McCaughan has a gift for capturing simple, affecting moments without tipping the scales to sentimentality.

You can start to see trajectory to Container’s LPs after this fourth edition, though the changes are deceptively subtle considering how unruly any specific release is. What’s never changed (and likely the reason the series remains so consistent) is simply how much fun Schofield makes all this mayhem sound.

Whereas their earlier material veered towards melodic art-rock, the music on Giver Taker sounds radically gentle and confident.

In 30 minutes, Painted Shrines sashay through a dozen modest but endearing tunes about love, hardship, hope, and the prelapsarian joy of sharing riffs with friends. Though this record has been in the works for at least three years, it is happily nonchalant, more concerned with a sense of warmth than perfection; that effortless allure makes Heaven and Holy addictive.

The record itself brims with endlessly replayable details, some goofy and some poignant, both in frontman Alex Turner's always keenly observed lyrics and in the band's ever-proficient music, the latter of which ranges here from muscular glam-rock to chiming indie pop balladry.

The best songs give Arrington the room to sprawl out and flex those ever-charismatic vocals, nearly untarnished by the sands of time.

Sure, greater dynamic variety and some selective risktaking would be nice, but these precocious upstarts already got the tough part pinned down: subtlety. Psapp have laid themselves a remarkably self-assured template for subsequent outings.

Even if Preteen Weaponry is one more left turn out of many in the band's catalog, it nonetheless reaffirms what makes Oneida stand out.

While remaining as obtuse as ever, O’Neil’s newfound appreciation for singer-songwriter-dom presents some of her most personal work yet.

Turn It On! plays to their strengths.

Steeped in the careening energy of surf-rock and mid-’60s Jazzmaster tones but open to any stylistic fancy that crosses Falcon Bitch and Gumball’s radar, When Horses Would Run is an unusually raucous and idea-stuffed debut.

It sounds exactly like what a fan of Bailiff would hope for, while offering something new and distinct.

The most appealing thing about this record is that this band, having created a brilliant and moving sound, returns to it again for another 38 minutes.

After Run to Ruin, it's difficult to hear Nastasia pull back to a songwriter-with-guitar style.

There's definitely something new going on, and most of it comes from the seductive voice and lyrics of Ambrogio.

Musically, Strong Feelings reiterates Constant Companion, which is fine, because it’s a good formula and Paisley’s songs are stronger this time.

The Narrow Garden features some of the most sunny and flowering music that Kang has created, seamlessly joined with a couple of sinister threnodies.

He continues to split duties on keyboards, guitars, bass, and drum programming with longtime producing partners Daoud and daedaePIVOT, and at its best, the music splits the difference between carefree and careworn.

The album is less immediately memorable than Wilderness' prior work, but its glittering suspension of pensive melodies and resounding rhythms is just as fine in the long run.

Mahal is as fastidiously layered as the rest of Toro y Moi’s style-shifting discography, but Bear leaves the edges rough, connecting the tracks with radio tuning noises and relishing in unvarnished instrumental expression.

King Night, accordingly, finds Salem pushing their sound far enough to create artistic distance from the rest of the pack.

He’s spent decades getting musical vocabularies from all over the world under his fingers, and even when his improvisations begin to meander, what he creates from his well of options is remarkable and wholly his own.

Puff may sound as slight as its name suggests--but this idiosyncratic and inventive record is anything but lightweight.

The clear ambition of X-Communicate is to leave Welchez’s old persona behind and emerge, fresh and new, as something completely different, and by and large, that objective is achieved.

So ignore the melodrama and enjoy the littler pleasures that are provided on Thistled Spring-- and there are quite a few.

Dissolution Wave crystallizes Cloakroom’s strengths while refuting the idea that concept albums are always bloated and pretentious.

Give Blood falls squarely in the "pleasant surprise" camp; a gift to short attention spans everywhere.

Because of its multifarious song types--leftfield club thumpers, futuristic sex ditties, and funky space jams--some will contend that Sweaty Magic lacks cohesion, that it's too ADD to be listenable, but I would argue that is precisely Rafter's point.