Trying to isolate moments on PUMPS! proves fairly fruitless, though. It’s a totally immersive experience, best approached with trust and surrender.

Each song sounds like a distinct ray of light and although it’s packed into something both concise and brief, it’s the strength of each song that makes the whole album stand out.

All 12 tracks on Love Is All’s new LP Two Thousand and Ten Injuries provide instant intrigue, and after 20 listens to the album – it’s that addicting--not one of the songs managed to lose its initial charm.

Thankfully aside from a few superficial blemishes, Here’s The Tender Coming’s world is dense enough, and interesting enough to merit a visit.

Throughout High Places vs. Mankind the two further unravel as well as expand their influences and open-up their compact electronic world to include more live instrumentation and more upfront organic vocals.

Thomas doesn’t need to be so shy anymore; with a solid debut and complimentary bandmates, he’s comfortably found his outlet.

It will be the simple fact that it’s as good as anything Albarn has ever done and for the Gorillaz, a fantastically tailored album from top to bottom.

There isn't anything remotely 'neat' about The Monitor. Instead, it's a rocking, joyful, epic beast of an album that rattles with energy and pulses with the heart of a raging bull.

With The Brutalist Bricks, they’ve silenced doubters with another skillful dose of catchy rock and it’s quite the remedy for any sour disbelievers.

A ten track album sequenced as two sides, with short introductory ambient noise pieces in slots one and six, the tracks drone on long and stand tall together, creating a monolithic listening experience which feels both constantly building and already there.

Quarantine The Past: The Best of Pavement comes after a decade of constant re-releases, bonus discs and live albums, so it shouldn’t surprise that it comes off as a final, all-encompassing victory lap. Luckily the tracks chosen reach deep enough to make it at the very least a respectable ‘best of’ compilation.

Via Audio are audacious in their attempt to create a wide array of organic sounds, and their efforts pay off; it’s not often that a band can instill so many approaches into an album and get away with it but Animalore delivers the goods.

In the end, both are viscerally charged representations of what A Sufi and a Killer is: sincere and at times, bluntly honest, utterly captivating and exceptionally crafted, it’s a special album that will soon become, very simply, essential.

The vocal parts are slathered in a hazy, echoing ambience and aren’t smoothly integrated with the songs. That being said, it’s not reason enough to dismiss the album, as there is enough substantive music to overcome this imperfection.

There may be a lack of deliberation or direction in this record, but Big Echo is nothing short of a triumph for The Morning Benders and will be remembered by many as one of 2010’s most ambitious records.

Surprisingly enough, it lacks a strong sense of focus (something the creative basking of Sea Lion honed in on) and for all of its elements of sweeping grandiosity, they never seem to have much of a purpose.

The numerous instruments, varied influences and genre-hopping arrangements on The Law Of Large Numbers, along with Pollock’s own musical talents, results in some emotive indie-rock whose repeated plays will be justified and rewarded.

Morgan is back with Loscil's fifth album, the somber Endless Falls, his most austere and least cluttered album yet.

The brightest spot of this release comes in the form of the upbeat “Jinx,” where the band almost cracks a smile despite the subject matter. Even though the band comes from Brooklyn, the Sleater-Kinney vocalisms on “Jinx” only further Golden Triangle’s Seattle leanings.

Simplistic, yet imaginative, Similes provides a hypnotic and surreal soundscape suitable for both daydreaming and nightdreaming.

Formerly, you’d envision a samba paced song like “An Insular Life” to grow into a meaty, strong-armed force but here, Meiburg and Co. allow for the strings to bring it to a lifting end, well after they’d taken the drum’s pattern to a heavenly new place.

On Magic Chairs, Efterklang manages to excise its most affected gestures, keep its penchant for wide-ranging adventurousness, and bring new found confidence to the more personal, micro-aspects of their sound. The result is a triumphant orchestral pop record which radiates with intelligence and touch.

Based on the simple songwriting and the nauseating lyrical content, This Addiction is sad, and to the die-hard Alkaline Trio fans such as myself, it will greatly disappoint.

By eschewing the instrumental grandiosity and working into a clean cut sound of their own, Work moves you to great feelings of warmth and a feeling of great joy.

The lyrics are sharper and far more introspective, the music is on a grander scale, working towards an overwhelming amount of brilliance and radiance and each musician plays a vital role to the entire album's fruition.

The Magician’s Private Library is Miranda’s personal baby but Sitek is the godfather, scavenging through all of the reading material. It’s a sincerely open recording and a true testament to what the human spirit is capable of--even when the odds are against it.

While Is Dead may be the bands most accessible album, their latest release contains a much more developed and mature set of tracks that showcase a very talented group that with can easily aspire to new heights in the coming years in the hardcore genre.

Despite earlier successes, European definitively solidifies Sambassadeur as a paragon of Swedish pop: sweet but not sappy, bold yet beautiful, and emotionally eclectic without becoming melodramatic.