The urgency and vigor he packs into the unplugged punk of Workbook--the frequent knuckle-scraping attack of his strumming, his refusal to whisper or withhold--are what make the album a testament to tension rather than hesitance.

By burrowing down into a few key sounds rather than stiffly approximating a dozen-plus, the intermittently funky, unshakably finicky Wave 1 is a mostly welcome return.

Interscope’s trust in TDE saves the album from the awkward test tube collaborations that bog down many of its peers, but Oxymoron’s doubling down on a reliable formula makes for a relatively risk-averse listen.

There’s a purism to Moody’s music, but it’s made of muddy waters (literally, on “Sunday Hotel”), dusty vinyl grooves and—if the Popeye's inner sleeve is to believed—greasy fingers.

Thankfully, it's not just dour missives and desolation--there's life in these songs.

Each of the 11 songs here are positioned at some point in an endless cycle of going out, scoping girls, getting drunk, making out, passing out, and “waking up in [your] clothes.” But for Skaters, such scenes are apparently so routine that they often sound disinterested in their own debauchery.

There was always a tendency to divert into different styles on their prior albums (at least from 12 onward), but always with a feel of continuity underpinning it all, as if each path they took was firmly routing off the same road. Here, their razor-sharp sense of direction feels strangely blunted.

Lucky for us, there’s no one else like them and on Present Tense, their success has allowed Wild Beasts to be even more like themselves.

Not only does it uphold the myths of baby boomer greats like the Byrds, Neil Young, and Simon and Garfunkel with a staid type of reverence, but it also piggybacks on the legacy of one of Beck's best records. It's the sound of a rule-breaker dutifully coloring inside the lines.

True to its title, Voices in a Rented Room is modestly scaled and simply structured; the tone and form established in a song’s first verse don’t change by the time we reach the third. But even within these confines, New Bums rarely retrace their steps.

St. Vincent continues Clark's run as one of the past decade's most distinct and innovative guitarists, though she's never one to showboat.

The album, and the woman steering it, are not only comfortable with their eccentricities but strengthened by them, and the effect is enthralling.

Helms Alee doesn’t slough any of its previous interests wholesale, and each aspect of their musical personality is too distinct to camouflage with the rest. But the seams now crisscross in brilliantly unsuspected patterns, giving each element its space and the benefit of contrast.

Digital Resistance might be older and wiser, a transmission from a lifer, but that not a quest out of which they’ve aged.

If you’re in this emotionally combustible state, you’ll relate to You’re Gonna Miss It All directly and deeply. If you at least recognize it in retrospect, you can just as easily appreciate its wealth of infectious songs that are both sharply observed and sharply written.

Lyrically, Lo-Fang songs range from almost embarrassingly inert to annoyingly overwrought to frustratingly tone deaf.

The slate of beats on Cilvia Demo unites into a consistently immersive, complete album package that's just as ruminative as the lyrics.

High Land is not only his first statement of intent as a songwriter, it’s his most innovative, his most influential, and his most timelessly vivid. Peaking early can be bittersweet, but the album is all the better for it.

Despite its problems, Oblique to All Paths is the kind of commendable idea that feels like a way forward.

Hunn is an adept mixer, and he plays the long game in a way that rewards close listening.

Even as Motivational Jumpsuit faithfully approximates the grainy fidelity and 60-second dosages of Bee Thousand and Alien Lanes, it can’t maintain the same dizzying standards of pop euphoria throughout.

As generous as Guilt Mirrors might seem, it puts an oppressive onus on the listener to find it.

Nothing much happens in The Soul Is Quick--it's possible to wander in and out, picking up a thread you left dangling a few minutes before. That's where Willner excels, in creating these supple moments where you can get totally enveloped in what he's doing, or check out from the world for a while, or just leave him running in the background and marvel at how slowly he moves through time when your focus returns to him.

The hard-driving Blame Confusion, in too big a hurry to stop and take in the scenery, simply lets too much whoosh by in the periphery.

With Small Town Heroes, Segarra proves herself one of the most compelling stylists in a folk revival full of suspicious acts either too beholden to tradition or too uncritical to make much of it.

Cheatahs might not be a very ambitious record, but it is kinda ballsy.

Finn sounds best when Dizzy Heights is at its dizziest, when he has to completely rethink how his voice fits a song. On the other hand, he sounds slightly less engaged on the more straightforward tunes, which perhaps don’t offer the same heady challenges.

Halfway between French Romantic and Nashville outlaw, Loveless’ songwriting can come across sometimes as overly bleak and therefore sensationalistic, yet Somewhere Else makes such boldness a virtue, as thought decorum blunts creative expression.