Even though there's a dramatic shift thematically, Collett maintains his signature sound of acoustic slow jams and the occasional up-tempo number.

Boniface is youth music, both in its vibrant shimmer and its wide-eyed, confessional storytelling, verging on embarrassing but typically landing somewhere raw and urgent.

Banks has managed to pull off a minor miracle, as Broke With Expensive Taste is an artistic success as well as a strategic one.

Never too bitter or too sweet, these songs are bursting at the seams with casual urgency, an intoxicating counterpoint to the songs' melancholy.

Part one of Sumney's smart double feature proves that art is everywhere — even in the drab hues that exist between extremes.

Though it lacks the alien opalescence of Charli's best record, how i'm feeling now contains a different sort of thrilling delirium. It's fun and sometimes silly, made on the fly and under a tight deadline. But it's desperate too — a frenzied call for release, an ode to the love that keeps us going, and further proof that no other pop artist today can make the digital sound so disarmingly human.

Mythopoetics may be Rose's most approachable album, but that just means that the world has finally caught up with Half Waif's wide-lens world.

It's singular, creative work with pure intent; that makes Girlpool an important band, and it makes Powerplant an authentic, beautiful, effective record.

Z is a quality beginning for a beguiling new artist with a fresh futurist sound.

Between its instrumental interplay and Gendron's singing and structural vision, it's a deep and gorgeous classic that moves her into the pantheon of our greatest living songwriters.

Currents is melodic, pretty, but there's a pervasive sense of melancholy here; each uplifting track feels as though it's masking sorrow with shimmering synth, a teaspoon of sugar to help the medicine down.

This is a winner, another great release from a band that, really, has no problem delivering great albums. Shape Shift with Me occupies a perfect middle ground between their last two discs, and that's a very special, and unique, place to be.

Production and keys aside, Turkey isn't much of a departure for Krol, but it may finally get him the recognition he deserves on the higher-profile Merge Records.

Mixed with poppy tracks like "Top of the World," "Pressure" and Michael Jackson meets Hall and Oates ditty "Ain't No Hat 4 That," it's evident that Thicke has created his most fun and mainstream-friendly project yet.

Patient listening toward the end of Pagans is absolutely rewarded.

Over 11 tracks and 50 minutes, the Hamilton duo create compact and unhurried works that reflect the musical simplicity and approachable feel found on their 2004 debut, Last Exit.

No matter how many times Dee Dee alludes to heartbreak and ritualistic evil, Too True is a joyful career pinnacle.

Island represents a tender, more melancholic chapter in Pallett's repertoire, but one that offers a refined perspective.

Contradictions and duplicities abound. But Webster is not putting us on. For all of its facades, Atlanta Millionaires Club is a work of arresting candour.

Lanza zooms between feelings and situations so nimbly that every time you revisit All the Time and the accompanying artwork, it's just as easy to imagine a freewheeling Lanza doing gleeful donuts in that parking lot as it is to envision her having a breakdown behind the wheel.

Curry has come a long way since he blew up and has fully solidified his place in the game. If ZUU isn't in your rotation, you're sleeping.

Skelethon is funky, freaky and heavy on the drums.

It is great to see Caroline Polachek giving a go at being an independent pop artist, and this album makes it feasible that she one day becomes a household name in the genre.

Once again, Lee Gamble has managed to produce an effort right in PAN's wheelhouse, pairing idiosyncratic experimentalism with dance floor styling, and it totally works.

It's tempting to imagine what it might sound like if Cloud Nothings took these experiments further and gave their sound a more radical reinvention. As it is, The Shadow I Remember perfectly encapsulates everything the band do so well, and hints at what might be to come.

With each song finely crafted and composed, Nervous is an exploration of sonic tension that ultimately wrings beauty from an undesirable situation.

The tuneless guitar twang that's used throughout the movie [A Scanner Darkly] and the little scraps of Radiohead tracks on offer have nothing on New Path though. All we need now is some devoted fan with editing skills to paste in the soundtrack that the movie deserves

Kommunity Service manages to deliver on almost every front. It's an impressive collaborative effort from two of California's brightest stars, yet another solid release in Mozzy's rapidly expanding catalogue and a much-needed return to form for YG following a few subpar releases.

This is a more fully realized and textured vision of what the band offered on their debut.

With its hypnotic loops and acoustic percussion, this great downtempo record, at times, calls to mind a looser, dreamier Teebs, with the melodic sense of early Four Tet.

Finnerty returns from these loftier reaches unscathed, allowing Honey to swing big without flying off the handle. Spread this one on your toast immediately.

Shabazz Palaces offer an ethereal conglomerate with a prophetic voice, a gutsy move that's more than paid off here.

By taking his time and falling in and out of love he ended up with I Know What Love Isn't, an album worth waiting another five years for.

Classic Objects ought to be weighed down by its thematic density, by its specificity and insistence on revealing its own ropes and pulleys. It's to Hval's immense credit that it feels airborne instead, the work of an artist operating at the height of her craft.

Converge have managed to once again best their only competition: themselves.

Fin serves as both introduction and transition.

With such a wealth of exposure in his musical upbringing, it's no surprise that this mix boasts the instrumental range that it does, not to mention such a precise and intuitively executed pace.

Bold and stirring, Darling of the Afterglow further establishes Lydia Ainsworth as a master of arrangement and melody, and pushes her just a few more inches toward the mainstream, where a larger, captivated following surely--and deservedly--awaits.

The momentum of King's Disease II's eventual first half results in some lag to the finish line, but whether it's inspired singles ("Rare"), fresh collaborations, new ideas or bejeweled one-liners ("How you expect to get love if you don't show none?"), King Nas serves up another reminder that he's no pretender to the throne. The wild ambition has just evolved into calculated wisdom.

By paying proper homage to his soul elders, while also employing more distinctly subtle singing and a greater relatability via his plainspoken lyrics, Smith sets himself apart with 1634 Lexington Avenue.

The Toronto, ON four-piece deliver their structurally intricate tunes with unhinged ferocity, the raw arrangements never deviating from the outfit's basic live setup of bass, pummelling drums and twin distorted guitars.

Fans of Frusciante's solo career will love this latest addition to his catalogue; it's one of his strongest releases to date.

The 11 pieces featured on The Flower and the Vessel are surprisingly complex, given Atkinson's delicate approach to her music. It is a powerful combination; she's able to present work that is at times genuinely difficult, but because it's performed with such careful subtlety, there isn't a single sharp edge to be found on the album's 70 minutes.

On False Idols, Tricky steps forward with a renewed confidence, proving himself equal parts mentor and maestro.

The fact that AraabMuzik isn't afraid to collaborate with up-and-comers (working on songs with Riot Ten, WattzBeatz, Dvnk Sinatrv) and bring in guest vocalists (Mikey Ceaser, Baauer, Raiche) gives Dream World a diverse mixtape feel that stems from and reflects the mind of a truly singular force.

Raven's unstructured, experimental feel may be unsettling for some, but the project's only other downside is that eventually, it ends.

There isn't a dull moment on this album.

While long-gone are the sonic textures of the band's early years — replaced here with some novel and resourceful instrumentation — the group's second (and now longest) run has been unbelievably solid and unimpeachable.

As their most viscerally intense release thus far, Kiss My Super Bowl Ring has the Garden screaming as much as they are singing, and transitioning between the two within a matter of seconds. Somehow, the Shears brothers are able to make it work.

The finely curated production on Slime Language 2 provides a perfect snapshot of the evolution of Atlanta's sound.

There is certainly an urgency here; a difficult album to ignore.

Townsend takes his fusion of weighty progressive metal and string, horn and choir sections to lofty heights here, not unlike what he achieved with Epicloud and Sky Blue.

As I Lay Dying bring no surprises to the table, they just continue to hone their craft and do it better than the countless clones that have popped up in their wake.

Pomegranate is sharp and vibrant, like a pulled pin it explodes lofty ideas and ideals, dreams sold to us by mainstream culture and reigning ideologies, and offers the everyday as something worth celebrating.

With each piece of childhood minutiae recollected, the divide shrinks, and there's a triumphant sense of something starting anew. Sparks flying.

Although Dedicated might be a more comprehensive piece of work as a whole, Side B is so impressively strong that it could easily be a continuation of the album (its B-side, even). Side B is brimming with starry-eyed euphoria, glittery synth-pop confections and her characteristically odd lyrical syntax.

Continuing to age gracefully, Deftones deliver an emotionally divided release with Gore, one that will continue to endear and swing with your own mood--however you're feeling.

Solo productions add ballast to an already solid outing; Knock Knock deserves your response.

Outer Heaven is consistently enjoyable, but never too comfortable.

The music slides along with a relationship to various genres that is curious and sincere while not making a firm commitment to any one, and with a depth and complexity that underlies the gentle waves on the surface.

instead of songs about past lovers and immaturity, Motorists are using philosophical ideas as fuel for their jangly indie rock.

Soulful yet sensational, Fabriclive 93 is a consuming mix that marks the intersection of Snaith's dance floor personas--and powerfully so.

Mirrored Aztec is also more tight and clean than February's Surrender Your Poppy Field – that Pollard still has this many hooks in him is mystifying.

Cooper seems to have found just the right balance of electronic elements and traditional instrumentation for this album, as well.

It's a gorgeous collection of songs, showcasing Spear's preternatural songwriting ability.

It's obvious he has a consummate ear for quality and potential. Listeners who share these sensibilities should be all over this release.

[An] astoundingly distinctive album.

The result is Protest the Hero's best effort to date, one where (relative) restraint yields a far more powerful product.

Whether you're aware of the conceptual backstory behind Potential or come into the project blind, Hinton makes the album just as conceptually moody as it is conceptually aural.

This is not just a comeback; it's All Saints' best work yet.

These unapologetically authentic offerings are balanced with several from the band's comparatively tidier self-titled LP era. The unholy marriage of mayhem and hookery on the infectiously melodic "Dirty Shirt" and "Leave Me Out" begs to be bowed to.

Either as a companion or a standalone, it's a consuming piece of music that reminds us of the Weavers' ambition to always lead and never follow.

On Migration Stories, M. Ward doesn't change the way he delivers his material as much as he alters the way it reverberates once it hits you.

There are no interludes or breaks, a consistency that is both the band's greatest strength and only weakness.

Old Star sounds as new as it does born of another epoch, reminding us that though genres and scenes may change, the riff is eternal.

The directness of Bully's songs--both emotionally and melodically--is their strongest asset, but it's tough to argue that Bognanno has any discernable weakness when it comes to her music.

III is fuzzy, fast-paced and ferocious in all of the ways we would expect from FUZZ. Ty Segall, Charles Moothart, and Chad Ubovich have carefully conjured cacophony once again, in what might be at once their most spontaneous and their most down-to-earth record to date.

The Mountain Goats really haven't gotten the attention they deserve over the past several years, so if you want to introduce someone to them, Songs for Pierre Chuvin is a fitting choice. It's a great example of the heart of the band.

Merriweather Post Pavilion remains as culturally important as it felt back in 2009. Ballet Slippers mines that very significance for its pure euphoria, and with carefully selected performances and interpretations, this celebration of that groundbreaking work does justice to its source material.

Being more open to collaborations, and trusting the process of a co-producer, the quality of production is more on the synthetic side, but the record still has a sense of nostalgia that permeates her techno-pop melodies, because of the heavy synths.

Insula is a cerebral, introspective record offering an abrupt turn from pigeonholing that tags grime as street music, the melodic refrains often more baroque and fantastical than they are rough and hard-hitting.

In the end, Everything Hits at Once may not be the most necessary thing. But, like most of Spoon's material, it is a well-crafted, admirable work — a pleasurable end unto itself.

Sometimes, a cloud isn't just a cloud, and Morgan's Equivalents offers a space to ponder the difference.

Burning Love add a dark edge to credible rock bands like Queens of the Stone Age and in doing so, have crafted one of the catchiest hardcore albums, or heaviest rock albums, of the year.

Her party-girl braggadocio feels more nuanced by recent tragedy. Yes, listeners are blasted with sex-positive bangers that bounce from wall-to-wall, like the infectious "Body," which will surely be gentrified by White TikTok in the coming days, but these moments are made human next to moments like "Circles" where she reflects on recent trauma.

At first listen, the album is scattered and slightly exhausting; it takes several attempts to make sense of everything you're hearing, and some listeners may run out of the patience required to dissect it all. Those with a longer attention span, though, will find SYRE a very promising debut that offers new delight with every play.

Across its 13 songs, the beats are crisp, the choruses pronounced and the hooks sharp.

There's a sense of well-earned intimacy throughout Local Honey, with songs that speak plainly and from the heart about deepening relationships and the life-sustaining love that comes from them. This record is warm, instantly inviting and crackling with life.

Verminous acts as a solid testing ground for experimentation in the band's sound that works well and could be improved and perfected as time goes on.

Women in Music Pt. III flips between the band's least and most processed work to date. Both sides yield highlights. ... It's as multifaceted as the music it encapsulates and the women who made it.

The rawness of the band puts them in a different category than other soul revivalists like Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, but the visceral quality of Boys & Girls gives Alabama Shakes an edge.

With progression and reinvention a staple of Romare's work, we can only wait in anticipation for his next release

Unsurprisingly, the results are some of Crutchfield's biggest rock'n'roll anthems yet.

Essentially, Yukon Blonde sound like a new band, and they may just be your new favourite because of it.

These are supremely creative songs ― violently sexy, humorous and malformed extractions from some of experimental music's most delightfully twisted minds.

The absence of track titles sometimes forces the listener to reach further into the album's alien sounds, but as Ultimate Care II hits the five-minute mark the novelty wears off and absorption into the composition's overall mood takes place, as Matmos do a terrific job of blending the album's noises (which ranges from water sloshing to lids slamming to knobs grinding) into a captivating whole.

This album strikes an intriguing, if slightly schizophrenic, balance between gently meandering almost-psychedelia and the restless rhythmic activity of recent dance styles.

Barragán is not an album determined to grab you in one listen; it's a "grower," as they say, but once it grows, it's apparent there's no shortage of baroque delights to discover on this veteran band's ninth album.