The Sun Dogs features solid, compelling songwriting and sounds wonderful; heavy, spacious guitars flare up amidst the smoke, and when these guys start to rip, there’s no stopping them.

There are a few thrilling moments here—notably the cinematic ballad “Nothing”--but the band mostly flounders as it seeks a new direction.

You’d be hard-pressed to find a more shimmering or sunnier pool party soundtrack.

While it does lack the sprawling, cinematic vibes of the previous two Quasimoto albums (and most of the skits), it will appeal to fresh ears for its lack of the sometimes-difficult segmentation and abrupt change-ups in which those records often mired.

Austra do a stellar job of navigating a sea of vintage synth sounds and applying them tastefully and appropriately so that they sound at once both retro-cool and strikingly forward-thinking.

Make no mistake, Kveikur is another brilliant addition to the Sigur Rós canon; it’s just not, you know...different brilliant.

Lilacs & Champagne are quite successful in setting the mood on their second post-Grails record.

It’s not immediately remarkable but certainly hum-worthy, growing on a listener like flowers blooming after a long winter and timidly warming to the sun again.

It’s more streamlined than their past work, more ornate while simultaneously accessible and experimental, though that may be partially to their producer’s credit.

Despite this dark lyrical shift, the group is still aping sunny surf-rock and collegiate-pop tropes.

While part of this consistency is the cursive guitar work and snappy hooks that adorn many of the tracks, the fluidity within and between songs also plays a significant role. Rogue Wave have risen to the occasion.

A poster child for all things 1970s, Friedberger’s obsession with the decade colors the album with a breezy charm.

Avalanche enjoys an embarrassment of melodic riches and the luminous release blows up the fragile soul heard on the duo’s self-titled debut to heroic proportions.

It isn’t business as usual, either; these songs sound grander without losing their quaintness and some tread unfamiliar ground.

Bleeker brilliantly masks the fact that his stability has gone adrift with the perfect blend of peppy tempos, airy harmonies, dream-like slide guitar and essential Hammond organ.

It has stylistic cohesion on its side, even though that’s where it’s at its most derivative, but it’s like an antique firearm--it might look the part, but it’s not much good for shooting.

If Silver Wilkinson is supposed to be a journey, it sounds like Mr. Wilkinson got a little lost along the way.

Although the songs carry recurring tropes of eagles, devils and the sea, as well as her signature intricate guitar picking, the most haunting aspect is--considering this accomplishment--realizing the potential that is yet to come.

These instruments layer in complex, hypnotic patterns that drone in and over themselves, forged together to create less an emotional outcry than the hazy anguish of recalled emotion.

A somewhat random but enjoyable and welcome compilation.

The standout beats have some old-school crackle and POC is most interesting when Kweli can relax and just, you know, be brilliant.

If you’re not bothered by the doom and gloom, Obsidian is just over 43 minutes of imaginative and spacious electro art--at times a bit jarring, but mostly beautiful.

It’s Nocturnes' two sleek singles (“Motorway,” “Broken Record”) that manage the best in dark electronic allure with shiny, hook-driven choruses.

Not content to simply cop post-punk aesthetics, these East London dread merchants are steeped in the sort dystopianism and apocalyptic anxiety that drove the likes of Killing Joke and The Banshees to such dizzying heights of foreboding.

Jim Eno wound them up and let them go to conjure the showy (“One Girl/One Boy”), the chatty (“Fine Fine Fine”), the high hippie-ish (“Californiyeah”) and mostly the buoyantly oddball without losing track of the band’s tense rhythms, nervous songcraft and all around raw silken soul.

3 shows a slightly darker side of the squeaky-clean She.

Despite a pronounced lean towards the gritty in all its finer trappings, Deerhunter’s fifth longplayer is riddled with some of Cox’s most structurally sound songwriting.

The record does sound like the soundtrack to a bad dream--but you won’t want to wake from it.