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.

The powerful, sometimes writhing, and often transcendent sonic landscape the band creates here is their most inspired work to date, brimming with purpose and assertiveness that goes beyond mere entertainment and reaches for enlightenment.

It seems unfair to call DNWMIBIY a failed experiment, as it's loaded with gems -- including some of Big Thief's most free-spirited work to date -- however, it lands much more like a showreel than a plotted album.

The Highest in the Land may not be the strongest Jazz Butcher release, but it certainly has enough frothy treats and swooning bits of heartbreak to remind everyone why they -- and Fish -- were so delightful.

As far as Punch Brothers albums go, Hell on Church Street is a bit of an odd bird in that it's an album of covers chosen by someone else. As a nod to Rice, however, they honor his spirit well enough.

Even though A Place to Bury Strangers have been bringing the noise back to shoegaze and post-punk for years, they're still finding new forms of expression. That they can create a career peak like See Through You two decades after forming makes them all the more inspiring.

Clocking in at just over 37 minutes, Dissolution Wave doesn't overstay its welcome, which helps to absolve it of some of its more directionless moments. However, even at their meandering, Cloakroom manage to compel, and their seismic heft and majestic layers of sound do all they can to counteract the weightlessness of space.

The band seems to play as a single multi-armed unit, and yet Wood's tortured voice is at the very center of their palette. Black Country made a strong impression on their debut, but things become much more interesting with Ants from Up There.

At times Give Me the Future feels a bit heavy-handed. Fortunately, the album's brisk pace saves it from feeling overblown. This is music for and of its moment, with a mix of ambition and pop concision that's unmistakably Bastille.

The hit of serotonin for longtime fans is an absolute joy. Against the odds, Korn have done it again with Requiem, a quick and ferocious blast that finds the band still hungry and innovative nearly 30 years into the game.

A bit of a slow builder with an almost cinematic trajectory.

The dense and shrouded nature of this album means you sometimes have to wait for the clouds to clear before certain lines resonate or choruses grab you, but once they do, they don't let go.

If formulaic in approach, cosmopolitan rhythms and trippy hooks vary, and any track or combination of tracks on the album is well-suited for front-of-house play or for a soundtrack to get the party started.

Second album Glitch Princess is more futuristic than yeule's past work and perhaps more dystopian as well.

It's an especially lucid reading of the sound they've been perfecting for over two decades at this point, and one that adds a human warmth to a group that's long been defined by their otherworldly nature.

The 7th Hand is a major work. It travels dazzlingly from tranquility and comfort to ambivalence, restlessness, and impatience before it engages re-entry, rebirth, and transcendence. This band understands that Wilkins' bold question may be unanswerable, but they play as if they know.

Listening to Good and Green Again is like visiting a warm little den where the songs of yesteryear spend an easy hour catching up on the news of the present. His is a peculiar gift, but one he's learned how to use to great effect.

The track sequencing is skip-proof. This and the film belong in every library on the planet.

Sees the group shift away from the more anthemic direction of their major hits ("Love Killa," "Gambler") to an airier, more vocally driven set of songs: strummed-funk tracks like "Tied to Your Body" and "Blow Your Mind" pull heavily from Justin Timberlake's early-2000s run, while others like "About Last Night" and "Better" slide toward the nostalgic disco yearnings expressed by their 2010s contemporaries.

DS4 is caught between the woozy, floating sounds of WUNNA and an older, heavier-hitting sound, yet nails neither.

Still in command of strong technical skills and now rapping over instrumentals crafted with bigger budgets, Cordae falls short when he starts sounding a little too comfortably at home in the mainstream.

If Good to Be... sometimes is a little too cozy -- it's executed well and its unifying spirit is evident, but a cover of "Lean on Me" still feels a little overly familiar -- it's nevertheless a warm, welcoming album that's every bit as soothing and comforting as Keb' Mo' intended it to be.

The subtle shifts in tempo and arrangement make this brief record feel fully realized: these are renditions that are deep and soulful, carrying the same richness of Cobb's secular material while having a palpable spiritual undercurrent.

Extreme Witchcraft isn't a big basket of musical sunshine, but it's been a while since Eels have made an album with this sort of muddled joy, and it's a welcome development from one of pop's major misfits.

It's the duo's keenly observed originals that stay with you the longest, delivered with hard-won wisdom, gallows humor, and the near-supernatural fluidity of sisterly harmonies.