A thrilling, frustrating souvenir of a band whirling out of control. [Sep 2004, p.130]

They might sound like Girl Scouts, but these are tough cookies. [Aug 2007, p.117]

It's protest music gone gleefully psycho. [Jul 2005, p.122]

The recording quality on their debut album is admirably scuzzy; the drums sound like somebody’s banging a cereal box on the floor, which is part of the immediate charm.

Though not as ambitious or original as the [White] Stripes at their best, the VB's indelible punk-rock blues parks a new car in the Motor City garage. [Apr 2004, p.136]

The arrangements pound and lurch through acrid garage-punk riffs with crazy sureness. [Dec 2005, p.145]

Resistance is useless. [Oct 2005, p.139]

Gorgeously understated. [Nov 2006, p.138]

Its attempts at a more ethereal sound crash up against Common's cumbersome intellectualizing. [#13, p.91]

[Moffat's] monotone is offset by colorful arrangements. [May 2003, p.114]

There are some surprising misfires here... but also some unexpected treats. [Dec 2003, p.147]

Dulcet R&B hooks are spoonfuls of sugar that make De La catchy enough for a new generation of fans. [Nov 2004, p.132]

This free-wheeling debut has the potential to run and run, carried aloft on the shoulders of the overly emotional. [#18, p.131]

Grand in scope, majestic in sweep and only 57 percent pretentious. [#27, p.143]

Full of clever wordplay one moment, kind of pretentious the next. [Oct 2005, p.134]

The Sparks' performances are so understated, their arrangements so mechanically soothing, that it's easy to miss Rennie's brutal, elegant twists on folk cliches. [Jul 2006, p.99]

Lyrically, Nashville... is about as insightful as a Hee Haw rerun. But... his warm, reedy voice gives comfort where his words can't. [Apr 2005, p.125]

The tracks are catchy, meaty and modern. [Sep 2007, p.131]

For the first time in El-P's career, he's realized you don't need to be loud to get your point across. [Apr 2007, p.110]

Their best, most expansive album. [#8, p.112]

It's sharp and in your face, like a scimitar. [Oct 2007, p.110]

Proves they can do just fine without the foggy-hollow reverb they've always used to make their meandering sound mysterious. [Oct 2006, p.139]

Rising Down is tightly focused and appealingly modest in its ambitions.

[It] sounds as if she's happy to give the people what they want: escapism and nostalgia. [Dec 2005, p.152]

Singer-guitarist Eric Earley accesses the haunted Americana Wilco nailed on "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot," with big nods to mid-'60s Bob Dylan, early-'70s Neil Young and the country Grateful Dead. [Oct 2008, p.78]

Brainy, brooding, classically "indie" guitar music. [#16, p.121]

It flows like a scrapbook rather than a novel, but it portrays them as diligent experimenters and meticulous melodists who have been liberated by embracing restrictions. [Sep 2004, p.155]

Less lugubrious and more melodic than [Bright Lights], but the improvement is marginal. [Oct 2004, p.119]

The big surprise on the 61-year-old’s follow-up isn’t her knockout voice--it’s the sympathetic backup provided by Lynyrd Skynyrd–worshippers Drive-By Truckers (whose guitarist, Patterson Hood, produced the record). The well-selected, never-obvious covers of songs by writers from Elton John to Willie Nelson are unflinching tales of struggle and survival.

Fans of the TV show will have heard versions of almost all these songs before. The problem is, they've also seen these songs before.

Though less indebted to the Smiths... these tidally anthemic doom-ditties still manage to sound more dire. [Oct 2006, p.135]

El Guincho has only himself to get along with, but you'd never know it just listening to his album. [Dec 08/Jan 09, p.78]

The elliptical vein opening, restless country twang and surging metal riffage have never sounded more confident. [Jun 2007, p.107]

Some songs are all middle, stuck on what might be mere bridges by, say, Rufus Wainwright or Paul Simon. Yet Bird’s open-field poetics do let a wider world creep in, from the corruption of ecosystems to the isolation that can afflict a touring musician or a declining leader alike.

Pleasant at a distance, the stealthy Son is downright mindblowing at close range. [Jun 2006, p.142]

A great record to play at 3 A.M. [#10, p.112]

A raw, passionate record. [#14, p.135]

It’s hard to listen to Already Free without thinking: Visine. Need Visine. That’s how redolent of pot-smoke-and-jam-band mud fields this music is.

It's a shockingly entertaining record riddled with moody hooks. [Sep 2007, p.128]

Ward still sounds most himself when he gets lost in his own world.

They invigorate brainy pop by adding slight belligerence. [#18, p.134]

No More suffers from a relentless sense of goth gloom that's as claustrophobic as a church confessional. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.107]

[Adebimpe's] singing is consistently riveting, and the oddball mix gives it room to flourish. [Apr 2004, p.138]

Much of [Sheets] sounds like a pop-punk update on Springsteen. [Nov 2004, p.137]

The genius of Sexsmith’s seventh and best work is the way he surrounds (or, depending on your perspective, atones for) the empathy overload with deftly assimilated, gloriously ascendant pop hookcraft.

At its best, the echo-chamber soup of flute trills, infinitely cascading drums and fuzz-ball stoner riffs does seep into your head and expand the contents. But the jams often drift when Ejstes wants them to glide; his singing, all in Swedish, is a touch whiny; and his ear for melody can be painfully flat.

What's amazing about Alright, Still is how similar the girl with the blog is to the girl with the hit record. [Mar 2007, p.129]

Though long, it's strong. [Oct 2005, p.134]

Backspacer is the bands most mature album to date and clocking in at just over 36 minutes, it is also their most condensed work; It’s as if Pearl Jam is channeling Ernest Hemingway, with not a wasted breath or note anywhere to be found.

Nas can still dazzle on the mic. [Jan/Feb 2007, p.87]

Sounds like the work of musicians who've spent just half an hour apart, not 20-odd years. [#11, p.143]

As Zwan create a louder and less obviously pop eclat than the Pumpkins, they also turn more minimal. Their first record has one theme: the electric guitar. [#14, p.140]

This is a credible update on the classic Killing Joke sound. [Oct 2003, p.118]

This is the least austere record they've ever made, and the fresh air helps their odd, raw narratives flourish. [#8, p.122]

Every instrument here distorts, giving tearjerkers like 'I’ll Dream Alone' complementary grit.

On their fourth record, the tempos are slower, the guitars thick and meaty, the rants kinda melodic, the thoughts impressionistic.

Over girl-group incantations, reggae lilt and courageously dinky old-school hip-hop allusions, Gartside searches for his emotional car keys, each comely coo abstracting him further from the truth he seeks. [Aug 2006, p.117]

Saadiq is a romantic who stays true to the deliberate simplicity of such titles as 'Sure Hope You Mean It' and 'Just One Kiss.' But his adaptable baritone is always crisp and cocky--he never threatens to assume the fetal position if he doesn’t get the extreme cuddling he craves.

Despite a short-circuited sequence of electroclash songs, the girls are winning throughout. [Apr 2005, p.116]

Her dream-cinema tales can meander, but Case’s voice will lay you flat, sure as any storm.

Artfully arranged songs about planets and beasts and bittersweet harmonies recall British folk-rock combos like Fairport Convention and Pentangle without coming off as retro or twee. [Jun 2006, p.137]

Their debut throbs like the Strokes with cross-eyed parents, their songs gritty and economical, their drummer nasty in all the best places. [Aug 2003, p.126]

Funnier, angrier, weirder. [Mar 2004, p.123]

So goofy and heartfelt it's endearing. [Apr 2006, p.114]

They're after something different here--it's just not as good as what they've left behind. [Apr 2006, p.110]

He switches styles and moods nearly every song, but his caramel harmonies and swirling guitars are reliable constants. [Apr 2005, p.113]

Hot Chip's relentless stylistic hopscotch... ends up in an intricate muddle that fully engages neither hips nor heart. [Jun 2006, p.138]

They're fascinated with rhythm, repetition and duplication, like early-'70s German experimental bands Neu! and Can. [Mar 2007, p.136]

This Is Not A Test lacks feeling--besides beats, what else what does she care about? [Jan 2004, p.102]

Badly Drawn Boy pulls off the job with panache, tipping his hat to Nick Drake, Burt Bacharach and acoustic-era Bob Dylan. [Jun/Jul 2002, p.103]

Mope-rock never felt so good. [Nov 2003, p.121]

The mean-spirited sounds of Good Mourning are easy to listen to, but hard to forget. [#17, p.132]

Neither for the faint of heart, nor for those allergic to pretentiousness. [Jan/Feb 2005, p.103]

[The] sense of playful adventure ensures that smooth needn't mean snoozy. [Jun 2007, p.108]

An album this pretty can make you believe in romantic spells lasting beyond first semester.

It's more consistent than Laundry Service, and maybe even more irresistible. [Jul 2005, p.120]

Problem is, [her] words are rarely about anything but her own dexterity. [Oct 2004, p.122]

They've created the Sgt. Pepper of screamo.

[A] near-flawless suite of deep, dark and powerfully sexy tracks. [Apr 2006, p.112]

It nearly always feels fresh, the way a new flame does. [Dec 2004, p.132]

The band replicates the surface effect of Otis Redding ballads, New Orleans jams and Motown pop-soul down to the last tambourine rattle, but their material rarely goes deeper than nostalgic genre exercises--which means it never satisfies like the real thing.

Ceaselessly enthusiastic European dance-pop that's deliriously colorful, vividly inane and usually about themselves. [Aug 2003, p.126]

Her coy delivery suggests a seething everywoman concealing her rage under an ominously bright surface.

All of this might be more satisfying if the group's lyrics were strong enough to turn caricatures into characters. [Sep 2003, p.116]

Quality is full of witticisms, but it draws equal strength from sonic diversity. [#12, p.145]

For an album almost four years in the making, it's frustratingly half-finished, like a series of preliminary sketches. [#27, p.142]

What Led Zeppelin did for bombast, Lambchop try to do for delicacy. [Apr/May 2002, p.114]

THe British balladeers have returned after a long layoff as elegantly miserable as ever. [Oct 2008, p.83]

The result is a mess but--thanks to Bemis’s passion, humor and knack for inserting multiple hooks into a single song--an exhilarating one.

Destroyer's slickest synthesis yet of ornate hooks and cryptic poetics. [Apr 2004, p.127]

All that carefulness turns out to be bloodless. [Mar 2007, p.139]

With its stories of faithless lovers, broken relationships and speed-dealing suburban doctors, @#%&*! Smilers almost seems to feed off the stagnation. [Aug 2008, p.88]

Some sublime songs prevail over the adornments.

Not much happens, which seems to be the point. [Jan/Feb 2006, p.96]

A fizzling delight, jettisoning previous jazzy inclinations in favor of a gorgeous electronic pitter-patter that sets off Prekop's velvety, mourning vocals. [#14, p.143]

Gracefully balances dirty-South revelry with gorgeous graveyard reveries. [Oct 2005, p.141]

Political without preaching, sexy in a bookish way, this record will keep you up talking with someone you'd like to kiss. [Dec 2005, p.149]

The blend of organization--even the oddest, most precarious combinations of instruments sync up--and derangement is Animal Collective's version 2.0 of hippie whimsy, and it's quite a buzz [Oct 2007, p.105]