Form & Control exhibits a duality that splits the difference in the disparity of the Clap's soulful psych-pop/dance club fusion.

"Old Ash" and "Silver Self" bring to mind Paul Simon's Graceland, each song incorporating that same infectious shuffle and giddy exuberance that made Simon's world rhythms so compelling. And yet, that makes Beware and Be Grateful all the more confounding, given that some of their melodies seem on the verge of a disconnect.

Though the songs can come off as occasionally sterile (“On A Day” quickly comes to mind), it’s still a pretty impressive collection of songs from a band that’s only been around for a few years.

Fossils remains uniformly subdued throughout. Yet, it’s hardly as dry as the album title might imply.

The band’s latest evolution is bound to shed some fans of the old lineup, but the music here is interesting enough to attract some new listeners as well.

It takes a certain like-minded political sensibility to wholly appreciate both the music and the mantra, but rebels in search of a cause will likely share sympathy for Morello's fervent muse.

The mix of blues, with their standard, folk and country is a nice addition, but may not be enough to win over folks who aren’t already Son Volt devotees.

With a reflective outlook worthy of Bragg’s now venerable stature, this weathered perspective serves him well.

While some songs are utterly slow paced, they are obscured by the strength of the aforementioned tracks as well as “The Fall” and “Last Dance.”

Among the Grey is still mired in... well... several shades of gray, so that when certain songs dissipate as a casual drift, it becomes all the more difficult to glean a more emphatic impression.

Though the sound is stripped down--limited mainly to voice, guitar and unusual atmospherics--the effect is also fairly frenzied and typically creepy as well.

Since only 42 seconds of the album is new material (the opening self titled track), it can, at times, feel redundant, almost unnecessary, but, with a musician of Claypool’s caliber, to see boundaries being pushed--and classics revisited--there is obvious value here. And, at the very least, it’s a hell of a lot of fun.

These nine songs are dusty and determined, stoic ruminations on hard luck and happenstance.

Dawson’s agility is remarkable to say the least, and despite the lack of additional embellishment, the music comes across as rich and riveting.

With heart on his sleeve, Wagner opts for sobriety, but when those strings swell, the effect can be intoxicating.

While Burdon himself remains indignant, and indomitable, his tenacious stance is coached in songs that rarely measure up to the classics credited to him early on.

On their fourth album in a decade, the Donkeys don’t have surprises so much as a more confident and accomplished execution.

Consider this music a salve for the soul--restful, resigned, pretty and pensive... and yet as fragile as it is fleeting.

What might have been a great album merely becomes a good one, due to fact that much needed variation is in such short supply.

Though Thompson remains in the same contemplative state lyrically, In the Pit of the Stomach is a great follow up to Walls and unveils an orchestral maturity form the four gents.

Big Star was more than the sum of its parts, and as evidenced here, Chilton was only just beginning to mine his.

Seeing this is Grossi's first full-length, it's an achievement, and although it fizzles out near the end, the killer tracks far eclipse the lesser numbers.

There are certainly times when a bit more instrumentation (a cello, some percolating percussion, a lyrical guitar solo) would have enhanced the presentation.

There’s a cover of Billy Joe Shaver’s “Georgia on a Fast Train” tacked onto the record (only available on the limited edition CD and LP) that doesn’t quite do justice to the classic, but there are still more than enough bar room sing-alongs on Holdin’ the Bag to make the album worth it.

Lumineers is an album that successfully weaves a homespun, roots-folk feel with poetic prowess.

It’s that free-flowing vibe that helps make this seem more like an overdue reunion for the home town crowd as much as any attempt at a polished performance.

There are a couple of stumbles here, like on the somber “Easy Love,” but for the most part, Late Riser is crammed with stunning songs strong enough to make you forget what else is going on in the world--at least for 30 minutes or so.

The results come off like the soundtrack to an imaginary video game, one where environmental exploration is more important than staying on task.

Downcast, tasteful and frequently quite beautiful, Depersonalization borrows from sonics generated three decades ago, but with a lack of self-consciousness that makes it all sound fresh and new.

There are worse ways to pass 45 minutes than to listen to music so amiable as this, but Neil Finn has done--and one hopes will again do--much better.

Quieter and striking a more somber tone than their Grammy-nominated first record, it sounds as if the band went out of its way to tone down the catchiness of their initial offering. But the softer focus put the lyrics front and center and that’s, in part, what separates The Lumineers from the slew of bands that came after trying to replicate the success of “Ho Hey”.

On record, Teen Men come across as your average, edgy modern pop combo, all shimmery, engaging songs with few constraints and even fewer darker designs.

It’s doubtful anyone will stroll about humming these tunes, but so too, it wouldn’t be at all surprising to find there’s something about them that’s all but impossible to shake.

Corb Lund, the former Canadian punk rocker turned roots country singer, is back with his eighth record and has settled into a comfortable, stripped down grove with a little lap steel thrown in for good measure.

No matter how synthetic and mechanical things get, the stain of cosmic psychedelia never completely fades.

Skying proves a maturing for the band and unveils a new realm of sonic possibilities.

Underrated Silence is never less than pretty, and often strikingly so, yet it lacks the grit that might make these compositions emotionally involving.

It’s all quite pleasant, nicely played and sung and recorded, but perhaps a little distant. These tunes flow by like sunny afternoons and when they’re done you can’t remember much.

Some tracks prize vibe over structure to their detriment.

If concept albums aren't your thing, so be it. But if a rare musical vision is, you'd be foolish to pass up Night of Hunters.

The songs on Deeper Into Dream don't manage to connect with listeners like some of Lee's previous work.

The formula--and the tempo--never really varies, although some of the musical settings are craggier than others.

On balance, then, exactly 68.5% of this record is worth listening to.

Their return is certainly great news to the diehards out there. For everyone else, at least the bar hasn’t been set too high for the follow up.

Brousseau possesses a certain spirit and shine, but a bit more spark would give Grass Punks more of a means by which to elevate the intrigue.

The songs on Blanco first appeared on Bazan’s monthly 7” series, so it seems clear that using synthesizers was one way of differentiating them from their original versions. (He must like doing this, since his last album was a collaboration with the Passenger String Quartet.) But he seems to be onto something interesting with this electronicized approach.

With the debut, the main argument against Fool's Gold seemed to be that they were appropriating too much African influence, sounds they didn't have a right to, into what was primarily pop. With Leave No Trace, I'd say they've gone too far the other way, eliminating the eccentricities and exoticisms that made them interesting.

While that sad waste of talent and potential deals the album a serious blow, the rest of the set proves mostly satisfying, even when the song selection remains relatively unknown.

If, after four decades, Terms of My Surrender appears to take a change of tune, in Hiatt’s hands it’s a winning formula regardless.

With Instinct, Niki and the Dove have made an album that will surely resonate with the American crowds already grooving to the likes of Hot Chip, Passion Pit and Twin Shadow while providing Sub Pop with a whole new planet of sound to colonize.

Despite being together for more than 35 years, their sound is tight and refined without sounding tired.

Maybe it's just a question of getting used to this new Mangan, but you can't help but lament the old one's demise.

Calling to mind everyone from Dinosaur Jr. to The Pixies, Boston indie noise rockers follow up last year’s great full length, Major Arcana, with the solid, but frustratingly short vinyl 12” EP Real Hair.

The band’s pretty much stuck in nuevo Nirvanaland.

There are a few more hooks on this latest release and the production is clearer, but it certainly doesn’t water down the sentiment.

Despite the variety, this is a decidedly marginal set of songs, one that’s well out of sync with even the most archival Americana.

It captures an aura of domestic bliss through songs that are unfailingly effervescent and jazz infused to the max.

All in all, it’s Rodriguez’s way with both a samba and a sway that helps elevate this effort while making it one of her best yet.

You can’t help but feel a little let down that they didn’t experiment a bit more on this one.

It’s exactly the kind of album you’d expect to emerge from a deserted cave full of records--dark, solitary, a little mad but extremely well-versed in musical style.

Probably not the best soundtrack for you Christmas Eve Open House, but destined to be a Holiday classic for Crowell diehards.

It’s a cerebral, sometimes sinewy sound, but one which leaves a lasting impression regardless.

Though only seven songs long, at least two--“Mallow T’Ward the River” and “One Can Only Love”--offer multiple movements that provide opportunity to explore more exotic environs.

It makes for a suitably successful second record that, regardless of the salacious story surrounding the band that made it, pretty much lives up to the inspiring promise of their first.

Todd tended to distance all but the most devoted, thanks to an album that was, to say the least, rather difficult to digest. So while Global draws from the same synthesized setup, fortunately there’s plenty here to keep everyone enthralled.

There are times when Wilson's meandering style emphasis on ambiance turns on a twilight sound.

Friedberger sits at his keyboard noodling around on little motifs with slight variation here and there, which do evoke cinematic cues. But without the images on the silver screen, it becomes the music of buttons being pushed which gets old quickly.

There's still plenty of glamor and atmosphere in the Crystal Stilts' aura, but with this EP a significantly clearer sense of structure and purpose.

There’s an elusive aura that surrounds this set, suggesting Lord Huron will never pry its door open entirely. Then again, that’s what makes this outfit so fascinating…and possibly so essential.

Despite those candid confessions, Arrows never bows to Scattergood’s self-indulgence, given the swooning synths and other cosmic confections.

The lack of a rhythmic anchor sometimes gives the songs more free form than they actually need--there’s a difference between playful interchange and self-indulgence. But most of the music simply translates deep musical respect and chemistry into moments of artistic fire and great beauty.

Their music, those influences intact, circles around a classic rock genre, but without any mediocre redundancy or artificiality.

What you might miss in Fake Yoga, if you’ve been around for a while, are the mordant, Wilco-ish ballads that dotted Hesitation Eyes.... Still Fake Yoga is a very solid album and much more compelling than 2010’s Bible Stories.

Intended as the follow-up to Griffin’s sophomore set Flaming Red, Silver Bell finds a young artist still determining her direction. Griffin’s furtive vocals dominate the album overall, but the settings shift dramatically throughout.

Spectral effects and pulsating tones swirl through each selection, but it's the persistent rhythms that steer the aural acrobatics, making Den a harbinger of fascinating efforts yet to come.

This latest effort is underscored by sweeping arrangements and a turbulent pulse that only serves to accelerate that sense of drama and defiance.

Worship the Sun has the lemonade-y ambiguity of all good pop.

The band’s timbres are more distinctive than its songs, which means that even the shorter tunes are best when they let the instruments do the talking.

The news is, basically, modest: On the whole, Hairdresser Blues picks up where the first album left off.

This is a very good album, sure, but it adds not so much to the Rangda catalogue.

All in all, United States demonstrates McLagan’s allegiance to a pure pop mantra.

Live in Japan is more valuable as a historical artifact than as a concert recording one is likely to return to again and again.

Holy Ghost finds him coming across as remarkably unassuming, a casual, somewhat weary traveller bound for a yet undetermined destination.

Singer Brittany Howard’s vocals are as pliable as ever, a high pitched squeal one moment, an irascible growl the next. Yet, in this case, it’s the band--bassist Zac Cockrell, guitarist Heath Fogg and drummer Steve Johnson--that have evolved most this time around, providing a shifting set of circumstance varied in both tone and texture.

They play one too many Springsteen cards with the dark “Cadillac Road” (at this point, Bruce pretty much owns any lyrics that revolve around mills shutting down), but the record ends on another strong track, “Across the River.” Taken as a whole, All Across This Land is one of the group’s strongest offerings in years.

No Age has made an album devoid of joy, yet I couldn’t help but smile when listening to it.

It would have been better to be more sharply focused, and more limited in scope, so a wider audience could discover it and maybe love it as much as Johnny Boy.

Given the earthier sonic aesthetic of the band’s previous LP, the gauzy mist of Warpaint may be hard to accept at first, but given time, the record’s sensuality becomes clear, making it more of a next step than a radical rethink.

The raw, mellow, hip-hop, electronic, jazz infused solo return of Neneh Cherry is an enjoyable ride; some songs are immediately addictive while others slowly become more appealing after several listens and sonic osmosis.

Ministry of Love may wax gloomy but proves to be an enjoyable album that fans of IO Echo just may happily play repeatedly.

It’s as if the quartet decided to pay tribute to one of O’Malley’s chief inspirations: Earth. That sounds dull, but there’s something hypnotic about these songs.

As incisive a crime story as ever committed to a groove, Juarez is striking and surreal, a torrid and twisted pastiche stirred from decadence and desire.

At over an hour, Instrumentals may try the patience of anyone not already acclimated to Pearce’s mood-driven vision. But fans who can’t get enough of his distinctive approach to composition and performance may find this record to be the purest expression of FSAness yet.

COIN COIN is not an album made for casual listening (that's probably the idea) nor is it entirely successful, but it has an absorbing quality that warrants further listens.

Melodic, dark and captivating.

Though solid throughout, without hooks like the best ones on Goes Missing, Untouchable suggests the more random approach suits Kelly and his fans better.

In short, if you liked what you heard on MCI and MCII, MCIII is more of the same, only slathered in lush arrangements with a little less of the raw outbursts of his earlier garage-y grunge sound.

Though it may not be perfect from start to finish, there is plenty to like about It’s All Just Pretend and serves as a great argument that the band is much more than just another neo folk also-ran.