Ashes Grammar draws you in by offering outstanding moments in strange contexts; you'll re-listen to hear specific pieces even though you're unable to remember exactly when and how they occur.

GusGus's seventh album isn't quite a hangover, and there's still a party going on--but the party is somewhere far away.

To catch a glimpse of these guys' past glories in 2009, your best option is still to go see them live; this is just a souvenir.

Kamaal the Abstract is not a great record by any means. But it is an interesting one, a unique effort by an artist struggling to mesh two disparate musical systems, gambling that inherent internal friction could spark some excitement.

It's experimental music, to be sure, but it doesn't conflate experimentation with alienation.

To those without the stomach for Joakim's waywardness, Milky Ways will often sound as much during the course of a listen. For those who are feeling adventurous but forgiving of the same, Joakim is a worthy companion.

Out Into the Snow is another solid entry in a long career for Joyner, and it seems his place as the dark observer on the indie world's fringe is pretty well set.

Wild Beasts certainly aren't the first rock band to stand up society's dregs and outcasts, but few others immortalize them on such a wondrous, mythic scale.

Experience can be a crutch, an excuse to tread water in comfortable waters. But Popular Songs wears its age well, a calm but firm reminder of an indie rock perennial it's all too easy to take for granted.

That's Signal Morning's greatest strength: It's a supremely busy record that at the same time doesn't sound fussed over.

Blueprint 3 is the kind of stuck-on-stupid, event-driven money pit that proves while Jay-Z's at a point where he's got no one to answer to but himself, he's still capable of an entire hour of failing to take his own advice.

All in all though, it's good to hear a new Os Mutantes record that carries forward the ideals and exploratory spirit that made us all love the band in the first place, even if it won't ever supplant those classic early albums.

It's weirdly kind of a grower. There's nothing that immediately jumps out and announces itself as the 'Where Do You Run' of Everything Goes Wrong.

Even if a lot of Heartbeat Radio is affable and politely poppy, a lot of it is so pointedly bland that you can't help but wonder if the good stuff stands out only because of the beige filler around it.

It's not always great--the band has a tendency to let its best ideas get the best of them--but there is a bigness of sound that is hard to approximate. And even harder to control.

So naturally the big question now is if the rest of Get Color lives up to the promise of 'Die Slow.' The answer is that it does... kind of.

Mister Pop stays the course for the rest of its relatively compact 10-song, 34-minute length, reshaping the Clean's core components into poignant bossa nova instrumentals ('Simple Fix'), propulsive Krautrock-outs ('Tensile') and, as only they can, bizarro fuzz-organ jigs that resemble White Light/White Heat-era Velvets auditioning for "Riverdance" ('Moonjumper').

In Prism ultimately sets a new standard for them: don't just make it sound like you never left, but rather make the past seem like a mere warm-up for what's to come.

Like Ghostface's modern classic, this album defies hip-hop's current atmosphere of youthful cockiness and aging complacency: instead, it's driven by the sometimes celebratory, sometimes traumatized sense of stubborn survival and perseverance, a veteran mindset that can no longer picture success without having to defend it.

Hawthorne clearly has the ability to integrate and recreate his influences in his own compositions; it would be revelatory if he added more of his own signature sounds and soul into the music.

East of Eden, in that sense, isn't so far from Studio's West Coast: a masterful, hypnotic album that draws on a world of influences but is ultimately limited by none.

As Good as Gone is Nudge's best album so far, the kind of record that indicates a band has found its signature sound, and is poised to deepen and expand it.

These 38 meticulously prepared minutes offer dozens of memorable moments. They just demand that you listen.

Tillman's intimate, close-miced voice, does lend Year in the Kingdom a lonesome, somber tone, one Tillman-- a funny, amicable dude, if you've ever heard him clowning on himself at a Fleet Foxes gig-- would do well to shake on occasion. Next time, maybe; for now, the stout, supine Year in the Kingdom, Tillman's second fine record of the year, will certainly do.

Just as you'd have to be made of stone not to enjoy at least some part of a Monotonix gig, anyone who likes garage rock would have to be an obstinate stickler for originality not to enjoy the best parts--that is, the majority--of Where Were You When It Happened?

Red contains no clunkers, only lukewarm forays that further convince me this band can nail any sound they want, cheekiness be damned.

Where the old Bondy would sometimes show his hand too blatantly, the new Bondy is playing his cards with greater aplomb and much greater skill. When the Devil's Loose, A.A. Bondy's second album, is evident of this ever-growing skill. But that's not to say there isn't room to grow.

Unsurprisingly, the rarities on The Fine Print could make a good album, but the oddities are often distracting.