The album just offers up a heaping pile of midtempo heaviness that harkens back to Metallica's middle years.

Of Copeland's experiments with more traditional beat-making, it's easily the best, most accessible work and still manages to be more stunningly weird than the majority of everything else out there.

Despite using occasional strings, steel drums euphonium, woodwinds, and even a mellotron, this is not a slick affair.

The versatility and strength of The Blind Hole will be impressive to anyone versed in hardcore's various hyper-splintered genres, mainly due to the band's ease when it comes to seamlessly combining so many different heavy styles.

Tides End is so smooth that some of its nuances may be lost at first, but before it slips away, it takes listeners on a deceptively breezy and surprisingly affecting journey through moments that can't last.

Perhaps the most tightly performed Joan of Arc material, Testimonium Songs feels less like a proper album and more like a sidebar, deeply aligned with the harsh tones of Reznikoff's bleak poems.

All told, Prince Avalanche is a beautifully subtle and introspective score that highlights the strong points of its composers while serving the needs of the film it was written for.

Although Bloodlines takes its time to get under your skin, when it does, it sinks in deep.

Swisher may not be as immediate as Blondes was, but these ambitious, accomplished tracks offer ample proof that restraint can be exciting.

Though this makes for a different kind of listening experience than fans might be used to, it's one that's ultimately pretty satisfying, feeling like it's not just manifesting the will and desire of the Polyphonic Spree's fans, but also reflecting the mission of brightness and hope that the band has been on for over a decade now.

Wide-eyed wonder still intact, there's a lot of depth to explore in the 30 minutes of Hobo Rocket, from bombastic glam, to chugging stoner rock, to colorful psychedelia--all of it odd as usual.

II is the kind of crafted album you just don’t expect from a supergroup or side project as it matches, and maybe even tops, the work of its individual parties.

Other bands thinking about re-forming would do well to follow their lead and not just get back together to play the hits and count the cash, but instead create something vital and relevant; something that makes the group's continued existence worthwhile.

Ultimately, the Civil Wars are impeccable craftsmen, taking weathered elements and repurposing them for something that feels new and never haunted by what came before.

Forward is a delightful return that focuses on the Heavies' love of smooth late-'70s/early-'80s sounds.

Perhaps it can be too sweet, too cloying at times, but it's warm and ingratiating, suggesting The Blow Monkeys can ease into a convincing middle age.

It is interesting to look at the epic, ambitious group by their attempts to cross over, and while not all singles were as worthy as the album cuts, this alternative view has some massive high points.

While The Living Infinite is certainly a whole lot of record, it's filled with enough vigor and creativity that it doesn't feel as though it's dragging along.

["She Said No" is] a minor blip on an otherwise excellent album by two guys who have discovered the transformative power that can be derived from collaboration.

Complain that they're stuck in a rut or praise that they're still able to do it convincingly, because this album gives up evidence to support either argument.

More cohesive and profound at times than the records that preceded it, the album sets a tone masterfully, and lingers contentedly and without rush, allowing the listener to drop in and sit for a spell with Jones as he ruminates on his various lush instrumental moods.

It's not fun but it's not meant to be: it's a bunch of lifers in their middle age reconnecting with the things they found important back then.

He's got talent to spare, but at this point he's swimming in an idyllic creek, not a raging river, and no amount of howling will banish demons that have yet to be summoned.

As the title suggests, it excels at capturing the kind of partly sunny heartbreak that can actually feel pretty good if you give yourself over to it.

Quite a bit bluer and calmer, where her previous music featured the four-on-the-floor pep of traditional house, this album falls closer to witch house and the rainy gloom associated with trip-hop.

As Blumberg puts on his Neil Young hat and laments "I've got some things to do/Some private things to do" on closer "The Plan," one can't help but think that, although perhaps overly self-indulgent at times, Hebronix could well prove fruitful.

All in all, Zero is an ambitious album that's amazing not just in how well done it is for a post-hardcore concept record, but in the way it shows that Hawthorne Heights aren't afraid to take risks 12 years into a long and successful career.

Big and bold the whole way through and with nary a stumble, Something Else is another triumph from Tech.