Yet something needs to be said for Allen’s ability to make cursing seem cute, and tunes about giving head sound charming.

Add in some politicking and dissociative trilling and Wild Water Kingdom is revisionist rap meant for fans who believe in Heems's neurotic, post-post-colonial, lapsed-academic POV.

Like his debut disc, Cole World, Born Sinner displays an astute understanding of the male-female dynamic--or at least his contributions to the demise of his relationships.

It's the lyrical shift that propels the album in a new direction that will be hard to appreciate amongst throngs of festival-goers. That's what the sugary hooks are for.

There’s not a lot to get excited about, but it’s a catchy enough confection that should work well in gadget commercials, which was likely the whole point.

Just when it starts to feel like the album is continuing in a high-powered vein, the Lips start sounding like they’re steering a chuckwagon.

Pond still appreciate the glue of a hummable pop hook and the intoxicating pyschedelia of headphone tricks, but the most satisfying way to hear Hobo Rocket is turning it up as loud as it’ll go.

Flux Outside flies by effortlessly and still leaves you with choruses you'll be singing to yourself long after the disc ends.

The album is chock full of solid songs.

They sound more like a live band than they have since their debut, and this relaxed natural quality suits them perfectly.

I Blame You is mean, raw and instrumentally tight, with splashes of surf and punk. Froberg and Habibion’s twangy guitars effectively interweave in highlights 'Fake Kinkade' and 'Pine On.'

Cudi deserves credit for such an audacious high-concept debut. It falls a bit flat, but at least it falls forward.

Despite some cliched lyrics and cheesy moments (Bootful Of Beer is pretty goofy, the groovy Wheels is straight out of a steamy 80s-rock-chick video), the album--the Wilsons' first in six years--is both tough and tender, and makes a girl like me dive into the YouTube archives to relish the ass-kicking awesomeness that was and still is Heart.

The album as a whole is still more interesting than any of its individual parts, but now we can truly appreciate each and every fragment.

Diarrhea Planet have always aimed for the rafters, but on Turn To Gold they crash through them.

Unfortunately, Furtado doesn't have the rhyming skills, vocal chops or attitude to pull off any one of her new personae.

Some of the 80s references take a few listens until they stop sounding goofy, and MacLean’s deadpan vocals occasionally grate next to Whang’s light and floating tone, but once your ears adjust, there’s a lot to appreciate.

The production (thanks to Jim Diamond) also sounds more radio-ready, but the increased crispness makes the looseness of Maya Miller’s drums far more distracting than it used to be, and everything is far too cold.

Her percussion is often mesmerizing, the glue holding it all together. It’s all cinematic in a broad sort of way, the kind of album you can put on and walk through the streets, imagining how the movie of your own life would unfold. Thematically, it swerves through early 20-something existential angst in a rather predictable and trend-chasing way, which starts to lag and feel samey in the album’s second half.

There are some really gorgeous moments here, as on sleepy waltz 'Don’t Watch Me Dancing' and beautiful lazy closer 'Evaporar,' but overall the album comes off as an incomplete and thrown-together hobby project.

Angelakos’s Hot Chip-meets-MGMT sound also works on I’ve Got Your Number. His distinctive vocals backfire only on the too-cutesy Cuddle Fuddle.

Turkey is erratic, disjointed and full of loose garage swagger--in other words, classic Krol.

Eraser Stargazer is full of ideas, a lot of them half-baked. But for the band, it's a courageous, wholehearted lunge into a more danceable form of convulsive mayhem, and into more elliptical and impressionistic narratives.

If you can disregard the arrogance of proclaiming yourself outside the parameters of musical taxonomy and if you don’t mind Anna Barie’s shrill chanting, appropriately ghoulish on Sand Tassels, you’ll probably dig this synthesized blueprint of the future.

Understandably, he’s lost a little youthful edge: there’s no defiant Mr. Cab Driver, for example. But the songs hold up.

They've still got a way with grand, sweeping crescendos and haven't forgotten that the build is as important as the payoff.

Just cold, robotic electro beats with Wiley's aggressive cockney flows on the usual subjects.

Stylistically, their fourth record doesn't depart much from previous ones.

When you have to think this hard about music, it becomes a somewhat joyless ride, especially since Booth and Brown deny the listener a single danceable beat until track 10.

Meh. Patti Smith does it better.

Black Radio 2 falls a note short of its Grammy-winning predecessor, but just shy of spectacular is still damn good.

Sustained by romantic tension, they walk a strange line between being mesmerizing and washing over you like sonic wallpaper.

It’s far from a perfect record, but it’s their best in years.

The quieter moments that give his voice less to compete with are more interesting.

It’s a rare and amazing thing when an indie musician finds ways to keep chugging along on her own steam for years and then releases an album that brings together in the most powerful way everything she’s learned. Moncton singer/songwriter Julie Doiron has accomplished this with her eighth album.

Trouble, while not a huge departure from the Woodpigeon canon, proves Hamilton's songwriting is always growing. Here's hoping his audience will be, too.

It isn’t until album closer Spring Fever that you get a sense of how much further the band could’ve pushed the experimentalism.

This is still effervescent, hook-based pop, but it eschews the Delgados' more orchestrated moments in favour of simpler instrumentation, whipped into cabaret-ish arrangements or pared down into frantic post-punk, with driving lines of ringing single-note bass and guitar.

Indecision and infighting have rarely sounded this solid and inspired.

While they’re great at the dreamy soundscapes, Toy are not as strong with fractured pop songs, and the vocals could still use some work.

Monica’s highly anticipated sixth album is rich with songs about self-validation, love lost and subsequent recovery, and doesn’t let up on that thematic gas pedal until the last tune.

At times, those love ballads veer into over-the-top Leona Lewis territory (Emeli Sandé’s More Than Anything) that only the Brits, it seems, can get away with.

She may have gone a little too far toward conventional pop, and not all of it rings true.

Their combination of new wave coldness and glam rock glitter is a formula that works well, and Haines has a genuine talent for walking the line between tough-girl swagger and fragility.

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.

The record's emotional centre hits toward the end, so stick around for Your Moon, a cathartic downer backed by processed strings and 808 claps.

The lyrics are dense with vivid imagery that could be autobiographical but may just attest to the duo's ability to create intimate moments for their listeners to enjoy.

Although the new direction isn't revolutionary, it's natural enough and distracts from some of the filler.

RTRWRA neatly combines those familiar chantable choruses, punchy guitars, pleasant harmonies and simple, clever lyricism--all in all, a great vehicle for that smooth, too cool croon of singer Alex Kapranos.

Calvi’s obviously got great pipes, but the EP would’ve been better if she’d made every cover unrecognizable.

Echoes sounds pretty business-as-usual.

Neither as playful as previous efforts nor as spooky as it wants to be, Mirror Mirror is a middling effort by a good band.

Billy Bragg’s studio return finds him in his comfort zone provided by the Blokes and producer Grant Showbiz under yet another title copped from novelist Colin MacInnes.

At this point, however, the movement of white UK female artists using 60s nostalgia to reinvent pop music is not all that original, but at least it’s a welcome break from the previous trends.

Of course, hilariously outlandish quasi-mystical song titles like 'Fire Lances Of The Ancient Hyperze­phyerians' probably won’t help their cause, but the progressively regressive arrangements, more skillful riffing and their relentless, groove-conscious attack will go a long way toward endearing them to serious metalheads who’ll appreciate the Sword’s obvious Sabbath, Maiden and Budgie inspiration.

Instead of moving forward with a bold new sound, they seem lost and confused, eventually reverting to the sprawling space rock jams of their early years, which may be their comfort zone.

Cuomo’s notes contain detailed autobiographical backstories for each song, some of which are probably the best Weezer never recorded.

There seems to be something unsettlingly artifical about the whole Beirut project, as if idea man Zach Condon is playing some strange cultural appropriation game for which he’s the only one privy to the rules.

Overall, the record is solid: lots of fuzzy psychedelic riffs and infectious melodies. But inevitably, a few of the toned-down tracks miss the mark.

Much of the record is stuck in a good but not great sound from 10 years back.

Overall, it's an ambitious and beautiful album.

Amazingly, though Elan Vital easily could've become their resounding Sandinista flop, Zollo's clean vocals, knife-sharp melodies and subtle politically charged songwriting help secure its nomination as Pretty Girls' London Calling.

It’s just the sort of gently strummed, sweetly harmonized and vaguely familiar-sounding pop music replete with quirky lyrical turns that is designed to make indie-rock-obsessed music hacks swoon. And they will.

I Predict A Graceful Expulsion is not only immediately accessible, but also rich and nuanced enough to survive repeated listens.

Beautifully spooky.

They've delivered faithful, appreciative renditions, but the elephant-in-the-room question is why anyone would cop this disc instead of an H&O best-of.

Despite the evident talent of his backup band – vocalists Patti Griffin and Jill Sobule, guitarist Smokey Hormel, bassist Don Was and Giant Sand's Howe Gelb on piano – it takes a while to get into, in part because the arrangements are often so busy that they verge on chaotic.

With Uncle, Duke & The Chief, they confidently step into calmer, more spacious sonic terrain and lean on classic pop songwriting. The nine songs still take plenty of left-field Ruffian tangents, but they come in brief, controlled bursts that add personality and colour.

The Menzingers haven’t necessarily mastered the grown-up punk formula, but they’re certainly maturing with each new release.

Why Bother sounds like it would be fun to see live in a dive bar, but at home it's a little grating to listen to from start to finish.

Hakeem Seriki's sophomore album kicks off with his heavy single 'Hip Hop Police,' with guest Slick Rick, one of the strongest rap songs of 07.

While the songs sound effortlessly crafted, there's a complexity to the melodies and structures that surprises on repeat listens.

It’s initially fun to play spot-the-references, but in the best moments the sounds are harder to pin down.

Jon King's vocals sound especially diminished, a reality underscored by the occasional electronic manipulation, while the cluttered mix overcompensates for repetitive songwriting. Without the vitality of youth, Gang of Four risk drowning in the sea of bands they inspired.

Their high and pretty voices tie the songs together in a way their previous releases lack, though they would do well to let up on the layered effect from time to time.

Everything sounds lovely, but the songs are too indistinct from one another, and there’s very little emotional range on display.

The sheets of noise and absence of hooks hide some interesting ideas if you have the patience to listen for them.

With its flawless song structures and instrumentation, the album flows seamlessly.

The Whigs are at their best when they embrace their more overt pop sensibilities over the wall-of-guitars thing, but it sounds like they need to expand their record collections.

If you already hate him, nothing on this disc will change your mind. But some surprisingly creative moments throughout the album will likely inspire hundreds of clones over the next year.

Somewhere along the way he must have forgotten about that--there are a handful of collaborators--but the overall theme of gleeful self-indulgence remains.

There is a fair amount of Bowie-esque schmaltz in Vincenzi Vendetta’s vocals, which make Dystopia a little harder to swallow than its instantly catchy cousin, Cut Copy’s "In Ghost Colours."

What makes Under The Blacklight a true disappointment is the shoddy songcraft.

While Adventures In Your Own Backyard can't be described as instantly catchy, its songs wend their way into your memory as if you've always known them.

Unlike Manson's previous records, there's no real guiding concept here, which is probably for the best.

The results are mixed--a few brilliantly sleazy moments but too few to make this album as good as we’d hoped.

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.

An exciting and often unexpected listen.

Don’t expect any major changes to their 50-million-records-sold formula. Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe keep things grandiose with paddy retro synths, discotheque drum machines and downtrodden lyrics.

She’s absurd, yes, but she also has an incredible melodic sense and can unpredictably weave trancey backdrops to brilliant effect.

Together is the flawless execution of can't-shake-loose melodies, genius arrangements (oh, those group harmonies!) and production that leaves you energized.

Mopey, twee, orchestral, downbeat--the duo cover all these bases in the flattest, most sophomoric way. Worse, though, is that the album sounds like a bunch of outtakes.

Baby 81's not nearly as original or as interesting as their past releases – including Howl.

Fans won’t be let down by this latest collection of accomplished and almost too-smart songwriting that borrows from the classic sensibilities of piano-based jazz.

Now, her newest batch of songs feel overly done up and superficial, with squeaky synths and drum machine beats fabricated for the club.

The title track and opener has a huge sound, but it’s the simple yet infectious guitar riff that keeps it together.

Musically it’s a gloriously tacky mix of dance pop and hair metal, and we mean that in the best way possible....The only problem is that he doesn’t go far enough, likely the result of the label trying to tone down his flamboyance.

The album mines go-to country clichés like driving and women (“Put your sugar down on my front seat, cuz you truly know what’s good for me,” Wilson implores in the opening track, North), but for the most part the songwriting is diverse and mature.