Though it's hard not to miss the gloriously messy sprawl of Pavement at their peak, this carefully crafted, languid recasting of their signature sound is effective and winds up as a fitting, bittersweet farewell for the best band of the '90s.

The fact that the emotional extremes are few and far between makes the album difficult to wade through -- its impact would've been tripled with about half an hour lopped off, but where to begin?

How Sweet It Is is a rare example of an album of covers that doesn't sound like a holding action, and makes clear Joan Osborne is still an artist well worth watching.

The album is always fantastical and innocent, a meeting of magic and technology.

A significant departure from the band's previous works, marking a new approach to songwriting.

Mystikal really couldn't ask for better production, overall -- all the tracks have bouncy, ass-shakin', club-ready beats, and nearly all have quite catchy hooks

Ultimately, the disc is a mix of Afrocentrifugal explosiveness -- not only from the music, but also from her powerful lyrics that make the political personal and the personal political.

This cuts back significantly on winding jams, upping the ante with tight songs and performances, a clean muscular production, and a lack of vocal histrionics from Popper

Practically a concept album about the bittersweet nature of nostalgia--specifically, nostalgia for, you guessed it, summer.

Like Kid A's little brother, Manic Expressive pops and gurgles through spacey, multi-textured compositions.

Living Outside is as conscious a follow-up record as there can be, but it's likely also the record Sense Field would've made anyway, even without the band's mainstream ascendancy.

Satisfying but rarely challenging, Quixotic is a fantastic start to a solo career, and its display of range, talent, and charm suggests that Martina Topley-Bird has an endless well of creativity at her disposal and that she is most likely destined for greater things.

Cuts into raw indie rock with spells of country and folk, while allowing Brock to explore a varying scope of sounds.

Just a set of productions that prove, once again, Bell is the most imaginative producer in British techno.

While it's not as diverse as Spanish Dance Troupe or as immediate as How I Long to Feel That Summer in My Heart, Sleep/Holiday is just as lovely and heartfelt, and another fine addition to Gorky's Zygotic Mynci's body of work.

A greater combination of accessibility and subversion would be nearly impossible to imagine.

Buzzle Bee might just be the group's most out-there production yet, as the Llamas churn out eight tracks full of gorgeous symphonic-pop arrangements and aloof, lazy melodies that dart in and out of all kinds of studio tinkering.

This variety is what makes The King of Nothing Hill so enjoyable -- it revels in being both fun and furious.

A swirling, beautiful, and warmly complex road trip of an album.

The results are goofy but undeniably exhilarating.

The most amazing thing about A People's History is the diverse styles represented throughout.

Given the right frame of mind, Closer has the potential to be the most powerful Plastikman album -- an alternatingly cathartic and mind-wrenching place to lose yourself in.

There's a sharpness that was absent before, a shift in focus and time that's strict in design.

It's an evocative and wildly creative, but not immediately accessible collection.

Built to Spill expands on the big sound that they crafted with Keep It Like a Secret.

Both dreamy and earthy, complex and immediate, and challenging and soothing.... The Sleepy Strange is the band's most cohesive work to date, yet it keeps all of the spontaneous beauty of their previous releases.

This time around the beats seem darker and more synth-oriented, giving it an edge reminiscent of the bass-heavy G-funk sound.

If any one album can be said to pick up on the surreal funk explorations of latter-day Miles Davis, Uninvisible is it.

Squiggling past looping divas, afternoon glares, and funkadelic body bops, De Crecy manages to manufacture a trail of songs that reach for that Anglo-French brass ring with nothing but admirable gravitas.

Their detuned sound and tales from the darkside are even more sinister and gripping on the concert stage, as evidenced by this 14-track set.

Echoes of classic U2, Echo & the Bunnymen, and Swervedriver resonate throughout.

Thrives on its mixture of fuller-sounding productions and relatively traditionally-structured songs with vocals.

A small triumph, but a triumph nonetheless.

This album is a study in repetition and rhythm, the same kinds that Callahan first toyed with on songs like "Bloodflow" and "Justice Aversion" from Dongs of Sevotion.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs cram more ideas and attitude into five songs than most bands express in an entire album.

Sometimes it sounds like Ennio Morricone, sometimes the Penguin Café Orchestra. Mostly it sounds like its own thing.

The weightless drones and light filigrees are as mesmerizing and familiar as ever when folded into each other.

He has created a record that might not be as wildly eclectic on the surface as Play, and it certainly lacks club-hits on the level of "Bodyrock" or "South Side," but it's a warm, enveloping, humanistic record with real emotional resonance, which surely is a noteworthy artistic step forward.

Song for song, it's better and more consistent than Head Music... thanks partially to Stephen Street's focused, flattering production, but also due to a sharp set of songs.

Occasionally, the album's spare, simple approach feels chilly and monotonous, but when it all comes together, as on the percolating, insistent "Your Moves Are Mine,"Attention reveals itself as a stylish, strangely romantic collection of club music.

Impossibly crisp production, impeccable interplay between rhythm and effects, and the most difficult quality for any electronica producer to nail down: a crucial, distinctive sound.

A return to their early-'60s Beatlesque sound...

While Faces & Names lacks the same physical power as Soul Asylum's best work, the best songs here manage to sound comfortable, magnetic, and passionate all at once.

On the vintage foundation of simple, minimal patterns repeated to often-hypnotic effect, Wire builds a beefed-up, contemporary wall of sound.

Read & Burn 02 shares its predecessor's hit-and-run aesthetic: it's a post-industrial punk rock barrage of buzzing, stinging guitars; chunky bass lines; and clockwork beats littered with terse, strangled vocals that fall somewhere between bolshy, pre-brawl aggression and football-terrace chants.

Organic as dirt, and full of an acidhead's sense of space, this one's a winner from start to finish.

Electric Circus does suffer from that which ails many contemporary hip-hop albums -- too many guests and a generally lengthy program drag this one down a tad. Nonetheless, Electric Circus is a brave and ruthless statement wrapped in sincerity.

At best, a rich man's Air. At worst, tedious, superfluous, hippy-dippy, overly ironic trash. Lemon Jelly .KY can be both, of course -- often at the same time...

Light & Magic is a logical, elegant progression for Ladytron, balancing their pop and experimental instincts even more ably than their debut.

It's not a splashy comeback, then, but a quiet return to something Gabriel does best -- creating soundscapes that are at once alien and familiar, eerie yet comforting.

If there's any problem with More Than a Woman, Toni Braxton's fourth album, it's that its so consistent, so much a continuation of its predecessor, Heat, that it may be hard to pinpoint distinctive characteristics.

No, it's not quite the same as another Pavement album, but its literate, funny eclecticism is almost as irresistible.

The album's a bit more edgy than any of her American contemporaries, but it's still not too far from [Lauryn] Hill and other neo-soul figures.

Riff, vamp, timbral fractures, lyrical tension, splintered harmonics, and a constant, seductive sense of groove permeate this jazz album, opening up a door onto a brave new future for a free jazz with soul -- Spooky has exceeded all expectations here.

When he sticks with the slide guitar, Martsch's combination of downhome blues and meandering indie-rock is a winning one.

The band's tendency to start a song quiet, loose, and lovely and then slowly sweat it into a faster, intensified crescendo is familiar by now, but somehow remains vividly evocative.

An undeniably pleasant and ultimately rewarding, if not immediately accessible, listen.

His last two albums also reflected his ongoing growth as an artist, but Supper's settled but intriguing warmth is an even bigger step forward.

Even though there's little stylistic maturation in his approach since his first release in 1986, Yoakam's songwriting craft keeps improving, and any track from this album could be a hit single. With Tomorrow's Sounds Today, Dwight Yoakam has fashioned a contemporary roots-conscious country album whose qualities, like the artist's distinctive style, are timeless.

There's a great deal of variety to the record, something that sets them apart from the vast majority of the bands that pay homage to the '60s, but also something that keeps them from developing a distinct identity.

Most importantly, though, the duo has pulled away from the brink; no one ever doubted that Autechre was at the extreme of experimental techno for its own sake, but given a record like Draft 7.30, listeners might actually return for multiple listens.

It's her first genuine step forward... probably the best record she has cut to date.

It finds Mellencamp at a kind of peak, turning out vividly socially conscious roots rock that works not because of the message, but because the music is seductive and sinewy enough to deliver the message.

More winds up having more style and substance than its predecessor.

I'm Staying Out is cut from the same cloth as her first full-length, While You Weren't Looking, but it expands on the ambition of that fine record and shows Cary growing from strength to strength as a writer and a performer.

The fireworks do not ignite the way they might have, but that is the nature of experimentation. Nevertheless, this is all great fun, a function of Shipp's slippery mind, and the results are not only danceable but disconcertingly so.

More than once everything connects perfectly.

The loosest record yet in Tindersticks' decade-long existence.

This music is beautiful enough to stand alone.

Decadent, theatrical, and magnetic, Alter falters only when the band's ambitions get the better of them, but the album's slight unevenness doesn't prevent it from being tremendously exciting.

Under Cold Blue Ground blazes some new trails for John Rouse, but the quality of his songwriting and the emotional impact of his music hasn't changed a bit; it's a solid and satisfying set from a genuinely gifted artist.

Hawley is a compelling mix of the pastoral beauty of English folk rockers like Nick Drake and the urban cool of balladeers like Scott Walker with a dash of the otherworldliness of Julee Cruise.

Though her voice is hardly the most impressive instrument in country music, Cash knows how to compensate by using an understated approach to more quietly highlight the essence of a song.

Throughout Sean-Nos Nua the production treats O'Connor's voice like a canvas on which to paint vivid images. At times the result is distracting, with far too much slapback, but it also scores on songs like "Molly Malone," where vocal and instrumental textures together trace the tale through poignant light and ominous shadow.

A collection of more shimmering, weightless pop that is nostalgic for yesterday's visions of the future but remains on the cutting edge of contemporary music.

Dynamic, taut, feisty and clever as ever, Send is this group's fourth-best album.

A hilarious effort loaded with satirical song parodies and rock & roll spoofs.

A delightful but slightly faceless blend of lounge pop, subtle beats, found sound and mellow jazz influences.

An addictive, densely packed pop gem that ranks among 2002's best albums.

His strongest album since he delved into unabashed crossover with Fresh Horses.

Fans who have stayed with the band this long will probably find the album a breath of fresh air.

More fully realized and bolstered with a stronger song selection than its predecessor, Wallpaper for the Soul is a well-crafted collection of infectious tunes that won't necessarily stick with you for years to come, but should be quite enjoyable while you're listening.

Polished and tight in all the right places.

While it's not quite the revelation that That's Not What I Heard was, Movement is still a dramatic album that shows that the Gossip is a powerful group continuing to define and redefine their music.

The Beauty of the Rain is Dar Williams' first recording that truly expands upon the sound of the album before it.

A pleasant album of sublime mid-tempo trip-hop, reminiscent of easy listening groove music, and continually referencing the breezier, atmospheric side of Brazilian, Jamaican, French, and Indian forms.

Twoism features the same exquisitely spooky, textured emotronica that fans will want to hear, all at as high a level as the brilliant Music Has the Right to Children to boot.

Credit much of the album's dusky allure to the atmospheric production of John Parish, which lends a shadowy beauty, revealing new layers of subtlety lurking underneath the band's ragged guitar-pop approach; the focal point is still Van Dijk's searing vocals, which harness the extremes of both pride and desperation to devastating effect.

Party Music doesn't really break much new ground for the Coup; it's more a consolidation of their strengths, touching on a little bit of everything they've done well in the past.

Equally cerebral and hip-shaking, with pulsating grooves and webs of intricate adornments tangling for an otherworldly type of psychedelic dance music.

for a few overblown performances and quasi-epic productions, It Ain't Safe No More finds Busta Rhymes with the same sure grip on his distinctive personality.

At times, the production is so even, the music simply flows out of the speaker without distinction between tracks, but the result is a record that holds together as a nice mood piece while holding up as individual songs.

It's honest and raw in the sense that McCulloch is cool with where he's from and unconcerned with where he's headed.

By not taking the easy way out, Ready for Love is a successful experiment that nudges at John Hammond's limitations while satisfying his recently acquired, larger fan base.

The results are sure to please longtime fans, while possibly reeling in a few folks who were turned off by the sonic excess of Dinosaur Jr. at their most punishing.

And though it is a disappointing record compared to the group's high-flying previous albums, it displays Underworld's talents well.