There's no jam-band noodling, and Anastasio's indelible head-bobbing cheer is now attached to the kidn of straightforward hooks Phish preferred to twist. [Dec 2005, p.144]

The lightness and clarity that once set Hales apart is here squashed by overwrought arrangements of lesser melodies that replace pop classicism with conventional rock bluster.

Jettisons their saving grace--a big, glitter-streaked wink--for limp stabs at profundity. [Apr 2005, p.117]

Lerche originals... aren't starry-eyed vintage exercises. They're just swell new tunes. [Apr 2006, p.114]

In updating the duo's dirty old sound, Ball makes the arrangements clunky, too clean and dangerously close to the blandness Almond bemoans. [#10, p.126]

Sure, it's commercial, but Rosey's expert melding of dance beats and hippie dippiness adds up to a debut slick with beatnik cool. [#8, p.122]

Benefits from a fatter recording budget, with swooping symphonic arrangements and dazzling melodies. [Aug 2004, p.138]

Even if the high-minded concepts prove elusive, no worries. [Nov 2006, p.138]

Here, their frustration with scheming girlfriends and negligent boyfriends boils over into a cathartic froth. [Nov 2004, p.132]

Cocky and nicotine-stained, the Kills revive the cheap art of sinister underground rock and puzzling, mysterious pseudonyms. [May 2003, p.121]

Delays have found a way to combine the sparkling harmonies of the Byrds with the glorious noise of My Bloody Valentine, and still sound as fresh and surprising as a London heat wave. [#27, p.134]

Essentially Californication 2, a reprise of their last album. [#9, p.142]

Many of the songs here could be Peppers tracks, except for the absence of Anthony Kiedis's vocals. [Apr 2004, p.128]

Loudboxer stands apart from other utilitarian dance music in its hypnotic sense of space. [#8, p.124]

Because of his no-frills persona, the smallest suggestions of personality make a charismatic impact. [Jan/Feb 2007, p.89]

His once-believable menace comes off as forced caricature. [May 2007, p.109]

With this foulmouthed, backsliding rock, Hull and his flock do Dixie real proud.

The familiar-sounding song structures are an artfully crafted misdirection.

Osborne clearly believes that her love for this material gives her the right to make it her own--which she does, convincingly. [#10, p.125]

They resemble a Seattle version of Iggy and the Stooges. [#9, p.152]

Nellyville will be the year's only record with a bigger-than-life number with Justin Timberlake, a capable ballad with Destiny's Child's Kelly Rowland, an acute dis of preachy rap veteran KRS-One, and an ode to the hip-hop footwear of choice. [#8, p.120]

The basic Slipknot sound has improved. [#27, p.147]

Their fourth album toughens things up immeasurably. [Oct 2007, p.114]

As usual, Franz Ferdinand pack a greatest-hits album’s worth of melodic tricks into each tune, while Kapranos purrs the sort of pick-up lines that would earn a lesser man a gimlet in the face.

They still spit nervous energy, but Shelly's melodies have suffered, and his pubescent whines have unfortunately matured into apologies for bad behavior. [#15, p.121]

Oliveri needs a grounding element; without it, he just plays the Neanderthal wild-ass screamer. [Sep 2003, p.126]

When they're not straining to be anthemic, Turin Brakes still weave a seductive spell. [#14, p.143]

The ballads are clunky and ponderous. The groove stuff, though... exists in that blissy stratosphere the Dead visited so often. [Aug 2004, p.138]