While Last Year Was Complicated is completely adequate, its highlights are a SparkNotes summary of the pop music from the past 12 months.

Ash & Ice lacks cohesive identity. Any record with Mosshart’s vocals and Hince’s guitar will be identifiable as a product of The Kills, but the record both feels inconsistent and as if the songs all blend together.

Plenty of artists can make up for tired phrases in their musicality. Thrice even did it themselves on Identity Crisis, elevating the largely overdramatic lyrics through loud/soft contrast and brain-rattling thrash. To Be Everywhere has no such energy, relegated to medium pacing and chord progressions that usually find the bass and guitars linked together in a monotonous crunch.

The pop star is putting out fine records, but it’s hard to escape the feeling that her ludicrous potential remains unfulfilled.

If I’m Honest starts with a barnburner about lacking suds (“Straight Outta Cold Beer”) and ends with a call to Jesus (“Savior’s Shadow”). It’s a trajectory seemingly dictated by Country Albums For Dummies.

I Still Do, a sleepy, cover-heavy, forgettable batch of tunes, will fit pleasantly soundtracking Sunday morning coffee with a newspaper--and if you’re not old enough to be up on Sunday morning or reading a newspaper, it’ll likely be a hard pass.

The main issue with the set lies in the fact that while those two tracks are immaculately produced, they don’t quite have the spark that made those early singles memorable, and the other two tracks are largely forgettable.

Skip A Sinking Stone is Lee’s most mature, thoughtful work yet, filled with complex reflection and meditation. That sense of calm also serves as the record’s biggest drawback, as it lacks the dramatic tension and sweeping heights that made songs like “Golden Wake” or “Advanced Falconry” so direct and impactful.

Dylan may naturally be better at the brooding that Shadows required, but these types of decisions equally prevent Fallen Angels from matching its predecessor.

None of the songs on Detour are without at least some merit, though a few are without any discernible marketplace value, save niche kiosks along I-40 or the occasional road tripper’s Spotify.

Many of these tracks certainly evoke something older, plucked straight from a dad’s record collection, but Down in Heaven carries some of that mustiness. The record ends up being too careful, even occasionally uninspired.

As a shoegaze record, Tired of Tomorrow‘s production is too metallic, its chord progressions sometimes bordering on pop ­punk. But as a post-­hardcore record, its guitar parts are overly­ simplistic and its vocals are sleep-inducing. It’s got one foot in each camp, but doesn’t benefit from either as much as it should.

Her construction techniques have always made for gigantic sonic treetops, and even better, the wind that rustled the entire forest. But when concentrating on placement rather than scope, simple additions don’t go as far.

Bates sounds separate from Gibbs; their aural love affair falls flat. Bates will have to soldier on behind Big Black Delta, and hopefully with more time and experience he can break through and deliver the kind of emotional overtures he’s only just hinted at.

Although Zombie’s B-movie-in-a-blender lyrics come up short, Electric Warlock at least stakes a claim at being his most musically heavy album since 1998 solo debut Hellbilly Deluxe, or maybe even White Zombie’s Astro Creep: 2000.

When it works, Delusions of Grand Fur makes a case as Rogue Wave’s strongest album, an expansion of sound anchored by the omnipresent sweetness of Rogue’s voice. But where it falls short, the ghosts of Permalight and Nightingale Floors loom ever larger, a haunting reminder of the growing distance between the band’s sterling Sub Pop debut and current quagmire.

There’s something to be said for organics, but that conversation isn’t happening here. Become Alive compensates by pinning three powerful songs to its tracklist, but the rest feel like scraps unintentionally left on the inspiration board.

Always Strive and Prosper doesn’t play to Ferg’s strengths. It feels more like album made by a big label committee, carving up a talented rapper piece by piece and stripping away everything that makes him special.

Taken on its own, it’s a fine if not slightly disappointing work. But looked at within his prolific catalog, it paints a picture of a musician who will never stop experimenting and will likely continue to make music until he physically can’t anymore.

Although this is a solid step towards solidifying an already tight presentation, it could go deeper. There is still a disconnect between Ebert’s philosophy of childlike adventurousness and community-building and the songs themselves.

If there’s one knock against Santana IV, it’s that it might be a little too overstuffed, with a tendency to occasionally wander into the realm of the self-indulgent.

Three Men and a Baby just happens to be one such experiment that doesn’t land with the blunt force fans might be used to.

The album rarely manages to break free of its ’80s-lite inspiration, its tricks little more than emulations--not innovations--of the source material.

Mostly, it feels like The Lumineers are talented songwriters, wary of repeating themselves, who know what they want to say, and are still figuring out how to say it.

The songwriting is boring and inoffensive, but the lyrics really sterilize the record.

Unfortunately, Amen & Goodbye largely works in the realms of humongous. There could well be a clear, concise thesis buried somewhere in all that business, but it’s very difficult to pick out amidst all the signifiers.

While Super is not indicative of the next big thing, and a few of the more club-oriented numbers sound more like remixes than actual songs, it’s an enjoyable way of catching up with the Pet Shop Boys while being served something fresh.

His aim to dive fully into a nuanced direction is a good look, and even though it can be too much at times, his earnestness is a natural antidote to the sleazy misanthropic attitudes of Bieber or The Weeknd. There’s just not enough focus, and promise can only take one so far without differentiation from the artists you’re emulating.