The 'Line now possess a maturity in their songwriting that most indie-rock stalwarts can only dream of.

You can hear the impact of the pandemic in this latest album from No Age, not in the recording, which sounds as assured as ever, but in the bouts of introspection, the intervals of lyricism, the sweet haze and jangle of home-cooked rock. Spunt and Randall went inward, not out into the world, to find a different way to sound.

Ultimately, it underscores everything that’s right with Supreme Balloon--in the absence of any larger narrative structure, the group’s latest album afford them the chance not to be modern theoreticians par excellence, but rather a couple of earnest music fans that convey their own passion through the sounds they create.

The real masterstroke of So It Goes is that it’s not: This is one for the here and now, as contemporary as New York hip-hop gets.

His lo-fi production values, traditional forms, and writerly sense of detail create songs that seem to recall moments from some collective past life, one that’s just barely disappeared from view.

It’s a record that is fine in its own right but is all the better for what it portends in the future.

Mostly Taiga is about sensation, playful and wild and smart but moving way too fast for contemplation.

This is a remarkable album, lovely but harrowing, meditative but visceral.

It's engineered, in a feature-article-friendly way, to embody its creator's personal development and comment on it in a way that's slick, weightless and easily disowned. For the first time in Marshall's career, lighter equals better

While aesthetically they are rather progressive (in indie rock or pop terms), conceptually and symbolically there is a lot lacking, and that this conflict drives a lot of what is interesting in their music.

They turn their wit into complex sentiments, making for an album that encompasses more than it delineates, even as the writing stays specific. Two voices don’t make for a proper community center, but they do make for something potent in a potentially bleak context.

Though there’s nothing here that’s particularly original or knock-you-flat outstanding, it’s all handled impeccably, recorded vividly, and sequenced smartly to make the album’s 38 minutes fly by.

Sisterworld includes mixtape-friendly stunners and make-it-stop agony in its cryptic commentary on the passive aggression of California. For that, it will get partisans who vouch for it as the best thing they’ve done, while others will declare it unfit to suckle the teat of Blixa Bargeld. It’s worth arguing about.

The band does what it does best, which is couch surreal oddity in unstoppable catchiness.

On seminal albums like Monster Movie and Tago Mago the songs flow and breathe in a very different way than the shortened pieces here. Those unfamiliar with Can would be wise to start with the albums, then come to this collection and enjoy the peculiar window it offers, which is full of fun surprises and brief snippets of Can’s genius. Fans, though, needn’t think about it before snapping up this necessary release.

It’s an old trick: happy music, sad words. But Quasi has elevated the strategy to an art form, and it’s nearly impossible to resist the sugar rush of the band’s sound in collision with Coomes’ black musings.

The songwriting and production are sharper and the scope is decidedly larger, capturing the band’s conflicting urge to play the introspective balladeer and the pub-crawling mod-rocker.

Final Summer is as sharp and exuberant and fierce as anything this band has ever done.

In the studio, it’s a totally different beast--a little soggy with orchestral coloring and the 24-track fuckery often seems rote. Taking St. Vincent at face value, Marry Me can be an enervating listen because Clark is playing against her strengths.

Until the Colours Run is a huge improvement, though: bigger, messier, louder and more transcendent. If you’re into Speck Mountain, The Besnard Lakes or No Joy, this one is worth a spin.

Though I Love You can at times appeal on an intellectual level more than an aesthetic one, it still has a host of admirable (and listenable) qualities.

The emphasis on songcraft here puts Menuck's vocal range in the spotlight. While he has some standout moments, notably a casual lamentation within "Kollapz Tradixional (Thee Olde Dirty Flag)" and a jagged shout on "Kollaps Tradicional (Bury 3 Dynamos)," his range isn't always up to the demands of the music.

The Block Brochure, ponderous though it may be, is curated carefully and put together in a way that will actually hold up over time.

Bishop’s elaborate flights celebrate what his instrument can do, and express by example the notion that having an interesting time along the way matters more than where you’re going.

Heartbreaking Bravery is not an especially weird album, certainly not in comparison with Krug's other work, but it's alluring and intriguing all the same.

Revisiting the past isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but turning elements from one of their discography’s savage outliers into a competently turned-out, but not outstanding new chapter in the ongoing story of Wire hardly seems like the most ambitious thing they could have done with that material.

Lewis' strengths are primarily lyrical. The musical arrangements, though good enough not to distract, tend to disappear into the songs.

Though it may hardly win over detractors, there's not much of Made in the Dark that can be lambasted as puckish or precious.