If the question on The Knife is what is an aging punk rocker to do, then the answer according to Feldmann is keep doing what you're doing--just be sure to be the best at it. It's a brave sentiment, and Goldfinger definitely lives up to it.

With Ross as a foil, Reznor's usual indulgences become focused and refined, making Add Violence a satisfying addition to NIN's less-essential, non-album output.

From the heartfelt Irish folk tribute "Blackwater Banks" to the unstoppably hooky "People Like Us," this is an engaging and fun listen that is easy to repeat again and again.

It's spacious and fluid rather than rock-solid and rigid, but every sound and movement feels entirely deliberate. Nearly 40 years after their formation, Laibach remain innovators, and Also Sprach Zarathustra is easily one of their best works. Absolutely glorious.

The freewheeling, uplifted spirit likewise continues. Martin and company combine and alternate between groove-oriented contemporary jazz, soul, funk, and hip-hop.

It finds the group evolving while holding on to what was best about their first LP, and they remain a singular and bracing punk rock band for people who think they're too smart for punk rock. Well worth your time and attention.

Spooky Action is rollicking exercise in high-impact lo-fi rock that should more than satisfy anyone who has dug any of Loewenstein's projects in the past.

Dylan didn't need another covers record. Thankfully, Nile didn't give a damn and delivered one of the best.

Wobble has been on a creative tear for decades with a few significant breaks. The Usual Suspects reveals its scope with sophistication, savvy, and humor. Essential.

Some references to proper nouns come across as either misplaced or forced, and the set could do with fewer strained fairground-rock choruses. These shortcomings are nonetheless too rare and slight to prevent The Autobiography from being a remarkable first album.

Overall, while the album is varied, it's consistently absorbing as it reveals itself with a sense of suspense through its melancholy ambience.

Even the album's weakest cut, "It's a Jungle Out There," works in context, and the two numbers about the bonds of family, "Lost Without You" and "Wandering Boy," are thoughtful and genuinely moving. And the easy, endlessly reliable stride of Newman's piano remains one of popular music's most underrated pleasures.

Though there's nothing here to grab headlines, A Deeper Understanding reclaims and explores the distinctive soundscapes, vastness, and haunted psyche of Lost in the Dream, and that in itself is significant.

Produced by Guy Picciotto of Fugazi in tandem with engineer Greg Norman, Cost of Living is a tougher and leaner effort than Full Communism, with the group's abundant energy even more tightly focused.

Altogether, A Fever Dream is confrontational, warped, emotionally and aurally high-contrast, and full of turmoil, but reliable in its infectiousness.

The results are so ghoulishly compelling that it's akin to shamefully leering out your car window at a grisly accident scene on your way to pick up a pizza. Hardcore done right is a terrible and beautiful thing.

While To the Bone sometimes seems inconsistent, it's an illusion; repeated listening reveals that Wilson's brand of progressive pop is so multivalently textured and expertly crafted, that its aesthetic and sonic palette refuse to be contained under a single rock umbrella. As such, To the Bone stands with Wilson's best work.

Woodland Echoes can't be called a return to form for Heyward because he never lost his form; it just went unheard for years. Call it a welcome return instead, because the world of pop music always needs music this smart, tuneful, and unabashedly romantic.

The entire EP is haunting, surreal, and undeniably beautiful.

Andrew spends TFCF discovering sounds that previous incarnations of Liars somehow never explored, whether it's the oddly majestic psychedelic flamenco of "Cliché Suite" or the brittle piano pop of "No Tree No Branch," one of a streak of surprisingly catchy songs on the album's second half. Amidst all the change, Andrew holds onto some quintessential Liars qualities.

Although Young is correct when he claims Hitchhiker is a "complete piece"--it sustains a dusky sweetness from beginning to an end--it is certainly not a polished album. Often, it feels as if Young is singing with no intention of his music being heard by a wider audience, but the presence of Briggs at the board means this doesn't sound like a ragged demo. Instead, Hitchhiker holds together as a mood piece.

By slyly alternating between these two extremes throughout Rainbow, Kesha winds up with a comeback that's fully realized emotionally and musically.

The best songs on Gibbard's tribute illuminate something new or codify what was essentially great about the original. Sometimes he even manages to do both, while essentially offering up slavishly executed re-creations of the original tracks.

It may not be a step forward, but it is a strong step in a very pleasing direction, especially for fans of a more unfiltered Iron & Wine.

On these songs, and really all of the album, Rose isn't just using the '80s as a prop or making a novelty record. The big emotions need a big sound and the songs about returning to the city of her youth need the music of her youth to really hit home.

It's easy to hear why Good Time won an award before the film was even in wide release: The way Oneohtrix Point Never's score bridges character, setting, and mood offers much more than a passive backdrop.

Villains [is] a dark joy, a record that offers visceral pleasure in its winking menace.

Forgiving those space fillers, Scum remains a great pleasure, the product of a young mind brimming with ideas coupled with enough youthful bravery to take such risks.