It’s a topsy-turvy balancing act that she’s playing, but for the most part it’s successful. Clark flips between that groovy funk of the 70s, then back to her guitar rock days, and then, sure, she employs some more experimental and electronic moments that might come across as jarring to some. But it’s also just part of the brand that is St. Vincent in 2021.

The Overload has enough interesting touchstones, but unfortunately, how Yard Act aim to utilize them within their songwriting MO is still a bit of a jumble. Many of the sounds and textures don’t really add much expressive gusto to Smith’s thespian qualities, and I feel the group can cover a lot of ground here on upcoming releases.

We Stay Together is Andy Stott's second LP of 2011 and it's easily the heavier, more defined, and arguably better of the two.

Tunes are built slowly and satisfyingly, ebbing and flowing into oceans of ambient sound. Through these layers, though, shine frequent flashes of utter brilliance.

Gigi’s Recovery manages to portray a soul longing for healing, resisting its thanatonic urges, grappling with the reality of being born into a cold, loveless void, and somehow trying to accept being loveable. And it has the brevity to show us that, at the end of its 12 song cycle, the battle can be won, even if the war will never end.

This is a life-affirming album which is not held back by the restrictions of linguistics and the limitations that words bring, and it may be just what you need to lift you out of yourself in these troubled times.

It’s clear that every listener will read Midnights in their own way – the record is simply too rich to function as background soundtrack. It’s a blistering experience that demands commitment, concentration and deep engagement – it’s an artist banishing their demons.

Fleet Foxes have become a band who will not stop pushing, who will challenge themselves to avoid stagnancy, who will work with both their instruments and their minds. Because of that, the audience is able to reap the fruit and feast on it together.

Pompeii truly feels like a gesamtkunst rather than a collection of separate songs. The album reaffirms what makes Le Bon’s music such a useful prism to process thoughts and feelings that feel too immense to articulate within traditional means.

Haiti lacks a clear narrative. Still, this hardly harms the project. It simply constrains it to being particularly strong rather than transcendent.

Once again, Sternberg’s irrepressible, impossibly human spirit shines through the darkness. This is the ultimate power of I’ve Got Me: the majority of songs here focus on negative experiences, but the feeling coming out the other end of listening to it is one of uplift and renewed resolve to make something of one’s life. It’s what makes the album sound both modern and timeless.

As the music fades in and out on the eight-minute closing title track, one can only imagine that boat in the water, the burning hot summer sun melting you down, and those slow but powerful waves washing you away. This is what it feels like to listen to Cass McCombs, especially nowadays.

Hannah is a culmination of everything Read has done up to this point and she delivers bittersweet missives through tender songwriting and a deft application of her strengths as a musician.

Smother may lack the proper drive of Two Dancers, but it succeeds in whittling down what has become Wild Beasts' motif.

While Artist Proof never quite lives up to the expectations of being a masterpiece, it is a great example of how the country rock genre developed in tandem with the folk scene.

He may do all of this DIY, but it comes across with more heart than a lot of the tourists of the scene, and it shows in his powerful lyrics just how far he’s come in this world.

The production on Good News is hardly subtle, and few of these beats would stand out on their own, but they’re effective at supporting her flows and keeping the energy going.

With this album, Curry wants to let the world know who he is and what he stands for, and the music is all the better for it.

This album is not served to us on a platter as a radio-ready hit record, and it is not made ‘for us’, but it gives us something better — the feeling of being a part of this music and not a mere recipient.

Sunn O))) rewards repeat listens as there’s so much going on under the surface. It’s majestic, euphoric, but also clearly not for everybody. But then you should never really trust the majority, anyway.

With Skinty Fia, Fontaines, D.C. continue to position themselves as one of the more emotionally broad-banded and nuanced acts to emerge from the latest post-punk wave. Soundscapes are evocatively sculpted and frequently galvanic, melodies and lyrics consistently enrolling.

While nearly everything else is still top tier pop music, but the Englishwoman leaves herself some room to grow. For now, Devotion is one the year's most promising debuts.

In its many guises, Classic Objects is that light, a profound statement from an artist bound by no traditions, and it is offered freely to those searching for all the questions they’ve yet to ask.

Thankfully, the pairing [with Adam Granduciel] is largely successful and allows Fender to shrewdly side-step expectations for his Seventeen follow-up; resulting in a mature take of arena rock and the most sonically cohesive Fender album thus far.

Though his shouty, communal sound now operates as a fever dream reminder of days when sweaty bodies toppled on one another without the worry of infectious disease, his topical dissection of society on the mend has never felt more thrilling than it is now.

It’s rare to find a lyricist so honest and a vocalist so earnest, and when put into song it seems to Houck as if every word is vital and cathartic and necessary.

While New Long Leg basked in a chic trendiness, Stumpwork more soberly conjures the spectrum of 21st century life: our endless search for identity, our egoic highs and crashes, the ineluctable tedium.

Like all the best songwriters, Tomberlin doesn’t act like she has the answers to the big questions, but knows that simply by being inquisitive she will eventually figure out her own truths, and she’s passing that wisdom along with this record.