This boxset--quite literally a suitcase--highlights four distinct sides of one of the most prolific icons of the pre-dylan era, and introduces both unreleased and released tracks to a new generation in themed installments. History is back in session. [Fall 2009, p.100]

Hospice accomplishes volumes by the addition of drumer Michael Lerner and multi-instrumentlist Darby Cicci, creating an expansively profound album addressing life's most transitory and fragile states. [Summer 2009, p.94]

While normally "killer flute" and "far-out sitar" playing would feel incredibly counterfeit coming from a white guy based in California, it's his classic roots that keep it all grounded. And this album has both in spades. [Summer 2009, p.93]

His voice is as naive as ever, yet Wind’s Poem churns like nothing from his past, providing a therapeutic musical massage.

This album has the beauty of controlled chaos, it's emotive yet carefree and secure. [Spring 2009, p.103]

In the jumble of See Mystery Lights (I can't tell yet if it's the brainwashing taking efffect), I might be willing to commit to whatever they're offering. [Summer 2009, p.98]

The tunes are still catchy, head-bobbing and toe-tapping, a kind of summer soundtrack that brightens your mood even if it doesn't quite make you smile, and sometimes that's all an album needs to be. [Summer 2009, p.103]

The practice spent fiddling with slower and more methodical tracks on the excellent "Purpleface" EP shows its effectiveness plainly here. [Summer 2009, p.100]

That the group could go from the sneering jauntiness of 'Girls And Boys' to the paranoid anxiety of 'Song 2' with no drop in hook-effectiveness is startling in itself; that it managed to continuously and effortlessly navigate th incomprehensible expanse between The Kinks and Brian Eno is an utterly singular achievement. [Summer 2009, p.94]

I'm Going Away is a decent road, but don't worry; you'll be able to put it dow. [Summer 2009, p.94]

Josephine isn't a drastically different approach for Magnolia Electric Co., but it's a lovely one that bears repeated listening, preferably at night while alone on the open road. [Summer 2009, p.94]

THe Knot is an iron-willed, albeit reserved, expansion of the duo's sound. [Summer 2009, p.106]

Where do these ever-evolving Portlanders go from here? It's anyone's guess, but their latest effort sends them off in the right direction. [Summer 2009, p.106]

Void of irony but sounding slightly inauthentic, Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeroes hit the right notes but may be a little late to the revival. [Summer 2009, p.96]

Despite the album's wide-armed title and obvious sweet-leafed leanings, these may not be the kind of people you want to party with. [Spring 2009, p.102]

Broken Records has a notable ability to convey otherworldly transit to past centuries and places, but unlike those aforementioned Americans, they sometimes take the wandering toward places too far off the beaten track. Summer 2009, p.103]

This one settles for regrettably generic high-plains fiddle and wistful sighs of pedel-steel guitar. [Summer 2009, p.94]

Here, every strain, key, and vocal is stirred up into a creaky, constanaut, clearly-defined symphony. [Summer 2009, p.98]

There's an underlying transcendence in McCombs' work that acts as pure poetry, but it also can come across as direct storytelling when taken at surface value. [Summer 2009, p.96]

Wilco (The Album) adds yet another chapter to the story, and if this band's relevance is to continue going forward, then let the resilent closer 'Everlasting Everything ' score our impending sunrise. [Summer 2009, p.90]

Like a Lynchian vision, it's darkly mysterious and disconsolate, but essentially human--and it's that sense of the persistence of humanity that lends this work its majesty. [Summer 2009, p.91]

Though it's no breakthrough, Varsons serves as a nice holdover until the new set of material we've been promised. [Summer 2009, p.100]

Her new environs are distinctly different to the basement recordings of her past, but the friends she brings along preserve some of the intimacy and spontaneity of the dramtis personae that earns her the adjective, "Spektorian." [Summer 2009, p.91]

Krug's songwriting can't help but put a smile on your face when you really try to let your guard down, and if you want the summer documented by epic eccentricity, this is your callling. [Sep 2009, p.94]

The band is not exactly daytripping here and there is a great fervor in what they do, but the fruit is not quite ripe. [Summer 2009, p.102]

This isn't a necessarily better brand of Foreign Born shoegaze, but it is far shiner and more decidely American made. [Summer 2009, p.96]

Despite its wandering parts and spacious production, Bitte Orca is a precise groove, almost medical in the way it delivers its complexity with such simple terms. [Spring 2009, p.100]

All the things you love about Sonic Youth are here, just a little fewer and further between than you'd like. [Spring 2009, p.93]