The most cohesive LP in at least five years and its darkest, most urgent, most intense work to date.

Biasonic Hotsauce is broken up by some campy skits that buffer the genre hops, and after a few of them, the record turns toward electro.

It's hard to imagine 200 Years standing out, even considering its low-key spirit.

Let the Poison Out only ups the ante. Distortion is easy and lo-fi bands are a dime a dozen, but hardly any of them clean up this well.

Just as Dedication surprised many listeners by aptly navigating theme, mood and flow, Nothing demonstrates Zomby knows his foundational sounds, the everything upon which he builds, better than anyone.

Even when you don't understand fully what's going on (is this song about L.A. or Baghdad?), the songs are catchy enough that you don't mind.

There's a just-right roughness to the recording that has worked for bands as diverse as The Commandos and The Trashmen.

Interestingly, the presence of the source music doesn't detract from the spooky, remote quality that characterizes The Caretaker.

It's just a smart encapsulation of underground dance music's better qualities, but not so showoffy that it can't work as an hourlong immersion tank.

The music has a bare-trees feel that dovetails with the wintry theme. There's plenty of orchestration, but it's all framing and backdrop for Bush's piano and voice.

Cave never quite summons the lyrical beauty that Neu! was capable of, nor do they rock with the blithering, obliterating tension that Oneida brings to its hardest bangers, but once or twice during Neverendless, they do turn locomotive precision into something transformative.

Spills Out isn't the best record of its ilk to come out this year, but it's not the worst, either.

The reissue shows how prickly and difficult Social Climber's aesthetic could be, its arrangements as sparse as Young Marble Giants, though less even less concerned with hook and melody.

Suffice to say Impossible Spaces itself is a journey, and one of the more all-encompassing ones I've had the pleasure of taking this year.

Bright and Vivid gives little of itself immediately, but unfolds to a much larger extent over time.

It's a slight little album about fascinations, and a product of them, too, which, whether you share those fascinations or find them boring, is perfectly fine.

While McCombs may not transcend his influences, his sense of...well, humor on Humor Risk does set him apart from the current crop of guitar-based musicians that wallow in the dour and faux-clever.

That such disparate musicians with such massive amounts of tape from the field could put something together this tastefully gives hope that whatever and wherever Albarn decides to operate next, he conducts proceedings in the same considered fashion as he has here.

For all the ups and downs, this collection fulfills Martin's goal of continuing the conversation.

It's a conservative, often misguided assault on mainstream dance music.

It was obviously made with care, and, as an result, is pretty easy on the ears. Much of it is also over-saturated, poured on too thick, and it can be cloying in its polite pleasantness.

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.

Veronica Falls are enjoyable to listen to, but they don't seem to offer more than that fleeting smile.

You need to listen and absorb. It won't always work. But when it does, you'll find the door open and a fascinating terrain inside.

Ultimately, this album manages to sound like all and none of these, making Barn Owl a band that's becoming harder to pin down and easier to appreciate.

He doesn't quite sell the thesis that that's the point.

I can't say I'll be giving Inside the Ships more spins this year, but it's offbeat charm never felt like a waste of my time when I did, and that's more than I can say for most albums this year.

Breaks in the Armor may, with a few slight tweaks, find Bachmann doing more or less the same thing as he's done on his past few albums, but when he does it this well, there's little reason to object.