A solid collection of the most talked-about bands in the New York underground.

With Shamelessly Exciting he's starting to get good. In other words, on this record, once you get the idea, you're still going to want to listen.

The abject despair of The Mess We Made can become tedious, and, more than most artists, Elliott depends on a listener who is willing forgive him his lack of subtlety.

She's lyrically sharp as ever, and switches gears and works in nice melodies just enough to soften the edges, luring fans in before she pummels them.

Highlights the band at its most exploratory.

The album has a sonic cohesiveness that makes for a consistently pleasant listening experience.

A good album that finds Oldham retreating from the layered solemnity of his most recent releases in favor of a mood that is as intimate and delicate as it is bittersweet and biting.

Summer Sun doesn't have the collective impact of its predecessors, a problem typically attributable to song selection, sequencing and mixing.

The found sounds on Digital Ash can seem an affected and unnecessary embellishment in certain places.... But in other places they work.

In recasting these wilfully off-kilter tunes and investing them with his trademark warm and inviting melancholia, Mark Kozelek need not be modest: Tiny Cities is a big success.

Awfully Deep, on the whole, is a bold, ambitious swing for the fences. But, like it or not, the game's done changed, and Manuva '05 sounds way too much like Manuva '01.

Like the band's first two albums, Winchester Cathedral is solid. But also like its predecessors, the album suffers from the "Hey, didn't I already hear this song?" syndrome.

The band shows an incredible level of bravado on their album of fun summer hymns, but has a hard time breaking through the barrier the lackluster vocals create.

Broder puts art before music -- as if he's recording an audio version of a painting.

Excise these less-than-enthralling moments and the forty-nine remaining minutes of Ultravisitor are satisfying.

So New York. So everything. So new. But yet, so much like the hippies saying, "Man, if we could only get Nixon to smoke pot, then we'd have world peace, man."

An album of both phenomenal concentrated bits, as well as some disappointing gaps.

A puzzling release.

Often dreamy, sometimes rockin', but rarely more than pedestrian.

Starting with track six, Laughter's Fifth verges on unstoppable.

The problem with Blueberry Boat is that, while it's a musical marvel, it's not an album that I'll keep listening to.

When the songs work – it's some of the best material Faithfull has ever produced. But when they don't – you're left... falling asleep in the car.

An uneven mish-mash of musical ideas that is only occasionally thrilling.

While Waves is not quite a knockout, it delivers some undeniable pleasures nonetheless.

The results are not for the faint of heart – beats stutter uncomfortably, disappear without warning, and practically scratch out the walls of your speakers from the inside.

For every misstep on the mostly acoustic Spooked, there's an undeniable classic.

Grand Mal takes a connoisseur's approach to classic rock, and when it works, the best of Bad Timing can stand tall next to its forefathers.

Second disc Chirpin' Hard is the crowd-pleasing Speakerboxxx to Hill's less-accessible Church Gone Wild.