Only lead single “My Full Name” keeps things a little too simple, lacking the complex sentiments and intricate arrangements that make this album special. Ace rewards close listening; from a stately chamber-folk album, something quietly unrelenting emerges.

Old Days features all the objective elements of useful rarities disc, but it's doubly valuable for reminding us of a Mirah that might've grown up too fast.

He doesn’t appear interested in total formlessness, instead reaching a place that gets as close as he can to all-out loss of control then just about pulling back. Getting there is a thrilling white-knuckle ride, like peering over the ledge for 30 minutes but never jumping off.

R&B informed the Sonics’ unhinged passion from the get-go, and This Is the Sonics pays proper homage to the group’s roots.

Even when their pendulum is swinging at a steadier pace, Thee Oh Sees still have the power to hypnotize--but from its twitchy jams to its blown-out power ballads, A Weird Exits’ most intriguing moments come when they break the trance.

Sometimes the writing on The Answer Is Always Yes is more generic than you’d expect from Lahey. .... But Lahey’s gift for imagery shines on songs like the hazy acoustic trip “The Sky Is Melting,” a rowdy story of misadventure: She spars with a deadbeat pal while high on melted weed gummies, trading conspiracy theories and belting out corny yacht rock before vomiting into a ravine.

Cheater is concise, well-paced, and thought-through. Its chaos is held together precariously, a ride that feels at once dangerous and secure. Though you know exactly what to expect, you keep getting back in the line.

The King offers no light at the end of the tunnel, no promises of inevitable redemption. Grief and anger only give way to more grief and anger. What it does offer though, is an invitation to feel deeply,

Murmurations represents a breakthrough. It’s thrilling to imagine where Simian Mobile Disco might go next; here’s hoping they get the chance.

Pharaohs succeed principally because they don't feel the weight of all those influences bearing down upon them.

With their fluting vocals and bird chirps, her songs could fit on the soundtrack of Michaela Coel’s sitcom Chewing Gum, about a 24-year-old British-Ghanaian woman trying to lose her virginity. Through humor, pop hooks, and scenes of emotional intimacy, both works juxtapose the vibrancy of life with the drab realities of public housing.

Lullabies occasionally evokes early Black Sabbath and nods to a few psych-rock stalwarts but, like most Queens' records, it's oddly unclassifiable. It's also troublingly inconsistent.

It’s endearing, really, the way this band goes the extra mile, even when it hardly matters, but the best thing about Bleed Here Now is how it rarely feels like work, despite all the work that clearly went into it. In their own overachieving way, Trail of Dead have made a hangout record.

Written and recorded during an extended stay on Ireland’s windswept west coast, the follow-up to Land of No Junction reaps lucidity from family bonding and fleeing the city in search of peace. With it, Frances’ psych-folk soliloquies arrive like postcards from a friend who’s just beginning to open up.

JP3 might sacrifice some of Junglepussy’s previously hedonistic splendor for poppier hooks and mellower vibes, but it also introduces us to a happier, more mature woman.

This time, the inevitable transition from vocalizations to near-unison saxophone shredding doesn’t carry quite the same charge. But on the whole, Blade Of Love shows that there’s plenty of sax-quartet innovation left for these artists to explore.

Glum and abrasive, Creevy’s guitars have graduated from sludge-pop hooks. On Stuffed & Ready, she uses them to shape turbulent atmospheres, pushing recklessly against the melodies.

The Highest in the Land, a just and honest headstone, captures the substance and self-definition of a singular songwriter where words and labels fail.

Segall makes quite an impression in half an hour's time, and Melted's the best foot he's put forward yet. It still seems like his best records are ahead of him, like he's still got a couple of things to nail, but as it stands, Melted could charm the sweat out of anybody.

El Rey has its share of surprises, mostly in the vein of its particular subject, which is the cruelty older men visit on younger women, and vice versa. But mostly it's merely another Wedding Present record: witty, randy, guitar-heavy, and not quite satisfied.

On Sixth House, by embracing the spirit of their best records without leaning on those releases’ do-or-die, hard-luck intensity, they’ve found a way to settle comfortably into their strengths.

On Belong, Duterte’s re-emergence as Jay Som, she exudes the confidence of those six years quietly but well spent. What the album loses in raw shaggy experimentalism of her last records, it gains in understated poise.

The first seven songs play out like a 20-minute power hour, but the album loses a bit of steam after that.

I’ll Be the Tornado is as accomplished and confident as a band can sound while sorting their shit out in public.

While do it afraid doesn’t have the snap and verve of the more structured Ten Fold, there’s a charming coziness to its loose sound. These open-aired songs evoke backyards and block parties, the rhythms gentle as breezes.

Dissed and Dismissed ends just before it starts to feel formulaic.

Wonky has the one-jolt-after-another vibe of a great collection of familiar hits but without the disconnected feeling you get when a bunch of obviously Big Moment singles are slapped together and called an album, rather seamlessly covering a whole lot of musical ground without sacrificing concision or intensity

Exploring the vacated ghosts of stale forms, Coxon has breathed new life into some of rock's most bankable clichés.