Frantic guitars, hooks that replay in your head, skeptical lust - they're all here.

One of Jamal's best in recent years.

The elements of Eddy Current Suppression Ring have always been very simple, yet they congeal in a primal, supremely compelling way. However, this time around, they’re still fundamental, but perhaps a bit less urgent, especially early on in the disc

Unfortunately, the greatest asset to Splazsh also feels like its greatest Achilles heel. The territory this album spans is substantial, but almost impossible to get into without focused, repeated listening.

By blurring the lines of his influences, Wymond Miles has been able to create an album that is very much a reflection of his own vision and personality.

The Besnard Lakes Are the Ghost Nation is another solid addition to a consistently strong discography. It doesn’t quite hit the heights of my personal favorite, Until in Excess, Imperceptible UFO, but it certainly comes close.

When Shining go technical, they do so with a flourish, but often seem too eager to return to the simpler crowd-pleasing verses and choruses that make up the meat of the album.

So yes, they've still got it. But that still begs the question; do you need re-recordings of tunes that changed the face of rock music? Not as badly as you need the originals, that's for sure.

At just 37 minutes, World Music is wisely edited--most of the songs hover around the 3-minute mark, so they speak their piece and move on before you get tempted to start peeling apart the layers to see what they're really made of.

The way this band turns well-used Americana sounds into something frightening is impressive. It's like hearing a loved one's voice when you know that you're alone, scarier in its way than any unfamiliar sound.

This austerity is reflected somewhat in the duo's avowed debt to the ambient tradition of Harold Budd and Brian Eno and, whilst that's not bad thing at all, it does mean that, at times, Ursprung tends to fold itself into the background.

A pretty percolating electro-pop record that embraces sweetness and strangeness in equal measure.

Kleyn sounds just fine accompanying herself with adept piano and efflorescent harp flourishes, her music FX-free except for a little echo, and I can imagine a less skyclad presentation simply gumming things up with New Age goo.

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.

He’s smart enough to be aware of his dorkiness, and by the end of Live From Rome he has almost turned it into an asset.

Incorruptible Heart really is a wonderful album and something beautiful to listen to, but I find myself having a very difficult time emotionally connecting to it.

There are plenty of moments among these 15 songs that are devastating in a way that’s unique to Xiu Xiu, but also moments that leave me frustrated and baffled. Essentially it’s business as usual for this brilliant yet confounding band. They challenge you to turn away, yet reward the brave and patient listener with flashes of startling beauty.

Drones and feedback accumulate, intensify, and the whole thing threatens to collapse or combust. It does neither. ... Menuck’s difficult record is clearly a post-Trump artwork, a soundtrack for outrage fatigue. Its odd power raises questions.

There's plenty of kicks left over, but it tilts the impression of the band. The Teen Beat questionnaires that come in the disc jacket (What's your favorite color? What's your shoe size?) and the shortened tracklist end up emphasizing the nerdiness over the jerkiness.

Luminiferous burns hard, but it’s searching for an attitude adjustment that could make the flames grow higher.

Carnival is far more subdued than Shanghai, simmering with supernatural menace, but never quite breaking into frenzy.

The melody is maintained, with the only difference between the two sections is a very pregnant pause added to the notes, the whole of robotic Europop from the '70s lodged into one oversized chrome éclair.

The Coathangers are clearly a band in transition, and it's very possible that this album's disjointed nature is a result of the band throwing everything against the wall and seeing what sticks.

Axis of Evol may not be a great album. It remains prey to some of McBean’s obnoxious corner-cutting. But it is his most resolute outing to date, certainly the first record he’s made that can be heard front-to-back, repeatedly, without losing most of its shine.

Screaming Females do not get me because I'm not surprised by them. I enjoy Castle Talk, but it's academic.

We are Him is more varied in texture, more resolute in execution and, to the probable amusement of Gira’s long-term coterie, an altogether darker disc.

By most measures, Cream Cuts is Tussle’s most enjoyable and fully realized release yet, but its excellence can’t compensate for the nagging sameness that plagues most of its songs.

Though it doesn’t hit the peaks of No Earthly Man, his 2005 foray into the pure history of the ballad, Spoils easily holds its own.