Runner [is] an exceptional Sea and Cake record, and if it's not their best since their classic album, Nassau, it is at least the most surprising since then.

Naturally there some moments where having too producers and visions hurts them, but for the most part, the band sticks to the formula that's worked in the past.

That their kitchen-sink approach yielded as many wins as it did on Strapped bodes very well for The Soft Pack, oddly enough presenting a band that has proven it's more than its record collection, and possesses a heretofore unseen amount of creative restlessness.

End of Daze sounds like a short segment of Dum Dum Girls' future greatest hits collection.

This is another hyper-energized, beautifully crafted album by the Mountain Goats.

California Wives' music is soft and pleasant and fully formed and vague. Their lyrics are ciphers.

While Fantasm Planes aims to capture the ante-versions of Iradelphic songs as drifting minimalist collages, it's a tough sell after such a fully realized album.

Meat & Bone is proof positive that music needn't be so reverent to its past.

Self-Entitled [is] the most energetic NOFX record in a while, but one that still ends up a bit uneven.

Knowing the story behind Piramida's recording process does not ruin the horror movie or give away the ending. It does, however, adds a plotline to the wordless emotions the tracks evoke.

This is an album that proves that Stars are fully themselves, confident in their genre experimentation and fearless in the emotions they express.

Unfortunately, instead of being an ambitious failure, and despite all of the fantastic moments, I Bet On Sky makes the potentially more damaging fault of being "just alright."

The album, sweet as it sounds, is so polite that to keep from offending listeners it stops short of saying anything to them.

You can see every angle and every side of the shape they've made. And the unimpeachable logic of each song, added to their odd tunefulness of the songs, makes them exciting to listen to.

[There] are only the few standouts on an album otherwise comprised of facile dance tunes with overwritten lyrics.

Like OMNI, this record seems a bit trite.

Besides a cyclical feeling that veers the album into the direction of repetition at several points, Bend Beyond is a solid listen.

Conservative, instead, describes Shields: Veckatimest authorized it to be far bolder. You yearn for what could've been.

We're now at a place where we can pretty well look at Dylan's career as, essentially, an entire body of work--and, even when considering all of the obvious highlights of his past half-century, Tempest still stands out.

Though this record's pace does not change much during its 43 minutes of playtime, each track is a slow-burning confession from Summers and Weikel's subconscious, a genuine feat that has taken them 16 years to convey.

Sic Alps towers above the rest of the ample retro garage acts today, in both scope and measure.

Koster's songwriting and arranging is growing by leaps and bounds, and Mary's Voice is his most assured batch of songs to date, it's just too bad that the production can't catch up or exude the same kind of progress and confidence.

The result is 10 songs of lyrical brilliance that will have music listeners giving Porterfield the credit that's long overdue.

You'd be forgiven to not have the hooks of these songs stuck in your head, or worse, confusing them for some other band.... Ignoring this, you have another quality catalog entry from one of modern indie rock's somewhat more surprising career bands.

Ragon has the skill to twist all his found objects into something real and new: a strange breed of robust neo-folk with a fiery art-punk streak.

It's a summer album released just too late, but should do a stellar job of carrying some heat over into the colder months. Most importantly, it's yet another case in the argument to trust Thee Oh Sees with whatever sounds capture their interest.

The duo successfully crosses Clark's talent of romanticizing morbidity through melody and Byrne's knack for eccentric pop by using a prominent horn section both as a bridge between the two and an unfamiliar element that distinguishes this as a partnered effort.

Algiers is a good record, and though perhaps it could have been great, it's still another fine turn in the winding, ever-shifting road of the Calexico canon.

Mould is at the top of his game on Silver Age.

It's a collective of conjoined poems, meticulously attuned to shake both the earth and eardrums alike.

Like the subjects of these songs, the music itself wanders.

For better or for worse, Stephens and Tyson Vogel have thrown in their lot with that angst, and thematically, The Bloom and the Blight is less of the departure it hopes to be.

Marshall still manages to wring pathos out of her work, if not to the same degree and not in the same way.

Many musicians watermark every second of their albums with their signature, but not Caminiti, and that's what makes his album surprisingly individual.

What you get, then, is an album that may have a sonic breadth, but really only two sides: one of sweet pop tunes, and one of strange goof-offs.

It takes its time, but its rewards are plentiful.

In short; it's new, interesting, and the inevitable remixes are going to be great.

For all its delicate psychological workings and spot-on embodiments of that feeling's senseless, aimless guilt, it's completely mesmerizing.

In addition to great production and invigorated rhymes, the album also sees four guest spots from the likes of Damon Albarn of Gorillaz/Blur, Beth Gibbons of Portishead, Goodie Mob's Khujo Goodie and Boston Fielder.

This type of rough-spun music isn't for everyone, but Among the Leaves is a valuable effort regardless of its pockmarks and dogged minimalism. Enjoy at your own risk.

Bloc Party once came with something to prove, and the conviction necessary to prove it. Four takes the audience's interest for granted, and refuses to step out of line to draw more interest. So much for a revolution.

One of the most satisfying, a nearly unclassifiable mammoth of sound that manages to weave brutality, atmosphere, and aching melody into a body-enveloping cocoon that sticks around longer than the average Hollywood movie.

A pleasant and inoffensive endeavor, it'll do well to keep any Foxes fan satisfied for the remainder of the season. But don't be surprised if boredom sets in by fall.

Each track stands on its own; there is no filler, and it highlights each musician's strengths.

Come for the shrill dopamine triggers like you knew you would, but stick around for the miles and miles of quiet rolling country rendered in this multitalented artist's flooring instrumental sweeps.

Advaitic Songs is Om 2.0's second full-length album, and it is far and away the most entrancing document the band has released.

Despite a sharp shift in direction, the spirit of Ascent floats--sometimes upwards, at times skittish and swooping underneath clouds--but nonetheless rising.

Yeasayer's only triumph here is perfecting a niche they've already seemed to master.

On Devotion, Ware demonstrates a knack for weaving everything together. And just like in the best-tailored clothes, it's difficult to see the seams.

An album that while fun, often stagnates no matter how much the trio push things into the red.

Spring is using her EP to carry on the torch until they can reunite, and producer Jorge Elbrecht (of Violens) provides adequate reinforcements for Spring's filmy sound.

God Forgives, I Don't is slick, large, and sounds like wealth.

If you like rock tunes with sharp melodies and earworm choruses, Researching the Blues isn't likely to give you anything to complain about. It's an album that feels, at its best, effortless. Other moments, however, feel too effortless, and as a result there are some missed opportunities.

The Ohio-based band led by singer/songwriter Jerry DeCicca bears its share of melancholy and then some on their fifth album, but so do a million and one other indie bands, and none of them come anywere close to evoking the same sort of sad-sack super session [like one with Lee Hazlewood, Townes Van Zandt, Stuart Staples from Tindersticks, and Mickey Newbury].

Unlike the surreality of their peers, distant and hiding behind static, múm is entirely here, wholly present and astoundingly beautiful.

Levi's gift lays in kitschy nuance that is inherently pleasurable. And by diving into more conventional songs on Never, she loses a bit of this endearing personality.

There's a true songwriter's ear buried beneath all the fist-pumping, and it relies on a well-honed melodic sensibility that borrows on classic power-pop tropes but introduces impressive key and tempo shifts.

While maintaining a slick vibe embodying the sultry lowlights of an unsuspecting loft party, Foals' Tapes are nothing particularly groundbreaking--but sure as hell an intoxicating listen.

You will not hear another album as straight-forward, unburdened by emotional distance and downright open as this one this year. And that's Major.

ike Animal Collective, Copeland's work is musician's music, geared toward the adventurous listener with a trained ear and a tendency to enjoy music as, well, an expansive, ever-shifting experiment.

At its best Gossamer is, like its namesake, delicate at first glance but possessed of incredible molecular strength.

Without sacrificing any of his detailed, anecdotal lyricism or thoughtful keyboard arrangements, Advanced Base managed to construct a record you can play over and over again without feeling so sorry for yourself.

At times, Life is Good is Nas' most satisfying album since God's Son, and at times it is just as flawed as its predecessors.

Keeping the music simultaneously lush and light is a good choice for songs that prominently feature people moving too fast and making weighty decisions that would seem reckless if they weren't so endearingly passionate.

It strikes a perfect balance between musical invention that will leave you cupping your ears, semiotically puzzling lyrics that will leave you scratching your head, and catchy pop style that will leave you tapping your feet.

At its core, Mostly No prioritizes songcraft above bare texture, and Cohen's willingness to temper eruption with meditation sets Milk Maid apart from many of its buzzy peers.

This is still a consistently great set of songs, and the album another major accomplishment for Aesop Rock--but it's still there on the edges, keeping a great record from becoming another classic from one of our best working emcees.

It's a perfectly serviceable and enjoyable post-metal/rock album that makes no real mistakes, and does manage to tweak the knobs of the formula ever-so-slightly.

Ultimately, BEAK> are only interested in that quasi-mysticism that endless jamming affords.

51 is a damn fine mixtape... one of this young year's best.

White is an accomplished storyteller – and stories and music both represent the best of what a ghost can be: incomplete presences, something that seems substantial in the moment but disappears in a matter of minutes, leaving only an impression in your mind.

The album feels unfinished, but not totally incomplete--instead, a documentation of something altogether mystical.

The Tarnished Gold is often nebulous and obtuse, trading in atmospherics more than the countrified terra firma of the band's past.

It may all cohere together, but it doesn't all work.

Longtime Companion feels like the first cracked smile after the tears have stopped, somewhere between dusk and the gloom of night.

They're an insipid, uninspired mess right now, but the Hives aren't done as much as they are confused.

For those readers familiar with Whitman, rest assured that this record only strengthens his hold on the contemporary experimental electronic scene.

Taken as a whole the album is great slab of rock and roll music.

Hallelujah the Hills steps out on their own turf with a new record label and a refined sound, they've also gone ahead and made their best record.

For all the foot-stomping vitriol that seeps out here and there, The Idler Wheel... is the sound of a brilliant songwriter putting away childish things, and waiting tensely for what comes next.

Unsurprisingly, The Lost Tapes is a masterpiece in his own right, much like previous revolutionary releases Tago Mago and Ege Bamyasi.

Lucifer transforms the mundane into the magnificent, slowly but surely edging out all other summer listening options.

At times the results might sound strained, but they are entirely consistent both with the principles of free jazz, from which the record emerges, and with the spirit of Don Cherry, towards which it returns.

Even with the highlights, there remains a feeling of paralysis on Synthetica that's reflected in the uneven tracklist.

Under The Pale Moon pays homage to the pasty romantics of '80s pop, the dramatic crooners of years further past, the intriguingly depraved icons of post-punk, and several others without sounding like a pastiche or a mere exercise in genre tourism.

It's a boring album, it's a depressing album, but it's also a deeply cynical album.

The Diver, in its poppiest moments or in its dingiest moments, can never quite get out of the house.

The Sister is Marissa Nadler looking down and realizing that she has recently written eight good songs.

Class Clown Spots a UFO is a fine record, but now two records into their return, it feels like this "classic" version of Guided By Voices is following too closely to a script.

More often than not it just comes off as either needlessly melodramatic or watered down to a state of vanilla

The duo has mastered the strange art of countering divides marvelously on Red Night.

With Freak Puke, they continue to embody the creatively restless heart of independent experimental rock.

There's a deep sincerity here among the saccharine, and no amount of painstakingly throwback falsetto harmonies can shroud May's songwriting from its fluttering, well-intentioned heart.

Like A$AP Mob and Odd Future before him, Purrp arrives fully formed, with his own unique, fully realized aesthetic vision.

This is stadium schlock of the highest pedigree, the kind of thing that can make you feel desperately cynical about rock music.

Upon hearing how masterfully Black Tambourine pull off these covers, it all makes sense. The sound these women helped codify with their music and their writing is inescapable today.

In Our Heads boasts at least eight festival crowd decimators, and finally strikes the right balance between Hot Chip's two sides.

Barring any idiomatic prejudices against the contemporary production techniques, there are no glaring missteps here.