True, there's a pop sensibility at work here that betrays their band roots, but that's exactly what makes this the kind of dance album you can actually listen to from beginning to end.

The follow-up to Ra Ra Riot's well-received debut album opens with a slow-moving reminder that this romantic indie-styled Syracuse sextet love their violins and cellos.

He allows the various sounds, guest features and flavours of the production, which he and his crew adopted from all over the world, to steal the show.

15 seamless songs that consistently keep interest high and ideas varied.

A huge part of her appeal is how authentically she manages to channel the intensity of adolescent angst, which makes lines that should be cringe-inducing feel too real to critique.

[Alex Turner] and the lads put their trust in Queens of the Stone Age heavyweight Josh Homme to help craft a record that, though not completely successful, frequently surprises, takes chances and demands further listens.

Some might prefer she stick with her usual skewering of gender roles, but that genuine anger lends a new seriousness and realness to even her silliest verses.

Shards of digital distortion and self-indulgent instrumentals are pretty much gone. What remains is a novel reworking of the California surf punk formula.

A well-considered 10-track song cycle of mostly shorter and tighter compositions that combine the catchy, guitar-oriented pop aspects of Ta Det Lugnt ... with the darker freak-folk stylings of 2002's Stadsvandringar.

The songs work best individually, though, and the tune Gang Of Rhythm is admittedly stronger when paired with visuals.

The range is fantastic but never jarring.

Hospice isn’t uplifting or hopeful; it explores themes of dejection through delicate, beautiful sounds.

There's not much that's accessible about The Most Lamentable Tragedy, but that's a good thing.

Gone are the days when this band gave us four albums in three years, but their enchanting harmonies and eloquent songwriting are as formidable as ever. And that's what matters most when it comes to a new Teenage Fanclub album.

Overall, it's an ambitious and beautiful album.

Most impressive is the lightness of touch Hynes brings to his arrangements.

The album is as focused as its predecessor (both are 45 minutes), but it is emotionally more expansive.

Themes of isolation and solipsism unfold musically as much as lyrically. Produced with help from Flaming Lips go-to guy Dave Fridmann, Lonerism surprises with layers of detail.

Phèdre, combines the best of both projects [Doldrums and Hooded Fang], with impressive results.

Nothing about For Evelyn feels resolved. A restless quality drives each track, resulting in a thoughtful, solitary album that you listen, cry and even dance to alone. Yet after it's over, you're left feeling less alone, because through its intimate explorations, Georgas makes the personal universal.

Like so much of his work, Staples lures us in with stylized storytelling and production (here, primarily overseen by No I.D.) but then hits hard with a jarring line like "They found another dead body in the alley."

It's a determined album, almost to a fault, and like the romance hinted at in lead single Shut Up Kiss Me, the album is occasionally messy and frequently epic.

Singer Glen Hansard moves from quiet introspection to earnest Jeremy Enigk-like wailing and back again, all the while reminding you just how rewarding a listen The Cost is.

You’d think this might get messy, but the arrangements are so thoughtful that the result is sweeping and astonishing.

Their fourth album reveals the breadth of the genre.

Yes, it is Christopher Bridges’s best work (relatively) but ultimately, he might not be capable of a Whut?! Thee Album-level classic. Top track: I Do It For Hip Hop, co-starring Nas and Jay-Z NOW | November 26-December 3, 2008 | VOL 28 NO 13 Go to Music Post a comment : All comments are reviewed.

Quirky melodies and unpredictable, anti-country structures make it interesting over repeat listens. A mid-career triumph.

The hallmarks of Blood Orange’s sound are all here--breathy male/female vocal interplay, rare groove rhythms, jazzy sax, gliding slap bass, honeyed falsetto melodies and flirty spoken word--but channelled into a reassuring, comfortable space that brings together pop’s supposed polarities of accessibility and specificity. Somewhere in there, Freetown Sound finds its own beautiful sweet spot.

Universes builds on that vibe [of a late-night P.A. set] with exuberant bangers full of snappy, discofied drums, repetitive phrases and dusty funk that could fit nicely into a DJ set of classic Philly soul re-edits or slickly produced tracks from the current UK garage revival.

In parts, this is the most melodic--and pretty--Shabazz Palaces have ever been.

For a band so heavily influenced by modern classical music, Mono are not at all restrained, and that's what's great about them.

You could boil Freedom’s Goblin down to “rock,” but the 19 songs offer 19 flavours of the genre--a testament to how many delicious recipes you can still make out of vocals, guitar, bass and drums (and, in this case, a dollop of horns).

The production is unpolished, warm and organic. It had to be. When you hear the pained fury in his rendition of Black Sabbath's Changes, it's clear it would be an affront to modernize Bradley's unvarnished howls.

Refreshingly, they're not only about slick production atmospherics, though some cavernous sonics and electro rhythms threaten to steal the show around the album's midpoint.

Lyrically, the mood vacillates between confrontational and reflective, but House Of Balloons really soars when his blunt resolve collides with a more nuanced or gentle vocal delivery, creating a tension reminiscent of Aaliyah's clear-headed emotional states.

Irony’s the entry point, the aesthetic and intellectual rigging that supports the record, a way into enjoying it.

The complexity of some of the arrangements and the bouncy danceability of most of the songs make it easy to overlook the lyrics initially, but with repeated listens they start sinking in.

Post-Nothing is their eight-song debut, and it goes by in a flash of infectious, sweaty anthem jams about angsty youth problems.

With Love Is Free, Robyn once again shows she can bring together discerning dance snobs and accessible-pop fans.

While R&B artists clamour for synth-heavy, layered production by The-Dream, Danja and Jim Jonsin, Keys proves a hit album can still be made using conventional means.

Much of Keep Your Eyes Ahead, like the softly plucked 'Shed Your Love' or the Dylanesque 'Broken Afternoon,' could easily backdrop drippy TV dramas, but that isn’t necessarily a knock. Both are beautiful tunes.

His tendency to cram a million ideas into every song gets toned down, too, but fans of that aesthetic shouldn’t worry; the songs are as intricate and delightfully off-kilter as ever.

She sounds like she’s rediscovering the thrill of making music, and a nervy triumph pervades.

There are a few moments when Auerbach's production touches threaten to distract from the grooves, but the overall quality is so impressively high that the occasional misstep is quickly forgotten.

Song for song, however, this is the best QOTSA album in a decade, delivering all the swagger and skew of their greatest work without rehashing it.

All the emphasis on getting the realness down doesn't distract from Bridges's butter-smooth vocals and inventive phrasing. Instead, the understated arrangements allow us to really hear his voice, unadorned by excessive studio shaping.

Emotional, stunning and one of the strongest debuts of the year so far.

Twice nominated for Britain’s Mercury Prize, Calvi has consistently delivered brilliant albums. This new era of openness only serves to push her to more relevant and engaging levels.

The album plods occasionally, but then the band’s mastery of mood shifts kicks in and a dreamy landscape and simple, jangly verse turn into a big, beautiful chorus.

What sets Yuck apart is their excellent songwriting. It takes hooks to pull off songs like these, even if they're buried under piles of grunge, and Yuck have hooks in scores.

Pala is a party record aiming directly at the pleasure centres – not at all a shallow pursuit.

We keep hearing about the death of rock ’n’ roll supplanted by some fleeting, trendy sub-genre; but with more confidence than ever, these dudes remind us just how powerful the pure stuff can be.

You have to admire the way Gaga fearlessly throws herself into, say, a disco mariachi arrangement on Americano, but she should be careful: her frequently righteous tone and overindulgence in clunky Catholic metaphors threaten to mire her memorable melodies in schlocky self-help proselytizing.

Schmilco is also sly and great, but superficially it feels like complex, mid-life personal stocktaking.

His debut album (named after his street, not the city in Oz) is a charming collection of lo-fi bedroom pop ditties that has the thematic naïveté of someone who’s just left his teen years and hometown behind.

Cold Specks’s anticipated follow-up to her excellent gospel-indebted folk-soul debut, I Predict A Graceful Expulsion, is a much louder, much more rock ’n’ roll, much more experimental experience; fuzz and feedback and unexpected elements (like synths on Let Loose The Dogs) constantly make things more interesting.

Pallett’s inventive textures lend emotional weight to some of the deliberately mundane lyrical details, so the album is at once beautifully ethereal and painfully real.

Apple's return to music is not only undeniably powerful, but Idler is arguably her best work yet.

A Wu-Tangy darkness permeates the whole album, which is cluttered with gems both musical (live sax and jazz flute) and lyrical.

It’s a fairly light album and doesn’t do anything new musically, but it’s solid; you don’t feel like it needs to be anything else.

Sky’s post-post-punk mellowing proves a welcome development, revealing maturity instead of postured snarling.

Through varied production, Q strikes a balance between his hard persona and the party vibe found on Habits’ catchiest tracks.

The result is one of their most serene and sonically consistent efforts to date.

Sounds like one big, happy family get-together.

Wacky pseudoscience aside, the results here are relatively accessible, at least by Matmos standards.

While curiosities and lost tracks usually only appeal to the fan who has everything, this album stands as a perfect complement to Springsteen's mid-70s work.

The songs’ simple moods--at times sentimental, winsome and ecstatic--nicely play off the depth and obsessive detail in the music.

Killer Mike is the Jäger shot of rap: efficient, acrid and totally devastating.

They've reused almost every song from their EP. But that's forgivable when the band manages a knockout with almost every punch.

It's easily one of the most beautiful, subdued folk records of the year.

This newest electronic funk vision feels like the album we’ve been waiting for.

This brutally honest record is in many ways more powerful than anything from his agitprop days.

The album is a delightful access point to the cloudy emotional zones Bernice have always occupied, from a warm place of Snuggie-bound safety.

His focus on high-quality, vintage synth sounds gives the songs a unique flavour and energy that are hard to resist.

Lyrically, he's still clever but also much more direct, and there's greater impact because of it.

Li's productions tend toward a functional minimalism that works well for DJ singles but to some ears might lack the dynamics expected from albums. If you can get past that, though, Under The Same Sky holds together as a compelling exploration of a theme.

By finding the beauty in isolation, Efterklang have made their most triumphant record yet.

What makes this work so beautifully is that the sound is completely unique and modern and yet couldn't be confused for anyone else.

The melodies' stoicism seems to reflect much of the empty, brutal beauty of modern life.

If this isn’t the band’s best yet, it’s still damn good.

Their name may reference a 52-year-old Elvis Presley musical, but Blue Hawaii are poised to have a lot of people talking about them right now.

Listening to the fiercely adrenalized sophomore disc by Sweden’s Love Is All is like being at the fair for an entire weekend, stuffing your face with cotton candy and taking one too many spins on the Gravitron.

Shapeshifting may sound very contemporary, but it's not in the least derivative.

He’s sounding more Sly Stone than Otis Redding this time, which gives him room to get delightfully weird and psychedelic while still keeping everything deeply rooted in R&B.

Always good for a spirited rock song, he infuses Patty Don't You Put Me Down with narrative wit and charge that recalls contemporary Bob Dylan. We're all lucky that Thompson is on fire these days.

It works as an homage but also as a reminder that specific eras, places, styles and sounds can live on as a state of mind.

If Fantastic is saying anything meaningful, it's "shut the hell up and have some fun."

Not every song is as outstanding as the next, but at points, Anti is incredibly satisfying and sufficiently distinct from her other efforts--very much worth the wait and the bizarre roll out.

Fade isn't a drastic departure, but when you've polished your eclectic sound as well as Yo La Tengo has, that's not always necessary.

Led by Patton’s smarmy vocals and the band’s intricately heavy instrumentation, Oddfellows cuts a swath between infectious bangers (Stone Letter, South Paw) and quirky atmospherics.

It's an extraordinarily consistent pop album.

The record, lacking choruses or pop hooks, isn't one to turn to for instant gratification. Instead, it's an engaging marriage of words and music.

Hanson artfully pits his airy vocals and kaleidoscopic harmonies (there's a pronounced Kinks vibe) against thick, sludgy guitar riffs and crashing drums.

The whole album is solid, save for Uffie's questionable club princess rap, and even that sounds better with repeated listens.

Despite repetitive structures and an average song length of over seven minutes, the duo hold interest with their sterling musicianship and artfully detailed performances.

It’s the middle songs that are most immediately enjoyable.

Ritter draws liberally from the well of himself, others and the Bible, and it's a fun ride.

Though QOTSA always seem to be on bland-rock stations, this is as different from the mainstream as you can imagine, and not in a bad way.