It takes a certain degree of self-containment in order to encapsulate a place as well as Hundred Waters does, and it's clear that the band has it.

It's one of the most back-to-front solid and uncompromising Berlin techno full-lengths this year.

The sonic corruption and disquieting sense of dread are accomplished with pure muscle alone. But instead of keeping this mindset out in the open, Metz just sweat it out over thirty jarring minutes.

2 finds Mac DeMarco growing as an artist, settling into a workman-like rhythm and puttering through some of the catchiest tracks of the year.

Like last year's A Frightened Rabbit EP, State Hospital lacks some coherency in style, but its brevity makes this less of a problem.

As it stands, these songs represent a promising new direction for Lightning Bolt, but one that they have yet to fully prove themselves adept at.

Nü Sensae are one of the most formidable punk outfits working right now and Sundowning is the work of a band whittling themselves down to occupy the very tip of fury.

For any fans of the group's 90s material, Class Clown is a highly recommended listen, especially for those put off by Factory.

Shut Down the Streets successfully infuses what could fly as an intimate acoustic set with contagious pop hooks.

Despite its flaws, Sun is not a complete failure and does deserve to be mentioned alongside the rest of her work, if only for the comparison of how she once tried something different--a flawed but worthwhile attempt.

Order Of Noise is one of the most worthwhile genre-defying oddities of the year.

It's just solid and efficient, a period piece with modern trimmings.

It's the best album of its kind to come out this year and, perhaps even more significantly, Segall's best work to date.

Short, sweet, and edgy without being rough, Strange Grey Days is the perfect soundtrack to an afternoon daydream, be it sunny or shadowed, for its lullaby quality if not its stark originality.

It's all very well-done, but it's not something that you'll feel much incentive to revisit over and over; an experience worth taking, but not necessarily one worth repeating.

Mumps takes a little while to sink in in a different way to previous albums.

The album is all about big and big is what you get.

With Transcendental Youth, the Mountain Goats have proven that they're more than capable of engaging us with even without the unimpeachable witticisms of their frontman.

While at this stage of his career a new Dylan release may only be heard by longtime listeners, it must be judged against all music. Even by such lofty standards, Tempest succeeds enormously, placing it not only in the upper half of Dylan's catalog, but also with the better submissions of 2012.

Breathy vocals, immensely hooky songwriting and a brilliantly defined technicolor aesthetic established from the very beginning. Such description could have been thrown at Stereolab in the early '90s and at Broadcast in the early 2000s.

Cruel Summer might be the worst thing in Kanye West's discography thus far, but it's a success as mainstream rap cabal compilation albums go.

No one's asking bigger questions of himself or more from himself in music than Flying Lotus is. These records are the only appropriate answers and Until The Quiet Comes is his most accomplished yet.

You'll find records this year of greater agency, but you'd be hard-pressed to find one that renders pleasure with such poignant lightness, control, and willful attention to difference.

Both in its challenging nature and its status as an emblem of everything that the Motion Sickness of Time Travel project has dealt in to date, it functions, without a doubt, as Evans most accomplished release of her career and one of the more accomplished ambient albums in recent memory.

The Soft Pack's knack for a no-tassels hook is what ends up making Strapped worthwhile, and it works best when they tighten the screws and keep it concise.

It's a refinement of what he accomplished with Sugar, and is arguably the most consistently engaging album he's made since Copper Blue.

The results are fun as hell, yet it's hard not to feel like LV have accomplished something with some legs on it.

Even if the highs aren't as high, like the rest of the reunited lineup's work, there really aren't any noticeable lows.