Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche and Jim O’Rourke bassist Darin Gray needed three years to create, during breaks in their schedules, the unhurried dream-like expedition that is their fourth full-length album.

The album drowns in atmospherics to the point where it could be entirely instrumental. Greene casts an enjoyably suggestive spell but it wafts right through you.

At 14 tracks (19 on the deluxe), Body Music feels overlong for a debut, but she’s melodic enough to captivate even when Reid’s hissing minimalism and spastic beats start to feel warmed over.

It’s softer, but it’s nice to see a band unafraid of mellowing.

Sure, it's bloated and loaded with overreaching, pretentious lyrics, but it wouldn't be the Pumpkins otherwise.

This “mix­tape album” decently whets the appetite.

The album is surprisingly full of acoustic sounds and wistful balladry reminiscent of her 90s material, but it also plugs into a load of dark, restless and weird club rhythms with help from a coterie of in-demand producers.

The novelty disco elements are balanced by enough rock-solid grooves that the cheesier moments don’t stink up the whole thing.

While it's hard to question their motives and integrity, Avocado fails to deliver the grand statement we might expect.

Other Life isn’t too polished, which means it will appeal to Savage’s pre-existing cult fan base but not the wider audience it aims for.

They seem incapable of softening their sound, even when they try.

Unfortunately, it often veers dangerously close to a corny dystopian sci-fi movie soundtrack, which becomes a little less cute with each listen.

Although All Of Me shares that record's [The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill] fervour, it lacks its cohesiveness due to a few forgettable pop turns.

4:44 is intimate, refined and mature--fascinating partly despite its flaws and partly because of them.

It helps that lead singer Tim Cohen is gifted with an expressive baritone that easily lends itself to any style the band tries on, but their subtly complex guitar rhythms and melodic hooks do just as much heavy lifting.

The album is as solid as its maker's last name but so predictable you could set your Flavor Flav clock to it.

Astbury's voice is just as deep and earnest as it ever was and comes through like gangbusters on opener Born Into This, while Billy Duffy's guitar work is still as raw and dirty as it should be--clear indicators that the whole album doesn't give itself time for ego or pointless filler.

The music often verges on innocuous, but it serves its purpose as a backdrop for Darnielle’s steadily churning imagination.

Occasionally sounding like Vast Aire’s little brother with Bigg Jus aspirations, this immense man spills his solemn life lessons while treading the literal lyric territory that Vast owns so effortlessly.

The album is executed slickly enough that this lack of cohesion isn't a huge problem. The goofy lyrics, though, owe too much to the hippy-dippy era.

The songs are old, and the album sounds really old.

Their imperfections blare through your speakers, as do the clanging discofied hi-hats, nervy guitar lines and jagged, boy/girl shouted vocals. And yet it satisfies in a way similar to seeing the final pages of your fanzine come spitting through a photocopier.

It comes off sounding like a transitional recording, but with Son Volt any change is welcome.

This second album for Lost Highway isn’t radically different from 2004’s return to sneering form The Delivery Man, only the rockin’ tracks sound slightly less raucous and the ballads not quite as bitter. So he’s back in Attractions mode, sans the old piss and vinegar.

[Dead Silence] sounds exactly like what you'd expect from the maturing Mississauga pop-punk band: more middle-of-the-road radio-friendly guitar rock, with less punk energy and more classic rock than in their younger years.

A bunch of tunes seem built for radio (So What, Error), ballad Sorrow is overly dreary, and Skin Me borrows way too much from Nirvana. But the strength, emotion and new directions make this album a winner.

They've made a sophisticated, thinking listener's indie-pop record.

There is plenty of momentum on the first half of the record.... So, it’s a bummer that the last half of the album descends into bland and skippable.