Bad as Me is an aural portrait of all the places he's traveled as a recording artist, which is, in and of itself, illuminating and thoroughly enjoyable.

While Astro Coast's nostalgia is missed, Tarot Classics finds Surfer Blood showing more potential to create something unique than their debut suggested.

The results can be winning, especially when they're slathered in classic, Les Paul/Mary Ford-inspired slapback delay. However, busier cuts like "Sleigh Ride," "Little Saint Nick," and "Christmas Day" reveal a charming yet pitchy vocalist with all of the inflections of a classic torch singer, and none of the discipline.

Their loosest, wildest, and most honest collection of Saturday night/Sunday morning pining/drinking songs to date.

They've embraced their schoolboy selves and are simply singing songs of love and good cheer, albeit on a grand scale that somehow seems smaller due to the group's insuppressible niceness.

Audio, Video, Disco might just be the quintessential example of pop music in the Internet world where everything is available, and available to shuffle, but the main point is good times, great record.

He's settled into this well-weathered skin on Clancy's Tavern, winding up with his best album in many a moon.

Despite the natural feel of these songs as sung by Wilson and performed by his talented backing band, anyone who's paid attention to his solo career of the '90s and 2000s won't hear any surprises.

Certainly, part of the variety is down to the multitude of producers and writers on Stronger, but the album's success is entirely due to Kelly Clarkson, whose personality and professionalism turns it into her best album since her Breakaway breakthrough in 2004.

The writing is nothing earth-shattering; in fact, it's rudimentary and formulaic almost without exception, although they still come up with a couple of winners ("I'm Coming Home"), and lots of tunes that would easily pass for understandably forgotten oldies.

It proves McBride has plenty to offer an entirely new audience, and showcases her transition from country singer to skillful performer of elegant, hooky, adult contemporary, pop/rock music.

Instead of re-creating sounds, they've recaptured the vibe, which is enough to keep The Great Escape Artist absorbing even when it begins to drift.

Howl of the Lonely Crowd will get some notice due to the people who produced it, as it should, but at its core it's further proof of Comet Gain as one of the great hidden rock & roll treasures of the last 20 years.

A chronological ordering gives a sense to the band's progress, a definite perk, but the big payoff with Tape Club is that it offers a chance to see through to the heart of SSLYBY's songs and realize how charming they can be without the big-league production.

Songs like this--imaginative, contemplative, densely wordy, slightly silly but unflinchingly earnest--are arguably Lewis' strongest suit, especially in his recent work, and if the instances on A Turn in the Dream-Songs aren't quite as striking as those on its predecessor, the album still ranks right up there among his best.

As the album concludes somewhere in the seventh minute of "Tether," all the aim-for-the-heights stuff they're about just becomes its own locked-in loop, an epicness that feels less remarkable than simply familiar.

This is a record designed to be listened to in isolation, preferably through a massive pair of high-quality headphones rather than in the mass communal surroundings of a club.

It's almost one high point after another.

If Gauntlet Hair are promising rather than solid, they're promising nonetheless, one band of many with a shot at a further brass ring after 2011.

It's certainly accomplished and self-assured, and at its best the results are truly impressive.

Lydia Loveless' Indestructible Machine possesses a classicist's grip of country, a rock & roll sense of swagger, and the keen eye of a songwriter twice her age.

The Bootleg Series, Vol. 1: Live in Europe 1967 box is an essential addition to the catalog.

Beyond the Sun plays it cool and plays it authentic--these aren't reinterpretations, but sincere homages--and if this doesn't have much grit, it has plenty of style and heart.

An affable shrug of an album, it's fine, but that's not necessarily OK.

While it may not be quite as striking as Saturdays = Youth, it delivers a welcome mix of classic sounds and promising changes.

The songwriting is more disciplined, and the arrangements and production are tighter. Together they create a seamless but welcome change in aesthetic direction.

You'd have to go a long way to hear a better synth pop album, no matter what decade you examine.

Solid yet understated, it's Hannigan's obvious gift for melody, tasteful arrangements, and remarkably emotive elocution (when her voice breaks, the heart follows suit) that keeps Passenger afloat, while the world schemes and churns beneath.

In a way, this is overkill indeed--over 100 minutes of remixes for a 40-minute album. However, it's also fascinating to hear how this current crop of producers--spanning abstract hip-hop, house, dubstep, bass music, and experimental techno, all selected by Thom Yorke--twists, bends, adjusts, and appropriates the source material.

The melodies remain fuzzily in focus, so Ashes & Fire winds up as ever-shifting mood music, sustaining an appealingly lazy haze residing somewhere south of melancholy.

New Blood isn't always as astonishing but that's fine.

While nobody expects cohesiveness from these guys, Monkeytown is at least commendably concise--their leanest and tightest offering yet.

It's a testament to Hawthorne's songwriting ability that this wall is easily scaled after one or two listens, and that the man sounds more natural and loose than on his debut might be this album's greatest asset, making the vulgar drops and other nods to the present feel less mannered than before.

yron Gallimore, who previously produced Sugarland and Faith Hill, gives Wildflower an appealing gloss that helps disguise the ordinariness of the material along with any of Alaina's shortcomings, and that slickness serves Wildflower well, making it a much more enjoyable piece of product than McCreery's Clear as Day.

There's a cohesiveness issue that keeps this one off their top shelf, but Erasure have settled nicely into that groove that the best veteran bands often do.

Loyal fans of underground hip-hop already know he's earned that crown on the cover, and with this purposefully packaged showcase now in place, the uninitiated have no excuse.

Educational and emotional in a uniquely approachable way, these songs are a lovely part of a bigger picture.

The Suicide-meets-Can growl that opens "Green and Blue," for instance, may be a familiar element in other revivals, but Cronin puts enough of a hooky spin on the feedback rampage to help make it stand out as the album's first down-the-line success.

Red is a strong step forward for a very promising band that arrived with an intriguing voice already established and has now made it even richer and more interesting.

These quintessential Rifles offerings may appease those deterred by the album's unexpected wistful nature, but Freedom Run's inherent charm has the potential to elevate the band into the big league, regardless of how many longterm fans stay on board or jump ship.

A Dramatic Turn of Events, while not a perfect offering, has enough of what makes Dream Theater attractive to make it a necessary purchase for fans.

Until Morrison manages to infuse some of this raw honesty and emotion into his sound, he's always going to struggle to create that one great record that his impassioned and soulful voice deserves.

As life seems to move at an ever-faster pace and information threatens to overload, Breakers offers an uneasy but welcome respite if we just take the time to listen.

Luckily, the majority of Gracious Tide, Take Me Home plays to the band's beautifully swooning strengths, and in doing so, produces one of the most majestic debuts from a British act this year.

Tarwater's continual evolution into something other than what it was before, however subtle each individual step might be, proceeds as ever on 2011's Inside the Ships, the group's 11th full-length.

It makes you wish the two talented guys behind the record would chuck their day jobs and just keep making records this good together instead.

Most of Modern Love is almost meticulously inoffensive, shot through with a middle-of-the-road approach that rarely overswings or underwhelms.

Ultimately, comparing For True to Backatown is pointless: they are of a piece. While you may prefer one over the other, they are, in essence, two parts of a compelling and dynamic musical aesthetic that is firmly in and of the 21st century, as they look back at history and forward to create it.

While most film trilogies adhere to the law of diminishing returns, World War III's clever storytelling and unexpected shifts in sound show that Madina Lake have wisely saved the best till last.

Cattle Core may well have a future as a metal subgenre, but Hank3 may want to shoot for an EP or a single next time rather than filling up a whole CD as he does on Cattle Callin.

It may not be as pretty as Red Devil Dawn or as road trip-ready as Forfeit/Fortune, but Breaks in the Armor has got more gas in the tank than either of them.

Although the album seems like silly fun on the surface, there is enough complexity to the interlocking synth lines and clattering rhythms to give the music some weight.

Deeper into Dream is, ironically, far more captivating when it appears to want to send listeners to sleep.

The album deliver psychedelic pop with an expansive, cinematic feeling, letting listeners get lost in its slow, drifting melodies.

[The second version of Just in Love is] a minor blip on an otherwise immensely entertaining and enjoyable pop record--inspired, tons of fun, and positioning Joe Jonas as a worthy successor to Justin.

He makes connections between disciplines--musical, literary, visual--that serve to further define Americana not as a musical genre, but as an expansive cultural enigma.

Even when just kidding around, Shatner proves himself to be an exacting master of his craft, and more than a few times on Seeking Major Tom the joke is clearly on us.

High Places' third album finds the duo of Rob Barber and Mary Pearson all the more comfortable and assured in a realm of moody electronic pop for the 21st century, at once drawing on familiar roots and putting distinct, enjoyable spins on the results.

McCartney's music is appropriately romantic, sometimes to the extent that the moments intended to convey creeping tension or sadness bounce with a joyous gait.

Joined by an impressive who's-who of traditional British folk, its eclectic array of songs, spanning from the 17th century (Scottish ballad "Barbry Allen") right up to the mid-'90s (Bruce Springsteen's The Ghost of Tom Joad outtake, "Brothers Under the Bridge"), ensures that it's no ordinary covers album.

With Telecasters and drums driving, and Valenzuela's mariachi trumpet singing above it, it's a cracking way to close an album that defines what Americana is.

Behind the Parade is another superior album from one of rock's true unsung heroes, and chances are it will sound just as vital and exciting two decades hence as it does today.

It's aural candy for aging goths and tortured tweens alike.

Ready for Confetti is, without question, Keen's most inspired and focused project in nearly 20 years.

Derulo's still saying nothing--which is fine, since these are hooky, club cuts--but it's the talking louder that's the issue.

Ultimately, Beautiful Rivers and Mountains is more than a mere curiosity piece; for all its easy-to-recognize styles, Shin's way of enmeshing them into something original underscores rather than erases their strangeness and splendor--even to widely exposed Western ears--making this is an excellent introduction to his work.

Ghost to a Ghost/Gutter Town is easily the purest expression of Hank3's crazed country vision to date, and anyone who's followed his wild ride owes it to themselves to give it a listen.

This set is a pleasant listen, but the fact remains that the best versions of Holly songs are by Buddy Holly, and no album of covers, no matter how well done or well intentioned, can eclipse them.

Violent Hearts is a resoundingly successful debut that puts the band right at the front of the line of all the reverb-heavy, backward-looking indie pop bands that overran the music scene like seagulls on the beach at low tide in the early part of the decade.

Indeed, while the album is quite pretty and powerful at times, the overall mood of glacial gloom can be suffocating.

Mute Math sound most natural when they let loose as a funk rock/alt-rock hybrid that closely resembles a heavy version of Tahiti 80. As rough as that translates on paper, this form of music totally works for them and pops up in more than a few of their best songs, including "Cavalries," "One More," and "Walking Paranoia."

The result is a strong, confident record that's his best solo effort to date.

On Again into Eyes, they take listeners down a fairly well-traveled musical road, but it's still an enjoyable journey.

Except for the occasionally bumpy ride, though, The Less You Know, The Better is one of the most entertaining albums of the year, with countless moments of brilliance.

Given that the core members are composer Dustin O'Halloran and Stars of the Lid veteran Adam Wiltzie, it's little surprise that both those conventions, and how to work well beyond them, are within their grasp on this debut release.

After three more amorphous recordings, Trust Now reveals a mature, realized Prince Rama sound, at once intoxicating and beguiling.

He's proceeding at the pace of a 74-year-old legend with nothing to prove, yet he's not resting on his laurels, he's just doing what he's always done: singing songs so expertly his virtuosity almost goes unnoticed.

People and Things might not be as accessible as Everything in Transit, which contained some of the brightest pop songs of McMahon's career, but it's stronger than The Glass Passenger, indicating that McMahon has begun to move onward and upward.

There's a soft-spoken power to Metals, even if its songs are more liquid and atmospheric than the title suggests.

While Conatus isn't as direct as Stridulum, it's still some of her most satisfying work.

Their darkest and most complex work yet, In the Pit of the Stomach unleashes We Were Promised Jetpacks' full fury with impressive results.

Apart from ["You Make That Look Good" and "Write My Number on Your Hand"], the songs and production demand that all energy come from young Scotty, who amiably sleepwalks through the tunes.

Kasabian have been a band of post-Brit-pop possibilities from the get go, so bringing in techno, ethnic sounds, and an orchestra is coming home for this impudent crew.

Major/Minor will go down as another solid, if unspectacular, Thrice release.

For their third studio album...Megafaun dial back the more progressive elements of their sound in favor of a languid, Laurel Canyon-inspired foundation that treads the middle ground between Blitzen Trapper's experimental, neo-Southern rock romancing, and Will Oldham's post-Palace Music infatuation with American Beauty-era Grateful Dead.

The soundtrack to PJ20 is not for them, it's for those who have stuck with the group through thick and thin, through any number of new drummers, and they'll certainly find much that rewards their fandom here.

Credo could have been the perfect opportunity to prove to their devotees that they haven't lost their touch, but although there are a few flashes of their heyday's magic, it's a strangely low-key affair which is unlikely to inspire any future synth pop maestros.

Watch Me Dance is a triumphant speaker-blasting party record that cements Toddla T's reputation as the U.K.'s bass wonderkid.

Ultimately, Grouplove's Never Trust a Happy Song is a cohesive if ramshackle crowd-pleaser, full of melodic double-lead vocals, handclaps, ringing electric guitars, and staccato synth parts that tips a hat to '80s dance-rock while still retaining the band's obvious love of experimental '60s folk-rock.

This focus on approachability over impenetrability makes Dreams Come True not only a welcoming debut, but a fantastic entry point into the more experimental side of electronic music.

Granted, they're not fishing for another viral earworm here, but you'd think they could come up with something better -- for the lead single, no less -- than "Michael Jackson"'s feeble placeholder of a refrain.

While their play-it-safe approach may mean they're less likely to suffer the rapid sales decline of their contemporaries, they are now in danger of becoming indie pop's answer to Westlife.

Staind may not be much more than noise -- it's not especially hooky or melodic -- but the group wins points for unexpectedly delivering something visceral.

Ironically, this very looseness not only results in a lively listen, but the polite messiness of Pajama Club winds up as a greater testament to his songwriting skills than the last Crowded House album; as the cliché goes, his throwaways are better than many artist's keepers.

As a record, this The Sea of Memories is easily the most enjoyable collection of songs released under Bush's name.

Daybreak is successful on two levels: in the way it touches on the best elements of Saves the Day's past works, it's a welcome entry point for new listeners; and with its freshness, it assures established fans that the band is still invigorated after going at it for over a decade.

For the Devil Wears Prada's fourth album, Dead Throne, the Christian metalcore six-piece is at its most technical and most brutal.

While fans might be disappointed that the album doesn't feature "Herb" Alexander, they'll have a hard time being disappointed with Green Naugahyde, an album that will satisfy those in the know while continuing, as Primus always have, to baffle the uninitiated.