Songs of Mass Destruction is a crop of solid, occasionally over-refined songs in which she consistently delivers lyrics with grand flourishes even as she lends them powerful intimacy.

Besides his singular style on the mike, it's Busdriver's willingness to challenge orthodoxy that's most refreshing.

These relatively simple power-pop songs aren't always big or memorable enough to support their grand conceits.

The Scottish singer builds on the promise of her first album with Drastic Fantastic.

Her songs and the ways in which she works them frequently lack distinction, and though an artist whose appeal is rough edges doesn't need to be sophisticated to be effective, neither should she be quite so ordinary.

The collection's 17-song canvas is sufficiently broad to hold the spirited, honky tonk-laced jaunt of the title track and the softly pulsating, organ-laced gospel of 'If Jesus Walked the World Today.'

Calling on producer Steve Fisk, current Wilco guitarist Nels Cline, and members of Vetiver and Evangelista, Toth conjures a down-home vibe that sinks in slowly but surely.

With so many stylistic shifts, there's no easy description for the kind of album My Morning Jacket has created, so let's leave it at this: Evil Urges is the sound of a great band that's only getting better.

Matthews finds a skillful balance in his lyrics between off-handed whimsy and deeper reflections, and the others back him with a tighter version of the instrumental interplay that has made them one of the most popular American bands of the past 15 years.

The beats are tight, the rhymes are tighter and the ladies seem like they're having fun without trying too hard or taking themselves too seriously.

Not all the songs work as well... But Adams dials in the sound of vintage Willie on a new version of "Sad Songs and Waltzes," and suddenly the pairing seems positively inspired.

The album as a whole is a tad precious, but the songs are pretty and Campbell's voice is subtly captivating.

Evolver delivers what it promises: A singer, songwriter and musician pushing himself to grow. This is a good first step.

While he's a fine creator of moods and verse-long vignettes, Malin often has trouble stretching a cohesive narrative for the length of an entire song.

Despite a slew of hit singles and eye-popping sales figures, Britney Spears has never released an album as coherent from start to finish as her latest, Femme Fatale.

A wide-ranging sampler of female compositions on which Moorer mostly provides subtle touches and an abundance of cool presence.

The preponderance of slow jams makes sense, given the introspection on display, yet none of them stands out enough to remind you that Brandy is more than just human.

A full-length debut strong on deft, cheeky wordplay and blessedly free of the usual hip-hop clichés burdening her American counterparts.

His voice is as yearning and creaky as ever, at once aged and childlike, and if the music doesn't always have a lot of weight, Lytle's songwriting remains pleasantly distracting on the surface and thoughtfully sublime upon closer inspection.

The 42-year-old Kansas native continues to mine that vein on her 10th studio album, "Shine," but although her singing is still strong, polish and predictability are its defining traits.

This is grown-up rock, with an adult swagger, from one of today's most gifted songwriting bands.

While the slow-into-snappy single '7 Things' is an obvious attempt at a follow-up, and although much of the disc tends toward the same mildly punky pop (much of it co-written by Cyrus), there's an unwelcome familiarity to the hooks, a sense that Breakout is actually just a mash-up of moves tried and discarded by Lohan/Duff/fill-in-the-Disney-diva-of-your choice.

This is the grittiest album the band has yet put out.

A muddled mess of convoluted textures that is at times, frankly, unlistenable.

Noel Gallagher comes up with a half-dozen tracks as good as the classic-rock epic 'The Turning,' or 'The Shock of the Lightning,' which swaggers as confidently as Oasis did a dozen years ago.

'Like You'll Never See Me Again' is a reminder, amidst the clutter of many cooks on As I Am, that perhaps Keys was best as she was, after all.

The hooks are less immediate as well. Songs like 'Carry You' and 'Here it Goes' retain the compact force of past band gems, but too much of Chase is afflicted with a degenerate case of sameness.

Hagerty's chords radiate like heat from hot concrete, forging shapes from the nothingness, like an audio mirage. So it goes for most of the album's 33 minutes.