There's a disarming simplicity and artlessness... with an increased emphasis on persistent pop melody over crafty wordplay.

It picks up right where Thickfreakness left off-- outside the bar in the gravel parking lot, swinging aggressively with Dan Auerbach's ferocious six-string and Patrick Carney's cymbal-and-snare seizures-- and brings the noise one step further.

Well-paced and cleverly sequenced, it is, in many ways, a throwback to the great records of the 1970s, and fresh enough not to sound like one.

The band's saving grace is its commitment to and execution of its textural aesthetic, owing as much to David Lynch's oneiric odes to Los Angeles as any musical counterpart.

It's brilliant at points, exhibiting the casual, grimy grace that laced Up the Bracket through English countryside benders, sing-alongs, and pub anthems, but evidently, The Libertines are creatures of excess, and even a good thing can be overdone.

It continues Björk's run of releases that sound nothing like their predecessors, yet is, as ever, particular to her.

But while the album is stylistically and sonically brilliant, it still suffers from the primary flaw of the band's four previous albums: Their songwriting hasn't made the same leap as their chops.

Anyone looking for [an] unpretentious, laidback and solid full-length is hereby invited to check out what's made Kilgour one our most consistent performers for 25 years.

To say that the album is over-produced is an understatement; you could bounce a quarter off of most of these songs.

Though reference points like Daft Punk and Prince have rightly been thrown around, Radical Connector is in fact a strange album that doesn't sound like much else.

The results sound just fine-- if somewhat familiar to fans of Tortoise, To Rococo Rot, Pan American, or Radian's previous work.

The mediocre filler that rounds out Half Smiles' lineup is, sadly, par for the band's late-era course.

Via a confluence of experience, ambition and glossy production, Engine Down have arrived at a palatable music that, with a little more refinement and promotional support, could cement their place in the mainstream cultural canon.

One can't shake the feeling that formula is what's really at the heart of the record, and in light of the promise shown by their debut, that lack of fervor and off-the-cuff adventurousness is a difficult shortcoming to ignore.

Business Casual is fierce and competent, and evinces the rippling of powerful musical muscles. But its affectations are so grating that it's tough to make it through it all in a single listen.

She Loves You treats each song differently while still being carefully sequenced so that its tracks cohere into a narrative of love and loss, resulting in a record that manages to sound as if its tracks were the product of one mind.

The Finns' latest is glossy, emotional, and sure to satisfy longtime listeners-- as well as any Stereophonics or Aqualung fans paying their respects.

The album's saving grace is the surrounding music, which almost, but not quite, makes up for Kinsella's constant barrage of tiresome non-sequiturs.

Good as some of these songs are... they're not quite enough to foment a revolution

The Dirty South is more consistent and cohesive song-for-song, its wide scope more public than personal.

Merritt has a long way to go before she runs the risk of being mistaken for A-league stars like Emmylou Harris and Dusty Springfield. But that we can speculate about her one day achieving that status is itself a tremendous compliment.

Green Imagination does awkwardly stumble into some redeeming moments, but never without a slog through the banal first.

Lewis' crisp alto shines on every track... Unfortunately, the songs (and especially the lyrics) don't give Lewis the support she deserves.

Well-played post-rock was always the bedrock of Windsor's sound, but they've added angst, a flayed post-punk edge, and new-wave organ loops to their ambition, creating a sound that should be familiar to Yo La Tengo fans, yet remains distinctly this band's own.

The result is both the best career-spanning snapshot of and single-purchase introduction to Talking Heads-- odd accolades for a live record-- and a treat for longtime fans.

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

Unfortunately, Fire in the Hole fails to invoke any effective nostalgia as it phlegmatically wanders through 12 solid but unexciting tracks.

While the J-Kwons and Juveniles enjoy the fruits of paradise and their Lexus helicopters, Shyne reminds us of the ones who didn't make it: the legions of his fellow Clinton inmates fighting to keep afloat under prison's psychic burden.