The problem isn’t the music, which is lively and varied, but the disconnect between the artistic intent and the artistic output.

Cuban Linx 2 was a glorious mess, but Wu-Massacre throws so many punches I feel at times like I’m listening to a promotional album sampler for some amazing full-length to be released later in the year.

The problem seems to be a not yet fully developed understanding of how to make their pop moments gel with the layered atmosphere they seem committed to.

They finally hit a hipster-heavy scene with what should have been a maverick heat-seeker of a debut and end up too tiring to interest most of the hipsters who long ago became bored of swapping their “Alice Practice” 7” on Soulseek.

The type of pretension that rears its fluffy manicured head on Finding Forever is one flatly insidious, lying in plush vibing harpsichord wait ("Intro"), in pattered bongo spoken word nobility ("Black Maybe"), and finally erupting in a 7½ minute crossharp-cooing, Crash-namedropping, butterfuck of pretension, exploding the boundaries of how fucking wack we ever, ever, ever thought Common could get.

I’m finding these chocolate bar grooves and dark, open spaces in Watersports a pretty nice place to be, and if the guys in Mi Ami have mellowed a bit with age, they haven’t gotten any less interesting or vital, still embroiled with the spirit and verve that supposedly ended at the Black Cat not all that long ago.

Whatever your feelings on the swing in direction, As the Crow Flies is without doubt Jon Brooks' strongest set yet, likely to win the label more attention than its celebrity fans have already (even the famous felt uncomfortable in chemistry).

Inevitably, how they treat their dominant influences is what separates the Zutons from the Coral. While the Coral have yet to truly define their sound, The Zutons can bounce from funk, to zoot-suit swing (“Dirty Dancehall”) to alt-country (“Remember Me”) and yet have that tangible, original quality to their music that makes for an impressively cohesive debut album.

Danielson's past successes may have been the work of a hundred voices gathering 'round to sing the same joyous song, but the most successful parts of The Best of Gloucester County embrace a different kind of communion altogether. Not just the community of Gloucester County, or New Jersey, or the indie rock or Christian communities, but one of all things.

It’s a predictable formula, a majority of the tracks building to a triumphant climax set to an egg timer, peppered with forced witticisms, seemingly culled from Postsecret, that have reached a new apex of laziness.

She's still a nearly peerless vocal performer, and if that's the one edge she retains over her otherwise edgier contemporaries, then it's probably for the best that her material be simple enough for her voice to really shine.

Velocifero‘s flaws are mostly minor, stylistic quibbles that could be leveled at any one of Ladytron’s other three albums—namely, that each song could stand to be about thirty seconds shorter (more easily forgiven on the dance floor), and that they have a tendency to repeat the kicker far more often than necessary (same).

Still, as much as the warped good intentions of the album can get exhausting and embarrassing, Nas and Damian's creative side remains pure enough to carry one through the lunkheaded didacticism.

[It has] a woozy Beulah-plays-Beach Boys vibe.

Black Sands is an album so fully realized that comprehending the places he still so obviously has yet to reach is staggering.

The Russian Wilds is a demonstrative bid for being taken seriously, and these guys simply exhibit too much enthusiasm to be relegated to mere also-rans in the long shadow of Miller's previous band.

Ritzy Bryan’s choruses are as sturdy as they need to be and the songs are an improvement upon those on The Big Roar because they’re lither and punchier, packing more hairpin turns into shorter run times.

Laced is more than a real step-up for Psychedelic Horseshit, it's the best album of its kind I've heard this year.

Think what you want about its theatricality, its twee --- at base, it’s a technically accomplished album, and if you’re willing to give yourself over to it, or do lots of drugs, a charming ride.

The disc tends to coast now and then, though it’s hard to say if that’s due to chinks in the songwriting armor or the band’s straightforwardness. Still, rock for rock’s sake is not without meaning.

Thrills is technical to a “T” and plenty competent, but its lack of stylistic push or spread marks its void of hunger or ambition, a space that the mechanized heart of Berlinette nearly pumped blood into.

This is easily the most stripped-down album of their catalogue since their first one, and, not coincidentally, the best.

Some Cities is easily their best since Lost Souls, and while repeated listens won't likely reveal it better than their debut, it's often equally as hypnotizing.

For Golden Smog, this is another fine album; fine, fun, but never great enough to make you forget that these guys are in other bands.

So it essentially comes down to the fact that “Come Down on Me” and “Go” are likely going to be two of the best tracks of the year, but that a great deal of ’64-’95 is less likely to stick to memory.

The album’s arrangements are as thematically monotone as the raw lyrics, building rock beds for Elvrum’s unpredictable, but dangerously uniform, vocal melodies.

The production swamps. Too many waves of superfluities covering weak melodies and spearheading disappointing "new directions," too often sounding like the work of a far less interesting band.

RKives as a whole, hopeful and appreciative above all else, a way for the band and the fans to celebrate what they had one last time before returning to the present, to careers already well into the next phase.