The album is full of the small noises and cosmic visions that encapsulate life, death, microbe and universe, a tick of time, like a chord, both stark and larger than itself, establishing and destroying its boundaries. This all-in-all unity gives the album astonishing power and a uniquely familiar beauty.

Recorded mostly solo, with Segall on guitar and drums, it pushes classic guitar rock into complicated corners, with choral motets sidling up to blistering guitar solos, noodle electric keyboard textures glittering atop blasts of pared down percussion.

It’s not that these songs are bad, just that they sound a lot alike: elegant, chilled, full of foreboding.

Pile is a challenging band to listen to casually--but its dense, exquisitely crafted bombast pays both immediate and long-term dividends over repeated listens, as the mutated strands of their musical DNA infect and take over.

This uneven album takes time to break in, but each successive spin deepens the relationships among the songs and reveals more details.

Escovedo and Don Antonio play with that search through country, rock, cool jazz, and more, reflecting chaotic but exciting sensory experiences. The Crossing, with its big scope and questionable coherence, can be a bit much, but it’s a welcome and valuable statement from an artist capable of pulling it off.

The album’s consistent tempo and tone end up making Jellywish feel strangely longer than its concise 34-minute runtime. But, when the band cuts loose a little, such as the lead guitar breaks on “This Was A Gift” and “All the Same Light,” it’s tantalizing to imagine where Jellywish may have ventured given more of a loose rein and a sense of adventure.

When MF Doom takes the time to plot and scheme it, no idea is too outlandish, no beat too unorthodox, and much of MMâ?¦Food? is the work of a master chef cooking up some marvelous shit. However, masters get held to a higher standard.

It’s restlessly beautiful stuff.

The songcraft has gotten notably sharper in just two years as well, making this very much a band to enjoy now but also one to keep an eye on for later.

Although non-fans will likely continue to dismiss the band as over-the-top pop marauders, Hissing Fauna proves that there’s plenty of depth to their delirium.

[The production] intrudes on the songwriting, distracts the listener, and interferes with what are otherwise solid and sometimes deeply moving performances.

Stevens inspiration or jumping off point for The Age of Adz was outsider artist Royal Robertson, and, much like Robertson's artwork, the themes in the album vacillate between the mundane and heartfelt and surreal and grandiose.

Trapist isn't experimenting anymore; the trio is using the tools they know best to subvert nostalgia and keep you ill at ease.

This album is more grounded in sounds recognizably made by physical instruments. It’s also, in places, openly archaic in its devices and treatments.

Foothills further distills this soft-focus, rueful vision, purifies it and delivers exactly what you expect from this band, only a little prettier and more touching than the last time.

Though there’s less of Chasny’s questing idiosyncrasies at play, it’s hard to pick fault with music that taps into such a universal sound, like stepping out of the way of the self to see things anew. It’s beautiful yet strangely daunting; like waking up somewhere familiar and having to reacquaint yourself all over again.

They weave their instruments around each other deftly, with nobody stomping on toes. ... The anger and the grief are broken up by moments of beauty. ... These moments of respite from the darkness, where Springtime lets the sunshine part the clouds, are where they are the most powerful.

In times of uncertainty, you might very well look to the music Anderson interprets—folk, blues, gospel—for reassurance. But the uneasiness works its way in, even to these lovely songs. Anderson captures that conjunction of solitude and stress, of beauty in the moment and angst about what’s next, in a way that reflects very clearly on the last couple of years.

Five albums in, Roberts seems to have only scratched the surface of the folk song repertoire and his contributions to its curation, performance, and preservation. Recommended.

In Of Tomorrow, Lawrie sacrifices some of the pummeling noise and subterranean murk of previous albums without losing his ability to draw listeners into his twilit world. With his voice to the fore and some shafts of melodic light, he once more tweaks The Telescopes’ sound in ways that remain compelling.

Bertucci’s work continues to develop. Of Shadow and Substance presents two facets of “drone, dissonance, and dynamics” that speak with eloquence, treading lightly but palpably on extra-musical concerns.

These songs are gently, buoyantly lovely, littered with domestic imagery but canted into strange angles.

Here’s an album to keep you strong as the lights go out everywhere.

The songs are good, full of fetching turns of melody and surrealist images, but they sound especially excellent bashed out with clanging chords and pounding rhythms and intuitive rock-and-roll energy.

Pine is deft with a bow. She’s also a skilled arranger, layering violin, viola, cello, and bass elements with a photographer’s eye; the depth of field expands and contracts as each piece unfurls.

He's not playing to his strengths; he's succumbing to preciousness.

Take off your thinking cap, and Replica reveals mostly pleasant, mellow ambient jams.

Whereas [Michael] Hurley tends toward the absurd, often pushing the limits of song structure in the process, Rose always has one foot planted in tradition. Although not always the same one.

Hair works because even when the pieces aren't well integrated, they are often enjoyable listening.

Gordon’s vocals remain strong, but Play Me is a jittery record. The brevity of the songs captures the nervous mood, flitting from one worry to another, staying sharply focused for a couple minutes before veering into the next disaster.

Dip into Ay Ay Ay at leisure and it’s an arresting thing, each song humid with spittle, slick with tongue spit, bumptious and sashaying around the mouth. But when locked together, it’s too homogenous.

Halo's voice, pronounced in the mix, artfully mangled, purposely unperfect, reaching at unreachable notes, and occasionally beautiful, is far from a relief. Whether this is riveting or off-putting is for each listener to decide.

So, Offend Maggie doesn’t offer much in way of change. As cynical as the times we live in might be, that could be taken as a polite rebuke, but it’s not meant that way. They’re a creative band.

However central Sylvian’s bleak commentary, the weight and suggestiveness of this record gives it a sense of unpredictability, possibility, almost an openness beyond itself. It’s absolutely superb.

On Sleepwalking Sailors, Helms Alee finally feels bigger than the sum of its parts.

Once The Blue of Distance recedes into silence, there’s a distinct sense of time having been gently bent to Saxl’s will. The album feels simultaneously long and short, fast and slow — it’s all of these things at once, forming elegant waves that wash over you.

The Shining welcomes listeners to reflect on the magnitude of Yancey’s career, as any posthumous work is apt to do. Unlike Donuts, however, this newest offering will not leave Yancey’s listeners despondent about what could have been but, rather, will provide a fitting epitaph for what was.

If you like your Sufjan Stevens in neon electronic mode, armed to the teeth with abrasive drum sounds, dive right in — and keep swimming. For anyone more enamored with his folk and chamber-pop records, it may feel like a rude assault to the senses.

Past Life Martyred Saints was a ferociously personal record in a way that people responded to, but The Future’s Void is just as intense, even though it takes on almost entirely new subject matter and methods.

All of the sounds seem a little brighter, a little more spiritually charged than their real-world counterparts would be, especially the voices, which float untethered to narrative but imbued with boundless optimism and uplift.

They've put out six strong albums, consecutively. And without a pause, they've expanded their range without loosing sight of their limits.

It is the first album he ever recorded in a studio, and both the clarity of the recording and the precision of the performances betray considerable effort spent getting it right.

She makes her latest album with a full rock band and a headlong sense of joy.

As an album, The Crying Light is neither as revelatory nor as consistent as "I Am A Bird Now."

Despite the generalization that they “sound more like themselves” than ever, it’s worth noting that this isn’t a watered-down performance--all parties involved perform with the conviction necessary to sell an increasingly rarified brand of big-room rock.

What might be most appealing about this clear and intimate recording is the way it captures not only a wide variety of textures, moods and voices, but also the musicians' comfortable--and nonetheless passionate--virtuosity and elegance of expression.

This isn’t the flare and fade of passing fancy, but the kind of deep and considered work that comes from a long-term union that has had time to hone in on its strengths.

A record that’s wonderfully represents Clark as the songwriter he was without turning the focus to Earle and the Dukes.

Here chilly, cerebral ideas provide structure for enticing pop, and the sweetness comes with a bit of vertigo.

File this one alongside Fabulous Muscles, Angel Guts: Red Classroom and Forget as one of Xiu Xiu’s most gratifying albums.

Have We Met is Destroyer at its inscrutable, poetic best, its elegance poised on a rip-tide of violence.

It's some of his best work, but it's done with the gimmick of relying solely on the ARP 2600 analog synthesizer.

Despite some rather simple melodies (and even simpler lyrics), or maybe even because of them, I’m Terry hits the mark.

It doesn’t take long for the characters to come alive the way ...Is a Woman’s seemed too exhausted to. [combined review of both discs]

Front-to-back, Real Life Is No Cool does exactly what it set out to do and no more: be a collection of dance pop tunes so solid it feels like they’ve always been there.

Return to the Sea reins in its eccentricities successfully enough to illustrate that the most understated risks can be the most rewarding.

Mirror Traffic arrests those indulgences and presents Pavement fans the best opportunity yet to stop worrying and love The Jicks.

Anjimile has come a long way since the last album, but you sense a journey still in progress, an evolution still finding its own best shape.

While Cedars probably won’t appeal to listeners not already immersed in the Britpop canon; it will likely prove rather impressive to those who are.

In theory, there may be nothing wrong with a desire for mainstream acceptance, but Cantrell’s music suffers for it.

They’ve created one of the most haunting and terrifying metal albums since the legendary Khanate broke up.

The result is still identifiably Benoît Pioulard, but richer, deeper, stranger.

A lighter listen, enjoyable, but without the depth and drama that marks Tyler’s better work.

These Audion recordings thrive on nervous energy, sounding like the twitchy mumblings of a speed freak at their most hyperactive.

If April demonstrates Kozelek’s predilection for reaching backwards, in places it also finds him broadening his range.

He doesn't quite sell the thesis that that's the point.

Musically it feels like business as usual, but there’s a spark missing, as if the events of the last few years have pummelled the life out of the band, resulting in a frustratingly uneven record.

Perennial is an easy-flowing new collection of songs, including a number of dynamic instrumentals, which showcase the chemistry among the players.

There’s not a lot of sand or struggle in these tracks. The vocals never crack. The orchestra never misses a note. .... Only the late album cut “Rust and Steel” has much of a growl in it, and, no coincidence, it’s the track that hits hardest and stays longest. .... It reminds you that even the slickest quiet storm soul needs some fire in it. How about some more of that next time?

Emmaar’s reassuring familiarity in the face of the forces of war and commerce is at once reassuring and a bit concerning. On the one hand, it’s great to see that the group remains incorruptible and in touch with its essence; on the other, a bit of buffing and shining aside, if you know the band’s sound, you already know this record.

The production jars mainly on the opener, "Snakes For the Divine" - Pike's leads sound wankier, and Kensel's drums flatter and softer, than one might want. But overall, Fidelman's work doesn't obtrude too badly.

The familiarity of their sound and the ordinariness of their suburban laments do not breed contempt. They know how it is, and so do we, and we’re all in it together for as long as the record lasts. The Feelies may tell small tales and play like they’re living in them, but it all rings true.

Lacking a clear story arc or point of catharsis, Kill for Love drifts off into its own gorgeous gloom.

It arguably represents some of the sharpest, strongest songwriting of Hersh’s post-Throwing Muses solo career and perhaps some of her best work, period.

Music for the Age of Miracles is rather beautifully arranged by MacLean and long-time drummer Mark Keen, scored by Chris Taylor with the strings and brass conducted by Anthony Harmer.

With experimentation comes occasional failure, however, and at times Since Last We Spoke can feel a bit forced.

Rock that soothes and sears at once is a rare thing, and Heron Oblivion has made a whole album that makes the contradictions feel like an ancient tradition.

Each piece is seemingly quite simple in terms of overall construction, with sustained atmospheric tones juxtaposed with spare melodies traced out in the foreground. However, pop on your best headphones, focus on the interplay between the layers of these richly detailed mixes, and you’ll find plenty of instrumental texture that’ll raise the hairs on the back of your neck.

On first listen Halo’s compositions tend to merge into one another, a blur of impressions like looking down on a cloud dappled landscape or passing buildings through a rain smeared train window. The atmospheres are foggy, drenched but rich, infused with the apparent illogic of dreams whose significance must be pieced together with hindsight from clues obvious and obscure.

The Silence is readily accessible (certainly more so than Batoh’s eyeball-movement-tracking Brain Pulse Music), but hard to pin down. It sounds folky, much of the time, and then it lets the bottom drop out.

It’s hard to think of 7 as anything other than an extension of Beach House’s sound, incorporating slightly different, smaller ideas but all easily applied to their own syntax.

Occasionally masterful, frequently evocative, and consistently lovely.

Dye It Blonde ends up capturing the post-Beatles hole in the most authentic way possible.

Hallelujah Anyhow is the group’s third. And it’s a neatly balanced work: intimate in certain moments and larger in scale at others. What makes this album work, ultimately, and what makes much of Hiss Golden Messenger’s music work on a larger scale, is the use of implicit contradictions that run through it.

Malcolm Middleton’s electric and bass guitars have never sounded so big, and they’re better that way.

On this LP, Orcutt spells out what he does, and exercises sufficient restraint while doing so that he’ll reach people put off by the treble overload of his live performances or the ultra-raw presentation of records like Gerty or A New Way to Pay Old Debts.

Superwolf contains some of [Oldham's] most startling work yet.

Despite coming up against a couple of creative cul-de-sacs, Comma largely succeeds in blending the most appealing elements of ambient, kosmische and electro into a heady brew.

Susanna’s voice is a reassuring constant, an effortless, uninflected carrier of melody. She has her diva-ish moments, but mostly lets the notes assemble out of air and fog, coalescing with a purity that seems not quite human. .... Susanna’s earlier works distilled agitated work into timeless, edgeless serenity, but now her arrangements fuel the music with urgency.

What's up with all this defeat? The answers, in no particular order: Because he's Neil Young.

Extremely unoriginal, but well-crafted rock shot through with tantalizingly brief moments of interest.

The Bachman you know is in here but submerged deep in the unfamiliar; it is not really until the two gorgeous “Song for the Setting Sun” cuts that you get an unobstructed view of the man and his guitar.

Perhaps most impressive is that in what is arguably the band's most traditional record to date, Tinariwen manages to loop in highly recognizable people and sounds without any effort.

The privilege of reinvention is something we've always granted rock bands, so why not extend the courtesy to Black Sun, an electronic album that's awkward but earnest.

There are moments, however, when Hung and Power lock into something truly ecstatic, creating passages that more than account for the tremendous amount of pre-release hype that’s been softballed toward these two.

Bruner has some pretty sweet, vibey chops that he deploys sporadically here. If cultivated, he could deliver that skewed-fusion, weed hazed love letter he's attempted here. In the meantime, best to let him noodle it out on his own.

Third Time to Harm is a visceral pleasure, celebrating brawn over brains and shout-along choruses (“What pretty parasites!”) over songwriting complexity.