for Robots is gorgeous. It’s also mysterious; it doesn’t reveal all its layers on first listen.

Gone is the petulant enfant terrible, and with it a certain sparkle and swagger that made a record like "Gold" careen from the speakers.

While Elton John may be the more famous half of this spirited collaboration, the inspiration was Leon Russell.

His dry, enunciative singing style still achieve a remarkable combination of pretension and playfulness. Lambchop may be evolving, but its capacity for sounding like nothing else remains intact.

Mostly, though, 21 sounds as though it was built around Adele's presence.

Tracks like the punk-lite “You Are Waking’’ collapse under the weight of their ambitions, but on the whole Lidell should be admired for his adventurous musical fusions.

11 Short Stories finds the band serving up pint after pint of a familiar brew--the heady blend of fist-pumping anthems, traditional Irish instrumentation, and scrappy, blue-collar grit that’s made them a household name--while using their distilled strengths to break fresh ground.

Young the Giant’s finely tuned ear for pop is on grand display here, and frontman Sameer Gadhia excels at playing ringmaster, testing the edges of his vocal range while spinning yarns with brio.

AMOK is heady dance music, in love with its jittery rhythms but never content to give over to them completely.

His first release in six years is filled with downtempo, darkly intimate tracks--eight of the 12 are ballads.

Like much of this mini album, “Monument” is not thumping music for the club; it’s the soundtrack for when you get home.

Few can match the Weakerthans's lyrical ingenuity without succumbing to earnest excess, and the result is an at times wry, at times touching exploration of life's overlooked corners.

With "Heaven Is Whenever,'' it seems unlikely that the Hold Steady will again change how we talk about modern rock, but when a band has already framed the parameters of the debate, it doesn't necessarily have to.

Welch offers a sumptuous, energizing experience that runs the gamut from ecstasy to fury and favorably evokes forebears like Annie Lennox and Sinead O'Connor and current peers like Adele.

With its deft blend of nostalgia and futurism, Transit Transit is not only a fantastic delivery on a forgotten promise, it's the best reason so far to be optimistic about 2016.

The band’s self-titled debut at times leans too heavily on familiar riff ’n’ roll, but for the most part it’s a groovy cross-generational jam.

The songs are strong, and the music is an engaging mix of smooth, midtempo honky-tonk dolloped with swing and pop.

Berberian Sound Studio is like a notebook filled with a lost love's handwriting.

What drives Super, though, is the duo’s overarching vision, which helps the album flow together like a night at a club: one that Pet Shop Boys exist inside and above, simultaneously.

Harris and Crowell cowrote six of the 11 tracks, and some are polished gems, including the title track.

Richard’s “One Life at a Time” is roots-rock for the barroom, and Linda simply shimmers on the folk lament “Bonny Boys.” Kami’s buoyant “Careful” proves she’s the pop singer of the bunch. Zak gives “Root So Bitter” some pluck and pickup, while Jack’s “At the Feet of the Emperor” is a sumptuous instrumental. Teddy steals the show with the title track.

While satisfying, the record could have used a bit more of that invention and risk.