Cuomo doesn't suppress his emotion; he just prefers sentiment, but what he loves most of all is a pure pop song and Hurley offers up its fair share.

His voice is clear over the sparse arrangements, and his words are more direct than before.

The Reason Why is mature, exquisitely crafted, and radio friendly; it ups the ante for contemporary country in songwriting, performance, and production (the latter by stripping away excess). It's as near to a perfectly balanced recording as one will find in the genre.

Despite lushly detailed arrangements, Bareilles never pushes this distinctly commercial gift too hard, letting the songs flow easily and this gentleness is almost as appealing as those classically constructed melodies, tunes so softly insistent they could conceivably appear on adult contemporary charts anytime from 1971 to 2010.

The tempos on Reckless are more varied than those on their self-titled debut, but even the slower tracks pack the big emotional punch that bluegrass fans love, the kind of feeling that used to make country music dangerous.

Even if it's not as cohesive as Mahjongg's earlier work, it's easily some of the band's boldest, most confident music.

Lisbon, like the rest of their music, is meant to be savored, the fullness of its songs allowed to develop over many listens.

While it's easy to see why some listeners may prefer the completely unhinged sounds of Grinderman's debut, this set, with its expansive sonics and studied bombast, is still full of so much adrenaline, nastiness, and rock & roll sleaze that it stands in its own league and kicks serious ass.

Though it's a little long and a couple songs veer toward filler, it's a return to form for of Montreal and more than justifies the hype and attention their live show has garnered.

They get a little too close to trip-hop for their own good on a few songs, and their widescreen drama is missed occasionally, but Penny Sparkle is still another beautiful reinvention for Blonde Redhead.

They may not be the hippest band around in 2010 but they sound as fresh and important as they did in 1990, 1995, or 2001, and Majesty Shredding is the kind of album that'll make you glad to be a fan of indie rock.

Given its wonderfully crafted and performed material and stellar production, it is the country album of 2010.

It's recognizably the Charlatans--it's hard to disguise Tim Burgess's laconic drawl or the light psychedelic pull of his melodies--but they're unexpectedly abandoning their dad-rock handbook and taking risks, winding with their freshest, best album since they traded the Happy Mondays for the Rolling Stones.

Crush is a fully realized progression, and one of the best indie rock albums you'll hear in 2010.

Harlem River Blues is utterly balanced, skillfully crafted, and exquisitely written and produced. Earle proves that he is a force to be reckoned with; in these grooves he embodies the history, mystery, and promise of American roots music.

This a major step forward and for the adventurous hip-hop fan, it could very well be appropriately titled.

As a whole, Imperfect Harmonies is its own animal. Tankian proves that he can pull off his grand ambitions in a maximalist approach that creates something new from the ruins of everything he destroyed to get here.

This is a band built for flexibility at live shows and for stretching numbers out, but thanks to Brown's easy, natural honky tonk singing and sharp songwriting, ZBB also deliver confidently in the tighter restraints of a studio setting.

All this serves to underscore that My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky is a mercilessly intense and beautiful record that only Swans could pull off, and that no matter who plays in the band, Gira was and is Swans: their sound, their musical and poetic vision, their heartbeat.

No Age's brief moment of near-mainstream notoriety may have passed by the time Everything in Between was released, but their growth as recording artists was progressing nicely and the album stands alongside Nouns as two of the finest noise rock/pop albums of the new millennium.

The ultimate irony and triumph of Record Collection, is that on an album all about how Ronson's own obsessive music tastes have defined his life, we finally hear him step away from the turntable and produce one of the best albums of his career.

It's not as immediate as previous Deerhunter albums, but Halcyon Digest has an appeal all its own: It's as difficult to grasp - and as hard to shake - as a memory lingering at the back of your brain.

Most won't have the skills to follow his playbook, either on or off the field, but Cube's utterly unique I Am the West shows the younger generation how to cross 40 while retaining their freedom and baller status.

At the surface, the temperature is icy. But like a cold lake's waters, the music of Public Strain becomes less drastic; comforting even, given time.

Not many bands bring together bluegrass' past and present the way Chatham County Line do, and fewer still can do it this well; Wildwood shows they keep getting better as they follow new stylistic detours in their music.

Throughout all of King Night, the feeling of a séance being held or a spell being cast is palpable, but Salem's ability to be affecting and menacing at the same time is pure alchemy.

Duppy Writer ably serves either of two purposes, an alternate career retrospective or a remix record of taste and distinction.

Bachmann's contributions play a back-seat role to those by Taylor and Fink, who sound as convincing after a seven-year break as they did during Azure Ray's heyday.