Gibbons is a charismatic presence, her golden howl and misery-inflected tone recalling a cross between Billie Holiday and a demented Edith Piaf.

This is simple music, driving music, perfect music for getting a good bath from the asinine perils of nu-metal and modern rock.

Whether you're an experienced fan or a newbie, the easy and honest appeal of their high melodicism should be readily apparent.

In austere style and apolitical theme, it's similar to Ndegocello's 1996 outing Bitter, but this is the work of an older, wiser woman who can view that album's romantic failures within a bigger picture.

An elegant masterpiece of unabashed Anglophilia, all slow-motion shoegazer guitars chiming like beautiful bells of doom and icy, disaffected vocals that sound like the Psych Furs' Richard Butler minus the three-packs-a-day larynx damage.

By muting Tool's over-the-top attack, Keenan has more time to devote to deepening the textures throughout.

A funky good time from two house music smarty pants with a future.

Albarn is the melodious voice of western pop tradition throughout; at first you might think his are the barmy brains behind this band, but it's just not so. His loose-kneed vocals are like pop tarts in this bumbling hip-hop parade, but it's the bumble that makes the rumble.

Always undervalued as a songwriter, Franti reassembles his familiar building blocks of rock, reggae, and vintage R&B into the funkiest, most inviting neighborhoods he's yet created.

Haven's one weakness is their failure to ever pick up the pace or well, y'know, really rock; like Coldplay's two agreeable, unhurried albums, there's a sort of same-y-ness throughout Between The Senses' 12 lullabies.

Her taste in cover material is slightly idiosyncratic, but that does nothing but add luster to the program...

Though the steaming electro missives of 604 can sound a bit uniform at times, Ladytron's buzzing bin of automaton female vocals and retro machine accompaniment intoxicates with illicit ease.

You remember Bee Thousand, Alien Lanes, Mag Earwhig! ? Well, those days are here again.

Along with her partner David Rawlings, Welch pulls together quiet unassuming tunes that straddle the line between country and folk and have finally found a home in the public consciousness via the Coen Bros.' O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack.

Dead Man Shake is a kick in the pants that shouldn't be missed.

No one--and I mean, no one, not even people paid to say such things--is going to confuse this with Highway 61 Revisited or even Nashville Skyline, but when the official Bob Dylan bubblegum card is issued, Love And Theft will certainly rank ahead of Knocked Out Loaded and Saved.

Weighted with tunes that approach middle age with tension and caution.

It strikes a balance between the buzzy pop of their first album and the heavier thud of their second.

With songs full of piss and vinegar, Soft Cell's return is triumphant and toxic.

This is still an excellent band composed of three excellent musicians who can produce one hell of a noise.

These dozen songs, which swing with the organic, old-school funk Prince began embracing in the late-’80s, also avoid his ‘90s excesses, combining rock and soul as effortlessly and succinctly as he ever has.

Recalling Come Away With Me only for Jones’s sultry voice, the album has its share of pleasant throwaways, but those are balanced by a handful of starkly beautiful and excellently arranged songs.

The band attempts to continue to deliver the hits on its seventh album, Splinter, while retaining its punk roots, and the Offspring succeeds on both counts.

This may be the Steve Earle album for people who've never been Steve Earle fans before.

Even at his least inspired he's got these funk-rap-metal boys beat.

About as far removed from Dire Straits as it can be.

What Clones proves, beyond its certain hits, is that the Neptunes have to be considered alongside the handful of great artists (Bowie, Prince, et al) who kept pushing boundaries as they pushed up the charts.

The album makes clear that these men really like music. They like singing it; they like playing it. And there’s enough fun being had here to convince you that you might like hearing it as well.