This is the kind of album that drifts by like a lazy white cloud on a beautiful summer day, leaving only positive feelings in its wake.

Kinsella's lyrical wit is still affecting, displayed in both song titles ("Howdy Pardoner") and his always honest, direct lyrics about relationships ("Let's cut each other's strings/Give me a hand if you understand").

The combination of intelligent and punchy songs, the sympathetic production, and Lerche's winning vocals make this a strong follow-up to Heartbeat Radio and further proof that Lerche doesn't need to mess around trying different things to keep people interested.

Suck It And See may be at the opposite end of the spectrum from the Humbug--it's concentrated and purposeful where its predecessor sprawled--yet it still demands attention from the listener, delivering its rewards according to just how much time you're willing to devote.

The timing for a change was right, too, as their 2009 record 200 Million Thousand wasn't one of their best, it was OK but seemed a little forced and uninspired. Arabia Mountain is the absolute opposite and could be their best album yet.

"The Godfather of Goth" sounds like the genre's savior here, coming on strong with those Bowie-sized aspirations and nailing that attractive Nosferatu-meets-Art-School style.

Cults is a bit like a sugar rush: exhilarating at first, and then exhausting. Still, the sounds and ideas they play with are too intriguing to dismiss entirely, even if some of the mystery around them is gone.

The 18 songs on the album are all in the heavily layered, chamber-hardcore style established on Chemistry of Common Life, but Fucked Up is taking the idea to the furthest reaches, and somehow pulling it off.

Gloss Drop may be more accomplished than the band's debut; even if it's not quite as much of a powerhouse as Mirrored was, it shows that the trio version of Battles is lean, creative, and surprisingly adaptable.

Taken as a whole, England Keep My Bones is evidence that Turner is an artist who has fully arrived and knows it. And that's no sin.

Vek is a self-made musician who embraces these kinds of flaws and more often than not makes them work to his advantage, and Leisure Seizure's independence and accessibility is a testament to that.

This is the most comfortable Alpers has sounded making music, and the result is some of her best work yet.

Cannibal Courtship is easily Dengue Fever's most consistent, sophisticated, and accessible recording to date, and one that should, with any luck, net them more than a few new fans.

Build with Erosion casts a wide net, but its 11 songs still cast a consistent mood, falling somewhere between pleasantly hypnotic and purposely peculiar.

Since the band cooked up an excellent 12 songs in only a few weeks last year (which they made available as a free download titled the Last Day of Summer), it should come as no surprise that the laboriously constructed follow-up is a masterpiece.

Luckily, there's enough genuine melody at the core of these songs to warrant their arrangements.

It's style for miles and miles unencumbered by hooks and accentuated by an attitude that carefully practices disdain for its audience, so if you're not inclined to buy into their gait there's not much reason to stick around.

ISAM plays out like the soundtrack to some bizarre nature documentary: it continually pauses, goes off in another direction, halts again, then sits unmoving for a time, as though Tobin had been musically ghosting the movements of a tiny insect traveling along a leaf.

Alegrias is a breezy yet luxuriant exercise in cultural fusion with none of the setbacks: it's a quiet stunner.

There are plenty of bands who literally spend a decade working up to an album as well-crafted, confident, and powerful as The Head and the Heart, and these folks managed to knock it out in a bit over a year; is they can make this particular bit of lightning strike twice, we may be looking at one of America's best new bands.

All well and good, and all very entertaining, but this is an album that's meant to be more: it's intended to be a soundtrack to a way of life, but it winds up playing as a collection of songs.

The record may not have the same depth and variety that It Was Easy had, but as a document of what a Title Tracks show in 2011 sounds like, it's pretty much perfect.

Heavy Rocks is diverse; but since it relies on the trio's blasting power over form, it is is more consistent than Smile and sounds like a refreshed and renewed Boris back on deck.

ltimately, The Dreaming Fields is a deeply moving, gloriously articulated album that should not only reawaken the interest of fans, but should win Berg a multitude of new ones.

It's nice to see him in the driver's seat once again, proving he's much more than a chauffeur for someone else's career.

In sum, Attention Please, with Wata's haunting vocals at the fore, is the most unusual and easily approachable recording on Boris' shelf, if not its best.

Street of the Love of Days is a well-conceived, perfectly executed album that captivates you right from the beginning and doesn't let go until well after the album stops spinning.

All in all it's a very enjoyable album, if at times a rather strange one.