Champ sees Tokyo Police Club with a firmer grip on their sound, their vision, and their conquest; and although not destroying expectations, it makes good on a lot of the promises their earliest work showed off.

As convincing as she attempts to sound, Bionic does nothing to persuade authenticity.

Being interesting, unique, fun and damn good is near impossible to pull off. Sleigh Bells has done it on Treats, and goddamn is it good.

Thought it doesn't make an impression at first glance, The Chaos crosses The Futureheads' entire discography into a wholly satisfying package.

With The Bride Screamed Murder, The Melvins attempt a refined edge from a songwriting perspective, songs like Pig House boasting some mathematic constructs and the organ bending Iâ??ll Finish You Off acting as some weird Flaming Lips take on grungy psychedelia.

Unfortunately, her constant insistence on being so ham-fistedly quirky and zany soon becomes wearing, and simultaneously rescues and spoils the whole album.

Micah P. Hinson and the Pioneer Saboteurs see the intensity and stark beauty return in full form.

Infinite Arms isn’t nearly as charming nor nearly as emotive as the band’s other work. It’s an image of a band that’s exhausted their aesthetics to a point of sterility, and it’s going to take a lot of soul-searching and reinvention to figure out where to go next.

Though he offers some of his most impressive and experimental numbers to date, due to Compass’s continual up-and-down nature it’s unlikely to make the impression of either of his two previous albums.

Love and Its Opposite is often a careful-sounding album and while that synopsis may not quicken the heart, it gives Thorn’s work an air of professionalism and care.

This Is Happening is looking back on a life well lived and well learned, the final cap on a perfect career.

Brothers doesn’t break new ground for the band, but it continues to affirm the band’s soul, further demonstrating the unlimited power of blues music.

For a first album, The ArchAndroid is astoundingly accomplished. It would be a lie to say there aren't a few lulls in the back end of the record as Monae begins to take fewer risks, but only the truly seminal albums can keep the quality level so high for over an hour.

Sea Of Cowards sounds like the record Jack White’s been trying to make for a long time. Whatever he does next will probably sound that way, too.

Try it out, it's definitely worth it, just not anything you'll be rushing to your guitar to emulate. Or maybe it is, if you're in to taking it easy.

With their infectious beats and clear guitars mixed with head-bobbing electronic, New Young Pony Club has what cannot be learned, yet what is one hundred percent necessary for achieving greatness: hubris.

Stuck on Nothing opens strong, closes strong, and the intermediate tracks are interesting enough to maintain interest. Free Energy haven’t created anything cataclysmically new, but they have created an entirely likable pop album.

They've never let us down before, and they don't here, as frustrating as it is to hear the band fall just short of crafting something incredible. All the songs stand up, but the album loses steam and focus and begins to drag by the end of its 65 minute running time.

On its own, it's a great record. Tacked onto the end of a sprawling, massively exciting discography, it just doesn't deliver.

There's a lot of beautiful music to hear and Patton treats it all with an admirer's respect, but there is something about Mondo Cane that reeks of vanity.

Sleep Mountain isn’t entirely unenjoyable; its two main crimes are that it’s too safe with its simple chord patterns and unimaginative riffs, and that it’s too in thrall to the records that have inspired it.

Snaith is able to hold onto his Caribou identity despite the new techno influences. His new album Swim reaffirms the supreme artistic capability that is Caribou.

There is absolutely nobody in the world but hardcore Apples in Stereo fans that need to hear Travellers in Space and Time, it's a record as slight as they come.

In what was already an inane, washed-up concept to begin with, P&A fail to enlighten by opting to deliver trite lyrics and characterless humor for their own amusement. Evidently, consciousness suits them better.

A four-year wait is inexcusable, especially when more than half of the album exudes familiarity.

The implication is that there was some kind of journey involved in getting from Point A to Point B in Trans Am’s spaceship of Douglas Adams-worthy quirks. But after twelve tracks totaling a brief-seeming thirty eight minutes, and despite some interesting routes, it feels like we’ve barely left the launch pad.

Too much of Weathervanes is unnecessary fluff. Of the album's 13 tracks, three are wordless moments of focus-less, meaningless noise and at least three other songs could have been trimmed down by a few minutes.

None of the songs are good enough as growers or deep tracks to hold up the album.

Ultimately, The Wild Hunt's stumbles are too little to mask what could be Matsson's finest hour. He may act as if he's the tallest man on earth, but he may very well literally be a talent of Goliath proportions.

What is frustrating about Junior is King's obvious talent. It is clear that this is a woman capable of a level of musicianship most artists can't achieve, yet she seems unable to do anything more with it than repeat a few good ideas with diminishing returns.

And Then We Saw Land isn’t a bad album, it just doesn‘t grab you.

It's a solid album throughout, with satisfying builds and a cacophony of beautifully symphonic music.

In honesty, a whole album of perfectly-executed retro soul can be a little wearing, but the craftsmanship carries it through, and the sheer joy of hearing a band go against the grain in the way that this band do, makes I Learned the Hard Way fully deserving of your time.

Hippies is a no-frills garage-rock record that is fun and energetic, and the utter lack of pretence is a breath of fresh air in this era of overproduced corporate drivel.

Combining 60s girl pop and 70s garage pop with the lo-fi mist that, admittedly, shares common ground with bands like Wavves, Vivian Girls and No Age, Dum Dum Girls come up with a very relevant and heartwarming throwback.

As a longtime fan of Usher, this album has great moments and also lagging tunes.

This isn’t political, but it is personal, comical, sad, satirical, intelligent and refreshingly honest.

Enter Wu-Massacre a fun, but mostly forgettable affair that comes from three of the clan’s most prominent members; (Ghostface, Raekwon, Method Man) and for the most part ends up being little more than good-natured fan service.

NonStopErotik lives and dies on your particular hunger for music like this in 2010. If you love what Francis has done over the span of his solo work, (and to a lesser extent, if you love the Pixies) you’ll find just enough in the album to merit a listen or two. If you only have a passing interest, it’s probably not worth your 45 minutes.

The narratives it employs are true to life, the reverb drenched instrumentation was rightfully summoned, and the substitution of dark undertones over lighter sensibilities that such genre was commonly known for were ditched with good reason. No wonder Slumberland has wholeheartedly embraced Black Tambourine's influence to their label. That's good enough reason to bring another of independent music's long forgotten cult stories into the forefront.

Where Volume One was strongest was simply the quality of the songs (try getting Why Do You Let Me Stay Here? out of your head in a hurry), yet there’s something sadly lacking about Volume Two, and what previously sounded like finely-crafted homage is now often more like impotent pastiche.

Good as a heartbreak-balm, an above-average way to spend a night in bed or just something to dance with your special lady / man / whatever to, Love is All's latest proves that they can be counted on to bring quality pop, no matter what.

This is their most assured, confident release to date and though it may not take the place of fan-favourite, it certainly deserves to be considered as the best introduction to Autechre’s oeuvre.

Recalling only bits of their awkward past-flirtations with electro-pop, this new material feels ripe with a formative momentum that only occasionally misses the mark (the elementary musings behind On a Hill in a Bed on a Road in a House, we can do without).

Abyss isn't a failure--their audacity to upend themselves, contriving each and every step of the way with an expansive sound that masks away the more attention-grabbing arrangements is worthy. Props to them for sounding like everyone else and no one else at the same time.

The band still has the muscle to match its mileage.

Ultimately, like many live albums before them and certainly after them, it's just okay. It succeeds in capturing a performance that is an apt representation of the band and is largely an aural pleasure, yet you never really shake the fruitless nature of the album.

The whole thing works beautifully, more with each listen.

They admirably say as little as possible, yet somehow get the message across. It’s an amazing gift in this day and age, when every wanna-be reality star climaxes at the sound of their own voice, to be concise and minimalist, and I have to say I love them for it.

Broken Bells is clearly a mood record, but even with so many textures, resources and talent, it all hits one stilted note. Either this is an indicator of where the temporarily Shin-less Mercer is headed or its little more than a curious footnote on his and Burton's careers.

This isn't a bad album, and these quotes are by no means deal breakers, but it is a little telling that an album about “feeling lost” suffers from a distinct lack of focus or specific vision.

Titus Andronicus have created an album that will grip the listener, carry them along on a tide of spit and blood and youthful aggression, and leave them dazed and exhausted at the end, with no other option but to start the record all over again.

jj no 3, in essence, fails to carry the same number of dimensions and, unfortunately, and perhaps unfairly, reduces jj to a hype machine.

It’s their most consistent outing since their debut, but it’s never much better than average. BRMC is a decent rock band, and if all we expect from them is fuzzed out garage jams they don’t disappoint.

If he'd played up his vocals over his vitriol, Brutalist Bricks could have been a much better album. Loud and messy may be the hallmarks of hardcore, but showcasing his talents would have made a bigger impact, both musically and politically.

If you strip their sound to its core, like the harmonies and the distortion, you’re left with an invariable rock record. If this isn’t a true representation of what modern rock should be, I don't know what is.

A Sufi and a Killer never, ever repeats itself. Gonjasufi’s beautiful, instantaneously classic voice is the glue that holds it all together. It’s captivating.

Aloha have created an album with a strange feel, Home Acres is dark but it’s not cold. It’s a humid album that aptly demonstrates Aloha’s greatest strengths, but also highlights their weaknesses.

The Benders sound buttoned-up and clean-cut, infinitely pleasant and inoffensive, one suggestive song title (Pleasure Sighs) notwithstanding.

Kairos is an intimate account on how stripping things down to a minimum whilst keeping a clear focus on limitations can actually lay emphasis on more unique songwriting.

It’s too flabby to listen to as a whole, and unless the label decides to re-release 'Stuck On Repeat' (which isn’t a bad idea actually) there’s nothing here strong enough to force a mainstream breakthrough.

Is this the groundbreaking work we'd perhaps hoped for during the album's initial release, an effort worthy of that preliminary giddiness? Sadly, no. Is it an interesting mix of tracks that confronts listeners with reimaging of songs so deeply tied to our heart strings we have no choice but to carefully imbibe and evaluate each note? Sure.

Reviewed as a whole album though, it must concede that buying Be Brave would be like paying for two songs played at different speeds and in different keys fourteen times over, an unwise choice that would eventually leave many wondering just what the hell is so different between Friday in Paris and Da Da anyway? I've got to tell you, after these past couple days, I can barely even tell anymore.

Golden Triangle isn’t the second coming of anything in particular, but they at least know what they’re doing.

Ultimately, this is what more bands should be striving to achieve: to thrill us, inspire us and confuse us - often all at the same time; to utiliize technology for the betterment of the whole rather than for technologies sake; and to allow multiple talents to merge and shine without a sense of the intrusion of personal ego.

That the record plays out so consistently and yet flows with such apparent ease is testament to the skills honed by the band since its inception back in Copenhagen in 2000.

Have One On Me is so enrapturing, so imaginative and so delicate, that it feels safe to say that in five or ten years time, you’ll go back to it and discover brand new things--whether they be the meaning of a song you’d never fathomed before or a simple amuse-bouche of a beautifully constructed oboe phrase.

This is such a charming little band, such a charming little album that one wants to like it more than it deserves.

As much as High On Fire pride themselves on their recorded brand of relentless brawn, How Dark We Pray, down to its fine solos and overall execution, is the album's best moment.

All that said, it’s only about a third as bad as it sounds. It’s fairly tolerable as far as extreme self indulgence goes.

They show the beginnings of great ideas in almost every song, and a few get the full treatment and stay great all the way through. The good songs are very enjoyable, the rest of the album is, unfortunately, pretty forgettable.

The swell of the strings is as equally terrifying as it is comforting, and Hysen’s fragile vocals always contain at least a small sense of peace. Picastro have created a record that is relentlessly bleak but nonetheless a rewarding and enjoyable listen.

It’s an extremely listenable record and definitely fit to stand aside their finest work.

They may be pared down to 5 members now, but they still generate a big band noise. Whether this is down to overdubbing or clever use of atmospherics is anyone's guess, but the results are convincing.

Measure can be described as being the metamorphosis that translates Field Music’s born again status. Ambitious as it sounds, it locks itself into a pop compendium, which has always been a strong suit in the past.

Don't get it twisted: this isn't a classic. There are a few lame tracks, and Freeway still occasionally stumbles over some dumb rhymes. However, listening to his Ghostface-esque storytelling on Never Going To Change or his Tyson-like intensity on One Thing or even his fear on Money, it isn't had to believe that Free has a great album in him.

The more tastefully formulated tracks just can’t offset the profusion of soppy lyricism and the tedium of weaker songs. Ultimately, Odd Blood reads as a well-informed but poorly executed homage to the ‘80s.

All but doing away with the wry humor of the group's earlier work, Hot Chip's lyrics on One Life Stand focus on affection and romance in a way that says, “We’ve settled down.” However, the stylistic decisions betray the fact that they are still searching for their center.

His voice a weathered and worn device, there are facets to his personality that seem to make this album work, when otherwise its disjointed presentation would seem haphazard or pasted together. It’s also very short, clocking in at shy of thirty minutes despite its fifteen tracks.

It’s easy to commend this album on the sole basis that despite coating his tracks with an incomprehensible amount of tripped-out trickery, Toro Y Moi still branches out into less protected songwriting.

Where ["The Bliss"] bubbled and spat like hot fat, its meticulous construction overflowing with polyrhythms, Black Noise seems disjointed and overlong even though it runs for roughly the same duration.

What Midlake has crafted here is monastery music – glorified Gregorian chants that achieve nothing if not snuff out the candle light in your head that represents your slowly melting interest.

The derivativeness quickly overwhelms.

Taken as a whole, The Soft Pack isn’t exceptionally challenging or memorable, though it does leave space to appreciate a few of its singles.

Should his solo career continue, this record could stand as an in between point between his teen past and his adult future, but as it stands now, it's just a muddled, occasionally interesting but often baffling pop-rock album.

However many crystalline moments of beauty their records contain (and of course there are some to be found here), for me there remains a cloying sense of the overtly melodramatic, of uninventive repetition that it is hard to ignore.

In the case of Blackjazz, Shining spreads lyrical passages across songs, repeats song titles with different music attached: they basically create an environment that can only be understood as a whole.

It’s not a completely futile exercise--there are some decent tracks--but it falls far short of the quality of its predecessor.

Romance Is Boring is fun, knowing, astute, energetic and packed with vignettes of youth and love lost.

Instead of modest waltzes and looped drum machines, there’s an evident maturity in the way the production unveils itself as richer and far more multifaceted. When you can’t break the familiar, expanding on those opportunities only makes you more in control.

What I find so satisfying with this album, is how Four Tet envisions the lushness of a song, and sonically creates a buoyant, lighthearted blend--a complete album for the lively and lighthearted.

Realism strikes a compelling balance between cringing honesty and organic chemistry that comes through in its crystalline composition as well as its more rugged manifestations. Complete reinvention isn’t necessarily reached, but isn’t quite the ultimate goal either.

While it is by no means required listening, Couple Tracks is certainly worth it for newcomers and short-time fans of an up and coming experimental punk band. And while it never achieves an album feel, it's got enough short blast of quality to make it worth the money.

One's enjoyment of Dream Get Together will depend greatly upon their appreciation for good jam sessions. Jam sessions are fine after all, but it's hard not to be a little disappointed in Citay after hearing the disparity between what they are capable of and what they want to be.

My high expectations for Boca Negra, misguided as they were, have been consoled, if not met, by the realization that if any act can legitimize avant-jazz beyond its narrow niche (never mind my aforementioned doubts), Chicago Underground Duo have the verve and creativity to enable it.

They simply combine their voices and come up with something unique in the process, which they’ve achieved. I’m interested, though, in how far they take their sound before it reveals any potential lack of versatility.

This third effort is trying too hard to innovate by, once again in Editors fashion, obviously borrowing from somewhere else.

While it provokes some unpredictable moments, it's heartbreaking to listen to such tuneful moments of inspiration buried beneath towering stacks of old debris, and not the vintage kind.