They play slow, but it's slow in the way that Low once did, a sort of punk-rock rebellion against speed and belligerence.

Cruelty Without Beauty is the sound of Soft Cell reclaiming the musical territory they staked out in their 1981 hit debut, Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, offering up hooky, dancefloor-oriented synthetic soul, now jacked up into a higher gear for the clublands of the new millennium.

Out of the Shadow is a meandering musical path, but one well worth taking.

Sturdier production and straightforward songwriting make a strong backbone for someone once lauded for his mysticism.

The songwriting is self-assured and thoughtful; the album is unified as a pastiche of romantic musings.

Hate is a beautifully gilded record, thoroughly nice and thoroughly listenable, and a mark higher than a lot of pop music with lofty intentions, but it doesn't move you to extremes.

As a whole, The Secret of Elena's Tomb is a compendium of many of the things Trail of Dead have been to date: provocative lyricists, well-honed musicians, and now film directors.

It's well produced and mixed, but lacks the edge to make it really interesting.

It's easily the least convincing album from the three Banhart's offered thus far.

One Word Extinguisher doesn't shock the way Vocal Studies... did but, if his debut drew the vivid hip-hop/electronic blueprint, Herren convincingly takes his plans and constructs something big with the follow-up.

By the time the longplayer finishes playing, you realize, whilst the acoustic guitars and harmonized vocals and that awesome table-tennis-ball-bouncing-beat may've made you think this was some easy-to-love pop platter, it actually hasn't stumbled all the way towards getting-it-together.

Overall, the melodies are so tight they seem vacuum-packed, and the album delivers a platter of faultless rock songs.

My feeling is that Rehearsing My Choir is an odd, initially indigestible album that is far more interesting than most people are willing to admit.

Throughout, there's little doubting Malkmus's charisma as a performer...

This is a rare record that simply responds to the quiet masses who maybe feel just a bit to much too often, and offers them a soothing, downbeat source of comfort without preaching or apology.

What makes Thunder... such an easy-to-love affair is the schoolyard exuberance they ply their tunes with.

The conversational rawness that drove the previous albums is gone, and the band loses something as a result.

This is gloriously trashy glam-rock with an updated cybernetic edge.

Madlib's constant digressions, interruptions and little sonic jokes may make for an immersive listening experience, but The Further Adventures of Lord Quas demands pretty strict attention, and what it gives back in return is only sporadically satisfying.

In one instant, lead singer Jordan Blilie is whispering passionately in your ear. In the next, he tears into your insides with growls so piercing you'd think he'd transformed into a savage beast.

It's always pretty, but overall, the allure is almost meretricious, considering four or five songs provoke nothing beyond a pleasant ambivalence.

Cash might surprise with his choice of covers, but in nearly all of his selections, he locates some personal meaning, or introduces new emotional elements.

The disc is basically a more straight electro-pop variation on the Gold Chains angle.

Band Red spins bouncy, raw, sloppy and slightly erratic punk that can stake a claim for carving out a jagged edge of its own, complete with loveable, contagious sing-along sounds.

On this disc, which bustles with other artists' flashes and flourishes, the different personalities sometimes vie for attention.

Plaid excel at the little moments where the music breathes -- moments all too rare within the regularized patterns of most beat-oriented electronic music.

With Phrenology, The Roots have finally made an album that lives up to their potential.

A sombre, sorrowful collection.