You, Whom I Have Always Hated is a beautifully punishing listen.

From start to finish, the instrumentation and production on We Are Him is immaculate

Lust For Life may be a scattered, confusing record, but it's a beautiful ride--one worth repeated listens, even if Lana's intentions--like her enunciation--aren't always clear.

Dance is best enjoyed when you accept its familiar pleasures--it bursts with pure deliverance, coming from a band that refuses to hang in life support.

Though Darnielle skillfully furthers his compositional approach in In League with Dragons, there are times where his unbounded, bookish wit gets the best of him.

While not the most creative thing he’s produced, it feels naturally cohesive and stands as an interesting piece on its own.

Frankly, Love Kraft sounds like a different band, which would be fine, if it wasn’t so less loveable and not nearly as bizarre.

For the most part though, it adds little to a genre that’s already saturated and is disappointing from a band whose past evidence has shown can do better.

The whole thing works beautifully, more with each listen.

Despite the obvious logistical convenience that made possible the merge of Boeckner and Daniel, A Thing Called Divine Fits makes a strong case for established musicians who randomly feel an urge to start a band.

I Don’t Run never ventures too far away from convention, but it doesn’t need to. It’s that familiarity that allows them to ramp up the sentimentality without coming across as kitsch.

Though Out Getting Ribs already gave us little reason to underestimate him, 6 Feet Beneath the Moon holds up as the kind of statement to truly brag about--a debut that’s masterfully crafted, reasonably ambitious, and, more importantly, exists as a truly unique statement.

This isn’t the breakthrough album that nobody expected. This is precisely the album everyone was waiting for from Metric, a culmination of all their strengths and a slicing off of the fat that may have slowed them down in the past.

Admiral Fell Promises sits somewhere in the middle of being a series of musical pieces and being an album. It's brave, but Kozelek's grace and musical deftness means he never risks alienating his audiences and makes Admiral Fell Promises another essential addition to Kozelek's remarkable catalogue.

If nothing else can be said about The Terror, it at least represents the culmination of all of The Flaming Lips’ oddball experiments and elongated, anti-sonorous jams into a single, abrasively beautiful cacophony.

Ghost Blonde brings a glimmer of hope to those who feel that noise has remained stagnant, past overdue its last hurrah. As these set of songs pinpoints, there's still plenty to discover in a genre that has always shown itself as deviously minimal.

It’s a pleasant listen with some great moments herein.

There’s a brittle vulnerability present in Viet Cong that triggers an innate sense of curiosity and optimism despite the downtrodden tone it adopts.

Their song-oriented approach recharacterizes a project that was once known for their simple, garage revivalism. Wand now rise above that notion--it's a refreshing move that makes it even harder to pin down their artistic evolution.

They used to make little records like this in the anything goes early 80’s. It’s nice to see Konigsberg bringing it back.

Trees Outside the Academy sparkles with an eclectic (yet accessible) sound that has my early vote for Album of the Year.

Root For Ruin is an album of decent, somewhat disappointing Les Savy Fav songs, but as its come to pass in the indierealm, any batch of Les Savy Fav songs is better than no batch of Les Savy Fav songs.

With varying strains of droning guitar sound carrying the album to a close, Boris’ sonic recognition of their roots pulses and shrieks, sounds that seem merely revisited and not completely inspired.

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.

Although Buffalo Tom will certainly never set the music world aflame with their lyrical content, Three Easy Pieces proves that getting old never sounded so good.

The EP highlight comes with 'My Mirror Speaks' recalling the band’s dynamic work from "Plans."

He never gets beyond either producing a meditative song or joyful song. The difference between this album from all the millions of other acoustic albums out there? Not much.

Without him [Machinedrum], it's a well assembled but dull record. With him, it's sublime.