For listeners who miss the simpler early days, All the Truth That I Can Tell is a treasure trove of comfort and familiarity, an utterly relatable collection of growth and hope tempered by the starkness of reality.

Timewave Zero might be a far cry from Blood Incantation's best-known work, but it truly rewards the open-minded listener, and is simply a fantastic ambient album in its own right.

While As I Try Not to Fall Apart probably won't pull in any new fans, it has a sultry, back-of-the-club intensity that speaks to White Lies' ever-deepening artistry.

Everything Was Forever not only shows they're still in strong form, it's as bold and inspired as their best work.

Segarra has wound up with a distinctive album, one that operates equally skillfully on an emotional and intellectual level.

Because of its lack of vocals, The Patience Fader sounds a bit more open and free than A Son, and somehow manages to say more with less.

It all comes together as a beautiful and honest reflection on self-acceptance and the passing of time. Bell invites us into the deeper reaches of his perpetual but ever-evolving dream state, and in the process creates some career-best highlights.

If Sarah Shook has evolved a bit as a person on Nightroamer, as an artist they're as articulate, as fearless, and as smart as ever.

The result of this envelope-pushing is one of their most nuanced and emotionally engaging albums in years, arriving at a different kind of immediacy than can be achieved with loud guitars and angsty hooks.

Cathartic and confident, Prey//IV releases her pain with a diamond-like strength and clarity that is entirely her own.

Sad Cities is the best kind of comeback album; one that has just the right amount of nostalgia baked into the grooves, but also adds in new sounds and approaches. Shapiro and Agebjörn certainly do that and the album is a reminder of just how good heartbreak disco can sound when delivered by people who understand it so well.

Released almost exactly two years after that EP [Texas Sun], Texas Moon is spacier and a little moodier, and Bridges' writing this time gets as personal and spiritual as it does in his solo work.

The sense of low-key but heightened melodrama can be alluring thanks to the open-ended arrangements, yet much of Manticore unfolds at a crawl, so it feels much less visceral than previous Shovels & Rope albums even if it has a greater emotional range.

Ocean Child is a fitting tribute to an artist who's challenged herself and her audiences for the entirety of a lifelong career, and inspired entire sects of music in the process.

Writing happy songs that aren't annoying is a tall order, but Mount and company pull it off with enough flair to make Small World a satisfying microcosm of Metronomy's music.

If that album [7] expanded the idea of what Beach House could sound like, then Once Twice Melody fills in that idea with colors both familiar and new.

Mature and focused, The Kick is a welcome return from Allen, a refreshing and ebullient collection that balances emotional introspection with pure physical joy.

Krüller is one of the most accessible-sounding Author & Punisher releases, but it's still vast and uncompromising.

Rashad sings with restraint the whole time, giving each line an air of secrecy and/or seduction -- almost as if he's self-conscious about breaking an unreasonable noise ordinance. The approach is fitting, with Rashad riding just above the warmly reverberant grooves and background voices to heady effect.

Perfect pop for perfectly sad people will never go out of style, and Summer at Land's End is more proof that Glenn Donaldson and the Reds, Pinks & Purples have the market pretty much cornered.

Their compositional creativity is at once complex and sophisticated while remaining inherently accessible. They match a ferocious appetite for muscular musicality with intricate attention to production details and rigorous energy.

The bottom line is that this 14th proper album of hers combines nuanced performances and succinct writing like none other.

The choruses are delivered in joyously emphatic unison. If there is a complaint about Cold as Weiss, it's that at 40 minutes, it's a tad short, because no one wants this dance party to end. (If you do, please check your pulse, you may have expired.)

On a strictly musical basis, Earthling is the most varied project Eddie Vedder has ever released, and it's also his lightest album: there's a palpable joy to his free experiments here that's infectious, even fun.

Their best since 2014's This Is All Yours, The Dream finds Alt-J in top form. Despite being so lyrically death-obsessed, the beauty and warmth coursing through the album make it full of life and absolutely human.

Once again, Spoon show there's still plenty of mystery left in classic sounds, and they're still experts at revealing it.

While its seeming contradictions make it a slightly more challenging listen than Shamir was, Heterosexuality acknowledges how complicated just existing can be with the wit, creativity, and unguarded emotions that have been a vital part of Shamir's music since the beginning.

Several tracks ("heavy," "heartbreak3r," "regret") follow a similar emo-rap style, but On to Better Things gets more interesting when Dior commits fully to exploring different approaches.