The a-ha moments in the archaeological game Magic Kids sets up on Memphis are fun precisely because the songs are so unassuming in their saccharine one-dimensionality.

On There’s No Home, Hunter reveals a human (albeit a chemically depressed human) range of emotion, making her narrative more believable but much less captivating.

Scatterbrain is a record of stocktaking but also of hope, at 32 minutes perhaps a lesser entry in The Chills’ canon, it is reminder that one of the great shapers and survivors of the antipodean sound still has much to offer.

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.

The Line may be as polarizing as ever, but fuck me, can it play a righteous drinking song.

A dream of an album.

For the most part, it sounds like giddy, faux-innocent psychedelia filtered through a kaleidoscope, moody but never mopey.

As one comes to appreciate them through repeated listens, it becomes clear that what initially sounds like a letdown is, from another vantage point, an impressive achievement.

Loney Dear’s latest, Dear John, is an endearing slice of small sigh indie-pop, well ornamented and too cute by half.

More important than the album’s conceit and whatever toehold it might offer, though, is that it sports less flab than their critical breakthrough.

Scratched up, indifferently tuned, coming in ghostly and pale like AM radio, Strange Boys’ first full-length has the banked fire of a slow burner.

To think about Invisible Girl too much would most certainly do it a disservice. Khan and BBQ are obviously not reinventing the wheel -- they’re just reveling in the eternal command of lock-up-your-daughters rock & roll.

This album, like others that nudge closer to perfection without technically breaking new ground--I'm thinking of the Cass McCombs and Tape albums, to name ones I've written about this year--could be a springboard for thinking about why musicians who seem capable of almost anything stay in their comfort zones for albums at a time.

Though the music lulls and comforts, you get the sense that these Lightman sisters harbor a prickly thought or two.

These songs are dull because they are about dullness, as sad movies are sad because they are about sadness.

Listening to Souvenir, I can’t help but think of Stuck, the Chicago post-punk-into-no-wave outfits that sometimes refers to itself as “evil Omni.” .... Comparing the two, you might begin to wonder if there’s anything solid behind Omni’s detached cleverness, it’s super clean, super manicured attack. Maybe regular Omni could benefit from a touch of evil.

Fantasy Empire’s production values keep some of this internal resistance in check, and the album’s relatively linear songwriting does the rest, with much of the record proceeding at a pretty steady gallop, without too many wrinkles or games of musical tug of war.

There can never be too much of this kind of music--so there's a built-in safety in Ways of Meaning for Dunn as an artist and for its listeners. It's automatically successful if you take it up on its own terms, but I get the feeling Dunn is inching his way toward something that elicits a more nuanced response.

Bermuda Drain bears the influence of Fernow's recent work with gloom-pop monger Wesley Eisold of Cold Cave. Synths dominate: crystalline, graceful and clean.

This is a decidedly unhurried album, and it takes a while to find the small pleasures within each song. But once you do, it’s really fantastic.

Instead of creating a sense of intimidation through overpowering samples and sheer brute force, they realize it through a cinematic eeriness and minimalist disquiet.

It's enjoyable and I find myself anticipating the songs.

The music (which is credited to the Cairo Gang) is in a soft folk vein and sounds as though it were designed to be complementary to Oldham's lyrics rather than to showcase the Cairo Gang's own talents.

“Everybody’s Song” features the melodic discipline, barely contained anguish and cryptic lyrical finger-wagging that marked the last few Posies records. “Just Stand Back” (“I’m gonna turn on you so fast”) is a hateful little bon-bon that could stand tall on a Sugar record. And yet, The Great Destroyer remains too rickety and pristine to be anyone’s baby but Low’s.

What is interesting about the Pipettes is that they're creating incredibly catchy, well-made pop music.... But their music could be something more.

JG manages to both make fun and have fun, their music more goofy than cynical.

If you flipped over Car Seat Headrest or just harbor a fondness for melodic hiss and fuzz, you’ll like this.

Only after the shock of genre and time warping wares off does the album’s real beauty become apparent.