Ultimately, this album probably won’t be the critical sleeper hit that its predecessor was-–it’s hard to find fault with the band’s playing, the choice of songs, and the overall premise, but Thing of The Past only nudges their art forward a bit from "To Find Me Gone."

It's cool that he's trying to change things up, but there's no substitute for a strong result.

Oldham's music, while drawing on familiar influences ' Neil Young and the Grateful Dead are immediately apparent ' is diverse enough that it feels far fresher than a by-the-numbers retread.

Nightshade's 10 songs unpack desire and affection and come up with the notion that disappointment is every bit worth savoring as joy because a romantic betrayal might acquaint you with real (not necessarily romantic) love. So while this record sounds pensive and lingers on experiences of loss, it's not depressing.

Out Hud’s new-found pop smarts leave you hoping that they’ll drop the instrumentals and devote a whole album to songs.

The players are so good that even their sketches make for engaging listening. And two songs on the EP are quite good.

There's plenty to like in this abbreviated outing, and hardly anything to raise the hackles.

Back to Reality's themes are pretty simple: having fun, getting laid and falling in love, all on the dance floor. It has just the right mix of crassness and manners, in a proportion that seems more than a bit quaint by today's standards.

For a songwriter who packs so much into his creations, it’s no surprise that Mercer makes it hard to get a full measure of 5 Dreams’ narrative gist, even after multiple listens. Approach these songs however you choose, and they’re sure to shift evasively, compelling you to follow.

Play It Strange covers plenty of ground and suggests that the folks in The Fresh & Onlys are far from out of compelling ideas, it also finds the band playing at a kind of strangeness that sounds suspiciously like work.

All told, Light Divide is a pretty thing, transporting and enveloping and full of glowing tones. Yet even as you’re listening to it, it slips away, and when you’re done, it’s like you’ve been asleep.

Teen Dream’s best material comes up front (“Zebra,” “Silver Soul,” “Norway” “Walk in the Park”) , and there’s a bit of a sag in the middle (“Lover of Mine,” “Better Times”), with songs that are pretty enough, but without any big payoffs.

It's got an energy that's usually associated with naiveté and learning instruments on the job. The trio knits their little hand-played loops together loosely, and in a certain light, there are places it unspools completely.

With Intoxicated Women we don’t get starlets and a known bad boy tussling in the spotlight. We get Harvey and his cast of players dusting off old scripts of prior perversions, delivering them to a world that fancies itself jaded, but is just as confused as ever.

The proceedings would be a lot less palatable if they didn’t often achieve a forceful, unhinged immediacy; amid the heavy themes and brash posturing, there’s still room for the band to elbow in some loud, rousing real life.

It’s nothing new and it’s nothing scary, but its renewed vigor is encouraging.

It has a denser, more cohesive sound, more defined rhythms and richer arrangements--and yet lacks some of the subterranean pull of its predecessor.

Even incoherent and excessively long, Frozen Niagara Falls shows that, like John Wiese with his recent--and more rewarding--masterpiece Deviate From Balance, Fernow is pulling apart the clichés of noise and looking at where it goes from here.

Even if it fails to meet impossibly high expectations, The Harrow & The Harvest offers a handful of keepers while moving Welch and Rawlings (hopefully) past their writers' block.

With the exception of the somewhat dull “Dormant Love,” I’m altogether satisfied.

The music doesn’t go far enough--it’s too restrained and mellow--but the point of view is crystal clear. This is alternative rock clinically perfected in a perpetual adolescence.

He doesn’t always push far enough; the album’s best when we feel the tightwire of this experience rather than when we suspect an agnostic at play. Religious language and transcendent experience (secular or sacred, if we divide them) come loaded with danger. The more Morby pushes into that space and the more he asks of the listener, the deeper the experience.

As far as conclusions about Popular Songs go, it’s fair to address the reader not as a consumer of the music, but as someone breezing through its clean, familiar architecture. You should check this place out. It’s pretty sweet, and I think you’ll like the light.

Basic, unassuming, and calling to mind a grip of classic material without going to great lengths to mimic it, Rush to Relax, the band’s third LP, adds almost nothing new to Eddy Current Suppression Ring’s repertoire.

It remains a little bit of all its influences, at times more like soul, at times almost straight country (particularly on “Here Is Where the Loving Is At”), but more often the proverbial blender mix.

Over the course of Spike Field’s 50 minutes, the songs’ prevalent mood can prove hypnotic if you’re receptive to its atmosphere. MBC is certainly adept at conjuring and sustaining a melancholy, nocturnal scene.

The 13 songs on What It Means to Be Left-Handed are all, in their own way, enjoyable. The ideas and collaborations on display are impressive, as is the stylistic range. But there's still a bit of cohesion missing there--something that makes What It Means to Be Left-Handed feel more like a collection of individually good ideas and less like a singular artistic statement.

Admittedly, this is a record with a specific style and set of concerns: if you don’t like your post-punk hyper-focused and with Van Morrison-levels of nods to mysticism, you may lose patience with it quickly. For those who appreciate the iconoclasm involved, however, there’s plenty to savor here.