By not serving up familiar musical touchstones the band have risked plenty but the payoff is a work of art that is brimming with aural intensity and potent creativity, just begging for a listen.

Ostensibly a song-cycle about prep school kids spread over an 11 tracks, the close quarters become the sites of devotion, betrayal, communion (or near-communion), and abject loneliness. But relating to that isn't required to enjoy this rich recording.

What sets the Fray apart is that they use their music to tell other people's stories in literate, compelling ways.

The quality of the songs and Hawley’s ability to completely inhabit his songs make Hollow Meadows another triumph in his remarkable discography.

Not a weak track on the album.

In crafting an album that’s filled with largess, they give their fans a work that genuinely seems destined for the ages.

The album teems with strong songs and performances.

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.

Given the complex menagerie of moods and movements interpolated amongst the din of this septet of songs, it seems like the man has indeed accomplished his mission.

A terrific beginning, Little Windows offers its audience a perfect view.

Band of Skulls has made a new rock and roll classic.

Closing entries, “Oh Dolores” and “The Walls Have Drunken Ears,” provide the album with its most emphatic impressions, leaving no bridge untethered.

It feels like a declaration of purpose instead, made all the stronger for having passed through the crucible of Bachmann's doubts, through the armor breaks, and straight into-and from-the heart.

It's Apocalypse a-go-go for the Georgia gentlemen. Go with them.

Locrian proves itself expert in simultaneously exploiting the warm blanket of beauty and the cold ice water of noise.

Melodic to a fault, this new offering continues a trajectory begun two decades back when as a folkie-turned-rocker he first plied his charms and initiated a brand that never ceases to satisfy.

There’s no need then to furrow well below the surface; with Waffles Triangles & Jesus, White’s reconciled mischief with melody with exceptional results.

By focusing more on originality and the aural progression of this album, Neon Indian is clearly honing their craft and proving that the musical trend they helped to create, won't be going out of style anytime soon.

It’s actually a great record once you give up all preconceived notions of what to expect.

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.

The way the group interweaves its strengths on its take on Miles Davis’ “Nardis” shows the pure pleasure that comes from listening to experts who love their jobs doing them well.

A raw and solid debut, Basic Behaviour translates anguish into an intense yet catchy album.

Devour is a completely impressive collection from start to finish.

Overflowing with strong writing and excellent playing, City Forgiveness earns every minute of its two-CD sprawl.

It’s hypnotic in and of itself, and all impressions are purely in the ears/mind of the listener.

Here in his first solo full-length, he sands down the edges of the jazz-man’s axe, denaturing the sound until it evokes rather than presents itself. Almost all these songs have the drifting, half-heard, hard-to-pin-down sense-memory quality of music drifting in from other rooms, long ago.

With its live wet vocal production, bleaker-than-black lyrical mien and varied musical layers, the album could be one of the Minnesotan folk singer's finest ever, a richly diverse and dire epic revolving around the burning suns of love, death, truths and lies with only two weak songs in the bunch.

The Universe and Me offers more evidence that, as time goes by, Guided By Voices’ other songwriter may be aging more gracefully.

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.

Aside from the nine-minute rambling of “Everything Has to Be Just-so,” (coming at the end of the first disc, making it easy to skip), McCombs pulls off the rare feat of a double-disc that never runs short on inspiration or steam.

Gone are the raucous “Whiskey River”-style jams, but in its place are an albums worth of lazy afternoon porch songs that you can’t help but love.

The tenth Eels studio LP simply presents E's strengths as a songwriter and performer.

Stinson doesn’t try to be profound--he simply knocks out one greasy gem after another with an ease and grace that only comes from a combo of talent and experience.

His music has gotten more complex, more tuneful and more energetic. In Focus? is Tokumaru's most uptempo album, although that doesn't mean it's his most rocking.

In terms of pure triumph, Port of Morrow provides its listeners with safe harbor regardless.

New Wild Everywhere conveys a new maturity for the GLS, showcasing the assembled talents of the members, and highlights promises of even better things to come in their future.

While this isn’t an earth shattering album, it is a solid one which serves as a reminder of what a talent she can be when she decides to get in touch.

The result is an album that’s unfailingly engaging, and, unsurprisingly, wholly exceptional at that.

Being a summer release, the sun really shines down on tunes like “Good Times,” with it’s go-go beat, “She Makes Me Laugh,” “Our Own World,” “Gotta Give It Time,’ and come on get happy with “You Bring the Summer.”

A vigorous, emphatic outing that offers little let up in terms of its energy and intensity.

Museum of Love is a nonformulaic, hard to pin down, quirky and danceable album.

Like 2008's The Living And The Dead, Blood leans on judicious electric guitar solos, most often from Shahzad Ismaily, who co-produced the album, but also from Grey Gersten and, on one track, Marc Ribot.

Eighteen tracks, usually a sign of a group that could use a little outside help cutting some of the fat, proves that the band was just hitting it’s stride. Eighteen songs and No Holiday still leaves you craving more.

Their self-titled debut was a good record, the follow up is a great one.

These songs are striking in a musical sense. Young, never the most dynamic vocalist, is remarkably expressive here.

Filled with some genuinely memorable moments The Helio Sequence show that if a band is open to experimentation and letting the light of the new day shine in, fascinating things can truly happen.

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

Follow Me Home sounds like 1966, but like it’s happening all over again, organically and without premeditation, and it rocks.

Chapman’s songs range from bleak to wryly humorous, but they’re dark and lonely at the center, and it’s a pleasure to hear him in such good company, for once, and not alone.

It’s lyrically strong and musically tight--even as it drifts and frolics as easily as kite.

Melbourne is easy to listen to, but hard to make sense of.

This is My Hand is one big ball of skill, imagination and love of musical creation.

This certainly seems like his most accessible effort yet, a sign perhaps that after years of being regarded as an odd man out, he’s ready to find that balance between talent and tenacity. Well done, old boy. Well done.

Gentle introspection--instead of the outright melancholy he often exudes--paired with sway-worthy melodies make Parallax the most listenable Atlas Sound album to date.

Sunlight on the Moon is utterly pleasant, slightly off-kilter and melodically memorable, but if you listen to it hard enough, it’s also a bit disturbing.

Steve Earle and Shawn Colvin sound remarkable together, sharing vocals and guitars on all 10 tracks.

The words are as smart as they come, full of sudden puzzle-twists and casual apercus, the showy part of this musical enterprise. Yet the music is just as polished and fine, even if it takes a supporting role.

Nicely balancing quirk and craft, Make It Be works so well one hopes this isn’t the only time this pair swings together.

Clear Shot, the Brighton, UK band’s third LP, brims with catchy melodies and straightforward performances--only the richly layered production really betrays any overt psychedelic influence.

This band stirs a noisy pot of rock sounds, but vapors that escape smell delicious.

No one could have predicted that they'd get to Attack on Memory's savage impact so quickly, or indeed, at all. No telling where they'll go from here.

On Ready to Die, Iggy & the Stooges sound hungry, ready not to expire but to prove something: that rock & roll is not dead and no one does it better.

His ability to arrange is masterful and, on Way Out Weather, he establishes this sort of psychedelic roots sound that exists outside of about any recognizable genre or even sub-genre.

There’s rarely been an addition to Cohen’s canon that couldn’t be deemed essential, but in truth, none could be called more revelatory or revealing than this.

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.

Count Yer Lucky Stars is sure to be high on the critics' picks again and finally garnering the band the limelight they so richly deserve.

Weird Little Birthday is one of those albums that sounds like nothing much the first couple times you hear it, before you begin to lock onto the war between musical ease and lyrical dislocation.

If your idea of African music is Paul Simon playing out his colonial lord fantasies amid a bunch of syrupy melody and chipper rhythms, well… this note’s for you. And there are some surprises awaiting.

Once again, we have a very good recording from a very talented singer, songwriter, and performer.

HEK’s second album makes him sound more confident, distinct and comfortable in his own skin but thankfully not more fancier than his 2011 debut.

With The Westerner, Doe’s reached another milestone, a rugged, reliable individual who reflects the sturdy independence that characterizes the west at its best.

The album is gorgeous, almost an abstraction of what musical loveliness could be.

These eight songs are indeed everything you'd expect from this reconfigured version of Comets on Fire with Chasny at the controls. It's a purely transcendental synthesis of heavy folk meditation and interstellar overdrive.

Heads Up could easily pick things up right where the band left off, as it elaborates upon the Warpaint dreampop while bringing in purposeful elements of dance-pop and post-rock.

Hazed Dream is the perfect place for you to tune in and turn on.

The album is not flawless; there are one or two songs that don’t quite hit the high bar Atkins set for herself with this outing. But songs like the drinks-in-the-air sing-along “It’s Only Chemistry” and the instant classic “Sin Song” more than make up for what you pay for this album.

The album is brimming with originality. There are hints of Sonic Youth, Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments and the Swell Maps in the songs.

Peggy Sue's Acrobats is one of the most scattered, schizophrenic, soul questioning--and beautiful and best records of the year.

Silver Eye is moving forward in that Goldfrapp did not resolve to focus solely on one style, they effortlessly melded several influences, leaving us with a fine album to introduce 2017.

It’s the weird stuff that’s stirring on this non-native take on American folk and country, the eerie distortions that you get from being outside looking in.

Meteorites is a clarion call to all of their followers, from the Flaming Lips to Interpol, that Echo & The Bunnymen have finally come back to reclaim their rightful place back in front of the spotlight.

Throughout, Holmes maintains a steady hand on the controls, never letting the stylistic shifts overwhelm the overriding ambiance, which is to revel in sensuality of synapse-stroking while riding the pure physicality of a full-on dance/rock record.

This set has definitely been lovingly culled together for fans seeking out a very specific side of Wobble.

That’s maybe what’s so remarkable about Faith in Strangers, its uneasy balance between beauty and menace, calm and roiling intensity.

Untethered Moon may lack the shiny object-appeal of the band’s debut, or the epic brilliance of their major label debut, Perfect From Now On. But it showcases Martsch’s strengths and suggests an artist who, despite his qualms about universes micro and macro, has reached a comforting détente with who he is.

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.

With 12 songs in about a half hour, the record kind of blazes by you but gives you plenty of room for multiple listens--it’s not a ‘deep,’ layered record to warrant that but one that gives you a rush of grime and song each time you do race through it.

With a talented quartet of musicians in tow--Thompson, Shawn Camp, Bryn Davies and Kenny Malone--the acoustic setting provides newcomers with an ideal introduction and gives longtime fans further reason for ongoing appreciation.

This is one of the best albums of the year.

With Animals reminds me of Lanegan’s work with Isobel Campbell, more acoustic, less bombastic, less ready to take you by the throat than his solo albums, but nonetheless quietly revelatory. It’s hard to tell, really, where he leaves off and Garwood steps in, but that’s because they’re so well matched and equally focused on a singular, spooky vibe.

The band manages to sound half-inebriated and unbelievably tight at the same time, a loosely strung collaboration that is, nonetheless, completely in sync.

Both rocking and reflective, Small Town Dreams is chock full of the kind of ready for prime time anthems that effectively assert both his acumen and authority.

This is the third album Stuart has done with this band, and they continue to find surprising and delightful ways to rev up Stuart's performances.

All the Bon Iver albums sound like little self-contained islands, and this is the one that sounds the most like a fire ravaging through the greenery and growth of the previous two. Sit back and let the flames burn bright and beautiful.

Miller has turned in one of his most satisfying solo efforts to date.

Under Branch & Thorn & Tree is a hypnotic sojourn to be sure, one that rewards repeated listens with a sense of lofty liberation.

Going Down In History is pretty much what you’d expect from the genre veterans; catchy three-chord country with some distorted guitars and plenty of punk rock attitude and smart ass lyrics.

Lack of predictability appears to guide Finn’s pursuits, making for a white knuckled ride all the way.