As she’s shed the trappings of distinctly 2010s R&B for something less easily time-stamped, she’s revealed a new and very telling set of inspirations.

It's an enjoyable detour, one that affirms how well these producers have honed their approaches to sound.

Instead of merely contrasting the tunefully heartfelt Barlow with the more erratic, irascible Loewenstein, the new album finds them mining common topical terrain—namely, the emotional toll of perpetually wading in a sea of misinformation—through their respective personalities.

Man Made Object is tailor-made for laid-back enjoyment, to be consumed at a moderate volume without much fuss. It marks a nice step forward for a group that lives comfortably beyond artistic restraints.

As often as the band has pushed in new directions, it’s never abandoned the core dynamics of its songwriting, a fact that Lonely People With Power underlines. Fifteen years into their career, having long transcended any given genre, set of influences, or fan expectations, Deafheaven sound, more than ever, like nothing other than themselves.

Anyone expecting a revival of the Delfonics sound we all know and love very well may walk away disappointed. Taken on its own terms, though, the record works.

A byzantine, feverish album that unravels and pieces itself back together song by song, a mind gradually turning inward on itself.

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

These 11 songs may be meant to chronicle a pointedly personal inner voyage, yet he’s wound up with a warm, collaborative record that feels like a balm for fear and loneliness.

Pre Pleasure takes its time unwinding and occasionally leaves too much unsaid. Some songs drift away, setting a mood rather than communicating an idea. But when Jacklin allows the two to work in tandem, she excels.

The record’s strongest moments originate in its audacity rather than precision: Desert Window opens up the ambient ideas she’s perfected in the past into riskier, roomier territory.

By ABBA’s own imperial standards, this is more ABBA Silver than ABBA Gold. ... Still, a second-string ABBA record is far better than most pop groups can muster, and Voyage is the rare post-reformation album to build upon the band’s legacy without abandoning what we loved about their classic records in the first place.

In League With Dragons is light on mythical beasts; only four songs here come from the original wizard musical Darnielle was writing. Instead, he fills the record with the subjects of his own escapist fantasies. ... The record occasionally delves into the arcane, as Mountain Goats records can.

While the two new records don't match up to the original’s mastery, scattered throughout both are glimmering moments of this carefree abandon and commitment to the bit. It's clear that twigs has never had quite so much fun.

Here's yet another exemplary Aimee Mann album to add to the pile.

A lot of the weaknesses come down to the lyrics. .... His singing is the most unaffected element of these new songs: bold and melodic, equally clear and prominent in each edition.

On We Cater to Cowards, Oozing Wound have downsized to a smaller ride, but they’ve filled the tank with rocket fuel, and they’ve never sounded more comfortable behind the wheel.

This music is demanding—of your patience, of your attention, of your tolerance for cacophony—but the reward is a fascinatingly confounding journey through the fragmented mirror world.

Without a lead melody to hone in on, the album’s ever-shifting arrangements can sometimes feel uncertain, like carrying on with a scavenger hunt after forgetting the hiding places. But heard in full, Notes With Attachments’ restlessness sounds more like determination: an insistence on fitting as many ideas into as short a time as possible.

In the Shape of a Storm is an album’s worth of that feeling. In grief many cloak themselves in distractions, or hide away entirely: Jurado treats it as an invitation to look closer, feel deeper.

Introduction, Presence doesn’t offer any great reinventions. ... But their understanding of the genre they’re working in—its workings, tropes, and trappings—is so refined that they are able to boil it down to its barest essence, saving catharsis for just the right moment.

Stand for Myself, with its themes of inner fortitude only brightening the white-hot star at its center, vaults Yola to another place in the pop world, with her boundless curiosity and vocal brawn establishing her as a knowing, honest voice for those who need help summoning their own strength from within.

Cosmic Troubles sounds a sadder, vaster album than before, but one whose meditations can soothe your bones like an inviting stream.

A trio of cuts toward the middle of Everything’s Beautiful suffers from feeling less robustly reimagined than the rest of the set--placing a slight drag on momentum.

At times Wish on the Bone can be non-specific, and the universality of Howerton’s feelings becomes untethered and slippery. Perhaps that’s why the album ends with the brief, incisive finale “I Took the Shot.”

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.

The Truckers demonstrated with 2008's Brighter Than Creation's Dark that they don't need non-stop yuks and grotesqueries to reach greatness, but the best moments of The Big To-Do nonetheless offer tantalizing proof that these guys still possess fascinatingly warped minds when they feel like showing 'em off.

In many ways, Some of My Best Friends Are DJs is little more than a brief comedy album, filled with strange samples of eccentric characters pontificating on their record collections and audio systems.

Eagulls have synthesized their influences well, and have created an enjoyable rock record (they've been around since 2010, which may account for why so many of these songs sounds accomplished as they do); so while Eagulls is not exactly life-changing music, the songs stick with you, and sometimes that's enough.

Ocean’s no extrovert, but he’s an intersection for a wide array of listeners, and Felt exhibits a porousness that could also attract new and more varied fans of Suuns. Perhaps, in the end, we’ll all want it weird.

It’s both sharp-tongued and warm hearted, an LP-length memoir that dabbles in political manifesto. But it comes over like an album Ali made for himself, and he sounds better off because of it.

These new tracks are probably the strongest in his catalog--full of cheeky, relentless verses to match the energetic funk he’s best accompanied by--and the repetition feels strategic.

Per usual, the group’s love for mini-narratives can sometimes clutter the music and cause an interesting idea to outstay its welcome. .... But the overall mood is agreeably potluck, a diverse spread of beats and rhymes to nourish the soul.

Somehow this totem of influences works, stacked one atop another in a monument to the newly refocused Strand of Oaks.

Where “Quantum Physics” is whispery and diffuse, “Brighton 75 Fünf” is emphatic and visceral, hammering at the edges of its central theme until they’re sharp enough to draw blood. The most thrilling moment comes when they abandon the roadmap entirely.

These periodic lapses of over-constraint are especially disappointing given the group's obvious talent for making spontaneous mid-air adjustments to their sound; but there's enough evidence here to be optimistic that one day soon the group will gain the swagger necessary to more consistently abandon themselves to their wilder sonic impulses.

Black to the Future is highly accessible, politically engaged jazz that’s more focused on communication than individual experimentation.

The introductory duo of “I Don’t Know How I Survive” and “Roman Candles” position Asphalt Meadows as a clean break from the slick competence of Kintsugi and Thank You for Today. ... A record that mostly satisfies through course correction.

If these songs are low-voltage wires that hum, buzz, whir, purr but rarely jolt, they yield just enough electricity to light the way forward.

Yoncalla highlights all the best elements of Yumi Zouma, wrapped up in some of the prettiest music they’ve made yet.

Corpse overcomes its moments, due in part to concision and earnest songwriting.

The band’s music on Shape Shift is less straightforward than Transgender Dysphoria Blues. As a noisy, digressive follow-up to an anthemic rock record, it’s more a parallel to their audacious sophomore album As the Eternal Cowboy, and its relationship to their rumbling folk-punk debut Reinventing Axl Rose.

It’s a tremendous step forward, while still remaining an acquired, uncompromising taste.

Angel serves as a balm in another era defined by mass pessimism and doubt.

Aaltopiiri feels much more like a soundtrack, with creeping drones sliding in and out of the mix, and more subtlety overall.

It sounds quite unlike any of the electronic music being made in 2016, and is refreshingly unfashionable in that way.

Like that high-pitched whistle that SonicScreens play outside corner shops, there'll come a time when what DZ Deathrays are doing no longer resonates with you. But for now, it's more than worth going deaf to.

Unlike Beach Fossils' compartmentalized distance, though, Brown Recluse sound bright and direct throughout Evening Tapestry, like light shining through their sleepy fog. Sort of like a dream? No-- better.

It’s evocative and complex enough to establish Snoh Aalegra as a name worth remembering, even as it leaves you wondering what it might sound like when she finally faces the full extent of her feelings.

Everything Ecstatic marks his first slight step backward as a solo artist but it's hardly a failure.

Black Hours shares some of its strengths with Leithauser’s work with the Walkmen, and same goes with its weaknesses—namely, an occasional lapse in focus.

Produced and almost entirely performed by VanGaalen, Light Information demonstrates he still has an uncanny knack for off-kilter songcraft, while also gently questioning the societal pressures that might lead us to miss the point of creating and appreciating art in the first place.

Though he’s preternaturally funny and frequently debonair, only a portion of these songs approach the vim and vigor of his generation-defining anthems.

The album helps prove he’s a lot more than just Drake’s patois advisor. Clothes that don’t quite fit his boss feel effortlessly tailored to Brathwaite.

As an album, Tim Melina Theo Bobby is maybe even less concerned than usual with coherence, which tends to create the atmosphere of a singles collection. If there’s a unifying theme, it’s about time and boundaries, the things that separate concepts like then and now or you and me. Musically, this can sound like a walk through Joan of Arc’s tangly, overgrown garden.

Future raises the stakes considerably, leaving the band's musical talents to play catchup with their new material's epic-sized dimensions.

Bicep’s expansive production and compact song-lengths often lack the transportive and hypnotic potential that the best dance music offers. But it succeeds as a lean and consciously paced album.

Old LP works because its growth doesn’t pander to modern notions of “cool.” But the way the band re-balances the grime-vs.-grandiosity equation with each song demonstrates that when it comes to musical math, the proof matters as much as the outcome.

Though there are moments where a new tone or inflection runs the risk that Doja might be mistaken for someone else, the album’s anchor in her R&B and soul background creates a tender space for her to stack and reveal her layers. Hot Pink doesn’t demand that Doja figure out the totality of her sound right now.

We are hearing someone who risked his physical and emotional well-being searching for catharsis with “Two” and “Bear” and “Every Night My Teeth Are Falling Out” and discovered freedom in acceptance. Green to Gold might feel peaceful, but it didn’t come easy.

Seasonal Hire sounds more like a Black Twig Pickers album than a Steve Gunn album.

Mostly, though, the shock of Funeral Mariachi is that it's the friendliest record in their catalogue. It doesn't have the twitching intensity of a lot of their other work--that's both an asset and a deficit--but they couldn't have made a sweeter farewell.

Every track on The Future Will Come that hasn't already appeared as a single last year is a relatively short and succinct piece of work; think a bunch of radio edits instead of the 12" mixes. The good news is that brevity keeps some of these tracks from getting stretched thin.

Who Is the Sender? effectively doubles his recorded output and moves him from the category of a curiosity who returned after a four-decade absence to make a third great album to someone perhaps capable of doing so in perpetuity.

This soundtrack is a nice surprise, exceeding expectations when it eschews the expected.

A Shut-In's Prayer is arguably the strongest album of Owen Ashworth's career thus far, and it arrives at a time when the influence of his former project looms over specific spheres of indie music.

If Alice Bag was wondering back then whether her Chicana resilience could last, then Blueprint is proof that she’s only grown more powerful.

Versions, presented now as a complete overhaul and re-imagining of Cellar Door, nudges their Balearic soft rock tendencies back toward their dubby fundamentals, offering drastically warped takes on that underwhelming album.

It's wide-eyed pop minus the fizz, demonstrating that sizzle can still be subtle.

While Honus continues to prove himself one of rock's best working lyricists, Life Fantastic contains as many musically compelling moments as Rabbit Habits and Six Demon Bag.

John Wizards is, to paraphrase the anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss' opinion on animals, "good to think with." But that won't make people want to listen to it. What will is its hip diversity, sunny disposition, and the fact that Withers never asks more of his audience than he's willing to give: A man of contract, he puts his clients first.

More willing than ever to flex their jazz chops, the Vanishing Twin of Ookii Gekkou sound best when settling in for the long haul, exploring the nooks and crannies of their pluralist fantasia with a microscopic attention to detail.

But with two (admittedly gigantic) exceptions, Nocturama reneges on its promise-- something's still missing from most of these tracks.

Upright Behavior is Schatz's attempt go pack as much of this essence into one space as possible, and it comes on like a combination Chinese finger trap and bear hug.

Soused is compelling, almost inherently so, but it’s not a classic.

Even sharing a track with current it-man Ty Dolla $ign on the mellow celebration of “Hey Up There,” he’s able to hold his own. Conversely, when he leans into rapping, he achieves an emotive style of delivery that injects his words with extra resonance. Still, Buddy is at his best when he lets himself be carefree.

TP3 Reloaded is one of those albums where every song sounds like a radio single.

Even as Scott’s ambition sometimes clashes with the content of the actual songs, Tongue is both her most intimate and eclectic album thus far.

For an album that presents a more assured, swaggering Black Mountain, it's a minor disappointment that Wilderness Heart doesn't so much climax as gradually wind down, without a show-stopping finale to crown the victory lap. But even in their quietest moments, the band can still leave you unsettled.

Lacking the emotional knack for jaw-dropping singles, the band succeeds in consistently churning out songs that would be solid filler on an amazing album-- a Magical Mystery Tour comprised solely of "Blue Jay Way"'s.

An album of sunlit melodies with the shadows of Detroit looming over it delivers more than expected; it’s not easy creating a doleful aftertaste that never quite dampens spirits, but Bonny Doon pull it off.

Cohen’s inviting arrangements may not always strike the delicate balance between peace and uncertainty that he strives for, but when they do, his music remains as warm and rewarding as a fresh cup of coffee at dawn.

Radiant Door is exactly as its title suggests--the brighter side of one of America's best psych-pop bands.

Like Ball, Davisson seems like a humble man attuned to something far beyond his station, and they share with Bowles and MacKay a belief that a homespun melody or a gently plucked theme or even just two instruments ringing out together might give anyone in earshot a glimpse of God. That’s an awful lot for any album to hold, and at times the music bows under such weight, but Keys never sacrifices its life-size scale nor its humility.

In track after track, he mulls over memories of neighborhood characters and late-night hijinks, contemplating all the ways that the city can grind you down. The lone exception is “Riding Cobbles,” a lighthearted fantasy of European idyll. Several Songs About Fire plays out like a long, messy divorce from an adopted home. Musically, though, there’s nothing shaggy about Several Songs About Fire.

The latest Horseback album, Piedmont Apocrypha, compacts this meandering trajectory into a five-song narrative that's inclusive, intriguing, and unquestionably creepy.

Musically, Toy is their most experimental and varied album.

As relatively bare bones as some of these arrangements are, the songs are as kinetic as one might hope for from such dynamic songwriters. They just wouldnt sound as rich had they been fleshed out by any other set of players. Still, the album's middle stretch sags quite a bit in comparison.

Out Among the Stars is a boon for fans of country music history as well as those who just can’t get enough Cash. More importantly, it highlights a missing link between the often disparate eras of a long and complicated career.

Selmasongs breaks no new ground whatsoever for the Icelandic composer, instead dwelling in more comfortable regions already mapped by Homogenic.... the record definitely has its great moments. The problem is, there are only two of them.

The Fifth Season is imbued with the tension and power of a live instrumental performance, at once intriguing and nerve-wracking. Throughout the album, Lafawndah embodies a purposeful fluidity of genre and role that makes her difficult to pin down.

For the most part, Congleton doesn’t push Mogwai anywhere they weren’t already heading, but in its home stretch, The Bad Fire proves this band of steely veterans can still disarm you by opening up surprising new dimensions to their sound.

Rkives is a full-sounding collection that reads like a long-lost Rilo Kiley album from the early-2000s.

It is the work of a kid still determining his creative identity, and the best part of EVERYBODY’S EVERYTHING is how it shows him figuring himself out through his work with others.

Calamity shows Cohen struggling to balance his twee pop tendencies with experimentation, the same thing Deerhoof mastered on The Runners Four.

Jake Shears is a breeze, with members of My Morning Jacket and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band gathering to lay down the tracks in single takes. The result is pretty irresistible, as long as you’re not looking for authenticity, and if you don’t mind vocals that sound like a honky-tonk take on jazz hands deployed in the service of lyrics like “Cuz baby I love you/More than the trash can.”

Life Under the Gun explodes out of the basement show without abandoning its energy and essence. The noise of their earlier EPs has become rich and lush, their rhythm section tight and crisp.

Almost every song here shoves interpersonal woes against societal angst in a fundamentally Bright Eyes way.