Inara George's voice is so gorgeous and soothing that you'll immediately believe that you can listen to it forever. Unfortunately, by the fifth or sixth song on All Rise, you'll wonder if you have been listening to her forever.

It's disappointing to hear them following trends rather than inspiring them.

A band more fixated with guitar solos and drunken fist-pumping than in the more nuanced, desperate territory of their former incarnation [Lifter Puller].

Shrill, sharp, twitchy compositions that can be as abrasive as they are compelling.

However, while Looks at the Bird's expanded arrangements are more conventionally "listenable" than much of Field Recordings, this comes at a small price.

When the formula works, the results are quite impressive, but at other times the songs simply fall flat, victims of their own overly simplistic and repetitive arrangements

Mono singlehandedly redefines the concept of dynamics. They are very quiet, and then very loud. It will hurt your head.

The problem is, it all feels a bit contrived.

Look, there's no question whatsoever that this is a well-put-together, carefully arranged and tastefully executed album created by a consummate craftsman. On the other hand, its palette (and, I fear, its audience) is limited to the placid and gently swaying.

The fact that it hides among its excesses a handful of truly excellent rock anthems seems almost like an afterthought, as if, when the band ran out of crazy ideas, they found that there was nothing left to do but write actual songs.

Some moments are exciting, but overall it's a bit cluttered.

The Sleepy Strange offers seven mid-tempo rock songs, most with the inevitable country leanings that a pedal steel creates. These pieces lack anything even remotely resembling a sense of direction or urgency; Japancakes' songs don't travel from Point A to Point B so much as wander up and down the street in front of Point A and dig odd little things out of the lawn. Some listeners will love it, while devotees of single-minded purpose will positively hate it.

Optometry's highlights throw expectation to the wind. They're more than jazz, more than hip-hop, more than whatever the hell "illbient" actually is.

By the time "Our Mutual Friend"'s symphonic percussion and hammering cellos reach their crashing apex, the album begins to feel a little like the fourth consecutive hour at a well-stocked party full of musical theater majors.

Like the Austin Powers films, there's a sense that authenticity has been betrayed in some vague and troubling way.

Sure, they meld muscular riffs with smoky organ meditations, folky landscapes, pompous orchestration and the occasional IDM skitter, but not without losing the transcendent detail that makes each of these genres worth savoring and holding on to.

As entertainment, Tenacious D succeeds surprisingly well -- for the first few listens.... The only long-term replay value you'll get from this record will come from playing it for friends who haven't heard it.

Harper performs his knock-offs so earnestly you'd think he were resuscitating some forgotten art, rather than aping tunes that are played 24/7 on oldies radio.

The songs here are resolutely pop, almost bubblegum, and though they're sometimes buoyant, hyperkinetic, even fun, they have almost no depth or resonance to them.

You'll either find it cloying and saccharine or heartfelt and precise, or maybe a little bit of both.

Though marred by a few missteps, it's mostly enjoyable, if unchallenging.

I'm used to hearing more layers in this type of music, and the simplicity here is surprising -- not necessarily in a good way.

Although the Cooper Temple Clause pack plenty of celestial firepower and darkwave ambiance into their six-minute movements, by the time they unveil the epic "Written Apology", the sheer compositional weight is too much for a mortal listener to handle.

Like their NYC peers Liars and the Rapture, HHH are adept at fusing dancefloor polemics with angular guitar atmospherics, yet their sound lacks the sweat-soaked sexual ardor that those groups flaunt so remorselessly.

While there's no denying the hedonistic charm of "Emerge" or "Turn On", it's also obvious that the album slips easily into a beat-happy rut, never quite pulling off the total and complete transfixion it was so obviously designed to achieve.

Anyone searching for a wholly absorbing listening experience should look (and listen) elsewhere.

While there are plenty of MTV2-ready tunes, the record doesn't bear much repetition.

Taken as a group, Heroes to Zeros' slower songs are the musical equivalent of a month-long sinus infection: heavy on the repetition, sleepy detachment and sensory deprivation.

The passion that once seeped from the group now appears manufactured.

Plenty of albums split the difference between gems and junk, but the biggest problem with Glass House is that it lacks any discernible anima; the band seems to be phoning in their performance from a comfy armchair somewhere in Milwaukee.

I so want to hate this album.... If only the album flat-out sucked, I'd be on much firmer ground. Too bad it doesn't.

Unfortunately, it seems that the only thing he really learned was how to write a Pavement tune, and he's having a little trouble trying to figure out what to do with himself now that Pavement is no more.

There's nothing wrong with her performance -- it's just undistinguished.

For a band that regularly draws comparisons to Beta Band and Pavement, Vehicles & Animals is all too pedestrian.

Their songs routinely beg for a spoken message, to the point where their originals sound like dub versions.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that White People should never have happened... but Paul and Dan would do well to move on while they're still ahead.

While the Big Chorus and post-hardcore theatricality are hardly disparate stylistic traits, it's odd that Rogue Wave would embrace them after establishing themselves as a nuanced pop outfit.

Although the group's previous outings routinely got bogged down in forced experimentalism, Broken Ear Record at least keeps the pace sufficiently frantic, which allows us to excuse some (if not all) of its more self-indulgent moments.

I can respect the need to innovate in hip-hop, but variety here comes at a cost -- there's no coherent or consistent melodic through-line.

You say you don't give a shit about lyrics? That's good; most of Echoes' lyrics aren't worth giving a shit about.

Mid-tempo rocker follows mid-tempo rocker without any change of pace to keep things interesting.

Statistics... come off like an emo version of Coldplay.

In the end, Tree City's quality makes its carbon-copy nature all the more frustrating.

Sparta seem a bit too retro-focused for their own good.

Seal IV... finds him retreading old ground and misguidedly attempting to claim new territory.

There's a lot to admire on Jackinabox, although it's ultimately less than spectacular and even occasionally embarrassing.

By forsaking professionals for amateurs, the Plan has narrowed the scope of their artistic vision; for every stunning reworking, like Deadverse's "Automatic", there's a stinker like ASCDI's predictably bland mix of "Time Bomb" or Cynyc's blasé beat-slapping "Following Through".

After a while, the songs begin to sound the same, and while Martey's vocals are consistently strong, the fact that she almost always sings in the same range robs them of much of their effect.

The tunes just circle like SUVs in a parking lot; there are traces of a head of steam, of a nod towards explosive tune-structures, but it seems the ball is dropped at the last minute in favour of a holding-pattern approach -- the familiar bassline and chorused keys. It's a letdown.

A fairly average jaunt into familiar indie rock territory.

It's not necessarily a welcome change, as drugged-up, dubbed-out majesty has always been Fearless's stock-in-trade, but there's something oddly captivating about these dusky grooves and forlorn moods that makes it difficult to view the project as a failure.

With Frances the Mute, the Mars Volta have unfurled a big and bold artistic statement... Unfortunately, that bold artistic statement is rife with pomposity and glimpses of prog-rock at its most horrifically self-indulgent.

Slick, well-constructed and mall-friendly.

O'Connor's lack of subtlety eventually grows tiring.

Julia and Lena's voices are nothing special, and their lyrics are still derivative -- suitable fodder for Charmed or a Rachel Leigh Cook movie, but not the sort of thing that makes a lasting impression.

They hit all the right notes and create the right hooks for success, at least in theory, but for all the passion in Jake Snider's voice, he might as well be singing about the ham sandwich he ate for lunch.

While the album's bouts of strangulated sexuality are initially stirring, this lack of melody eventually dooms Do Rabbits Wonder? to wallow in a torpid swamp of half-formed ideas and analog squall.

The album, while competent, is thoroughly flawed.

There's nothing distinctive about it.

The Milk Of Human Kindness grabs at elements of its predecessors, but they're often the wrong ones.

The quality is uniform, but below par.

Unlike Leona Naess the musician, Leona Naess the album is nearly forgettable, such is the perfection of its production and cardboard cut-out lyrical and musical themes.

There's not quite enough to justify the addition of another album to the Blondie catalogue.

There wouldn't be a problem at all if Buzzkunst wasn't such a maddeningly forgettable record.

Yes, it has a certain something that makes you bob your head and/or shake your ass to songs that you'd probably be ticked off by if someone drove past your pad blasting them out his windows. But no, it's not the stuff that great CDs are made of.

Aside from being tracked incorrectly (on my copy anyway) and not always being of the choicest sound quality, Sad Sappy Sucker shows that Modest Mouse’s rise to the pinnacle of indiedom started at the bottom, just like everybody else.

The least interesting, least engaging Sleater-Kinney album ever.

Whereas Walking With Thee was a wonderful relief in the indie/retro-rock world, pushing the band's internal parameters and the idea of what pop music should sound like, Winchester Cathedral feels more like a roadblock, or at least a pit stop, rather than a step forward in Clinic's previously innovative evolution.

As Higden struggles to make his way to the forefront, his bandmates appear greedy, desperately reaching for moments of startling stateliness -- much to the detriment of the songs themselves, which are lost in an atmospheric morass with delusions of (Radiohead) grandeur written all over it.

Middling music that shoots for epic and edgy, but takes far too few chances and falls short of its fans' expectations.

While Sha Sha is certainly ripe with hooks and strong in stylistic concept, the songs are woefully one-dimensional and marred by immaturity.

With an approach that seems so clinical, the album sounds cold and soulless -- and, well, boring.

As recently as last year it looked like The Datsuns might be next in line to make arena-sized, super-popular rock the way Zeppelin, AC/DC and G'n'R did. They still might, but it's going to take better songs than these.

If the whole record could be as good as the first ten seconds of "Artificial Light", it would be great. But it isn't.

Your senses will be sorely disappointed.

The low points are easier to spot than the highs, which tend to peak at a low elevation.

Dangerous Dreams' late arrival was nearly enough to doom it to obscurity, but the disc's lack of new ideas puts the final nail in the coffin.

Awake is a distinctly flawed album; much of what's here is precious or forced-sounding.

Gomez do nothing to rethink or reinvigorate their earlier recordings; in fact, when Out West's renditions are compared to the originals, the live versions sound dull and lifeless.

You have to admire Hefner's artistic spirit -- but Dead Media is too flawed and derivative to earn serious praise.

Songs too slow to dance to and too annoyingly repetitive for passive listening.

While a few of the songs -- like BMG's team-up with Esthero for a cover of "White Rabbit" -- may generate momentary interest, they all sound a little too much like commercial radio fodder, their quirks depressingly predictable.

The absence of memorable hooks and catchy choruses is obvious.

There are times on this record, though, when the quaver fades for a few notes and [Oberst's] voice drops out of hysterical high range, and it's actually pleasant to listen to -- but that never lasts, and that's a shame.

An overblown, overhyped dreamy swirl of sound that can't commit itself to being anything.

Devoid of Tanaka's usual unpredictability, Beautiful is bland, linear and frequently downright dull, with entirely too many six, seven and eight-minute songs running out of ideas long before the halfway mark.

This shit is boring.

Only the dub-inflected excursion of "Pipe Bomb" and the Clash-style raver "Eyes Wide Open" manage to break from boredom and form long enough to feel somewhat genuine -- as long as you don't listen to any of the lyrics.

One offers ten tracks of zipless triple-A folktronica -- bland, edgeless songs like "A Million Ways" that wouldn't even heat up the Ballroom D dancefloor on the final night of a Midwestern Regional Sales Conference.

A towering monument to Esthero's overpowering sense of self satisfaction, this mess overstays its welcome and abuses whatever attention you're willing to spend on it. In short, it's not a career highlight.

Take a Casio keyboard or any other early '80s dance machine, wheel it out and blow the dust off and you would most likely be able to produce an album at least as enjoyable as this one.