If there is no respite from volume, there are variations in pacing. [No. 117, p.59]

The album fares best when Evelyn lets his sampler do the talking. [#56, p.101]

It sounds like a fun, energetic performance but it downplays his sophisticated charms. [#91, p.56]

Taylor is meditative in both sound and thought, using slow, simple arrangements in the service of a tender melancholy that grows more palpable as Await Barbarians floats along. [No. 111, p.61]

[Dave Davies is] mostly restrained here, content to strum as he and Russ sing together. [No. 142, p.54]

Like a tightrope walker toeing a slack line, the Helio Sequence enters and exits this fifth full-length at its highest points... In between, Negotiations breaks down. [No.91, p.55]

The imitations/references spill out... But Spills Out is considerably less interesting and more cerebral, when Pterodactyl sounds like other bands.[#82, p.59]

The album also contains enough experimentation and cleverness to stand on its own in !!!'s decidedly confusing and overpopulated sub-genre. [No. 143, p.53]

Space-rock created in an energy vacuum. [#47, p.104]

Where the smart rap of Antipop Consortium came off as quick and cutting, Maverick just seems remote. [#66, p.86]

Gimmie Trouble: cyber funk or cyborg punk? [#70, p.86]

Cydonia is a welcome return to the sensual, dubby, progressive trance that marked its best early work... [#50, p.102]

These are not tunes created with an eye on the top of the charts, but it only takes about four bars to realize that they should be up there. [No.86, p.56]

The pottery kiln warmth of the rhythm section lays a solid foundation for Lobsinger's sensual voice. [No. 128, p.59]

It gets waylaid by a few meandering ballads and overly repetitive choruses, but Hynde's still one of rock'n'roll's great singers. [No. 110, p.57]

They too often edge into Meat Loaf/Jim Steinman territory, where every detail becomes a cause for operatic exaggeration and any clunky line or cliche sounds ridiculous. [No. 93, p.56]

Aside from the awkwardly grungy 'The Score,' these are good songs well-played, with Walla handling everything except for drums.

The whole of Dr. Dee is bucolic yet slightly nervy with Albarn's chatty croon acting as yet another gentle breeze wafting through the Arcadian affair. It's not the Damon-pop solo you hoped for. [No.88 p.52]

Their best work. [#54, p.107]

Halfway applies Cook's fading trademark of playful repetition to similarly crackly sampling and comes up almost wholly unlikable. [#48, p.89]

Mediocrity this aggressive should cancel itself out at some point. [No. 101, p.53]

No No No plays less like a travelogue than simply what it is: a really good--if brief--Beirut album. [No. 124, p.52]

Here, on one compact disc, is what's wrong with the music industry. [#54, p.110]

As his politics become more complex, his writing has grown subtler, the melodies more sophisticated and the lyrics more richly detailed. [#53, p.72]

With a few exceptions, the rest of Goodbye remains little more than background music destined for life in service to candle boutiques and Saturn commercials. [Summer 2007, p.106]

At it's best, Barragan sounds like typically inventive musicians sleepily phoning it in. [No. 113, p.54]

As ever, SSLYBY thrives most on its unyielding pleasantness. [No. 102, p.60]

When Slo Light want to pound pulses, it does so expertly. [No.106, p.53]

Paper Gods is an exercise in shamelessly rehashing every tired, vaguely transgressive cliche that's defined Duran Duran's 30-plus-year career. [No. 124, p.55]

At its worst (most of it), it's layered synth sounds with beats and vocals smacking of a manufactured sexiness, all designed to hide the gaping void where memorable songwriting should be. [No. 93, p.59]

Lucky for Conditions of My Parole, Puscifer has graduated from embarrassingly stupid to simply boring. [#81, p. 59]

The LP's slow-building peak moment is "Violins And Tambourines," which is also dramatic and affected, no matter what Jones may actually be singing about. [No. 101, p.60]

About 45 seconds into song after song, the chorus punches in loudly--predictably and, ultimately, annoyingly. [No. 135, p.57]

Like a handful of Flinstones Chewables, Velocity is sugary, prehistoric and well-intentioned, but Apples don't make a meal. [#56, p.78]

A pleasant surprise. [No. 136, p.56]

Michael "Fitz" Fitzpatrick still knows his way around a catchy hook, though, and there are more than a few memorable ones here. [No. 98, p.55]

There are but three words to describe the sixth album from [Nightmares On Wax]... "repetition"... "derivative"... "listless."[#71, p.108]

You can't take your ears off it. [#48, p.86]

The results are gorgeous, but frustratingly circumspect: twitchy, mournful, would-be futuristic dark pop that's almost comforting in its claustrophobia. [No.99, p.55]

The lyrics are often stupid as hell. ... What's novel about Pacific Daydream is that its giant, overcompressed choruses really do burrow their way into your skull. [No. 148, p.51]

The Dandys haven’t sounded this simultaneously energized and devil-may-care since the Duran Duran-polished synthpop of 2003’s Welcome To The Monkey House. [No. 131, p.52]

All Around Us is moody, pretty and spooky-cool. [No. 123, p.59]

The combination here of light electronic production, show-stopping African vocals, Mumford harmonies and heart-on-your-sleeve pop is hard not to love. [No. 133, p.59]

Most of Traps keeps the toes a-tapping with happily-sung, sad-bastard references to bygone lovers, running out of weed and coming of quarter-age. [No.88 p.57]

Matt Pond PA shows it can rock out tastefully. [Fall 2007, p.102]

One of the most powerful and overtly political albums he's ever made. [No. 150, p.55]

Takes The Strangest Things' dark, occasionally scattershot pop and refines it with sharper songwriting and a slicker approach. [#69, p.100]

Any party mix could benefit from the crisp beats, blasts and riffs here, and just because Stereo Total's music is jubilant doesn't mean it's vapid. [#67, p.111]

If you're a fan of heavy psychedelic bands, but wish they'd spend less time writing songs and more time blazing on the fretboard, this is your record. [No 88 p.56]

The Speed Of Things has no teeth.... But the choruses are strong and the melodies catchy enough. [No. 103, p.54]

So well-versed are Jacuzzi Boys in hooky guitar pop that their boisterous personalities occasionally get lost in the mix. [No. 137, p.55]

Good-natured, utterly accessible dance pop with meta-awareness of its own shallowness and disposability. [No.92 p.58]

Last Of Our Kind has heavy and abrasive moments that are heavier and more abrasive than anything in The darkness discography. [No. 121, p.53]

Detour is a great showcase for Lauper's vocal range and prowess, but the freak factor is dishearteningly low. [No. 131, p.59]

Unfortunately, [Markus] Popp has recently become more fascinated with theory than result.... This is what causes the downfall of Ovalprocess as a work of pure music.... a disappointing misstep. [#47, p.112]

The Olms offers ample reassurance that Yorn is one hell of a craftsman, even when he's striving for a less-is-more-aesthetic--though the jury's still out on whether he's an artist best left to his own devices. [No. 100, p.54]

One-third of VII has the quintet living up to the folk/country billing with upbeat, chaw-spittin', porch-sittin' classics-in-waiting and depressive ballads presented in Eric Earley's stark, storytelling style. The other two-thirds have skittering keyboards and soulful backing vocals. [No. 103, p.52]

Glow & Behold feels like a safe play. [No. 104, p.60]

Only the last song, Wild Sun's straightforward, vulnerable take on "Easy Way Out," finally hits the mark. [No. 137, p.61]

Like [Bright Eyes'] Conor Oberst, Sennett teeters between precious and wild. [#70, p.94]

Occasional exotic loop or surprising flair aside, the rest [aside from three songs] is listenable, charmless and pointless. [No.90, p.58]

The linear song structures, full of droning, atonal, repetitive music, shrieking vocals and skewed tempos, still make this music as challenging today as it was in 1978, although some of the songs now sound remarkably normal. [No. 113, p.61]

It's four-on-the-floor disco that thumps its way through this polyphonic orchestral funk like a bully. [#51, p.92]

While it's a challenging listen, it's rarely jarring, making it oddly satisfying for both active and passive consumption. [No. 97, p.52]

The failing of Plain, however, is its lack of direction and absence of cohesiveness. [No. 98, p.55]

Fro all the hooks and hummable moments, none of them stick around after the song is over. [No.89, p.56]

The songs have a somber, ambient feel, even on tunes with uplifting subjects. [No. 134, p.57]

Pelo pumps up the beat and subtly shifts the band's sound from the lounge to the club. [#48, p.75]

On Rehearsing My Choir, the Furnaces are just defiant because they can be, indulging every impulse but neglecting to make any of them even remotely compelling. [#70, p.96]

Not even Linkous can prop up this house of cards for long. [#58, p.94]

The Jersey quartet offers its most effective heartland punk cocktail to date, but shakes and stirs the concoction with new influences and musical approaches. [No. 113, p.56]

The 10-song Heavy Mood is eclectic enough to say that the band has matured. Almost. [No. 92, p.60]

A draining listen due to its scatterbrained ideas and patchy sequencing. [#73, p.106]

Walls could be their portal to lingering greatness. [No. 137, p.57]

The cosmic expanses of "I Love You Too, Death" and "Astro-Mancy" are particularly engrossing, but this record boasts more than enough quality head trips to keep you in it pull 'til the next go-round. [No. 103, p.57]

[An] awesome, never-sappy snapshot of two people who drive each other wild. [No. 121, p.59]

Strength In Numbers makes you wonder if you ever really liked this band at all. [#75, p.94]

The album has plenty of massive organ sounds and driving rhythms. [No. 112, p.53]

Though there's plenty of wit... to go along with copious amounts of jangle, twang and... Brian Wilson-esque sweep, there's often an overriding, wistful sadness mixed in with the Left Coast hedonism. [#73, p.106]

Dealing with Trans Am entails dealing with a great sense of humor that's a fun and striking listen to boot. [#54, p.109]

Crisper and cleaner than any previous Why? musing, Mumps Etc. is chamber hop for people who buy every remastered reissue of Pet Sounds. [No. 92, p.60]

Campily butch. [#69, p.110]

No, the London band is never going to be called innovative, but the gusto with which it approaches those naked influences of Dinosaur Jr, Pavement and Sonic Youth--and the craftsmanship with which it does so--cracks through our cynical shells. [No. 129, p.61]

DJ Shadow first made his name by delving deep into the world's bottomless pile of debris to redeem the wannbe hits and half-formed artistic statements of our musical past. Now, he contributes to it. s[#82, p. 54]

The results are about as bold and memorable as a spent glowstick. [No. 148, p.55]

It seems so mild. [#64, p.98]

Two albums in, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros sound just as phony as Ima Robot did. [No.88 p.59]

Babel is the more subtle and accomplished album. [No. 92, p.56]

The album kicks off with an accomplished, but by-the-numbers nod to T. Rex/'70s glam, then proceeds to genre-jump through the filter of neo-alt-country/Americana in a well-done, but regrettably innocuous fashion. [No. 128, p.53]

Yes, some of these are very stupid songs.... And like Doolittle, there are great songs here. [No. 110, p.58]

For much of Happiness, Bays slurs his way through the best music Hot Hot Heat has ever made.

Wild Things does its darndest to plug the electro-dance ice-pop void left by La Roux's sophomore let-down and the absence of new Robyn, Annie And Dragonette albums. [No. 133, p.57]

She dives into world music on this album, with interesting results. [No. 123, p.61]

[A] return to the simpler production style of 2001 debut The Optimist LP. [#68, p.112]

A note-cramming session heavy on the Little Feat and light on the Sea And Cake. [#55, p.70]

May piles up cresting false falsettos, disco pulses and Beach Boys wall-of-sound swells and, with the exceptionally sappy "Tell Her," offers a serviceable "So Happy Together" homage. [No.88 p.57]

The record is full of texture, and while it maybe isn't essential listening, it's a nice addition to both catalogs. [No. 109, p.55]

You can feel Bridwell's effort, while Beam's casual understatement is entrancing. [No. 122, p.51]