It's more of the same on his second album, a collection so bland, it makes hardtack seem sumptuous.

Universal Mind Control gets stuck in the same rut as so many other booty-jam records do: It's not all that memorable.

It's a bland album that rarely shifts tempo and shows almost none of the personality Jackson used to have.

By the end of Teenage Dream--hell, halfway through--it's apparent that neither Perry nor her collaborators had much to say that was meaningful, or even particularly interesting. It sure didn't stop them from saying it anyway.

Even Banks' better-than-average skills can't save "Rotten Apple" from mediocrity.

Harry remains a creative force, and it's clear she needs to continue making music, but her new songs lack the cohesive spark needed to make anyone but diehard fans take notice.

The bloody, boastful rhymes are mostly DOA, victims of songs that value attitude over arrangement.

The music on Take It to the Limit is forceful and full of bright, churning guitars, with just enough melody to elevate the songs above most of the hedonistic hard rock out there.

The third disc, Bria Valente's Elixer, is a tepid afterthought.

The irony is that such a colorful person and performer in life has seen so little of that fire (no pun intended for those who recall Lopes' most infamous exploit) carry over to her work.

It's an odd sort of talent, making joyless slogs out of music that is supposed to be fun and exuberant, but The Beginning is at its core a shrine to forced joviality, and that's no fun at all.

Band leaders Justin Warfield and Adam Bravin write songs that are well-constructed and generally catchy. Then again, that's not such a marvel when so much of it--the drums on 'True Romance,' the stinging guitar riff on 'Pretend the World Has Ended,' the synth-heavy hooks of 'She Will Always Be a Broken Girl'--comes from a template some other band crafted

An honest, humble, rootsy record that shows the band maturing.

The band sounds crisper and cleaner than it should.

He overreaches on occasion, but more often pulls off the sort of trick he manages with 'Families Cheating at Board Games,' merging faith and offbeat, cerebral underpinnings to forge quirky slivers of fresh perspective.