The songs feel pared back and polished and just about exactly right, whether in the gospel-swelling idiom of Iron & Wine’s Sam Beam or in the jazzier, more experimental haunts of Calexico. There’s nothing extra, nothing silly, nothing distracting, these songs are as streamlined as an otter in water, slipping through in cool, frictionless purity.

No Keys again has no indelible riffs, but it doesn’t seem to be missing them anymore. Instead Dommengang goes deep into the abyss of buzz and croon and humming mystery and finds something beautiful, maybe what they were looking for the whole time.

With this album, NOTS continues to reinvent itself in interesting ways that make sense for them. An experiment, an extension, a logical next step that you didn’t see coming, 3 is a significant move ahead for a band that is always worth watching.

Laughing Matter is a Major Statement in the classic style, which might have been irksome if Wand hadn’t pulled it off. Successful gestures of this sort can serve the purpose of reminding us why those tropes were satisfying in the first place, and if this album doesn’t quite boast the succinct charms of past releases its makes its own, compelling argument to turn on, tune in, and just let it all wash over you.

The looping phrases of Reward are carefully considered and joined with the precision of mortise and tenon. Her songs have always been like small rooms, though they are no longer drafty and rustic. This is a record of tidy natural sounds. They are not immediately inviting, yet spending time in these well-mannered spaces becomes a pleasure.

The Imperial [is] a pleasure to hear. Sonically, the dark, rich timbres of The Imperial are as wallow-worthy and voluptuous as bar-light or certain kinds of sadness. Like the assuredly crappy hotel from which it takes its name, The Imperial is too run through with exhaustion to want to spend a lot of time with, but it’s perfect for retreating into when you can’t feel right about anything.

Venom Prison makes songs that are just as musically violent as the stuff their deathgrind peers churn out, often thrillingly so. But the Welsh band lifts the subgenre out of the thematic gutter. ... This is a terrific record.

In 27 short tracks, Flamagra creates a vivid, memorable collage of L.A. life circa 2019, speaking to both the complicated present and the imaginative future of the city Flying Lotus calls home.

Brown addresses alienation, identity, the lure of the spectacle, religion but she does so with an oblique approach to words that mirrors Drahla’s approach to their music. If this all sounds very serious be assured that Useless Connections is an album that, above all, rocks.

This is a four-way conversation rather than a competition for attention and the musicians display a depth of mutual understanding that belies the fact that they are playing together for the first time. Urselli’s production gives each instrument room to breathe and the tracks swell and recede at a relaxed pace as layers of guitar, synth and sound effects form palimpsests of sound.

Rave ‘Til You Cry is a welcome reminder of Raczynski’s skill, his lightness of touch and the sheer exuberance of his music. If it’s exhausting to dance to it’s great to hear and to reminisce about the Battles of Beatdom.

I liked it better when Olden Yolk songs glowed with auras around their edges, when they surrounded themselves with a special kind of air that reverberated with songs in the process of becoming.

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.

Young Enough is a big pop influenced record that rings authentic and hits every mark both lyrically and musically--an album to dance the pain away.

There’s maybe a bit less of the clever wordplay here than on previous albums, but the words, like the music, are sturdy, not over-crowded, unexpected and right. There’s not a cliché on the disc, but the lines lead exactly where they need to go, slipping sideways into standards that are off center enough to matter.

This Mess Is a Place is considerably more grown up and pop-leaning than any of Tacocat’s previous albums, with lavishly massed vocals and bounce-y hooks, yet it retains an air of joyous subversion, sweet but spiky and smart.

Life Metal is music as event. It’s a terrific record.

What unites the songs, if anything, is a breezy insouciance that belies careful construction. You get the sense that, like Yeats’ women, this is an album that must “labor to be beautiful.” It hides the work very well behind a sunny façade, but you don’t get movie-perfect string swells and luminous vintage keyboard lines and cheerful blurts of all-hands brass without a certain amount of forethought. Consider Collins the impresario, taking what his collaborators give him and polishing it to a high gloss.

All Time Present is a guitar players album, but more than that, a songwriter’s work.

In the relentless, rampant pursuit and procurement of new musical product, it’s easy to lose sight that a return to and expansion of what’s worked previously can prove just satisfying for both artists and listeners.

V for five, V for victory and V for very much what you want from the Budos Band.

Not only is Ilana Moctar’s best record, it’s also one of the best Saharan records to reach Western ears, and an early contender for the most exhilarating rock record of 2019.

While Sky Blue may have the most appeal for those who are already immersed in Van Zandt’s work, it’s good enough to rank among his studio albums. It distills what makes Van Zandt a compelling figure and shows him using his delivery to match the strength of his material.

A record that’s wonderfully represents Clark as the songwriter he was without turning the focus to Earle and the Dukes.

The Seduction of Kansas is, all things considered, a solid second album. It builds on the promise of Nothing Feels Natural, and while it occasionally fumbles its own goals, it’s hard to fault Priests for aiming high. One can only hope that the radical ambition and sense of purpose on display here carries them far into the future.

Czarface Meets Ghostface may not be the stone cold classic the participants are capable of but it is a very enjoyable trip through a world populated by comic book and movies heroes and villains.

Martha’s music may be good for you or good for the planet or good for society, but at its heart, it is just damned good.

It’s kind of fun to hear Ex Hex experiment with their production, but it would have been more fun to hear them take some real risks with, say, an acoustic number or some synths. Truth is, despite its heft, It’s Real isn’t a huge departure from Rips. It’s more like a bulky rough draft of the record that preceded it.