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.

There are a few clunker lyrics--Grainger’s at his strongest when he’s singing about making love, not having sex--but overall it’s a worthy record from an artist who refuses to make the same one twice.

While the rhythms may seem like invitations to dance--or at least sway--the lyrics are almost uniformly bleak, making Pale Fire a late contender for saddest album of the year.

So even though Burnett has assembled a crack acoustic support unit to play the choice material he's selected from Gene Clark, Townes Van Zandt and the Everly Brothers, without that magical X factor you've got nothing but two good vocalists trying to stay out of each other's way.

Reign Of Terror still sounds like Sleigh Bells, but a more polite and conservative version.

The band's maturing on Kintsugi, which, if you remember the haircut and attitude of your 16-year-old self, is always a good thing.

Dark Bird Is Home sounds carefully constructed, and Matsson keeps things simple rather than making easy moves toward a grandeur that could bury his songcraft.

Despite a couple of interstitial tracks just past the halfway mark, RR7349 is more like a suite of discrete moods than a cycle of songs.

M.I.A. is good at circumventing dance music clichés, often through sheer polyrhythmic excess; it’s hard to stay still during effusive bangers like Y.A.L.A., Matangi and tribal-trap anthem Warriors. On the flip side, Matangi’s forays into left-field pop (Come Walk With Me, Lights) are blandly saccharine compared with // / Y /’s pure pop moments.

Too many of the tracks seem more like very good imitations of song types than like actual songs.

Terraplane's saving grace is that it's fun to listen to and full of swagger.

Ward's writing--though universal and singalongable--sometimes suffers from vagueness and clichéd rhymes. He should have a bit more faith in his audience, because Hope is most interesting when it strays a little from this formula.

It works best when the overpowering synth lines let up and make room for experimental noises and Iwanusa’s tender voice.

The quietness is also the project’s greatest weakness. At times, it leaves the album feeling incomplete or intrusive, as if we’re peeking in mid-thought.

Fans will be thrilled to know that, despite the replacement of main guitarist and co-songwriter Ben Moody, Evanescence's sophomore album is at least as unsubtle as its predecessor.

While Bun B's weathered voice and lyrical detail add weight to his words, there are a lot of predictable OG conventions on this overlong album.

The band's adventurous use of sampling and beats pays off when supporting Andy Maize's vocal on The Herd, but the alt-folk arrangements tend to get melodramatic on quieter songs like I'll Be There and the tremolo-piano-treated title track.

It's not a tasteful formula, but that doesn't mean it's not valid.

Latham's plaintive voice sounds like it's emanating from some romantically ruinous daydream. The effect suits the mood but makes his lyrics difficult to decipher, which is frustrating given his pointed message.

Often he's trying too hard to be cool, and it's unconvincing. When it does work, the band sounds surprisingly like Broken Social Scene, but with more cowbell.

The Polish-born, Brooklyn-based DJ, born Jakub Alexander, makes music that's as likely to induce sleep as a mild panic attack.

Real is a beefy record that plods and dances precariously close to the jam band divider.

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

It works best when DiFranco points to contradictions within herself, and worst when her lyrics get preachy or black-and-white.

Closer Oh Bummer, sung by drummer Greg Saunier, is a straightforward moody rock song--at least for the first three minutes, after which a striking doomsday-meets-Thriller breakdown erupts, reminding diehard fans that the band members are still weirdos but also keeping fair-weather listeners at a distance.

On indie pop cut One True Love and the rollicking I Need An Angel, Wisenbaker’s gritty voice scuffs up Goodman’s buoyant one – a good thing, since she can sound static at times. That said, she’s sorely missed on the jangling track Nineties, in which Wisenbaker takes sole vocal duties but lacks the charisma to pull it off.

It’s rare to hate one half of an album so much while genuinely enjoying the other.

While occasionally generic, nothing on Shine On is as annoying as their breakthrough single, Are You Gonna Be My Girl.