The soundtrack to PJ20 is not for them, it's for those who have stuck with the group through thick and thin, through any number of new drummers, and they'll certainly find much that rewards their fandom here.

Entertaining castoffs, but not his best work by far.

Elsie functions best as a display of Fallon's underused bottom register and acoustic songwriting skills, proving that slowing things down once in a while can still be a punk rock move.

His debut's failure to capitalize on his unique selling point means it's likely to leave everyone else nonplussed.

Butcher Boy were always going to find it hard to step out of the shadows of their more celebrated chamber pop neighbors, and while Helping Hands is by no means a miserable failure in doing so, it's at its strongest when it embraces their similarities rather than their differences.

The sound is standard-issue pop-punk in the Green Day/Blink-182 manner, with an echo of Jimmy Eat World in the contrasting vocals.

As a whole, it feels a bit too laid-back, especially given its nearly 70-minute length.

Deep it is not, and its aspirations to be something greater keep it from being truly trashy fun, but there are enough energy and hooks to keep Money and Celebrity entertaining.

Indeed, while the album is quite pretty and powerful at times, the overall mood of glacial gloom can be suffocating.

This set is a pleasant listen, but the fact remains that the best versions of Holly songs are by Buddy Holly, and no album of covers, no matter how well done or well intentioned, can eclipse them.

City of Vultures is a solid first offering suggesting that Dickinson Jr. is capable of stepping out of his father's shadows in the future.

Forever is a mood album, heavily sedated and perpetually out of focus, like an R.E.M. dream after cough syrup.

Derulo's still saying nothing--which is fine, since these are hooky, club cuts--but it's the talking louder that's the issue.

yron Gallimore, who previously produced Sugarland and Faith Hill, gives Wildflower an appealing gloss that helps disguise the ordinariness of the material along with any of Alaina's shortcomings, and that slickness serves Wildflower well, making it a much more enjoyable piece of product than McCreery's Clear as Day.

It's certainly not pretty but it's a distinctive first record that, in a bizarre way, appears to live up to his rather unusual claims.

Until Morrison manages to infuse some of this raw honesty and emotion into his sound, he's always going to struggle to create that one great record that his impassioned and soulful voice deserves.

A Dramatic Turn of Events, while not a perfect offering, has enough of what makes Dream Theater attractive to make it a necessary purchase for fans.

Noel's High Flying Birds is tasteful, mannered craftsmanship.

If Gauntlet Hair are promising rather than solid, they're promising nonetheless, one band of many with a shot at a further brass ring after 2011.

As the album concludes somewhere in the seventh minute of "Tether," all the aim-for-the-heights stuff they're about just becomes its own locked-in loop, an epicness that feels less remarkable than simply familiar.

The results can be winning, especially when they're slathered in classic, Les Paul/Mary Ford-inspired slapback delay. However, busier cuts like "Sleigh Ride," "Little Saint Nick," and "Christmas Day" reveal a charming yet pitchy vocalist with all of the inflections of a classic torch singer, and none of the discipline.

While Peggy Sue's drastic musical overhaul doesn't always convince, it's an admirably brave effort which possesses enough quality to make it worth the occasional test of endurance.

Despite the natural feel of these songs as sung by Wilson and performed by his talented backing band, anyone who's paid attention to his solo career of the '90s and 2000s won't hear any surprises.

The writing is nothing earth-shattering; in fact, it's rudimentary and formulaic almost without exception, although they still come up with a couple of winners ("I'm Coming Home"), and lots of tunes that would easily pass for understandably forgotten oldies.

Ultimately, Lulu is a brave experiment for both Reed and Metallica, but it's one that falters as often as it succeeds.

These songs never hit their mark as a result, aiming for the relaxed pitch of an afternoon siesta and often sounding closer to a snoozefest instead.

Is the World Strange or Am I? is indeed a little too strange to achieve the commercial success Jarvis has admitted he craves, but it's an admirably bold statement of intent which is perhaps unlike anything else you'll hear all year.

As a hair metal album, Balls Out is finely crafted and well produced, evoking the glossy sound of the era, but as a joke, it's pretty one-note, so either you're going to get it or it's going to grate on you.