The wan, wimpy Weird Revolution relies on tired drum loops and flat rap vocals. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.121]

Too often, songs drift off into a fog of vague guitar atmospherics. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.130]

This collection seems less pointlessly abstract than 1999's similarly staffed Cobra and Phases. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.130]

Vespertine is her most intensely private and intimate-sounding work, a journey through an interior world that is quietly ecstatic, erotic and playful.

Though the drones drift into Enya-like ambience on "Slip Away" more often, as on "Pieces and Parts" and the keening "Broken," Anderson dresses up her hard-won koans of personal wisdom just enough to make them alluring. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.120]

Occasionally overblown... [Aug/Sep 2001, p.132]

On the whole, it's an inventively played, not-quite-straight bluegrass album... [Aug/Sep 2001, p.124]

All in all, time well spent. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.122]

It does what it's supposed to, giving Usher a grown-up R&B sound without reducing his boyish charm. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.131]

Tweekend lacks the immediacy of Vegas, but it works better the further it strays from Ecstasy-fueled breakbeats and squawking electro-hooks. Unfortunately, it doesn't stray too far. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.122]

The music is by turns atmospheric, quirky and joyous. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.126]

Celebrity shines brightest when the group matures enough to forget about its image and focus on the tunes. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.126]

McCrea is still spinning wry, keenly observed stories, though the band has broadened its stylistic base some... [Aug/Sep 2001, p.121]

Meanders aimlessly, stumbling into bits of tune but never taking them anywhere. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.123]

And if he occasionally errs on the side of self-indulgence... so be it; for every moment of youthful overreach, there's another that shows a promising new talent in first bloom. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.121]

Though its sound is still cloudy and distant, the group takes tentative steps toward Everything But The Girl territory. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.123]

The weirdest hip-hop album since OutKast's Stankonia. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.112]

Faith in the Future is built with recycled beats and borrowed sounds, relying on castoff samples and guest contributions... [Aug/Sep 2001, p.132]

Quiet pleasures, but worth seeking out. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.130]

Rooty boasts a raw, bustling edge and compulsive experimentalism closer in spirit to the hypersyncopated, R&B-flavored two-step garage currently ruling London clubland. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.104]

It's all clever and overstuffed with ideas, guaranteed to bug dance-music purists just as much as it annoys their parents. [Aug/Sep 2001, p.130]

And just as 1992's Connected served as an antidote to grunge in its day, Dirty hopes to deliver more nuanced dance music to its fans. Too little, too late, though. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.116]

His ornate, piano-driven arrangements cite a wide variety of musical sources, from indie pop to Gershwin to trip-hop and back again. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.116]

Subduing the bright tinge of her country-flavored roots rock, Essence's acoustic musings mix Delta blues with Nick Drake-style nocturnal intimacy, while Williams's voice limits itself to a hushed drawl. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.102]

Amnesiac isn't a difficult album -- or, rather, it's not a mere experiment but a successful one... Nobody has ever made a record that sounds like this before. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.109]

This time around, both Air's jokes and their grooves have lost their grace... [Jun/Jul 2001, p.104]

EBTG still have some way to go before they can mix such disparate elements together successfully. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.108]

While Costa is almost too glamorous for her own good, she flaunts that old-school splendor that generates apt comparisons to early Lenny Kravitz. [Jun/Jul 2001, p.107]