Most of the time it's a joy to listen to.

The album is at its most successful when Lanegan allows these alien textures [electronics, atmospheric guitar] to take a more prominent role in his songs, providing a counterfoil to his gravelly rock vocals. Elsewhere the songs meander too much for the album to coalesce into a convincing statement.

This is by and large a record that moves at its own pace, and a calm one at that.

It gets a bit boring, a bit sleepy, and altogether, it's a bit forgettable.... But, you know? It sounds good doing it. That has to count for something.

Plumb feels unsure of how ambitious it wants to be, but instead of landing in the middle of the road, the lack of focus and uncertainty create an incoherent mess.

Young & Old is a more mature release which demonstrates that Tennis possess both the wisdom and guile to evolve.

Tramp isn't as seizing as Epic, its songs aren't as dense and unalike, its textures don't diverge in the same methods, but it breathes more, it quivers more, it shakes, it overturns itself, it rusts.

There may be some great ideas on here amongst the mis-steps, but without any suspense, it is difficult to tell.

More quickly than you'd expect, Busdriver's quirks become endearing; his cartoonish vocal stretches to reach those high notes become normalised and you begin to appreciate how much heart he puts into his singing.

Dr. Dog's best effort yet.

Sure, a couple tracks hit it just right, but by and large, once the album's over, it's not liable to pop back into my thinking.

An epic, widescreen journey which is busy and bonkers but constantly entertaining.

You're probably not going to find another record quite so beautifully produced this year, or quite so warmly inviting, or just quite so full of lovely stuff.

There are no compromises to be reached, and that's what makes No One Can Ever Know such an authoritative listen.

The biggest, brashest cartoon this side of Eminem's early albums.

Libraries is chock full of restructured reminiscence, yet doesn't lay any cautions in modernizing pop's landmark, time-honored aesthetic.

It's elegant, but hardly likely to inspire any particularly stirring flights of fancy, or any reevaluations of the band's post-Moon Safari discography.

House of Balloons is still his finest hour to date, but Echoes of Silence comes damn close to it.

Shortcomings are well disguised, and even when they are exposed, the originality of Papini's storytelling is enough to keep the ears alert for several listens.

Firing on all cylinders and exhibiting the canny combination of eminently danceable rhythms with big hooks and gorgeous synth melodies.

Considering how the lyrical content and flat as a rug singing in Weekends was written for an elementary school child to understand, they probably should've kept it that way; it occasionally downgrades the songs to a point where they are unable to rise above their cheesiness.

In both songwriting craft and execution of recording, The Coldest Winter For A Hundred Years is exceptional.

It all sounds very immaturely polished.

From the album's onset, you're treated to both the abrasive and the profane.

While I can appreciate their longevity, ironic style and pureness in their sound, I can't admit that this was enjoyable for me.

The often overly-enthusiastic arrangements threaten to smother the qualities that made Rodrigo y Gabriela special in the first place with the quiet brutality of their guitar playing often lost in the extended jam-band style... structures.

Far beyond simply avant garde, this is one for the abstract devotee.

The end result is an album full of tracks that sound so warmly familiar that they instantly seem like old friends.