While Grace/Confusion may lean too heavily on Hawk's production, it's a hair better than Player Piano. But it's hard to call it an "improvement" or "progression" considering it's hardly outside the scope of what Memory Tapes has done so far.

Until the Colours Run works just fine for an all-purpose wallow, but it’s simply too ponderous to be the galvanizing social commentary to which it aspires.

There's no shame in catchy, concise, sharply executed tunes that communicate mildly fresh takes on relationships, either -- and this album has more than a few.

Banned is stronger when the pair sound more invested, when the songs feel more composed and can unspool without as many distractions.

Too many of the songs are flimsy and fragmentary, never shaping into anything substantial and coming across like incidental music.

For all the great ideas and fantastic moments sprinkled throughout Peeping Tom, it turns out that Mike Patton's idea of pop is as uncompromising as his other musical notions. In this case, what's great in theory doesn't work so well in practice.

For the most part, though, from robotic-but-rambunctious opener "Runaway" to the late-album one-two closing swoon of "It's You" and "Overtaken", Feel the Sound leans on Imperial Teen's puppyish charm and love for soft-rock's smooth bliss.

This band lives or dies by its hooks, and in truth most of Hideaway’s are only OK. They’re straightforward to a fault, and short on those small, sometimes barely even perceptible deviations from expectation that distinguish a sublime hook from a routine one. Williams’ greatest strength and weakness as a songwriter is that he always follows the path of least resistance.

Not the sundazed party record that was promised but an exploration of how it feels when the party’s over.

This is the album that might’ve better earned the title Everything in Between, as the songs are composed of scraps, MacGyver tricks achieved with contact mics, bass guitars, and doctored amps. Occasionally, the effort manifests in notable progress.

Why, pray tell, did Elbow decide to start sounding less like Radiohead rip-offs and more like midlife-crisis Travis?

Left to his own devices, Nav sometimes strays back towards raps without substance, coasting on pristine beat selection and Auto-Tune that lull the listener into easy-listening mode.

Meliora is a step in the right direction, but their pandering can only go so far, and even then, it might be misguided.

On Around, Whirr don’t elevate themselves beyond the level of a listener; instead, they remain supplicant to their influences.

Morrissey has often talked about exaggerating her feelings in song to make up for her youthful lack of experience, but within the lavish Tomorrow Will Be Beautiful is a songwriter whose knack for subtle self-assertion needs bringing to the fore, not dressing up in quirk.

It's hard to begrudge a band a transitional record when its in the midst of a substantial transition, and Apes wear it better than most.

A frustrating listen from a brilliantly talented artist. For all of its angels and prophecies and mid-century decadence, what we are left with is a very quiet collection of songs with all the weight of ephemera.

Egregiously melodramatic missteps aside, Creatures exists as a reminder that out there in the between of electronic music are swirling, delirious spaces that are yet to be explored.

Demon... is a near doppelganger of [Architecture in Helsinki's In Case We Die], down to its multitude of vocalists, its adorable accents ("It Is the Law", coming out something like Hopelandic), its short attention span, its 50s-style romanticism, and its infectious giddiness.

Despite its scattered high points, though, it's hard not to think of Wasted Years as little more than the third most exciting OFF! record.

Where previous PE releases this century have often sounded dated, this one often sounds forcibly modern, the sonic equivalent of your tech-challenged granddad trying to use Spotify.

Meticulous as the sound palette is throughout, favoring sustained organ chords, close-mic’d guitar strums, and the patter of hand drums, the effect starts to smudge everything together.

The sound of New York is occasionally absent on 1992--in moments, her Migos-like repetitive hooks and regionless hashtag punchlines move it somewhere a bit less rooted--but Frasqueri’s loved for the city never wanes.

At its best, Welcome Oblivion is undecided and unfocused, with moments of intrigue scattered through songs that wander on an album that rambles. At its worst, Welcome Oblivion is passé and redundant, suggesting recent successes by Salem, Burial, Laurel Halo, Purity Ring, Gold Panda, and a litany of others without improving upon them.

In other words, it’s not MGMT vs. Oracular Spectacular; if anything’s holding MGMT back, it’s themselves.

The Bachelor most damningly lacks the charm attendant with any of those character descriptions, continuing Wolf's ability to please one's inner music critic, but too often ignoring any sort of pleasure principle.

Songwriting chemistry is a tricky thing, and while having two or three competing voices can push writers to new heights, a group of five here leads to songs that are merely passable.