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

Where past albums documented a litany of bummers, cascading melodies now airbrush moments of depression or kinkiness--even the horny groupie of 'Natural Disaster' sounds like a girl you could take home to Mom. Higgenson’s new outlook is surprising.

Isbell’s recitation--defiantly unexciting in its averageness--doesn’t help. But the thing is, the guy can really write.

Labored production isn’t the only problem.

On their fifth album, they crack the window, slow the motor (except on 'Shopping Bag,' a jazz-punk binge and purge) and take side trips into primeval glades where runic rites are conducted on acoustic guitars.

Superfine pop moments never stifle the underlying Jamaican flavor... even if Beenie sometimes sounds a bit like a guest on his own album. [#10, p.114]

Feels like surprisingly generic party rap. [May 2004, p.126]

Dry and straightforward disco-soul. [Jul 2005, p.116]

Without a target for their ire, TBS opt for sheer emo relentlessness. [May 2006, p.111]

Even the best of these tracks lack the grimy menace of the most thrilling Neptunes beats. [Sep 2006, p.147]

Even when he tries to make a connection between pickup lines and international tension, in “Made of Codes,” Peñate never forgets that even quasi-protest songs need a good beat.

They still have plenty of growl left in them. [Aug 2004, p.133]

This is music for the well-read rock fan and the would-be scoundrel. [Mar 2007, p.134]

The band’s fourth album turns down the roiling boil of 2004’s What Is This America? to a seductive simmer.

It's the sound of a 24-year-old accepting death, as imagined by a lifelong misfit aging gracefully. [Nov 2007, p.158

The Garbage machine doesn't always function so pristinely. [Oct/Nov 2001, p.105]

Odd, ambitious, confounding, and occasionally brilliant -- which is to say it's much like the five Aphex albums that preceded it. [#4, p.114]

The music's intellectualism obscures as many truths as it unveils. [Mar 2007, p.130]

On album two, his focus switches from coke to cash as he booms about his fleet of Maybachs (on the soaring T-Pain synthfest 'The Boss') and prepaying his baby daughter’s college tuition.

Westerberg delivers a hook, an idea and a subtle emotion on nearly every track. [Jun/Jul 2002, p.116]

As Clef drops mostly trite lines about green cards, strippers and police harassment, this strategy either succeeds brillantly--or goes haywire. [Nov 2007, p.153]

Robinson establishes himself as a distinctive singer, his world-weary yet optimistic drawl no longer beholden to the rock larynxes of yore. [#11, p.140]

Lacks some of the cocksure oomph of his debut, though RZA does try to broaden his sonic palette. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.128]

Too often... Branch expresses loneliness or betrayal or yearning without the precision or detail that would make her sentiments memorable. [#17, p.132]

Unusually crafty for a stoner-rock record. [May 2006, p.111]

Its 12 tracks are unusually raucous and raw, as Kravitz finds a comfort zone with turbocharged punk and arena rock. [Oct/Nov 2001, p.111]

These records are too dramatic, too personal and, well, too much. [Oct 2004, p.110]

Start the 18-song album in the middle, and embarrassments like Nicks's "Illume (9-11)" reced behind love songs that exorcise pain with an accusatory chorus and a skein of guitars. [May 2003, p.116]