In its often inchoate roar, We Are Undone bears little resemblance to the laser-focus punk-blues of their earlier work. The songs just aren't as good. The most satisfying callback to Two Gallants' halcyon, mid-'00s prime comes in the album's second half.

Every darker, weirder impulse got glossed over while the music gives an agreeable shrug.

Kowalsky's work so far is mostly for hardcore drone-fans, and even they might not be blown away by Tape Chants. But anyone can appreciate Kowalsky's attention to detail.

Whereas Too Young to Be in Love was the excited doodles of a crush's name in a notebook, Hairdresser Blues is the discarding of the love letters that came after.

On Big Boat, they come up with a few winning moments.

Drone Trailer arrives--after numerous CD-Rs and tapes of cross-cultural, relentlessly unconventional music to stargaze by--bearing principally unthreatening, old-fashioned rock'n'roll.

Take issue with Styles’ taste at your leisure, but there’s no denying his comprehensiveness. His vocal performances are invariably the best parts of these songs.

But where their previous three albums translated that dynamic into emotionally-charged metal, Eat the Elephant assumes the form of a gloomy adult-alternative record flush with grand pianos, classical strings, and slackened tempos.

So much of the album is straining to be more than just an homage to the club sounds of the late 80s that it ends up being a bit less.

It's not terrible, just uninspired, and only goes to show that the disco romance formula is both harder to pull off and more singular than you'd think.

Voyager’s attempts to pay homage to disco ancestors while paring his maximalism way back make it all feel like a dance night in an unfurnished room, all speakers and no lighting.

End of World is hellishly inconsistent, its mid section adrift in ’80s funk-rock sheen, like INXS being harassed by an angry wasp. But when it works, End of World, more than any other recent PiL album, offers the winning combination of instrumental oddity and vocal drama.

The gulf between Minaj's public persona and her music here reminds me of the criticism laid at the feet of Lady Gaga -- that for all of her high-culture namedropping, wearable art, and big event videos, Gaga's music rarely reflects the full range of her conceptual constructions.

As so often when it comes to dance-music full-lengths, Bias' good ideas get lost in the sea of makeweight stuff, and his attempt to please just about everyone results in a frustratingly spotty album.

More unfortunate are the moments when Schnauss and Peters aim for surprising or affecting and veer straight into kitsch.

If every track on the album had the unforced lyrical clarity of "Little Houdini", Sage could have the album of his life on his hands here. But Sage is still the type of guy to name an album Li(f)e and a song "Polterzeitgeist", and the album comes packed with yeesh-inducing lines

As a whole, Fetty Wap adopts the same self-assured stance: Fetty's formula definitely ain't broke, and he doesn't seem in a hurry to fix it.

Rewild is how an average debut album should pan out. It might outstrip its ambition and wear its influences too blatantly, but Amazing Baby could be something special once it all clicks.

In general-- and despite passages of extreme beauty-- something seems amiss on Exchange Session.

It's tough to imagine how The Wizard of Poetry came into existence in the first place.

There’s much to admire about When Saints Go Machine’s effort to move their synth-powered pop music away from the dancefloor into more cerebral realms. But like the band name itself, their attempts at cleverness can come off sounding clunky.

Aside from its appropriate feel for a good time get-down in a surprisingly cheerful cartoon post-apocalypse, it's hard to get any real emotional connection from these cuts.

The second half of Cool Choices can’t match the first in quality or intrigue, but what makes the album as a whole worth listening to is Ghetto’s ability to burrow into a quarry of sentimental abandon and talk about what it feels like to be vulnerable.

They seem to be stretching themselves on this record, searching to create something meaningful in an ugly world, realizing that there are limits to their subgenre-referencing sound and if they are to grow they’ve got to push themselves.

Most of LIVE LIFE FAST plays out with this kind of energy: forced, obvious, its best ideas obscured in a haze of self-satisfaction.

They spent all their daring on concept, with little to spare for execution. Even for a duo as image-conscious and savvy as these guys, there is little style in their reduction.

Musically, Tennis have broadened their horizons just the right amount, adding rock'n'roll muscle and a more purely pop clarity.

Full of serious songs with sunny, heavily polished arrangements.

Magnetic Man's arrangements may proudly flaunt dance-pop's most universal qualities, but their efforts remain mere gestures so long as their beats continue to stare so resentfully in the opposite direction.

So among Forfeit/Fortune's many misses, Bachmann can't help but hit a few.

Wayward Fire continually misses a sweet spot between being lean and dirty enough to aerodynamically groove and being maximalist to the point where it opts out of that mode completely. And as a result, there's always that one last addition to the mix that sticks in your craw.

While 'Bruises' proves that a well-done song that sounds like other songs can make people take brief notice, Inspire mostly proves that recycling isn't the only answer.

As with most of Kasher's work, the main draws of Monogamy aren't really musical--words always get prominence over melody. Simply put, if you get a spark out of idealizing your romantic failures by doing things like drunkenly Googling ex-girlfriends (as he does in great detail on "There Must Be Something I've Lost"), listening to Monogamy as a whole is like dousing yourself in gasoline.

What the title describes is just as ineffable as their sound: you can see it coming down, but somehow it fails to leave any tangible impression.

The great leaps it takes sometimes feel less like an aesthetic choice and more like the work of someone figuring out where they want to go. It's a cut above most public attempts to undertake such a journey, if indeed that's what Collins is doing.

Uniformly and unashamedly sentimental, Born Again leaves too little to remember her by.

More money means more studio time, and more studio time can lead to more experimentation; as such, Business Casual's most successful moments are the result of genre-related leg-stretching.

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.

But forget about style and charisma: This band has no hooks and no energy.

The majority of the tricks, however, come off as cosmetic distractions, attempts to hide that Hawkins' songwriting hasn't grown since Permission to Land.

As could be expected, the production is sharp, and the song structures are tightly wound and delicately unraveled. The problem is that the effort as a whole is too slick, and its charm suffers as a result.

On their own, N.E.R.D. are the hip-hop Toto.

Costello has eschewed all sense of melody and humor in favor of rambling, mock-jazz noodling.

There are a few key moments of guilty pleasure, and the overall aesthetic of the record is appealing on the surface. But underneath the scratchy record sounds and the canned Casiotones, Fountenberry hasn't got enough substance to sustain him for ten minutes, let alone the length of an entire album.

It's an intermittently thoughtful album, but one that doesn't stray far from offering process-laid-bare insight into the beautiful pile-up that is Gang Gang Dance.

Way to Blue is too rigid in its approach and too timid in its interpretations to challenge or enlarge our perception of Drake.

Background check aside, there isn't much air to breathe for any or one of Cooper's many ideas in a given song, leaving the record as a whole even less of a chance to cohere.

This sh*t is intended to be the soundtrack to fun, and listening to the individual tracks is indeed a lot of fun. Color bursts from the edges of every track, and most carry no interest in subtlety or dynamic range. The production pops like a seismic charge.

While Brettin’s singing is greatly improved--lazy but more present and self-assured--his lyrics are at best inscrutable and in general lacking in substance.

There’s a thrill in watching a talented artist reach beyond her comfort zone, but the result is disappointingly flat. When she’s in her element, though, she’s singular and sparkling.

On Bleachers—especially on the singles-heavy first half—the band is simply playing for each other, much to the songs’ benefit.

The sounds themselves—sumptuously tarnished samples and breakbeats worn smooth as river rocks--are their own reward, even when they don't do what you expect them to.

Security Screenings is a marked improvement over last year's directionless Surrounded by Silence.

Sloppiness has crept into their once-perfect attack, and there is a certain any-era-of-modern-rock, unstuck-in-time vibe to the production choices and songwriting.

The new songs, meanwhile, feature a return to form for Belle and Sebastian, whose more recent releases have ventured away from their trademark style of “puckishly depressed” and into explorations of the dancy, the jazzy, and, occasionally, the kinda bad.

The dramatic crescendos and ostensibly cathartic payoffs of “Little Things” and “The Heart of It All” suggest profundity but mostly draw attention to its absence. Strip away the bombast and these are humble little songs. Humble treatment might suit them.

The quiet-loud-quiet-loud dynamics and turgid crunch taste and feel just like middle school. And even if that weren't the case, it's safe to say we've heard aches like just these before.

Even when not stated explicitly, most of Michel Poiccard feels like a love letter to Velasco from remaining founder Johnny Siera; there's a sadness and longing tucked into even songs that aren't ostensibly about Velasco.

Every so often, the album strikes that tricky balance between queasy and cute.

Ratatat always aimed for the flashy yet mass-produced flavor of sub-luxe fashion and lifestyle accessories--and for at least two albums, they hit their mark. But at this point, their sound is wearing increasingly thin and producing diminished results.

After two albums of post-Britpop mediocrity, Manchester trio I Am Kloot kick things up a notch (or think they do), and suffer from bipolarity and an ambition that outstrips their ability.

But even with 9th's craftsmanship, the melodies, like Buckshot's lyrics are vacuum-sealed. There's a pianissimo modesty that positively sucks the album dry.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend the LP for anyone who can't make an hour on the treadmill, but there are a few tunes here worth hearing. Too bad you can't exactly make out who's cranking them out.

The Golem is not a Pixies album, but it is a Black Francis record that walks and talks surprisingly well even without the master text of its film.

On an album of 13 tracks, it would have been nice to have a few that don't follow the same template. Still, there's no doubting Kölsch's mastery of his chosen style.

Living Legend isn't bad, exactly. It's a consistent release with no substantial misfires, full of densely packed verbiage and grand gestures, reminiscent of a time when technique, style, and personality seemed inseparable, interrelated qualities in a rapper's arsenal.

We know from songs like “Alpenglow,” from Range of Light, that he’s able to express real emotional grit in his songs. Carey gets there occasionally on this album, as when he restates his marital vows on “True North.” Too often, though, Hundred Acres is content to be pleasant.

Pinned reels in some of APTBS’s famous noise, but it doesn’t budge Ackermann from his station as a long-standing rock’n’roll archivist.

This blunt narrative ought to sound contrived, but Hardy’s gift for delicate phrasing is defiantly alluring.

Gravity the Seducer is a transitional album bearing the growing pains and separation anxiety that we usually associate with bands that are in between periods of true inspiration.

It's the most weirdly mesmerizing in a series of promising single, EP, and full-length releases that includes last year's shadowy, cinematic heart-tugger "A Place Where We Could Go."

The record is perhaps a more extreme a transformation than that of Patrick Wolf.

Twelve Carat Toothache, is accordingly slick, streamlined, and a little less vulgar and ostentatious than his earlier work—a sign that Malone is taking himself more seriously, for better or worse.

The album feels just pop enough in intention that its pleasures seem noticeably absent; with a few strong exceptions, the album could be a folder of songs waiting for someone else to bring them to life.

Ironically, in trying to tap into the mystique of America’s most storied cities, Foo Fighters completely demystify their own creative process, effectively turning the Sonic Highways project into a glorified homework assignment--educational, perhaps, but laboriously procedural.

Unfortunately, bare-bones arrangements, train songs, and good intentions are no shortcut to supposed authenticity, and still less are they a guarantor of overall quality.

Nation is saved from being a total failure at its close, with 'Deft Left Hand.'

Milosh’s crisp electronic soundscapes work mainly as contrast, immaculate bedding designed to melt away as his warm voice slithers in. At his best on Jetlag, Milosh builds up his tracks in the simple interest of pulling them back to let the vocal take over.

Sella once stood out for a demeanor that was both wide-eyed and jaded, torn between a yelp and a sigh. In Sickness & In Flames tilts too far toward the former; the Front Bottoms have lost their bite.

The disc infuses folk with frenetic intensity, but it's all so over the top that it's hard to take it as anything more than a distraction, like an annoying buzz or a particularly scratchy pair of wool socks.

It's another merely fine, expectation-meeting entry into Boratto's discography, a stopgap until the next knockout single comes along.

Even if Burning Daylight occasionally slips into shtick, Cowgill is still a good songwriter who can evoke a dark mood and the big, warm, beating heart underneath it.

Even the songs here that show flashes of congealing eventually end up falling apart into a watery mess.

With DSVII, the series evolves into a space for tinkering, where Gonzalez can embrace different influences. With neither someone else’s vision nor any cohesive album statement to fulfill, he reverts to maximalism, melding his two musical identities—synth-pop showman, serious composer for other mediums—to become the director of his own electronic daydreams.

Ash & Ice is an album of quality comedown tracks surrounded by run-of-the-mill rockers that plateau instead of peak.

For all the improved minutiae, French Kicks simply can't shed the "boring" tag.

Lacking any dynamism, complexity, or invention, the relentless drone of most of these tracks is a shallow, reactionary statement to the progress of the post-rock genre, and completely unedifying.

Overtly aping Mogwai, Jessamine and the entirely mediocre Bardo Pond, Kinski's aimless, ten-minute jams fail to deliver sonically or structurally, content to wallow in self-satisfied discovery, using distortion pedals to mask their junior varsity musicianship.

Without fail, The Fear rides that button down to a nub, going so far as to circle back on longer tracks to give the button another unnecessary push.

Throughout, and to the album's benefit, the duo's individual identities are more fully dissolved, so they can be more malleable in pursuing the idea behind a given song.

By the end of Animal Nature, Escort proves it’s gotten craftier and has found a bit more clarity, and they hit a nostalgic sweet spot that will never grow old.

Cheena is not trying to blow your mind. In fact, they’re not trying to do much of anything. But that spirit rings true, and it feels less like a pose the longer the album goes on.

In the Rainbow Rain isn’t always this thematically dense, though, and its more laid-back songs help loosen the philosophical knots that tracks like “Human Being Song” tie.

Ultimately, End It All, is another well-earned notch in Beans' solo belt and a testament to the strength of his artistic vision-- anyone who can get a convincing hip-hop beat out of Interpol surely deserves some kind of ambassadorship.

The record, then, turns out to be a fairly bloodless experience, a trait that suggests the Luyas should take heed of otherwise dangerous advice: A little violence never hurt anybody.

Feel Something is a so-so listen that never rises above the band’s influences.

Every hoedown on Sigh No More-- every rush of instruments in rhythmic and melodic lockstep-- conveys the same sense of hollow, self-aggrandizing drama.

It's music pleasant enough to carry intergenerational appeal, characterized by a youthful spirit but rooted in a classic sound. Bad Penny, then, is ultimately a solid debut that is still surprisingly safe.