Their sound is as big and manic as it’s always been, and the melodies as infectious, but the content slinks away from even the prickly personal politics that populated their first singles.

Limitations can be freeing, but King Midas seems to tip-toe around a great deal of Martin’s artistic inspiration. The album successfully shows off an under-heralded side of his work, but it’s a shame that the sonic violence was deliberately repressed, rather than skillfully incorporated.

Asiatisch is impersonal and airtight. Musically, the album is fascinating, diverse and expertly produced. But a chance was perhaps missed to deliver something with more to say.

The immediate embrace of anything analogue-warped by certain corners of the Internet shouldn't detract from Forever, as it's quite an engaging listen when the right (nocturnal) mood strikes.

More bands should, logically, sound like this. It’s a wonder that no one wrote the song 'Pine On' before now, as incredibly basic and memorable as it is. That said, Obits fall short of Froberg’s Hot Snakes.

Even accounting for his career of uncharitable experimentation, Martin Rev’s eighth solo album is something new again. To wit, it’s a haunting, intricate electro-classical record.

In veering so hard and so often, they manage to be that rare thing: interesting. Save for later the development of brand identity and a recognizable aesthetic.

As their music has grown more detailed, the details have become ever more foreboding.

While Endless Falls and its predecessor created an organic sound by including improvised contributions from a small ensemble, the string and piano contributions here stand with classical seriousness.

Ringer is another step forward in one man's ongoing aural self-actualization through refinement of his experiences and influences.

Riches' voice can still sound a bit flat on some tracks, but his vocal and lyrical abilities have grown by leaps and bounds.

It's a rarity, though, when kids successfully switch from absorbing listlessness totransmitting it themselves. That's the case for Mikal Cronin, who takes these circumstances and makes something of it that is big and varied and hyperactive.

Dissolver sounds like an album made by folks who are mostly sick of challenging convention and just want to swim in something that reminds them of why they love rock music.

These are exceptional bar-band songs, sure, but they’re still bar band songs. Where Tomorrow’s Hits suffers, though, is in its wholesale familiarity.

It's a great, moving set of songs from one of the few modern songwriters to actively challenge his own preconceptions of his art.

The Body, the Blood, the Machine reveals a band that's a bit older, a step slower, and startlingly sardonic.

The overarching narrative structure and sequencing make this album a well-conceived exercise in storytelling.

On Our Endless Numbered Days Beam feels some pressure to subtly expand his repertoire, but the swampy blues of tracks like “Teeth In The Grass” and particularly “Free Until They Cut Me Down” interrupt the aforementioned mood like unwelcome hiccups.

The music is progressive as hell, but this feels less and less like the right thing to be concerned with.

Through the Green is one of the finest dance LPs of the year for sure, but it's not something I could listen to every day.

Certainly fans of the Blonde Redhead of old may damn Penny Sparkle with faint praise. Yet if Penny Sparkle veers a bit too close to Blonde Redhead meets Sade, it is mostly pleasant, and not for all of us is that word an epithet.

On 4, he tinkers a bit with the trim, options and manufacturing methods, but leaves Dungen’s styling fundamentally unchanged.

Devout isn’t perfect, some tracks are superfluous, but as a defiance of white stereotypes and genre clichés, it’s a remarkable work.

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.

A decidedly pleasant listening experience, if not an altogether important one.

Zayna Jumma is the first non-cassette recording of the band playing in its electric glory, and their first CD release.

It’s not what you’re expecting from Moon Duo, but it’s nonetheless quite appealing, this magic, glowing sound space that isn’t quite real, but better.

Many of these tracks--indeed some of the most interesting--are more snippets than fully developed destinations. But there are real skills on display here.