Friendly Fire has the same feel as Into the Sun: namely, it's a pleasant but forgettable arty pop record made by a guy who has some promise but little discipline.

A deeply poetic record.

Part experimental rock, part electronica, and part hip-hop, Subtle's For Hero: For Fool is a complex, innovative, sometimes bizarre, and usually utterly confusing journey into the minds of lyricist Doseone and his five bandmates.

It is, thus far, his masterpiece, and as beautiful a pop record as can be made these days.

Live a Little sounds more open and roomy than the past few Pernice Brothers efforts.

It's one of the most mystical indie-pop surprises to arrive in 2006.

Like Homesongs, this record reveals more with each listen, burrowing its way into your consciousness and becoming a welcome part of your musical DNA.

What really differentiates the album from its predecessors is that there's almost no trace of tension to be heard. It's all about fooling around and being in love.

The best thing that can be said about The Lemonheads is that it sounds like the album Dando and company should have released in 1995.

Similarities to their debut are much easier to find than differences, although the songs aren't quite as memorable (except the single "I Don't Feel Like Dancin'") and Ta-Dah is slightly samey in comparison.

Peaceful and undeniably pretty, this is an album that should please many Sparklehorse fans, even if it doesn't challenge them the way Good Morning Spider and It's a Wonderful Life's best moments did.

It's understandable that Ludacris wanted to show off different parts of himself, but in doing so he didn't have to forget about what fans already knew.

One hell of a live record.

An uncommonly rich and moving album.

This is a keeper, one of those records that you'll still be listening to in ten years.

The Outsider is a carefully crafted, artistically elusive mess -- far more scattershot than even his first UNKLE record (Psyence Fiction), but much more interesting for its excellent productions.

Sometimes Darkel seems in danger of floating away on its flights of fancy, suggesting that Godin gives some of Dunckel's more whimsical ideas some grounding when they work together as Air. Nevertheless, this is a lovely working holiday, full of songs as shimmery and delicate as bubbles, and their slightness doesn't make them any less enjoyable.

This is by far their most accessible and cohesive record yet, and despite a couple of well-meaning but ultimately derivative hiccups in its second half, Awoo should bring a much larger audience into the fold.

Lost in all this is the instantly grabbing songwriting of Kasabian's debut, and to some extent, the bandmembers themselves, who often seem to be riding this swirl instead of guiding it.

Ben Kweller treads the same path as Kweller's other work, but fortunately, it still sounds genuine, not formulaic.

Truth to tell, since the quality of Oldham's songwriting has rarely wavered, the excellent arrangements and McCarthy's contributions make The Letting Go the best of his career to this point.

Without it ever deliberately going for the jugular, Nuclear Daydream is nevertheless an album that is difficult to shake out of your ears; moreover, it's one that only grows stronger with every repeated play.

There is no commercial slant on this music, but it's more relevant than anyone dared expect.

It might not quite seem like what a Fantastic sequel should be -- in fact, it seems more like a sequel to its direct predecessor, 2004's Peachtree Road -- but that's hardly a bad thing.

Mildly entertaining but tremendously taxing.

Hoodstar only makes it all the more apparent that the St. Louis MC's overnight popularity was like lightning in a bottle.

Food & Liquor just might be the steadiest and most compelling rap album of 2006.

Super Extra Gravity matches their previous record, Long Gone Before Daylight, for its dour mood and sour attitude, its lack of discernible hooks, and the unappetizing flavor of the Cardigans' performances.

While she's always been a pleasant presence on album, Krall has developed from a talented pianist who can sing nicely into an engaging, classy, and sultry vocalist with tastefully deft improvisational chops.

At times, Return to Cookie Mountain threatens to become more impressive than likeable -- a complaint that could also arguably be leveled against Desperate Youth as well -- but fortunately, TV on the Radio reconnects with, and builds on, the intimacy and purity that made Young Liars so striking.

The album is little different than their two previous atom bombs, De-Loused in the Comatorium and Frances the Mute -- tense and anxious, continually pushing the boundaries of extreme production, with long periods of dynamics that rise ever higher, followed by an explosion of release (usually screaming hard rock with storms of atonal brass and horns).

At this point, it's impossible to imagine them topping themselves; an album that is merely deeply engaging and wildly entertaining cannot be considered a flop in any way.

Jeremy Greenspan and Matt Didemus depart completely from 2-step and late-'90s Timbaland twitter, polishing their sound to such an extent that absolutely no detectable scuffs are left.

Continuum is a gorgeously produced, brilliantly stripped-to-basics album that incorporates blues, soft-funk, R&B, folk and pop in a sound that is totally owned by Mayer. It's no stretch when trying to describe the sound of Continuum to color it in the light of work by such legends as Sting, Eric Clapton, Sade, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Steve Winwood.

The uniformity of the album is at the expense of clear-cut standout tracks.

Graceless he may be, but Timberlake is nevertheless kind of fascinating on FutureSex/LoveSounds since his fuses a clear musical vision -- misguided, yes, but clear all the same -- with a hammyness that only a child entertainer turned omnipresent 21st century celebrity can be.

If there's a bit less childlike élan here than in the past, there's also an intelligence and joy that confirms Yo La Tengo is still one of the great treasures of American indie rock, and they haven't run out of ideas or the desire to make them flesh in the studio just yet.

Unlike his earlier recordings, there's little here that rewards close listening.

This is vulgar music, completely unsentimental or nostalgic but with a deep, wild, and tenacious heart; it's spooky, un-caged, and frighteningly descriptive of our time and place.

Jagged, fractured, splintered, and downright violent-sounding, it's easily the most extreme music the duo has made.

While nothing on Dark Light Daybreak is mind-blowingly original, it's all very good, and each song only adds on to the effectiveness and beauty of the next, layering one upon another like the instruments themselves, and making a very solid, even great, album.

This is stoner rock for the indie set, so every suggestion of Led Zeppelin or Queen gets filtered through a Sonic Youth or Yo La Tengo aesthetic, which helps keep the bombast and pagan iconography at bay.

The goal of Xiu Xiu's confessional, confrontational music is to shake their listeners out of complacency and make them think and feel; once again, they accomplish this mission beautifully.

Meadow is a new high-water mark.

His hooks are still heavy and melodic, which makes Welcome to the Drama Club easy to listen to, even if it is too tidy.

Blood Mountain is everything fans both hoped for and feared. Mastodon has dug even deeper in its foray into prog metal, but without losing an ounce of their power, literacy, or willingness to indulge in hardcore punk, doom, and death metal.

While Face the Promise isn't quite Night Moves or Stranger in Town, it stands proudly next to those albums and is most assuredly the work of the same singer.

What the cathartic Fading Trails might lack in foot-tapping motivation, it makes up for in passion and honesty and is highly recommended for those who like to dig a little deeper for albums that get better each time they are played.

Talk to La Bomb revisits nearly all the elements that made their 2005 self-titled debut such a thrill, but the songwriting has slipped a bit, welcoming the beloved act to the sophomore slump.

The Town and the City isn't likely to be the soundtrack for your next party, but it's an exciting and emotionally powerful experience that grows with each listen.

Their inspired, eclectic mix of sounds and textures is always playful, but Taiga's powerful playing and sophisticated arrangements make it OOIOO's most mature album yet.

The delicateness of Half the Perfect World is certainly nice, but Peyroux seems to be using it as a device to hide behind instead of an actual expression of feeling.

Their most colorful, diverse and consistent record yet.

While Beyoncé does sound like she's in a bit of a hurry throughout the album, and there are no songs with the smooth elegance of "Me, Myself and I" or "Be with You," it is lean in a beneficial way, propelled by just as many highlights as the overlong Dangerously in Love.

Yellow House is... required listening not just for fans of Horn of Plenty, but for anyone who enjoys ambitious, creative music with an emotional undercurrent.

Brilliant.

It feels live, immediate.

Game Theory is a heavy album, the Roots' sharpest work. It's destined to become one of Def Jam's proudest, if not most popular, moments.

Despite it missing the fire of his first record, it's a worthy piece of work.

Unfortunately, there are enough songs on 4:21 that are so utterly boring that the claim of redemption can't be made quite yet.

Listened to with an open mind, it's a refreshingly retro rock & roll album that uses its waste-oid imagination in capturing every fantasy that entered Bobby Gillespie's teenage mind.

It's Cursive at their finest, challenging and smart and absolutely riveting.

Idlewild is certainly a spectacle, and an occasionally entertaining and enlightening one at that, but it translates into an elaborate diversion when compared to what this duo has done in the past.

They make honest indie rock for those looking for a solid, good song. There's no frills, no fancy production, just the purity of these songs.

Future Crayon is a must for Broadcast obsessives and a good way for casual fans to explore some of the rougher edges of their music.

This ranks with the best work of one of America's most original musical visionaries.

[An] impressively diverse album.

With The Body, The Blood, The Machine the Thermals haven't made another thrilling noisy gem like More Parts Per Million, they've made an inspired and inspiring, semi-grown up indie rock record with more thought than thrills.

Post-War is not only Ward's best effort yet, it's one of the best records of the year.

A compelling and touching record.

Fans of Bachmann's gruff Neil Diamond-meets-Steve Earle vocals and lonesome and literate subject matter will find everything they love about the Carolina native on display, while those who prefer his vocal affectations surrounded by the din of a full band should stick with his group efforts.

Though it's disjointed, a little bumpy, and -- in places -- perceptibly unfinished-sounding, The Shining is a very worthy addition to Dilla's discography.

Paris makes no apologies for being mass-market pop, but everybody involved made sure that this was well-constructed mass-market pop.

What makes it less successful than 1999's Kaleidoscope and 2003's Tasty is that it's extremely choppy and excessively long, and it doesn't have the range of emotions to match the varied backdrops.

VanGaalen's a skilled musician, and compositionally the pieces are well-constructed, but there's nothing on the record that truly blows you away.

Outwardly it's a fun album, triumphant and full of majestic refrains and riffs... but there's still something in it,... that makes it somehow all very sad.

It's clear from the first notes of Trying to Never Catch Up that this is a band that knows what they're doing, and is pretty damn sure about it, too.

Maybe by the time their next album rolls around they will be able to tame their influences into a more coherent-sounding body of work that will more fully represent their abilities.

It may be all about style, it may be a little crass and self-centered, but it's also catchy, exciting, and unique.

For those listeners who pine for a world when Seven Mary Three received heavy rotation, this will satisfy, but anybody expecting the spark of Jane's Addiction or even a dose of Navarro's campy on-camera charm will be sorely disappointed.

Barat's music doesn't have the baggage associated with Doherty's brooding, poetic aspirations, but it doesn't quite have the same impact, either.

More often than not, Avatar is stunningly beautiful, even if the definition of that word needs to expand a bit to embrace it.

The downside of Reprieve is that it isn't as musically arresting as earlier albums like Out of Range, and DiFranco, on a song like "Millennium Theater," can be rather obvious.

As a whole, Winter Women/Holy Ghost Language School is a lot to process at once, but untangling the mysteries of Friedberger's music feels like more fun than it has in a while.

You will be hard-pressed to keep from walking around all day grinning like a fish once you give the album an airing.

An anti-Christian/anti-Islam/anti-Theocratic, anti-war album, Christ Illusion is essential for anyone interested in the genre.

It's more of the same old, same old.

Against productions this diluted, Jurassic's top-notch rhymers -- Chali 2na, Soup, Akil -- fail to make any headway, usually spitting rhymes already familiar to listeners of their earlier work.

A large chunk of the material is second rate compared to his past highlights.

At its core, it's moodier than most of his records.

Franti's brain-stimulating songwriting rises to a new level of proficiency here.

If it's not quite a triumph, it's challenging and ambitious stuff that rocks on out and doesn't tarnish the memory of what Johansen and Sylvain accomplished so many years ago.

Putting the Days to Bed finds Roderick writing his most intimate lyrics to date while also building upon the radiant pop sensibility of 2005's Ultimatum EP.

The songs, as far as the writing goes, are routinely terrific; however, the ones that rely most on convenient synthesized elements are a bit dainty and rudimentary and deserve to be made without the limitations of a home studio.

The album is impressive, especially in small doses or when Steele reigns it in a bit, as on the pretty, bossa-nova tinged "Miles Away." As a whole, it's a sometimes exhausting listen.

A much darker, more ambitious set of songs than the Knife's previous work.

Midlake might be stuck in the '70s, but they make it sound like the best place on earth.

It isn't easy to strike the right balance between ambition and emotion, scale and humanity; White Whale manage it with ease on WWI.