It's cohesive, it's tight and it illustrates the band's continuous depth and attention to subtlety.

There’s something hauntingly beautiful about the way these tracks morph and evolve over their fairly short lifespan.

Passive Me, Aggressive You is undoubtedly a pop album, and an impressive one at that. There's a nice blend of intensity and honesty here, which TH&F will do well to maintain in their future career.

These guys are still writing and playing at the top of their game, making another album that’s just as brutal as Stage Four, if not a little more palatable for everyday listening.

With the exception of the very syrupy Taiyo No Baka, (an apparently "dark" song despite its relatively chipper demeanor), Noise fuses the best aspects of every genre Boris tackles, perpetuating their evolution with the promise of aggressiveness, distortion and all things wonderfully “loud.”

Not as poppy as either Moon Safari or Talkie Walkie, not as out there as 10,000khz Legend, Pocket Symphony instead boasts songs that deserve more attention than previous numbers without performing the prog histrionics often found on their more experimental works.

Crack the Skye follows Mastodon’s uncanny tradition of crafting a brand of heavy metal that is unabashed, mazelike, and above all, fresh.

Like Grouper before her, she’s wonderful at exploring those liminal spaces, washing over and subtly overwhelming you.

It's an album of striking and stark beauty, with finely crafted songs that feel stripped to their bare essentials, and just allowed to be what they are, unadorned.

For the most part, Code Orange leans upon evocative writing that pairs heaviness to thoughtful lyricism. While there are a handful of phrases that feel sloppy or obvious (“The digital knife's edge that cuts us all” on In Fear, or Cold.Metal.Place’s “The fire burns down our 3D world”), Code Orange’s self-seriousness almost entirely works because of how badass they are.

Halo is just as effective when taken purely as an aural experience; just like the symbolic spirit she invokes, her challenging and throbbing entanglements are impossible to turn away from.

Across Head Cage’s 12 tracks (yes, 12, not 25), Pig Destroyer focus not on being the fastest, loudest, craziest band on Earth, but on simply doing it better. They still do all of the aforementioned better than anyone else (Dark Train, Trap Door Man), but more often than not, they take that intensity and lock it into steadier groves, shifting moods and hookier riffs.

While Lekman certainly knows how to use a sample, it is his songwriting talent, his storytelling ability, and above all his remarkable emotional honesty that make I Know What Love Isn't the finest achievement of his career.

With strong, fully realized statements such as Mauve, Ringo Deathstarr are making a strong case for being one of the most vital bands in shoegaze today.

Much of Cobra Juicy finds itself operating more on the sensitive side of their distinct weirdness, with the album sporting some of the bands gentlest, breeziest, and most romantic sounding tracks yet.

Either way you bend it, his confessional accounts on how men view the female gender is all too relatable under any context.

The Unseen in Between should be the album where he steps out from the shadow of his contemporaries and establishes him as one of the most reliable singer-songwriters of his generation. His heart is in tune with that of a wanderer but his songwriting is firmly in place, ready to come out of obscurity.

Along with a numble of likeminded producers to help fulfill her vision, Parks comes across as an open book, delivering a lushly atmospheric portrayal of a woman who takes pleasure in living in the moment.

On this fine album, Wilkinson seems intent on capturing this precious, ambivalent space.

It’s the sound of a band transforming into something subtle but beautiful—the same way trees do when their foliage fades from green to orange.

All told, The Faint, once again, have written a succesful album.

It’s difficult to avoid making repeated comparisons to Antipodes, but despite the differences in the sounds between the two LPs, the quality and strength of them is the same.

Whereas I don’t necessarily believe it a step above the Mystery EP, still ably showcases the talents of BLK JKS, their world-influenced musical hybrid a unique presence in an industry dangerously close to being oversaturated with no longer distinctive hipsters spouting tra la la’s.

The Body's latest exercise in amplified bleakness, a blend of muck and misery whose existence almost requires a term stronger than “doom” to succinctly and conveniently explain it. To call The Body’s music “doom” is tantamount to calling the rapture an unexplained and coincidental spike in lengthy vacations.

Magazine manage to retrace where they left off, rediscover their intricacies and do an excellent job at defining themselves for, what one can only hope will be, new generations of listeners.

Vile Child is a debut LP that is rife with a resounding honesty and an airtight dexterity.

In an age of musical ephemerality and impermanence (especially in the electronica/dance arena) it's good to know that sometimes innovation and inspiration can go hand in hand with experience.

A welcome addition to the avant-garde canon, an album that demonstrates the continuing development and growth of Mice Parade and Pierce.

Overall, I can honestly say that I enjoyed Little Scream and I'm interested to see what she'll do next.

I Romanticize bobs around with a collage of springy trinkets that both confound and fascinate, though never without trying to make sense of his eccentric impulses.

It might not be new and it might not follow the current trends, but this is a rare document of heartbreak and hope with the power to move you to tears and make you smile, sometimes at the same time. It deserves any accolades it will receive and many, many more.

While there are moments that feel less remarkable (the insignificant Hasdallen Lights or the groovy but repetitive Asteroid Blues), Heavens to a Tortured Mind succeeds when it’s mostly focused on creating a sensual yet serious mood throughout.

Snaith's gradual evolution is more than evident in Suddenly, a reflective and also outgoing mood piece that shares insight into what he's learned in the six years he's been away since 2014's Our Love.

She’s made an album for embracing yourself, your past and whatever lies ahead, and having fun while doing so. Her music doesn’t sound like the future. Even better, it sounds like the present.

There's a clear warmth and passion in this remaster; if you've yet to let this album grow to be a part of your life, get this.

Earthly Delights shows that they have yet to exhaust their uncanny vision.

Throughout, I’m Not Your Man is a meandering undercurrent of predatory slyness, advancing with a slack but completely controlled swagger.

Three tracks and two genre-shifts in, it’s a wonder how well the pieces fit together. Vu’s voice is a connecting thread, a honeyed contralto as distorted and disconnected as her affect, doubled onto itself and pulsing with uncertainty.

It’s all tons of fun, and is almost guaranteed to cheer you up with its overwhelming chirpiness.

Pierce commits to an intricately layered masterwork that brims with beauty at every turn. He has come close to writing a Motown-inspired ballad-like Let it Bleed (For Iggy) before, but here, in typically unorthodox fashion, Pierce nails down that aesthetic while serving up Britpop grandeur this side of Blur’s The Universal.

For the first time is usually nonsensical, frequently transcendent, and compulsively listenable. Everything that sprung to mind is on the wax here, but BC, NR don’t forget to make it catchy and groovy. In nailing that balance, they’ve given us the year’s first capital-G Great record.

It shows a refreshed band, back on the chase to find new ways of songwriting, with strong melodies and intriguing lyrics remaining a constant. I’ll Be Your Girl is the start of this new chapter, and it’s a wonderful place for them to begin again.

It sounds like a labor of love through and through, and its painstaking process of development only augments a desire for something exclusive. In all accounts, your satisfaction is most certainly guaranteed.

Despite Holter's all-around meticulousness, Aviary never comes across as careful or rigorous. She engages in artful replication, seeking to understand those voices she successfully reconstructs with a feeling of apprehension and anticipation. And in the process, leaving her own imprint for others to also discover in centuries to come.

It feels carefully tailored to a fault, making it practically impossible to find its flaws—especially if you find the interchangeable poetic sing-speak of Hard Drive endearing. Nevertheless, this is solipsism of the highest caliber: gentle, hypnotic, fastidious, but above all else, hard to resist.

Lime Garden isn’t shy about their influences, sure, but what many of those artists lacked at the time, soaring choruses that linger for days, they deliver in spades.

Ctrl is a languid, cavernously soulful debut that is never anything but assured--a collection of delicious jams that are equal parts fragile, cozy and piercing.

It’s not that Diamond has recorded a masterpiece, since quite a good portion of this is decidedly B material. It’s that the good stuff represents Neil at his best, exploiting his considerable knack for melody and structure to the fullest.

Soused, with its impenetrable construct and heavy ambition, delivers on many fronts, most notable of which is in its thoughtfully composed immensity.

Unusually for an EP, each track warrants its place on the record and the title track never overshadows anything. It’s well worth listening to, especially if like me you tend to get gushy at the mere thought of probably this country’s greatest living musician.

There are additions to her guitar-pop foundation here, but they’re mostly limited to the occasional keyboard line or an anomaly like the dreamy synth outro of Outside with the Cuties. Met on its own terms, however, it’s a record that plays entirely to Kline’s strengths and confirms her as a worthy successor to the legacy of indie modesty.

Key Markets doesn't disappoint. Their commitment to their aesthetic and their ability to use it to say new things is unflagging.

It’s the ultimate sample platter for a band who defiantly refuses to meet your expectations, and for everything it lacks in consistency, it more than makes up for in offering a heart-bled moment that will burn bright for someone.

Because they write interesting but still enjoyable songs, as they do consistently on Change Becomes Us, they make their music worth coming back to again and again.

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 many of these ideas aren't particularly sexy, especially for artists who've recently turned forty, the band wisely keeps their grand, romantic gestures in check while making them thoughtful and relatable.

Portrayal of Guilt’s songs become so chaotic and overwhelming in their bipolar brutality that almost every song needs an ambient comedown to cool off, though even these are just as lurching and ominous as each riff is impeccably tight and terrifying.

Throughout Emotional Mugger’s 39-minute runtime, Segall is comfortably out of step, abandoning the pop refinement of Manipulator to creative self-sabotage with some of the more album’s more electrified moments, which, while highlights, don’t constitute the bulk of the album.

I guess I'm the contrarian here, but I think Interpol deserve a significant amount of respect for taking the risk and mustering the sheer talent to create something so deeply submerged in melancholia you can't even see light.

The performances are muscular and attention-grabbing, and the melodies built around her distress take new and zestful contours.

Get Color goes by fast and leaves the listener satisfied but begging for more wonderful, eardrum punishing noise.

Giddy and tuneful, the band feels more at ease as a tried-and-true guitar pop band, reminiscent of how a band like Los Campesinos! captured the hearts of many an indie rock fan.

Weaving in dustier threads to Beach House’s ever shimmery fabric proves that the cyborgian approach of mixing the organic with the mechanical is an increasingly winning formula.

With such masterful creativity and an ability to connect with listeners emotionally, no matter what language they are singing in, Ibeyi may have already released the debut album of the year.

With Journal for Plague Lovers, it feels like Manic Street Preachers have finally closed the door on a painful chapter in their career and, rather fittingly, they’ve done it with some aplomb.

Mvula has written a hypnotic record that provides a congenial embrace, but it also isn’t afraid to take bold action. A new star is most definitely born.

Their best full length yet.

All these songs stand out for their craftsmanship and collaboration, not only between three artists but also three friends.

It makes a complicated formula sound so effortlessly simple. And that's not something you can do with little effort or care.

That Nothing’s About to Happen to Me feels both self-contained and expansive speaks to how Mitski moves to her own rhythm.

Marissa Nadler does continue Nadler's impressive track record, and showcases her at her most confident.

While doom metal is typically considered too droll and meandering for most non-metal fans to penetrate, Foundations of Burden transcends the genre so well that submerging oneself in the album’s striking melodies and crushing riffs feels almost effortless.

Courtney might give the impression that he's aiming for a low-stakes, minor effort to pass the time in Magic Signs, a stopgap until moving on to a relatively more ambitious project. But he couldn't be more in his element, shifting in and out of focus as he recaptures his youthful wonder.

His irrepressible, grizzled vocal is the master key to the soul that is often kept hidden behind the pewter façade, and it’s the desire for more glimpses into it is what makes Gargoyle as affecting as it is.

King Of Jeans burns with enough vitriol and frustration that the music escalates the album’s importance. And, at times, they do grant second-party attention.

For all of the melancholy, it's far from a depressing experience; if anything, it's an oddly uplifting album, one that manages to find a great deal of beauty lurking just beneath the ugliness we sometimes find ourselves confronted by.

What makes M.I.A. so good is her simplicity. Not quite electro-clash, not quite hip-hop, not quite grime, she's a world onto herself with little more than a groovebox and her voice to sustain her.

Crush is the result of Abe Vigoda's common practice to evolve without abandoning their signature sound. There's still a fair amount of sharp guitars, post-chorus breakdowns are just as memorable, and metronome time signatures are still shattered. Not to mention, their shrewd tack for melody is as resounding as ever.

Woodkid has a sound that is unique in the music landscape, and most of the songs on this album are exciting, evocative tracks that play to the most basic of emotions: love, loss and redemption.

The quiet/loud dynamics of Pleasure showcase an artist who’s satiating her capricious appetite, all while keeping her listeners guessing with a knowing wink.

It’s a bit of stretch to call Parquet Courts the next trailblazers of off-center indie rock, but they sure got the rock n’ roll part down pat.

While Aghori Mhori Mei doesn't reach the same highs as some of their defining albums, it does show the original trio of Corgan, Iha, and Chamberlain forging a newfound musical identity in lockstep.

[Banga] may be the songstress's most ambitious statement yet.

While not his best album, Hesitation Marks shows that he has no intention to fall back on old formulas.

It's a moving, eclectic return that longtime fans will admire—and find themselves surprised to discover them for the first time.

We Cater To Cowards has warranted many listens, our current timeline a wealth of ridiculousness breeding targets meant for Oozing Wound’s shrapnel. Again, if you’re missing the joke, you may want to duck.

ATUM is more sonically consistent than 1995's opus Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. ... Corgan somehow achieved the impossible: a genuinely likable, odd, and even inclusive album that sounds like nothing else in 2023.

Van Etten took the risk of not releasing any singles beforehand so audiences could more fully understand the full scope of the story. She holds a little bit of control before charging ahead, unlocking the connection she craves after experiencing a ceaseless stream of negativity. It's the kind of emotional catharsis all of us can relate to during these uncertian times.

Stormzy makes every minute of this album count. By giving a voice to both the street and religious sides of his life he is able to produce a well-rounded, exciting project.

No holds barred, and no pitch-correction in sight, the tracks of 200 Million Thousand shine like diamonds in the rough, warts-and-all.

For Fanfarlo, this is a follow-up that does all that it needs to do. It keeps us critics and fans happy with a healthy balance of familiarity and expansion.

From subtle synth stabs to soft rock explorations, Hamilton and Thomas open their songwriting possibilities by paying attention to nuance. It's in those shadings that their music takes shape: slowly but surely, and with unassuming confidence.

Tell Me is an impressive work. Mayfield shines as she enters new territory in her musical composition and her lyricism.

It’s still haunting, and it’s still beautiful. It’s like a soundtrack to exploring some abandoned, centuries-old mansion in the middle of a desert, now filled with ghosts, lost memories, and cobwebs weaved around expensive furniture.

Changing Horses emphatically answers the question of “what next?” for Ben Kweller and although not faultless, it’s a strong showing, especially for someone exploring a new musical direction as he is.

Bondy trudges along without much to believe in, but his instilled confidence tells otherwise.

Its authenticity is what makes it so addictive, so accessible.

A work of art, slightly rough around the edges and a little makeshift, but tremendously beautiful all the same.