For all of Thr!!!er’s reliable pleasures, the requisite cover-image riff on the triple-bang logo is the boldest idea here, which makes for an awfully modest record to hold up against the pop-canon cornerstone for which it was named.

Russell's recordings are enormously idiosyncratic, and a lot of Master Mix's contributors try to normalize his music: sanding off his bristling electric cello tones, hammering repeated phrases into choruses, singing with dramatic intonation in place of his ethereal reserve. (The major exception is Lonnie Holley, whose four brief "interludes" here abstract Russell pieces further.) That often works just fine.

The interplay here is more complex than You, You're a History in Rust, showcasing restraint and more subtle shifts.

It's great that the band can slow down and still hold attention, and one hopes Obits will dig deeper and find new thrills in old traditions in the coming years.

Even if the overall effect here isn't terribly original, there are still plenty of nice touches spread throughout these tracks to suggest Le Loup holds the potential to become more than an amalgam of well-regarded influences.

Constellations begs for more rather than delivering all of the goods all of the time. Perhaps that's an old-fashioned concept-- demanding the sort of patience and attention that technology's made obsolete. But at this point, it's exactly the move Balmorhea needed to make.

The eight songs on New Shapes of Life clock in at a tidy half hour, and sometimes you wish he’d give himself the space to stretch things out further.

Cudi too often assumes some sort of higher ground even though his self-pity is flaunted no differently than any other tacky rapper accessory.

The dozen takes are every bit as crafted as those on Kylesa's increasingly excellent five studio albums, with tones both enormous and exploratory and vocals both large and enthusiastic.

There are moments on Detroit 2 that feel special, but Big Sean himself rarely has anything to do with them.

The Sister ultimately comes across as, at best, a retread done well and, at worst, a retreat into previously approved territory by an artist who has noticeably improved as a tactician.

Vile certainly has the talent and ability to churn out tunes, and with a little focus and editing his best batch is most likely ahead of him.

Despite the blemishes, Cuts Across the Land is a surprisingly galvanized and consistent offering.

The music is big but gentle, offered without tension or anger. When it is not big-- see the leaden sentiment of "You Make Me Feel" and "Delicately"-- it is laughably composed and calculating.

On their second album, Tales from Terra Firma, they continue to be almost crushingly dull, making well-appointed and cheerfully empty music that successfully communicates next to nothing.

It’s a testament to the strength of Clarke’s compositional gifts and his command of mood that even 14 or 15 tracks in, in an album pitched at a consistent campfire glow and midtempo stroll, songs like “The Golden Sky” sound just as fresh as the record’s first notes.

If you've ever wanted to hear classic cuts from the dawn of hip hop turned into hallucinogenic setpieces that knock and clang like glitched-up King Tubby, Echo Party should justify whatever the hell it is Edan's been doing with his time over the past four years.

The Coathangers' latest finds a notorious must-see live band finally capturing some of the energy of its shows on record.

Machineries of Joy lacks the kind of crucial equalizers that appeal to all levels of education--big hooks, convincing physicality, legible emotions.

If Diarrhea Planet’s goal is just to be a memorable, messily great live band, they’re well on their way. But if they want their records to live on, they need to decide what they're trying to achieve, and figure out how to deliver it more effectively offstage.

The strangest thing about Loose isn't its irregularity, but the simple fact that this doesn't sound like Nelly Furtado at all.

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.

Despite the strength of "Music Is My Boyfriend" and lush single "The Fear Is On", I continually find myself humming songs from the debut instead.

We Are Your Friends might not be a completely successful album, but it's rarely less than a compelling one.

With these production qualities, the band is just comfortably abrasive, snagging against the mix of bent-string guitars and strange, trebly percussive clamor.

By co-opting and debasing punk-disco's vitality and sincerity and thereby rendering the style accessible to the botox-and-bulimia set, Jackson betrays the visions of those whose ecstatically powerful music he lavishly degrades.

A compelling synthesis of the hip-hop producer's talents and the solid ensemble work of the Blue Series collective.

Brother Is to Son is weird, but it's neither incomprehensible nor didactic.