Heavily arranged around Hans-Joachim's piano playing, much of the music on Echtzeit is surprisingly melodic, as Qluster keeps a thawing pace throughout the album.

While INVSN probably won't shock anyone sonically or lyrically, there is still definitely a spark of creativity and honest expression here.

It appears that Williamson is always fleeing from somewhere and yearns to live a life with no regrets with the time we have left. Sorceress is her personal but inspiring, magical journey to get to that point.

The piece has a propulsive quality, even if it isn't travelling at a danceable BPM, and at 41 minutes, it never lags. It's also very listenable, its infinite aural nuances — blips and bloops, pounds and crackles, hisses and animal sounds — offering a constant source of delight, calm and exploration.

It's a brand new soundtrack that doesn't require a film. Carpenter knows exactly how to appease his fans, and with Lost Themes, he has given them just what they want.

A dose of psychedelic pop, captivating hooks, and guitar trembles enhance the listening experience. Exploring the themes of new opportunities, growth, disconnection and hope, listeners can feel frontman Jack Steadman's raw emotions.

This is Ghersi in her truest form — which is to say that it is many forms at once. The record zigzags between styles and moods at a breakneck pace, collapsing genre in its wake and crafting new pop forms – never has an Arca album held so many moments of pure songcraft.

Eva Moolchan reaches new heights in her career on Happy Birthday, but not without encountering a few bumps in the road. Even at its questionable points, though, there is something beautifully refreshing about a new Sneaks album — Moolchan is having fun, and she doesn't care what you think about it.

Commonwealth offers a little something for everyone, no matter what you're looking for.

Valtari might not be Sigur Rós's greatest work, but it is an album of subtle beauty and remarkable restraint that deserves to be heard.

Natural Disaster builds on the laidback, Californian sound that defined much of Best Coast's catalogue, and is a reflective time capsule of a moment between distinct chapters in Cosentino's life.

Originally envisioned as the first in a series of efforts to help inspire artists (hence the title), this is the perfect album to sleep, cry or meditate to, an album for life on this planet from an artist usually obscured by the whirring of machines. Imagine that.

McCartney III is more than your average covers album — each collaborator stretches the skeletons of McCartney's songs into something new, making the album an unconventional collection of tracks that bypass the rules of genre and sonic cohesion. Few will enjoy every track on this album, but it's the versatility and diversity throughout these tracks that truly make McCartney III Imagined the record that it is.

Her drive and influences are there, but, moving forward, the search for hooks may remain her greatest challenge.

Few of his contemporaries possess a post-important-band solo discography as prolific and consistently great as that of Stephen Malkmus, but each new album firmly leaves his past in the dust.

The majority of the record does take the tortoise's path to victory and proves that with this kind of music, it's really not a race at all, but a fight.

While not as album-oriented as their past efforts have been, Fashion Week functions well as a beat tape through the diverse range of influences that Hill and producer Andy "Flatlander" Morin and have chosen to explore.

The slow roll-out of singles over the past few months leading up to its release makes Product hard to consider as a singular cohesive package, but as a primer on SOPHIE, it's as good as it gets, a snapshot of an exciting artist whose tightrope walk between sweet and scary, pop and avant-garde, has yielded some of the best singles of the past few years.

While various artists-type vehicles do tend to feel disjointed in spots — this one included— the versatility and energy of the Free Nationals is bolstered by their upper tier level of craft, something a lot of backing bands rarely receive credit for. With that in mind, this self-titled outing is a treat.

Lyrically, the songs are often about longing and seemingly missed connections, but by creating such a rich and textured album, NZCA Lines connect strongly, expanding their sound and blossoming accordingly.

There is an invigorating energy that shines through the lyrics and tempo of this album, so although lyrics about the finer things of California living aren't necessarily profound or entirely relatable, on Man About Town, Hawthorne's buoyant optimism for beginning anew in 2016 is utterly contagious.

The rest is more than art for art's sake, and a pleasure for the ADD listener in all of us.

The drawback is that the lyrics are often too hushed and garbled, which makes it seem like he doesn't really care about what he's saying, and so maybe you shouldn't, either.

She takes a left turn after her more recognizable house palette in the first half of the EP.

Delete the rest of the interludes and you'll have a worthy sequel to Deltron's debut.

Luminous is a tremendously dense record, but one that manages to find ample breathing space for each of its studio takes.

The good news is that even without Adrian Younge's luscious music to draw from, Premier has found a clearly ample replacement with the more eclectic, less retro up-and-coming composer Antman Wonder. All that, along with Royce's ambitious spitting, make PRhyme 2 a prime contender for the best hip-hop LP of 2018.

Between appealing beats and this discomfiting tone, Silver Eye sits in a middle zone--and while it could give listeners some better-defined emotional content behind the android-y veneer, it's by no means borin