At best, this would spark an awakening that provides the catharsis for yourself. At worst, WIXIW is an impressive statement by a band that regularly seems several steps ahead of their peers.

To say that Oh Holy Molar has a bite is a vast understatement -- the record grabs ahold of your skin and refuses to let go.

With nothing wasted, it leaves you wanting nothing more.

It has a known start and finish, with a middle that's tied together cleanly enough.

Nupping proved it, and Natural History amplifies the point that Dope Body are a completely unimpeachable unit from a musical standpoint: able to fit in with contemporaries while still sounding undoubtedly like themselves, carrying on the proud outsider-rock tradition of their hometown.

As a genre that's saturated with trends, micro-trends, and anti-trends, it's rare to find someone doing something that makes a legitimate claim at being totally unique.

Control System is one of the better mixtapes to come out this year.

It's the sound of a cooking band truly cooking it in the studio. Everything sounds like it's about to jump the rails at any given moment.

While the album, at times, feels a bit monochromatic, it maintains its intrigue and never loses its vision.

Words And Music expertly explores the intoxicated love of music and the sheer joy of being a music fan: feelings so universal that they will never be confined to particular eras.

The hooks often lack a singular focus, and there's a significant amount of fun to be had while working in a studio that's better off left on the cutting room floor.

Beautiful front to back, it's still an album that never quite asserts itself.

The true brilliance of Cancer For Cure is its refusal to find common ground, to come to the middle and meet anyone.

Its power and poise never ceases for 90 wonderful minutes.

If Family Perfume Vol. 1 can be seen as a progression where Presley is settling into his skin, Family Perfume Vol. 2 is a cathartic catalogue of letters never sent, the consequences of past decisions poignant enough to keep Presley musing, wide-eyed, remorseful--but nonetheless hopeful.

Dismania makes for an altogether appropriate title for an album this interested in gathering the common ingredients of despair, anger and disaffection.

It's his finest work yet, which is saying something, and the kind of record that will resonate for years not just because it's reveres history, but because it understands it and isn't afraid to demand answers from it.

Even if they are more refined, they may still sound very much like what Blackshaw has given us before.

In 2006, it seemed like Beach House couldn't outlive Beach House. In 2012, Bloom is the bar to clear.

For all its questing, though, the album's--and the band's--heart and soul are the simple arrangements which, layered upon one another like a stack of firewood, often signify something greater than their sum.

They act as a constant reminder of the power of music that isn't afraid to be ugly, blunt, and confrontational.

You could never truly expect a truly cohesive album from Santigold, and she's met expectations.

If "just trying to play with passion" is the ethos, then consider the band's sophomore album, Death Dreams, the perfection.

If you enjoy church hymnals, tabernacle choirs, tunes from the Elizabethan era and all things Stratford-upon-Avon, you'll pleasantly enjoy Dr Dee's attempt at a modern interpretation of the ancient, packing a lost piece of history into 2012.

You can't knock the songs, but it's hard to swallow whole.

Like Pigeons before it, A Different Ship is a solid album, but one that still finds Here We Go Magic on the road to perfecting and updating their sound on a full-length album.

A valiant attempt to combine varying disciplines of Eastern music with neo-psychedelia, Aufheben is a pleasant listen.

This is a rich, complex and conflicted soundtrack for the best comic book movie never made.