Carrie & Lowell is tough to nail down, but it’s also tough to listen to.

Half of the album is magnificent, and stylistically contradistinct, while the other half exists in some offbeat and off-putting terrain that will either elude its listeners, or alienate them.

It’s a good album, but not a great one, and though the long tail of history will eventually render such a long production time moot, it’s certainly not a record justifying the ludicrous wait.

The Suburbs offers several observations comparable to the ones above but fails to combine them with a greater mixture of moods and topics.

Despite its hype, its expectations, its blown up sound, and its many production flourishes, Bon Iver is nothing more than a solid placeholder album.

With brevity missing from Toledo’s musical toolkit (see the blame-deflecting “The Ballad of the Costa Concordia” and its 11:32 run time), the pain is exacerbated by songs that are simply too long to be memorable; what few hooks exist on Teens of Denial are quickly forgotten.

Overall, the album has held itself up as a solid rock record over 25 years, and that’s quite the success. The demos are of mixed blessings, to be honest. It seems that they were pretty much just run-throughs for the sake of the album producer.

So what's the problem? It's too, uh, perfect.

Remastered by Weston as fuzzy or sharp, this generous re-release (the second in a series by Merge Records, founded by Superchunk) should win Vee Vee another devoted following.

50 Song Memoir might not lift itself into the same orbit of greatness as its gargantuan twin, but it’s still a strong work from one of the most singular songwriters of the last 30 years.

Halcyon Digest is, to my mind, the best we've seen from Deerhunter, and a hint that their best is still to come. It's a fascinating document to study, but I'm not sure that makes it all great music.

At 59 and 48 minutes each, with space left to fill on both CDs, the label’s lack of curiosity about these more obscure sections of the Blur discography seems negligent.

The inclusion of trans rapper Rahrah Gabor on “Closure” is a fun and exciting change of pace but is still a small interlude on a record that is otherwise without features. Likewise, from its production choices, lyrical and thematic content, and overall aesthetic, Raven is less a bold artistic statement than its author might wish to convey. Despite its flaws, Raven is still a worthwhile listen.

We Will Always Love You is less poignant when it's about "politicians calculated, in the tower insulated"—as Cherry raps on "Wherever You Go"—than when it's about that lonely signal bouncing around among the stars, anxious to reach a distant planet before its source self-destructs.

The new record is pretty sparse in terms of its recording tones, very dry, and, in that respect, it owes a lot to skeleton-sparse Smog records like Kicking a Couple Around. But while that EP, another gem, seems to expand in its quiet moments, suggesting all sorts of dark narratives, heartbreak conceits, and hidden dialogues, the distance between Callahan's voice and the material he surrounds it here will leave some broader declarations up for grabs.

Bleach is a stronger record than it is commonly perceived to be, and does deserve to be checked out in some form by fans of heavy riff-driven rock. Regardless, this reissue is underwhelming, seemingly more concerned with enticing Nirvana completists to purchase it for the live material than in illuminating why Nirvana’s first album was an important step in a career that has helped define rock music for the last two decades.

It’s too bad really, that Have One on Me is so overdone because there’s a decent album hidden somewhere in there.

Understand that most of the tracks are excellent. If this were a stand-alone record, I would rate it more highly. As an overview of or introduction to Pavement, it is terribly flawed.

Maybe it's churlish to hope for more than the sound of two friends doing something they enjoy but Sunn O))) have delivered so much more than that, over such a significant period, that it means the biggest surprise here is that a band famed for discovering the nuances and unseen potential of repetition, finally sound repetitious.

It is an album about the ways in which we recover, the ways in which we find ourselves after feeling loss. It’s also an album that, musically, full of fitful and exciting exploration.

While Lambert obviously sees herself as the headstrong country rock rebel that all the little girls will understand, the true joys of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend are to be found elsewhere.

Kaputt is eccentric and enjoyable, but it's no Infidels, which is to say it never quite breaks through its sonic limitations.

A record so concerned with repeating the strengths of an album past that it forgets to chart its own path.

There is nothing wrong with bands making predictable music specifically designed to be played live; hell, bands like Motörhead and AC/DC have become rock institutions by doing just that. With this in mind, do not expect an artistic revelation from Fantasy Empire.

There’s enough that’s interesting and/or good about Light Up Gold to give it a solid recommendation, with the caveat that Savage’s voice is likely an acquired taste.

The 11-song, one hour set is packed with all the hits from those classic first three records. However, as you would also assume for a band taking the stage well after midnight, the energy isn't always there for the entire set.

Troye Sivan’s Something to Give Each Other offers pop music enthusiasts a much-needed reprieve from the more emo offerings of Olivia Rodrigo or Billie Eilish. But the record falls short of its own standards, set high by the success of its predecessor and lost in its own ecstasy and provocative imagination.

Laurel Halo’s penchant for abstraction has long served her music well, but Dust veers too far in the direction of academic detachment, suffering from its own inertness.