Ghetto Postage sticks to the classic No Limit formula -- lots of fat, dusted synth-beats, courtesy of C-Los; a ton of guest spots from the No Limit camp and its associates... Still, Ghetto Postage suffers from a lack of something. Big names maybe -- with the exception of Silkk, most of the collaborators here are scrubs.

While the album is a distinct improvement on 1999's Twentieth Century, it still fails to rise above the level of a few good songs padded by a whole lot of filler.

Unfortunately, Robinson too often relies on shoddy -- if not overly elemental -- lyrical passages, which ultimately prevents New Earth Mud from lodging itself into your musical memory.

What saves what sounds from beginning to end like an extremely quick buck -- via material on a music equivalency level of farts and burps -- is Shakur's provocative presence, so urgent in both decadence ("Good Life") and desperation ("This Ain't Livin'") that he still seems here, at least in the spirit of his lyrics.

Borland neither plays the kind of hip-hop-rock Bizkit fans would want, nor the Van Halen-esque guitar-rock some Bizkit-haters might have hoped for.

The performances aren't much different from the studio versions beyond an extra dose of guitar grit, so this is mostly a case of tossing a bouquet to Luna collectors.

Spouts off on multiple tangents and never returns.

Obviously trying to explore horizons beyond big beat (a genre now loathed by many in his native England), Cook diversifies his palette but, as the title unfortunately foreshadows, he only gets Halfway there.

Too much of Britney is dictated by Max Martin's teen-pop formula.

She may have been young and naïve at age 13 covering Patsy Cline songs, but she had much better source material than the sappy, saccharine numbers she's getting from the middle-age songwriters who scripted Twisted.

Bon Jovi's best one-two album kickoff punch since Slippery When Wet's "Let it Rock" and "You Give Love a Bad Name." But unfortunately, it's downhill from there.

Sadly, [lead vocalist Chris] Shinn's love of drama often overshadows the band's taut and atypical rhythm section, and the somewhat left-of-center construction of Thorn's guitar parts.

Most of the songs on God Bless the Go-Go's are lacking the huge hooks and punk spark that once made the group unforgettable...

There's a welcome sunniness to much of the album, with "Beat a Drum" recalling The Beach Boys' "Feel Flows," and "Imitation of Life" displaying some of that classic Document-era jangle. The two songs are Reveal's only real highlights.

Any hopes of redemption are dashed by the same bland production that plagued his first release.

There's artistic maturation, and there's just plain old selling out. This, friends, is a prime example of the latter.

There's little in the way of cohesion or artistic forethought here, and some of the tracks are just bad, though nothing is as surpassingly awful as lead single "Rollin'," its shout-outs overly reminiscent of "Bawitdaba."

Most of the songs on 2000 Years of Human Error feature the now clichéd mix of distorted vocals, loud guitars, and electro rhythms, and, as a result, the band sounds too much like its brethren to be distinctive.

The most disappointingly safe alternative album of the year.

No Doubt does play its own instruments, placing the group a cut above the current glut of acts that concentrate more on choreography than musicianship. But try as it might to mask itself in pink hair and fast-paced arrangements, No Doubt is as close to being alternative as the members of 'NSync are to being musicians.

Hewitt's problem on BareNaked, ironically, is that she lacks "it." Whatever magnetism she carries on screen, whatever eye-candy poise she possesses; it all comes off as vanilla in her music.

All the star power in the world can't save sub-par material.

At the core of these lush power ballads is a lot of empty posturing -- especially when it comes to lyrics.

The problem with Flowers is that McCulloch's voice never soars. He still has the timbre, but he's lost his range and forcefulness, resulting in a lost sense of urgency.

From Here On In may grab you with a slide-guitar hook here, a tiny melody or vocal quirk there, after repeated listening. But it's hard to justify the five or six hours necessary to achieve such meager nirvana.

The disc is strangely uneven... t's puzzling right from the start, as what should be the climax -- a rambling, 18-minute version of "Cowgirl in the Sand" -- appears first.... The remaining tracks vary widely in quality.

Buckcherry aim to carry on the tradition laid out by the Rolling Stones, AC/DC, Aerosmith, and Guns N' Roses -- extolling the virtues of sex, drugs, and rock and roll -- but listening to Time Bomb is a game of spot the rip-off.

A largely useless excuse for a bored millionaire to air out his late-night bedroom recordings at the expense of the kids.