There's a purposeful simplicity to its narrative approach and a concreteness to its imagery--even when our narrator sounds less than engaged.

This is probably the most uplifting album of his career... Exhilarating.

It's probably his most immersive single release--or album, or mixtape, or emanation, or whatever--in a year and a half, better than both Based God Velli and I'm Gay.

It displays the boundlessness of her vocal talent but finds her tethered to a frustratingly limited aesthetic.

On the evidence of Mr. Impossible, they still sound like no one else and they're still thinking hard about music and texture. When you're craving something trashy and tripped-out in this very particular way, they still deliver the properly damaged goods.

From the first shudder of the keyboard and crack of drums to that last, celebratory walk through the village of the virgins, Iyer, Crump and Gilmore keep things spellbinding.

Compared to the wool-sweater warmth of those early recordings ["Crocodile Rock", "Babies"] Oberhofer's sad-sack persona and yelping vocal ad libs come off here as less endearing and more desperate, like someone trying to oversell simple songs with eccentric affectation.

Quakers is kind of a mess, and odds are that a not-insignificant number of people are going to find the beats more consistently entertaining than the verses... But ambitious messes are the best kind, and riding out the less-interesting moments is worth it in the long run.

New Build's arrangements are impressive and uncomplicated throughout.

The band's debut was kind of a crumpled, nicotine-smudged affair, but Atlanta feels brighter, less muddled, not polished but certainly tidier around the edges. Smith's voice remains a friendly, mid-range yawp-- emotionally precise if not always entirely on-key.

Voices From the Lake is a triumph of care and exactitude, the kind of well-executed work of art that feels effortless despite its obvious complexity.

Listening to M. Ward is nowadays perhaps more deeply pleasurable than it ever has been, with glistening strings and big slabs of piano occupying more and more of the terrain once almost entirely populated by his nimble fingered guitar, trashcan percussion, and creaky room noises.

Even more so than their promising debut, Staring at the X proves them to be a commendably ambitious band with the chops to carry out even their most far-flung ideas.

A solid debut.

They've found a way to be ambitious while also elemental, a difficult trick that Sleep pulled off on Holy Mountain and Dopesmoker, and one that High on Fire have nailed here.

It is an album of well-portioned, difficult grooves that owe as much to craftsmanship as they do to scholarship, the sound of a chronic disciple slowing learning to make his influences work for him.

On all of these songs, Nicki is dartboard focused-- she's rapping harder here than on almost anything from Pink Friday... But much of Roman Reloaded sweats with a too-big-to-fail desperation.

The main issue with Songs is that, for an album of "songs," there are too few pop cuts to work well as a whole. It's more of a pick-and-choose affair where the modern ability to fast-forward to your favorite musical moments, down to the second, is crucial.

Despite its overall hazy, sun-lit-kaleidoscope feel, it's just too sonically scattershot to truly take in and enjoy as a body of work.

On good nights, the band conjures a singularly eerie vibe. But on Better Luck Next Life, it's not always coming through.

You're left wishing the album drew a little more blood.

Phédre is the sound of a band trying to do too many things at once in too short of a time.

I Love You, It's Cool is admirable in large part because its ambitions are every bit as subtle and difficult to quantify as its pleasures-- you don't have to call it "adult indie," but it feels like conflicted indie rock for adults.

The sharply differentiated genre experiments become less well-defined in the home stretch, but the sound design stays immersive, with pleasant little things to listen to festooned in every niche.

Electric Cables is the sort of album whose deceptively placid presentation belies the richness of detail and sense of purpose at work here.

Their weakest record to date, one that lacks the subtle power and distinctive personality of their best work.

Whatever Other People's Problems is trying to say is lost beneath the fact that it's so sonically muddled and abrasive, and lyrically imprecise.

Listen to all of The Aberrant Years, and you'll probably get too caught up in feedtime's bracing songs to think much about bands that came after them.