It is clear that these two albums need to be heard and absorbed side by side?

Back-to-church-basement harmonies and familiar pledges of eternal devotion.

But what makes Badu a source of deep pride for her black audience (and intriguing puzzlement for her ever-growing white one) is that her mysticism produces its most compelling poetry when set against gritty realities such as drug-dealing boyfriends, jealous neighbors, ghetto etiquette, and the constant war on poverty. As a songwriter, Badu's particular gift is being able to work such everyday touchstones into sublime allusions of spiritual rebirth.

The only complaints involve omissions. Four of five singles between '92 and '94 (among them the minor American hit, "Bang") aren't here, which bypasses the band's crucial early development and leaves only one song from Modern Life, the punchy "For Tomorrow." On the other hand, the disc could easily have shed at least one of its five offerings from Parklife -- most noticeably the title track.

Unfortunately, A Day Without Rain, Enya's first new studio album in five years, lacks the edge that could pry it loose from the New Age niche. The Irish traditional music Enya performed so skillfully in the early 1980s with Clannad has by now largely disappeared in a mélange of sly, Celtic-flavored pop hooks and muddled mysticism. The only mystery is why it took her so long to come up with something so short (under 35 minutes) -- and, in many spots, so uninspired.

On this excursion into the noodle-prone mind of Mr. Lee. True, all the lyrics are his and his alone, but after all this time, plenty of Peart has rubbed off on him, resulting in much impenetrable mumbo jumbo about the universe and its "secrets" ("The Angels Share") and the workings of the mind...

Fizzy but numbingly predictable.... The delightful element of surprise occasioned by Martin's breakthrough English-language debut has been replaced by a formula-milking attempt to replicate its track record. This is particularly disappointing, since in concert Martin stirs things up by doing more than nodding to his roots.

Despite their retro stylings, this Orange County, California band has served up a sixth album that is better (by leaps and bounds) than the punk-by-numbers that dominated their first two albums, 1989's Offspring and '93's Ignition. Further, Conspiracy has more well-written, hook-laden songs than anything found on their fluke indie hit, '94's fittingly titled Smash, or their too-boring-to-be-a-sell-out 1997 major label debut, Ixnay on the Hombre.

Lovers' Rock ranks among the finest albums of the year, as Sade, nimbly utilizing that distinctively smoky, vulnerable instrument that is her voice, weaves gentle yet insinuating odes to love and loss.

Nonetheless, while more ambitious than almost all of today's metal-flaked rock competition, the 19-track Holy Wood is not without its problems. On numbers such as "President Dead" and "Cruci-Fiction in Space," the band seems to be just rehashing old terrain. And, while The Wall may be a worthy role model, Manson and company don't quite have Pink Floyd's lyrical or musical range, adding to the rote feeling that troubles some of this overlong (60+ minutes) disc.

John and Frank Navin, the brotherly core of Chicago's Aluminum Group, produce impeccably tailored bachelor-pad pop with a cynical bite -- like a less restrained Sea & Cake or a more Anglicized Stereolab.... More post-consumer than post-rock, the Aluminum Group's environmentally conscious sounds will make your ears feel as comfortable and cultured as fine quality furnishings.

Another quality installation from an artist who views his entire oeuvre as a work in progress.

It opens with a nine-minute song. It's a concept album. Worse still, it's a science fiction concept album. With songs about robots. But here's the thing: Every time I listen to it, I don't hate it.... The combination of prog-rock ambition, scrappy sounds and the odd hip reference almost make it feel like Pink Floyd growing up and making a disc in the post-Beck era.

Yes, this is their "mature" album, the one where the once effervescent combo that could be counted on for enough hooky innuendoes to excite pre-teen girls and dirty young men alike aspire toward some sort of longer-lasting pop relevance. Which translates here into ballads and a huge dose of R&B-lite. It all sounds very professional, though only a hardcore fan can deny that the bloom is definitely off the rose.

TP-2.com isn't the masterpiece Kelly seems capable of, but it's as strong an R&B album as any since, well, since R., balancing the carnal and the spiritual as convincingly as anyone's done it since Prince in the 1980s.

Fans of "Praise You"'s twisted but hooky soul or the beat-box bonanza "The Rockafeller Skank" may be a bit disappointed with this current collection. Not because the record is a thundering and cohesive example of sequencers used for good instead of evil, but because Fatboy's approach this go around is a lot less (new-) user friendly. The tracks are longer and more measured, many of them built around the ebb and flow so essential to dance music made for the clubs, as opposed to dance music made for TV dance shows.

This collection is a sugar-high set, adrenalized even more than Blink's souped-up studio albums by the waves of Cheap Trick Live at Budokan-like female screams pouring from the audience. And the playing offers plenty of evidence to quiet anyone who thinks these guys are just three-chord wonders.... But young audiences love Blink shows in part for the wiseacre, self-deprecating quips, and this album is full 'em -- and not just between songs, as there are (count 'em) 29 extra tracks of banter lasting over 10 minutes at the album's end.

Twangy guitars, melancholy pedal steel and mournful, high country fiddles abound on this collection... Tomorrow's Sounds Today forgoes the livelier and more genre-bending studio tricks that pushed mid-'90s albums such as Gone and This Time into brave new sonic realms. This time around, as it was in the beginning, the mood is modest, the sound is sparse and sans embellishments.

U2 albums are generally slow growers, so it's much too early to label All That You Can't Leave Behind a classic. One can say with reasonable certainty that it's their most vibrant offering since Achtung Baby, their hardest-rocking one since The Joshua Tree, and their first true soul recording.

Their songs still bulge at the seams with clever ideas, but they're veiled in deep grooves and hooks.... Outkast have developed a major sweet tooth for P-Funk, but what they've picked up from their former collaborator George Clinton isn't his low-end bounce. It's rather his hovering, serpentine vocal arrangements and his acidic political fantasies.... [but] Stankonia's conceptual sprawl isn't all good for the album -- the collection is hampered by more than a little filler.

She has always been a good songwriter -- experimental, dynamic, probing -- but here she demonstrates that she has the potential to be a truly masterful one. With newfound clarity and restraint, and with her usual wit, she examines the ways in which we try to convince ourselves that we are safe in an unsafe world.

Rather than an abdication, In the Mode is a defiant and defensive statement.... This bristling new approach pays off well for the most part. As on New Forms, some of the best moments come when the crew mixes some soul and R&B stylings into the proceedings... At times the determination to keep the beats pounding hard and heavy leads to a slightly generic feel, especially on the instrumental cuts.

Given the changes that both New York and Jackson have undergone over the years, it's fitting that the new album lacks the swagger and bubbly feel of the first edition, and instead leaves the listener sad and gray...

When a tune falls into the jurisdiction of the venerable country-folk troubadour, the accumulated details of any previous readings or associations are stripped away, and its core brilliantly revealed.

Fred Durst may grab the headlines, but Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water really shows that all the power Limp Bizkit are known for comes from their bandmembers who, you know, actually play instruments. Durst's lyrics are wack when he raps and bad high school poetry when he sings.... Of course, there aren't many people looking for deep thoughts from Durst and Co. -- just lots of big, dumb, angry fun. And on that count, Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water delivers.

On their fourth album, Bedlam Ballroom, the Zippers have concocted another stew of lively dance music. Problem is, with so many people having jumped on the swing revival bandwagon, the group's new material sounds dated. And not in a good way, either -- it merely recalls a fad, rather than evoking the bevy of twentieth-century American music styles the Zippers have long been in love with.

Producer Don Was allows the surprisingly girlish, persuasive part of Midler's style to shine, working in harmony with the production and the material.

Jakob Dylan and his team have fashioned an album that's longer on big guitars, crunchy grooves and cool changes than overt confessionals. All told, Breach is a subtle, seamless effort with nary a lull or misstep -- in contrast to its multiplatinum predecessor, the second half of which suffered from a series of pedestrian songs.