There's a proficiency at work on Feel Good that's undeniably impressive--it's an album full of musicians who can play and they approach this stuff with an endearing alacrity and a willingness to let Syd do more this time around that will pay dividends on future records. She's still got room to improve where lyrics are concerned.

They've finally happened on a formula that goes down smoothly for the length of a whole album, [yet] you may still find yourself missing the slick tricks and rough edges, all that dance-as-rock oomph and crap rapping, that once made them so endearing.

For the most part, though, Old Growth is exactly what this band has always done.

Carnell captures his negotiation with vulnerability in the process of its unfolding, and his relationship with his sonic language feels in-process as well--a generative path, to be sure, if sometimes an uneven one.

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

The title of this album is a challenge as well, as How to Dress Well’s modern masterpiece is conducted with the most eternal transparency--Krell asks “what is this heart” and lets you look right into his own.

Playboi Carti feels like a break from life, the soundtrack to a mindless good time.

More focused on offering Banhart's international and oddball bona fides than crafting songs that feel at all like home, What Will We Be finds Banhart in need of direction and editing.

This is a much leaner record that feels skillfully edited, with less use for indulgence and circular routes that don't lead anywhere.

The personalities on this album are so blank the songs may as well be performed by apps, and sung by Siri.

It’s hard to imagine the wild-maned early incarnation of Kings of Leon even wanting to listen to a band like this, let alone play in one. In truth, their current iteration doesn’t sound all that thrilled about it, either.

Slightly-too-frequent derivative moments can be mostly forgiven thanks to heaping helpings of youthful earnestness.

In a way, the album simply highlights many of the reasons why Orbital have been so beloved for the past decade-and-a-half.

Everyone on the album sounds engaged and happy to be in the room.

Barring a few notable exceptions, World Music Radio is so beholden to its premise—so enfeebled by Batiste’s insistence on universality—that it offers up few opportunities to get to know Batiste himself: his stories, his struggles, his euphoric victories and devastating losses. That absence leaves the record feeling hollow, like a pretty house where no one lives.

It makes sense that, at almost an hour, it wants to make good on fulfilling its feature-length ambitions, though even the most devout midnight movie synth-pop fans will still find it a bit much.

Nothing is left to chance here and both listener and artist are now free to imagine a 90 minute shot of perfection, where every transition is smooth and every dance step is executed with ease. We could all use those moments to dream of a unsullied world, if only for small stretches before getting back to the otherwise messy reality we’re in.

It sounds nice, but for a lot of its runtime, it also sounds like DeMarco is exhausted, like he’s ready to move on and try something new but is trapped in a creative holding pattern.

Electrified's rife with cardboard power chord progressions that should've been buried with all the other Nirvana aftermath opportunists.

Here, with one exception, they sound as though they're in soundtrack mode.

It's good for what it is--better than it needs to be, in fact--yet what it is is only a fraction of what it could be, if only Earle would stop trying to tidy up his inspirations.

Fantastic Playroom puts the emphasis on the content, not the trend, and in so doing makes a damn good case for post-punk's matriculation.

The second disc is ultimately little more than a curiosity for most-- and will no doubt be complete anathema for some-- but given that the entire package retails for a single-disc price, that's hardly a reason for a die-hard to opt out.

Beach House the EP succeeds where the mixtape Beach House 2 didn’t, further commercializing Ty’s sound without sacrificing the meat and potatoes of it, the foul-mouthed, sex-positivity of Ty’s quixotic bedroom capers and the production’s precarious balance between slight, house-informed ratchet music, trap and densely arranged traditional R&B sounds.

Tomorrow remains compelling through 'Static Object,' the record's closest thing to a Joy Division moment, but then limps out over its last third, mired in a tone/tempo bog that reveals the group's soft spots and least-appealing features.

PC Music is escapism whose primary effect is to remind us of what we’re trying to escape. We can’t trade body for avatar; we can’t displace longing forever. But for the space of an album--the sheer forcefulness of this intention smashed into a dizzy half-hour span--the sincerity within our most fundamentally artificial impulses comes calling.

Over the course of its thirteen tracks, Labyrinth loosely chronicles growing anxiety and its dissolution, peaking at “Mino” before settling into a level of serenity at “Bunny.” Kanda is most successful when he interrupts the album’s emotional arc.

The band's seemingly desperate to reinvigorate their cultural cachet, but Absolute Garbage's latter half emphasizes the depths they've fallen.