H.N.I.C. Pt. 2 makes for a much more complete and visceral portrait of an incarcerated man than the most precise and technically sound record could possibly manage.

If the herky-jerky new-waver 'Total Bloodbath,' and the 'Ticket to Ride'-styled charmer 'Partner in Crime' find Reis comfortably adapting to the pop approach, the mix can also leave Reis hanging out to dry, particularly on the smooth '70s-Stones strut 'You've Got Nerve,' where the droning qualities of his rasp are overemphasized by a chorus that simply repeats the title ad infinitum.

From the Valley to the Stars has hills that rise close to "El Perro del Mar's" peaks, and its cohesive vision is a pleasure to behold. At the same time, though, it harps on its themes with an overzealous single-mindedness, occasionally letting flimsy stuff support an overarching conceit that requires foundations of marble.

Sure, they're a very raw talent, but a formidable talent nonetheless, and this record's peaks hint at even greater musical epiphanies to come.

Liars and Prayers' success is owed as much to the band as its leader, but in the end, there's still no doubt about who's working on whose watch.

A great deal of Death Set's charm lies in how their toothsome double-guitar attack is deliberately undermined by their tinkertoy beats and new-waved keys; when the band try to overcompensate with the aggro.

Saturdays=Youth meaningfully diversifies M83's catalog while retaining Gonzalez's indelible fingerprint.

Konk feels like a mere cowardly act, a TPS report from a band that strives to be nothing more than British pop's ultimate company men.

So this record's creative and artistic value is pretty much nil--in fact it only just hits competent.

More so than the album's overall malaise and inconsistency, it's this ridiculous (and in some cases, offensive) attempt at "edginess" that's most off-putting.

It highlights their strengths (that voice, those beats, that authentic giving-it-their-all vibe) and hides their weaknesses (lack of songwriting breadth and dynamic diversity) making it sound like there's no place more fun than a Gossip concert, and no better host than Beth Ditto.

So Embarrassing is a bold change in direction for Capillary Action, but one that pays off as well as one could hope.

The Bad Seeds sound even edgier and more sophisticated on Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, providing a fitting pulpit for their bandleader's ravings.

Even if every one of these tracks stands as a formal experiment unto itself, after an hour or two these half-formed ideas begin to bleed indistinctly into each other, evolving into puddles of vaguely ominous aural mush.

If "Title TK" was a tentative first step back into the public eye, Mountain Battles finds Kim and Kelley proudly venerating the Breeders' battle-scarred history and bull-headed perseverance.

These moments of misplaced weight make Antidotes hard to recommend, but there are good ideas and moments all over the record.

Walk It Off attempts "The Loon's" indie patchwork using fewer and larger pieces, causing less-than-stellar ideas and riffs to suddenly become load-bearing pillars for painfully linear three-minute pop songs.

Clinic play with a renewed sense of the same eerie raucousness that drew people to them in the first place; this would be an easy second-album recommendation for a new fan after they've initially discovered and absorbed "Internal Wrangler."

Habits has little to apologize for, no serious blemishes or ill-advised shifts in direction.

It's as if a bunch of people have gotten together to try and create a communal experience they don't quite believe in. It's a little depressing here, but elsewhere, the sense of irony serves the album well.

Regardless of what kind of audience it ultimately finds, though, In Ghost Colours earns its smiles with a combination of ingenuity and easiness that you don't often come by, and for that, even in April, it already feels like a triumph.

The Spirit still play hard-to-get, which helps to avoid any ridiculous moments on this polished sophomore effort, but they're often too stand-offish to even challenge the listener, let alone push the envelope that their influences have so neatly prepared for them.

Likability has got Kylie Minogue this far, and it pulls her through again--even the weak tracks on X have a sparky enthusiasm that makes their magpie modernism sound less cynical.

This debut is unusually taut and polished, with hooks, crescendos, and clever turns of phrase nearly always in the right place.

In the end, lost amidst the faithfully reproduced house piano progressions and familiar melodies is anything signaling that those epiphany-filled late nights were actually, you know, fun.

Maneuvering between the King of Rhythm's joie de vivre and their crestfallen, crossroads-blues heritage, Attack and Release subtly expands the Black Keys sound.

Accelerate's broad strokes, big riffs, and beefy production (the album was reportedly recorded in "just" nine weeks) are admirable, as is the disc's concision, but its success is still more as a step forward than a slam dunk.

For the most part, it's all the same old bong-thrash, save for the record's one non-heavy trick: English-jig folk.

The album draws its power not simply from the quality of Kozelek's songwriting, but from the close intertwining of words and music, which makes his albums much more essential than any book he could ever publish.

There are a number of somewhat bland mid-tempo tracks and a few sketchy incidental things, like the ultra-brief vocal exercise 'Thank You Very Much,' but this is a worthy addition for Apples fans who haven't already tracked down every flexi-disc, Japanese import, and vinyl edition in the band's large catalog.

While Funplex's super-sized dance pop can't quite compare with the band's best moments, there's plenty of residual B-52's-ness to satiate longtime fans.

Whether it was intended or not, White's personality sometimes overwhelms, and makes Consolers sound like a little sibling to Icky Thump--a little less unique, certainly, but another loose, comfortable affirmation of what they do well.

Plants and Animals may not be the first band to put Montreal on the musical map, but, with this album's there's-no-place-like-home vibe, they are certainly the first to celebrate it so warmly

While Cave represents a return to form, the band hasn't recaptured the beauty of early highlights like 'When the Red King Comes' or 'A Dream in Sound.'

Overall, it's this sense of forced importance that makes the album no fun: You feel like it's meant to do something to you, not for you.

Sixteen meaty songs strong, the album is part slightly-fictionalized tour diary, part rumination on unrealized success and finding fun in the day-to-day.

Guillemots cram themselves into awkward fits, and Dangerfield has to squeeze the hardest--whether he's tying himself to a straightforward ballad instead of clamoring for the rooftops, or standing up for a fight when he's so much more comfortable slipping into a dream.

The guitar work here is still ten times rangier and more inventive than you'd expect, but it takes a few very professional steps back, nailing down its snappy flourishes amid ecstatic "whoo!"s, new-wave poses, and occasional clouds of glitter and confetti.

Beat Pyramid proves to be an affirming and promising first step.

It's a great trick of rearranging that pulls back the curtain dramatically, but nearly every other song on Midnight Boom seems to be waiting for this kind of moment, losing it to a pile on the cutting-room floor.

TID might be Bejar's most pompous, profane, and pastoral record, but it's also his least "intelligent," rational, or linearly clever.

Something mysteriously blocks this very good record from being great.

Sounds and ideas repeat constantly, yet Street Horrrsing never feels redundant.

After a handful of other singles and remixes, the full-length debut Reality Check still can't match the Teenagers' first time, but it shows a developing group with their own distinct take on misspent youth in the era of free internet porn.

This album might be more focused than its predecessor, but what it's focused on is a the kind of murky, paranoid weight and depth that doesn't much make for chart-climbing singles.

Deschanel is more convincing when she's on an extreme end of romance--either losing it or being swept into it--than when she's trying to rationalize it.

They don't stay in one place for too long, but the body of the album can be distilled to an essence of the glassy, ten-lane stare of Last Exit with Ed Banger's egg-frying EQ.

Listeners looking for lyrical meaning will still be disappointed, searching in vain for hidden significance in these nonsensical love song lines. A word of advice: It's best to just accept his words as conduits for his dreamy voice, and give in to his charming tunes.

Magnetic Fields-like numbers 'Winter' and 'Undeclared' seem vanilla by comparison to some, but by making room for both, Visiter ends up being one of the most welcoming (and welcome) records of 2008 so far.

Now, uneven or not, the songs seem to breathe on their own, benefiting from a shot of rhythm and a healthy sweat.

As for his lyrics, it's wrong to call them stream-of-consciousness, since that implies Wolf is a poor self-editor; nothing about Alopecia is lazy. It's more like 5 a.m. journal entries cut up and turned to collage.

"Why Did You Leave Me' and 'Can't Say Goodbye' are some grown-up songs, and Snoop probably has a whole album of them somewhere in him. But as long as the pothead-pimp shtick keeps selling, we'll probably never hear it.

Trilla, Rick Ross's inexplicable second album, is every bit a fatty contemporary American disaster.

Still, for an album that pushes the limits of how much you can say about so little, the stuff that's said rarely fails to be entertaining in the pure linguistically structural sense.

Rife with suspense, drama, and a grisly cast of characters, Voyager's probably more likely to ignite your inner playwright than get your foot tapping, but it's still a cathartic rush all the same.

There's more to diskJokke than bulletproof connections; his spacey electro-disco is technically impressive and effortlessly appealing.

It's a decidedly bummer affair, and even though the aggressive tempos suggest they're willing to fight against the crushing weight of existence, there's no relief to be found anywhere in Dartnall's lyrics--not in material goods, not in your fellow man, and certainly not in romance.

Bauhaus can hold their head high, mission accomplished; but with no victory-lap tour, no more studio albums, and several awesome new tunes pointing at an un-actualized future, it all feels rather anti-climatic and lacking closure.

Like hearing DLR's lonely voice doing its best in the absence of accompaniment, most of Robotique is just sort of depressing.

Real Emotional Trash is determinedly unified, even if it isn't always clear to what ends. At its best, the record hints at opening a whole new musical world for Malkmus--one in which his well-worn style is effectively played down in the service of a mighty rock'n'roll band.

Musically, Saturnalia, named after the Roman festival where slaves and masters switch roles, is a concentrated dose of their usual badassery, never straying too far from the territory Dulli explored on the last three Singers albums, and even includes many of the same collaborators.

Even while Quaristice is in some ways the most listenable album they've created in a decade, it's ultimately no easier to parse, and can be very rough going indeed if you're not in the mood for their peculiar world.

Even if Red Yellow Blue overstays its welcome for one song, it still counts as one of this new year's most engaging and endearing indie-rock debuts.

If the satisfying Afterparty Babies doesn't have the same thunderclap impact of its predecessors, it's because that element of adventure is subdued.

On Asking for Flowers, she sounds better than her peers for being so much braver.

It's not until Magnificent Fiend's closing trio of seven-minute behemoths that Howlin Rain find traction, though it's the band's willingness to tweak its grand appropriations, rather than the tracks' epic lengths, that helps the songs stick.

Picture, the more ambitious of the pair, simply sounds unfocused, overly concerned with effects and production--with moments and sounds--than with songs or overall shape.

Sea Lion's artwork, song titles, and McPhun's background all suggest something pan-global and yet the album shines brightest when it stays closest to its indie rock roots--a reminder that despite their escapist charms, exploration and travel work best as an accent to the familiarity and comfort of home.

After the surprising opening salvo, however, Shots clumsily bogs down in its desire to be big and rocking, even though any time Ladyhawk can be bothered to push the tempo.

Who knows whether or not the Felice Brothers--brothers Ian, Simone, and James, plus a friend called Christmas--are actually, consciously trying to come as close as possible to replicating Dylan an/or the Band on their self-titled latest. Regardless, the point is, whether they intended to or not, they've come eerily, awkwardly, creepily close to capturing that familiar mix of mood, mystery, atmosphere, and aesthetic.

But with all the excitement and decadence drained out of the music and the voice, the trite themes stand out a bit more clearly.

Big tracks aside, it's an awfully static record, which gives it the kind of high-art "difficulty" that we critics have been known to like.

These are crisper, brighter, bolder songs, retaining Beach House's sense of elegant decay while sweeping up the debris.

Another Country just isn't nearly as consistently satisfying as Merritt's earlier offerings.

NY's Finest, Pete Rock's fourth proper solo album since 1998, has just enough comfortable tricks for the one of the grand old men of 1990s New York production to maintain warm feelings.

They're moments when, perhaps more so than on any previous record, The Dirtbombs sound like a band of five musicians with distinct input, rather than the many arms of Mick.

American Music Club's central values--humility, self-effacement through musical understatement, sentimental candor-- may be currently out of fashion, but The Golden Age proves that, handled with care, they never truly go out of style.

Darnielle's characters are back where they know best.

Bell X1 generically compartmentalize everything instead and end up with a record that doesn't even top the work of their former bandmate.

Vernon gives a soulful performance full of intuitive swells and fades, his phrasing and pronunciation making his voice as much a purely sonic instrument as his guitar.

As with each of Cox's projects, Let the Blind works best as a swirling, disorienting whole, organizing traditionally abstract styles like graphic-design elements within his unifying vision until they communicate like good pop.

Despite its slightly more diverse palette, Sleep Forever merely dabbles in more styles rather than explores them, and as soon as their creative finger slips off the pleasure button, it's hard to resist from dozing.

Eventually Doughty is going to have to do something about his lyrics, because "The moonlight shines like a luminous girl tonight/ Yeah, Jesus Christ like a luminous girl tonight" isn't going to hack it.

The insularity of "Cease to Begin" certainly has its merits, and it's pointless to argue about who comes out on top here, but the way Grand Archives come forth with arms outsretched results in a debut that likely exceeds most expectations.

Some Racing, Some Stopping is the kind of record, in other words, that you'd expect casual listeners to enjoy and critics to unfairly malign.

It's hard to begrudge a band a transitional record when its in the midst of a substantial transition, and Apes wear it better than most.

The album could use a little more of Fitzgerald's fiery extremes, and a bit less of meandering disappointments like "You Looked Good to Me" or "Dancing in the Stacks", but at its best it's a clever piece of musical storytelling by a band unintimidated by genre.

59.59 could use a few more fiery moments like these; as the album settles into its more temperate second half.

Too often, it tries to get by on what it's opposed to instead of what it stands for, a gambit with little margin for error if you don't have a viably exciting alternative, or enough trust in the taste of the listener.

Producer Gareth Parton (the Go! Team, Foals) wisely handles Little Death with a light touch, engineering some fantastic vocal interplay (like less dramaturgical versions of the Futureheads), and otherwise leaving things the hell alone.

Do You Like Rock Music? doesn't fail miserably--which at least might have been more interesting--but disappoints gently.

Good record but not a great one.

It's not that it lacks tension--indeed, almost every song touches on relationship strife--it's just that the squabbles are gentle, the rage subdued.

For the most part, though, Old Growth is exactly what this band has always done.

This mannered, understated virtuosity permeates Collett's music, just like it did the Band's.

On Falling Off the Lavender Bridge, Hynes offers a comfortable (and more interesting) marriage of lush Brit-pop and Omaha-flavored country-rock.

Circular Sounds can feel impersonal, especially in how Stoltz hopscotches from voice to voice, some far stronger than others.

The biggest critique is that as an album, This Gift is perhaps too far in the red too much of the time, but even that complaint is tempered by the fact that the ride is so good