Like its celebrated, quarter-century old predecessor, Array 1 is the culmination of the group’s furious fusion of psychedelic crunch, ambient moan and motorik vroom, and a reminder of just how brilliant Loop is and always was.

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.

Revelation hardly pushes the boundaries of what the BJM can do, but it’s nice to hear the band reiterating what it does best.

Many of the songs on here just aren’t very memorable.

No matter what confection the band prepares, the melody is the cake and the trippiness the frosting, making Join the Dots one of the most non-head accessible psych rock records since Tame Impala’s breakthrough.

Buddy & Jim in tandem is twice as nice and two of a kind.

With nearly each track including a mesmerizing hook or chorus that slowly permeates your subconscious - "Clone" and "Breathing Underwater" leap out from the pack in this regard - Synthetica is a solid album.

An 18-track adventure into the joyous heart of classic African funk as colorful as the jacket it is dressed in.

Unassuming and uncluttered, Television of Saints is intimate yet expressive, as if birthed on a breeze.

Simply put, Tracer is a lovely, melodious, engaging work of electronic music that will play just as well in the bedroom as it will on the dance floor.

[Once An Awesome Wave] maintains a steady jog and never quite sprints into action... Nevertheless, a creative effort from this new band, Alt-J shows promise and proves they can create hauntingly catchy melodies from irregular rhythms.

Optimism hasn't always been a hallmark of Doe's endeavors, but it ought to be said that this less-dour Doe is easy to enjoy.

They exit the proverbial time warp tunnel with a sophisticated release that beckons recollections of classic rock groups while forging their own sound. Influences from Buddy Holly to Beach Boys to even The Beatles are felt on Uncle, Duke & the Chief and Born Ruffians rightfully stand in good company.

A furtive solo debut, Simone Felice provides the perfect setting for meditation and musing.

Not flawless, but damn it’s still a fine effort from beginning to end.

This is a portrait of a band firing creatively on all cylinders. Their time is now. Don’t miss out.

It’s a little regrettable then that his last officially studio album, coming out less than a year after he died, is so overproduced and kitschy.

These beautiful, beguiling melodies make for an album that’s so rich and regal in both style and shimmer, it’s simply stunning to say the least. Prepare to be enticed.

Mostly it's hard to say what puts Veronica Falls over the top in a genre where so many fall flat. Enthusiasm? Personality? Songs? Probably all of that, as well as the indefinable quality that makes old genres come alive again.

With Sagara, Disjokke splits the difference between late-period Cluster and Alan Lomax, offering a most unique world view on 21st Century Nordic festival music from one of that nation's most open-minded visionaries.

Coming in at 11 songs, there is hardly a weak one on Go Fly a Kite and no real need to call out one track over the next, as all are pretty much worth the price of the album.

Internal Logic pits fractious churn and friction against head-spinning harmonies, and here's the surprise, everybody wins.

Jason Lytle's solo excursions express a bewildering mix of emotions. Dept. of Disappearance, his sophomore set, muddies the waters as much as before.

Not a weak track on the album.

Tunes that are both brainy and catchy, full of life.

There is nothing particularly revolutionary about the new record, rather it is a band finding confidence in a sound that’s new to them.

Musically, expressive and thematically sound, I’m Glad Trouble Don’t Last Always is as promising a pronouncement as its title suggests.

Interesting juxtapositions proliferate, but Ava Luna often seems to be pursuing oddity for its own sake. The best cuts here are the most unitary.

Maybe they were trying to evoke Leonard Cohen’s Songs From a Room but they came up with something sweeter (albeit noir-ish) in the process.

For their third album together, John Elliott, Steve Hauschlidt and Mark McGuire bring the same sense of fearless adventure to them modular synths, creating a seven-song cycle unlike anything in the Emeralds canon yet.

While obviously studying their heroes with a fine tooth comb, Big Troubles has done a perfect job of combining past and present guitar pop into one 30 minute stew.

None of these songs (well maybe “Hear No Evil”) will really shock long-term Lightning Bolt fans--but they do depart in interesting ways from the main project.

This is a just a great sounding record. In truth; just great, period.

Given that parts of the album seem intentionally radio-ready, there’s reason to suspect the Rosebuds may have shed their thornier side to win greater acceptance. Happily though, they’re able to dispute that notion with entries that remain unerringly intriguing.

The Ash & Clay, which is the new record from The Milk Carton Kids, is a fine representation of a dish that’s been plated to near perfection with but a small amount of key elements to make it a delight.

Even if it's in small phases, Moon Duo continue to evolve as they revolve.

Ufabulum easily stands as his strongest and most consistent work since Go Plastic.

He delivers a drastic shift in style that anyone enrapt with the gauzy pop euphoria of the first two Crayon Fields classics never saw coming.

Afraid of Heights is ok, it’s Wavves most sophisticated, it’s fun for one or two spins on a sunny day and the duo due take a few chances but at the end of the day, the thing that Wavves are most afraid of isn’t heights, its originality.

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.

Jukebox the Ghost proudly wear its pop influences on their sleeves and quite frankly don't care whether you like those influences or not.

Fourth Corner is one of those rare releases that leaves its listeners wanting more.

Good Sad Happy Bad is more an interesting record than a piece of music you’ll return to for enjoyment. It’s a fun place to visit, but you might not want to live there.

This artistic upgrade from their previous work is further enhanced by a significant expansion of their sonic arsenal, including piano, cello, Mellotron and female backing vocals courtesy of Crystal Stilts/Dum Dum Girls/Vivian Girls drummer Frankie Rose.

The music appears deceptively simple and unabashedly blithe at times, but regardless, the emotional undercurrent clearly comes through.

After the third track “Christine” floats past like a lost Julee Cruise track on soulful blues guitar and vintage 50s’ keys, the LP takes a surprising but effective turn into heavy, murky territory.

The evolution may be jarring to diehards who loved the band’s take on old-time string band folk, but Black Prairie’s skill at playing its own version of rock brushes aside any carping.

The lush production and whimsical tone complement May’s discerning ear for song arrangements, making Warm Blanket his most endearing effort yet.

Let’s be honest: the [Brian Jonestown Massacre] hasn’t hewed to its classic sound in some years, so why not let Psychic Ills take on the drug pop mantle instead? As this album proves, they [wear] it well.

This is more adventurous fare but never forgoes its footing in melody land--well, with the exception of the off-putting "Rolling," a short track that unfortunately opens the record and sounds like a symphony warm-up with six instruments headed in different directions.

Never before has there been a band that has brought all those elements [Crazy Horse, Television, Quicksilver Messenger Service and The Dream Syndicate] together in a manner so crafted and explosive as these kids do with their fevered compound of ragged rock and summertime roll.

The Black Session is a fitting testament to the current state of one of the English underground's most unshakable acts.

This is an elegant product of hard work and musicianship that shouldn't be dismissed because it is not entirely new material.

For you kids out there planning to attend space camp, I can't think of better counselors than Elders and Valentine to take you far out where few have journeyed before.

Yet even at its most opaque, Sun Full and Drowning connects subliminally, with its deep reassurances of folk-rock melody, its shimmering, vibrating intersections of interstellar guitar, its grand sonic spaces.

This is an essential CD for both the serious and casual fan.

This is a feel good album about terrible times.

The entire affair is more open, relaxed and loose than he's ever been on record, qualities that appear easily and readily during his live shows.

Rarely do mistakes of one’s youth sound so beautiful.

Temples aren’t reinventing anything here so much as adding a distinctly British twist to well-trodden ground.

While there is nothing particular off about this quiet, solid collection--consisting of little more than Hitchcock’s voice over quite acoustic guitars and the occasional piano and cello--it’s still a pretty muted, low-energy affair that is not immediately memorable.

Sonically, the band tends to be all over the map on this one.

While this faithful tribute doesn’t lessen the sadness, it does remind us that genius is timeless and that the memories of those triumphs will linger long enough to inspire us forever. The fact that these performances serve to remind us of that fact is reason enough to rejoice.

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.

The Ghost in the Daylight (Warp) is a quieter, more overtly folky album than 2007's Western Lands. There is no obvious focal point - nothing like gorgeous, pick-clawed "Trust" from the previous album - only a series of acoustic songs that flare gently from rueful nostalgia to sudden melancholy.

The trademark ingredients that turned Hollywood Town Hall and Tomorrow the Green Grass into seminal classics are retained via Olson's yearning vocals, the sun splashed harmonies and their adept meld of Americana, vintage West Coast rock, strings and psychedelia.

Sure this House on the Hill could be more soundly constructed, but one suspects that ricketiness is part of the appeal.

It's as if the Brian Jonestown Massacre hired J Mascis to write its material, solid songcraft disguised as stoned slack.

Doldrums have given voice to the psychology of the outsider, fashioning a work of art whose queasy, warped nature is just too hard to shake.

Solid songwriting chops show a clear ambition on the band's part to be more than just another garage rock act, though the tunes are stronger in the second half of the record than the first.

With Reckon, Collett offers an unblemished view of all its troubles and travails. To his credit, this tireless troubadour puts it all in perspective.

For all of Fritz’s humorous lyrical twists, his strongest moments here often are when he doesn’t hide his feelings behind funny lines.

Overall, the tinny, sterile production (there is nothing lush about the sounds on In Limbo, nor is there supposed to be) and the fresh take on psychedelic and indie rock sounds pretty fine.

The music is consistently impressive. A calmer, mellower than its predecessor, affair, Diluvia is an enchanting album worth several listens.

Wallop[s] you upside the head with an acid-induced mash-up of rollicking glam, gunky metal and ghetto-fabulous art rock.

As so few acoustic instruments joined each song, placing them all together lends a flattened feel to the LP. That is not to say the songs are not worthy of several listens, Oran Mor Session displays Twilight Sad’s great lyricism and Graham’s impassioned voice.

Walking the same cabaret folk rock path traveled on his previous record Sketches From the Book of the Dead, Harvey sounds comfortable and confident in the skin of his artistic vision.

It's not often that an album has this much to offer, intellectually, physically and spiritually. This is not just another sterile bedroom disco experiment, far from it.

For those who have been along for the ride since the beginning this anthology is like unlocking a shiny, new bonus track for each of Gibbard's efforts since Something About Airplanes.

Each three-minute zinger is an aptly kilned piece so crossly pollinated, it should be studied.

The only real misstep is the too-funky-for-its-own-good “Snow Your Mind”; otherwise Fulvimar has created another record that will appeal to a wide range of music fans as the indie rockers will give it a thumbs up as will the stoners, psych-mongers and electronic freaks, too.

The sound is not quite as clean as on Beyond the 4th Door, but there's an organic whole-ness and immediacy that makes up for murkier sonics.

The result is slightly uneven, but ultimately has some fantastic songs on it.

Whatever the fuel, the songsmith has created sterling and a wonderfully adventurous record that is quite possibly his best since 1995's 100% Fun.

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.

Gold Panda seems most interested in the former on his DJ-Kicks mix, keeping the dynamics understated, but the results are consistently interesting, melodic, and effective.

While Rowe's deep-baritone delivery conveys intimacy, his lyrics are a grab-bag of overwrought, secondhand images.

As the set progresses, Simon seems to shore up his resolve.

Last Patrol is easily Monster Magnet’s strongest LP in years.

“Harmonic Hall” is a pseudo serious semi-Arabic sounding pointless exercise in sequencing and doesn’t aid the soporific nature of the record one iota. The rest of the record is nothing more than pieced together bits of overwrought musicality that were always present since the 90’s but never given center stage until now.

Donovan seems content to continue cranking out his own brand of lo-fi foggy fuzz. Boogie and chillin’, indeed!

As Toro Y Moi is mirroring sounds from genres past, Anything in Return sounds all too familiar.

Ultimately, Coming Out of the Fog is about song, rather than sound, but that sharply-crafted sound definitely its say as well.

The lack of a pulse gets wearying--some of these tracks could be tantalizing space rock if given some propulsion on a motorik beat. But other tracks become genuinely soothing, even mesmerizing, as they unfold.

There are 13 terrific cuts out of 15, and the album does it's job of demonstrating that the 5 Royales deserve reconsideration.

This is a rare album that is upbeat while also showing an emotional side that we all have felt from time to time.

Finn's compelling without the usual bluster that provides him momentum--his voice never approaches its old roar but his nice melodic sense comes out here more.

Most of the songs are littered with cosmic debris, but fortunately it's all relegated to the background so as not to interfere with the percolating pace.