Somewhere Gone is a different animal from Cervenka's acoustic music of the late '80s and early '90s, at once simpler, riskier, and more confident, and it captures one of the great wild talents of her generation in strong and impressive form, still unafraid to take her talent in new directions after more than a quarter-century of blazing trails.

Johnston's craft as a vocalist can rise to the level of Falkner's well-crafted soundscapes, he's going to sound out of place on his own albums if he keeps making records like Is and Always Was.

Carlile still prefers sobriety to levity but it never feels affected; it's music that gets under your skin and cuts to the bone.

While the more upbeat tracks on Threadbare are competent and downright catchy, they're ultimately engulfed by the fog from which they were born.

The resulting Run Rabbit Run dutifully re-creates its creator's hypnotic, quirky, and oddly sweet song cycle, and peppers it with enough dissonant bow slides and odd harmonics to please the avant-garde crowd while keeping the twee melodies intact for the casual indie pop fan.

With its captivating set of beer-stained rockers and heartfelt ballads, 1372 Overton Park offers a triumphant example of gritty, sweaty, all-American music.

She remains musically mercurial and virtually unclassifiable, even if she is at her most accessible on Devil's Halo.

Compositions range from the lengthy to just fragments, and while it feels at points more like a collection of sessions than necessarily a complete stand-alone album conceived as such, the end results are still well worth hearing.

Classic and maybe even a little awesome, Sonic Boom makes that "hottest band in the world" tag much easier to swallow.

The true testament to the value of that craft is that The Liberty of Norton Folgate is as rich and rewarding in its deluxe double-disc incarnation as it is in its simpler, single-disc set, something that speaks volumes to the extent of the band's unexpected revitalization here.

La Roux's dedication to their aesthetic makes this an album where the songs are variations on a theme, and on the rare occasion where the songwriting isn't razor-sharp, the style threatens to overtake the substance. However, that devotion also makes La Roux a standout, not just among the many other '80s revivalists, but the entire late-2000s pop landscape.

The album was composed by R&B's best songwriters of the late 2000s, Terius Nash (The-Dream) and Christopher Stewart (Tricky); they give each song the intelligent mid-tempo bump-and-grind they've made into a specialty.

Revolution offers a strong, cohesive take on what has quickly become the “Lambert sound:” a blend of lilting ballads and loud, fire-breathing anthems, many of which owe as much to rock & roll as country.

The anthemic, celebratory songs that made Riot! so appealing were largely absent, but the band found a new way to rock during those sessions, prizing catharsis and nuanced arrangements above the hooks of albums past.

Ultimately, AFI have lightened up the band's darkly-sexy vibe on Crash Love and delivered a yearning, perfect pop/rock crush of an album.

The overall effect is that this is one of the Streisand albums most appealing to her fans and her potential fans--which includes nearly everyone who appreciates a singer singing like she's lived every line of her songs.

The collection does a fine job of living up to the title--it's certainly a celebration of Madonna's career and includes some of the most celebratory and thrilling pop music ever created.

While they'll never be mistaken for a feel-good band, there is a palpable sense of relief that they get to play together again as a band, and what's remarkable is that they still sound like themselves, capturing that weird murk halfway between '80s metal and '90s northwestern sludge, reminding us that we were missing something in their absence.

If Kristofferson never cuts another record, Closer to the Bone will have been a proud note to end his musical career on.

Though Zero 7 are still not in the same class as Air (or even Phoenix), Yeah Ghost is an enjoyable record that shows them apparently on the way to something more unique.

The result is an intimate, poignant album, laced with rich production that enhances, not clouds, the songwriting itself.

It sounds like it was worth the wait for Sandoval and O'Ciosoig and it's a welcome return for fans of her music, and also for fans of late-night, melancholy balladry that will break your heart and ease you gently into dreams.

Since 2000, every record she's released has been at least as good as the one that preceded it, and this is no exception.

Nasty as he wants to be, Ghostdini is nothing more than the Face and friends having a good time. The results are as improper as they are infectious.

Despite the large cast, All in One is a remarkably unified record; no one makes a larger impact here than Bebel Gilberto herself, while she and executive producer Didie Cunha create a record that's modern in execution but classic in its feel.

Neither a straightforward score nor a collection of kid-friendly indie rock songs, it lies somewhere intriguingly in between--and it's just as good, if not better, than the music these artists make with their main projects.

None of this is going to sell enough records to bother Jay-Z, and a track or two veer too close to MF Doom for comfort, but Fluorescent Black is easily one of the best rap records of the year.

Seconds is a worthy successor to the classic Red Hash, but more than this, it is hopefully a new beginning for Higgins; god knows we need more songs like this in the world.