A sophisticated pop pleasure from start to finish.

The combination of his [Mac McNeilly] careful, aggressive-when-needed playing and the core duo's performances makes this four-song collection a wonderful surprise.

This soundtrack stands tall in the man's wide-reaching discography, offering fans a Wu-flavored vision of a world where both the damned and cursed still swagger.

Macklemore's a mix of all of the above with some distinctive qualities, and with Lewis putting that kaleidoscope style underneath, The Heist winds up a rich combination of fresh and familiar.

The man behind the Gangsta Grillz mixtapes and the man literally behind T.I. and his Grand Hustle crew continues to do the improbable on his 2012 release Quality Street Music.

Psychedelic Pill [is] yet another oddity in a catalog filled with them: it's noise rock as comfort food.

Whether you want to label it post-rock, post-Krautrock, electro-rock, or some appellation of your own devising, Den does the Kreidler discography proud.

It finds Morgenstern honing her popcraft and scaling back her artier impulses to yield her most concise, song-oriented and--relatively speaking--immediate work to date.

All Time Low swallowed their pride, rededicated themselves, and ended up making the best record yet in a very consistently satisfying career.

The continuing work of Mika Vainio--especially given his longtime association with Touch for a variety of releases--has been at once reliable and sometimes quite surprising, with a certain restlessness that has served him well in his various explorations in sound. Fe3O4: Magnetite continues this.

Deer Creek Canyon is a work of modest genius that, like falling in love, manages to be simple and richly complex at the same time.

Though none of this will be particularly useful to anyone who isn't already familiar with the band (and if you're one of those people, run out and buy Oceanic and Panopticon right now), but for the initiated, Temporal makes for an essential and illuminating listen.

It's not uncommon for artists to lose a little of their music's heart when they upgrade their sonics, but The Inner Mansions is equally emotional and polished, and some of Teen Daze's finest work.

Unfortunately, on Top 10 Hits of the End of the World, PR were so involved with their campy concept, they neglected to write and record music capable of carrying its weight.

At times, Rave Age feels like it's missing some of the spark of Vitalic's previous work, but Arbez manages to pull off a lot of changes on this album while retaining enough of his playful atmosphere and kinetic rhythms to keep fans engaged.

In its own less-alien way, Luxury Problems is just as brilliant as what preceded it.

Smalhans is, like its predecessors, ultimately its own complete, unified statement; one that is, in its deceptively humble way, as ambitious and assured as anything he's done.

She's always been willing to take risks, and despite the initial thought that her music may not stand up to the orchestral treatment, The Abbey Road Sessions is another victory in a career full of them.

Music from Another Dimension! is no worse than Nine Lives. It may lack a single as immediate as "Fallin' in Love (Is Hard on the Knees)"--or the subsequent "Jaded" from 2001's Just Push Play--but it faithfully follows Aerosmith's '90s blueprint, getting nothing wrong but never quite feeling right.

The highlights are all casual, subtle, finely detailed midtempo numbers and slow jams. What's truly disappointing is the absence of energetic songs descended from soul and funk.

Evoken gave themselves half a decade in which to stockpile this much quality material for Atra Mors--just one of many reasons why what could have been a truly funereal occasion (no pun intended) may instead signal a new lease on life for the group.

The amped-up chiptunes and film score moments are interesting enough, but the band sound their best when expanding on the lush tones and tension-laden improvisations they've been working on since the beginning.

Palpable big beat electrifies Call Me Sylvia, but Low Cut Connie aren't only about sound--they're crack songwriters, bashing out big hooks and riffs in songs that are sharp, clever, and funny without succumbing to cutesiness.

Musically, the production never veers from the glossy, by-the-numbers approach of mainstream pop.

The bottom line here is that for all of their tweaks and changes, The Sword are still a band all about massive riffs and epic lyrics, and while other bands might be more structurally complex or aggressive, few can offer the instant cosmic journey that dropping the needle on Apocryphon can.

It's hard to get offended when everything about Supermeng is so self-consciously goofy.

The album's depth and openness to straying away from typical devices of the genre make Atlas one of the more engaging and thought-provoking metalcore releases amid a sea of the interchangeable riffs and howls of other bands.

Some moments aren't the best--his duet with Jack Goldstein, "My Girl," stumbles a bit at the start--but such killers as "Fell 4 U" with Glasser and "Fathering/Mothering" with Anne Lise Frokedal showcase both his ear for vocal counterparts and his immediate, beautiful arrangements.