Another great release from the most important emcee in hip-hop.

I Feel Cream is a force of positive motion that addresses criticism with the sonic equivalent of a bitch slap.

When the songs are spare nothing feels left out, and when they're grandiosely band-heavy not one harmony or piano fill comes off as pilled on.

Gently blurring the lines between the warm golden haze of pedal-steel’d country rock with elements of tasteful, classicist new wave, the quietly intimate Cardinology jettisons the schizoid, freewheeling genre-hopping of previous records, giving the album--and, most important, the songs--an intensity of focus where there was once just intensity.

Nobody sounds quite like them, though, and few metal bands balance spiritual and metallic consciousness so well.

He's smart enough to know what's to be done, sincere enough to do it free of distraction, and nice enough not to impose his will on you. Ted Leo has literally seen his success as an artist become a life or death experience, and he's here to tell you how to treat it like a grown-up.

This album is the sound of just scraping by with a shitty job but not letting it get you down because there’s more than enough beer and guitars to make life worthwhile. Maybe in the next life or maybe in another world, but for right now The Bronx are right now. Welcome back, boys. We missed you.

Above all, One Second Of Love is a triumph of atmospherics and arrangements.

Although the reinvention teased before release never materializes, Lust for Life is still a return to form which should cement Del Rey’s status as the queen of femme fatale pop.

In addition to great production and invigorated rhymes, the album also sees four guest spots from the likes of Damon Albarn of Gorillaz/Blur, Beth Gibbons of Portishead, Goodie Mob's Khujo Goodie and Boston Fielder.

The album's great achievement is that it melds the civic with the personal. Mo' Mega spans a bigger range in its eleven tracks than most albums twice its length.

The attention to detail, the avoidance of crisp production, the resonance of the instruments and voices all contribute to the depth of the music and its ability to penetrate through to the listener in an almost raw and pure state.

They've found the blueprint to the instantly memorable rock song - and Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga contains several - and continued to follow the instructions.

Some are sure to hate it, but unlike any Melvins album since "Houdini," Nude With Boots certainly demands your attention.

Free at Last is everything that his heads could want.

What could have easily ended up as a boring, stale record -- the sound of a band getting ready for 401(k) land -- is instead the peaceful sound of a goofy band being a little less silly.

The album is just as solid as Franz Ferdinand’s 2004 eponymous debut, and it shows that the group clearly knows its sound -- maybe a little too well.

In essence, under the mantle of her most pretentious album title yet (in a catalog of pretty brilliant titles), lies an earnest dance-pop album.

Heretofore lurches well beyond the confines of the breathtaking rustic songcraft they're known for, but every experiment is drenched in gorgeous melodies and inventive instrumentation. In short, it's Megafaun's most effortless, assured work to date.

Mountain finds the band taking several huge leaps toward that end, resulting in a more cohesive picture of their sound and a band beating down a clear path for where they'd like to take their music.

How lucky to be either a new or old fan, hearing Jansch at such a late age and in such a remarkable state.

Plumb is one of the top-shelf albums of 2012 so far because of Field Music's openness to continually tinker with pop music's DNA.

It's true that most of the attention Gonzalez received in the beginning was from songs other artists' wrote. The difference with Gonzalez is that he picks songs that fit his minimalist and whimsical approach--and he often makes them better than the originals.

Vampire Weekend’s debut comes across as a confident, precise, and, for better and worse, mature collection.

Matthew Houck, better known as the voice of Phosphorescent, has given Willie Nelson (and the rest of us) a gorgeous, shimmering gift in To Willie.

It’s promising indeed when an album that most artists would be happy to have as their pièce de résistance still shows plenty of room for growth.

Paralytic Stalks is a record made by a genius or a hoity-toity psychopath depending on your perspective--call it whatever you want, but it certainly isn't boring.

We can quibble about intent and expression, but in the end you will have to succumb to the heart, body and soul, and your brain might be left behind.

The guitars come at you from all angles, drums bubble up and clatter like a perfect assembly line, the vocals soar or are flung in from behind. Melodies sneak up and poke you like stray branches. Grab your headphones and start wandering.

It's a restatement of relevance, a testament to strong songwriting, and ultimately, a legacy enhancer that they desperately needed.

while Thank You Very Quickly is not shy about facing the challenges and horrors of certain parts of the world, it is defiant in its love for life in spite of struggle. It proclaims the power of working together and leaning on one another, no matter the circumstances.

As a genre that's saturated with trends, micro-trends, and anti-trends, it's rare to find someone doing something that makes a legitimate claim at being totally unique.

It remains to be seen if the loose, congenial vibe of Sun Bronzed Greek Gods can be sustained for more than this EP's 19 minutes, but betting against Dom might be foolhardy.

Gone are the frantic raps, menacing synths, and general hardness of the band's past three albums. In their place is a mellow approximation of the jazzy, old-school charm of The Roots circa Things Fall Apart.

Its dreamy interludes, leading into those electroclash tangents provide a welcome bit of inventiveness that help to remind that, while relatable at their best, Little Dragon are hardly conventional.

The album is a crumbling beauty.

Here, they sound polished and crisp, which is a remarkable change from other issues of these recordings. Presumably the band is happy sounding this way, but it often feels a little too clean.

Maybe it's time to alter our exercitations for new TV on the Radio albums: We might not be blown away, but TV on the Radio's sonic environment is still one of the most interesting venues in music.

You won’t get the same thing twice on Kids Aflame, and Goldstein keeps the surprises coming with subtle changes to his vocals, adding layers of horns in unexpected places and by simply choosing not to be safe.

Just a hair less than 40 minutes of energetic music. Which is a welcome change by today's standards -- to simply appreciate some music by itself.

Veirs hasn’t given us anything strikingly original with Year Of Meteors, but there’s something to be said for working within the confines of a given genre and excelling at what that entails.

Kid Sis has elected to keep things simple--so when the album works, it becomes clear that it really works.

Body Talk concludes a triptych of highly enjoyable pop albums. Let's hope we don't have to wait another five years for the next batch.

Although it's similar in style to the band's first three, numerically named releases, The Spell transcends more-of-the-sameness with the strategic addition of some elements culled from Amore and a further honing of the band's unmistakable sound.

Although Steeple is not entirely groundbreaking, it's not entirely safe either, as its fidgety temperament is remarkable enough to make anyone feel at home.

It's OK to play with enthusiasm. Oh, and also, it helps to have an album with 12 fantastic songs, the way the do on Nothing Hurts.

The result is 10 songs of lyrical brilliance that will have music listeners giving Porterfield the credit that's long overdue.

Essentially, Forgiveness Rock Record finds Broken Social Scene trading "big and loud" for "wide and warm" and as a result sounding like they've really just settled further into their identity as a band.

The most elaborately impenetrable album we're likely to hear this decade.

[The] most unexpectedly superb album so far this year.

Though the production value of Love and Other Planets intermittently occupies the same close corners that Homesongs did, Ilham's newer work presents a concept that is far too vast to for him to have covered on his rather intimately constructed solo debut.

The strength is in Vernon’s ability to make a quiet, lonely album that is not boring.

Considering most of the album is spent describing what life’s like for the rest of us, it’s surprising Stay Positive ends on a relatively self-focused note, courtesy of album highlight “Slapped Actress.”

He uses his angelic croon to beckon us to listen to him, sounding so damn desperate. Combine that with the rest of the band's driving, yet ambient build-ups and we have one of our most lovely and earnest records of 2011.

These lo-fi pop gems have been polished, and the result is sparkling.

Hospice mixes the personal and fictional in a way that few indie albums outside releases from Arcade Fire and Neutral Milk Hotel tend to do. Granted, Antlers aren’t in that league yet, but Hospice positions them as one of the more exciting young bands in indie rock today.

The beat selection, personal insight, wit, and overall coherence surpasses that of "Kingdom Come" and fulfills many of the expectations that the latter album failed to meet.

The self-titled release was dominated more by decaying, almost bleak instrumental meanderings than the half-cocked pop-fuzz that made the group's many singles such hot items. 2010's Nothing Fits, released on In the Red, is a near total about-face, consisting of 11 swift, fierce blasts.

Hella are a band reinvigorated on Tripper, realizing and embracing with all of their arms (a run through any of the tracks here definitely makes it sounds like they each have more than two) the sounds that absolutely work best for them while showcasing their growth as songwriters and the experiences they've picked up from their myriad side projects.

Unsettling and unexpectedly ravishing in equal measure, Prurient’s latest is as accomplished an album as his followers have come to expect.

Out in the Storm is a deeply impressive record, one that finds Crutchfield honing the strengths we knew she had, discovering new ones, and adding another strong record a rare sort of catalog--one that is consistent but unafraid to push for something new.

Kind of like Brooklyn, which wants you to think it doesn't care what you think, The Babies are impressively adept at making it look easy, at making it look like they're not trying too hard. The truth is that there's as much skill and passion going into this slumming side-project than most full-time bands could hope for.

Simply, Menomena are a band that sounds completely familiar but totally different.

While the unabashed pop moments on Interstellar are truly great and welcome, Rose easily proves she's capable of more daring things.

While collaborator conductor Aldo Sisillo's orchestrations deserve a healthy dollop of credit for the overall sonic success of the album, Patton's voice is clearly the centerpiece.

Cripple Crow is demanding because of its length - after twenty-two tracks on a single disc, nearly any artist would be difficult to tolerate. But the album is beautifully executed.

How can you talk about The Haunted Man without calling it "achingly beautiful"? This is a real problem, and it necessitates a thesaurus.

Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters is full of thoroughly enjoyable tunes and melodies if you're willing to give it time.

These Four Walls retains its charm, even when Thompson goes to the well perhaps one too many times with the line repetition trick.

It seems Smith and Shields simply both did what they are best at, and in the process uncovered some common ground that few thought existed. Fortunately, the results are riveting.

So This Is Goodbye displays an impressive maturation on the part of Junior Boys leading man Jamie Greenspan.

With an ear pointed to the type of gritty urban centers depicted on the album cover, Dirty Bomb references dubstep, baile funk, breakcore, North African drum patterns, Arabic folk music and Bollywood strings. And it will devastate your subwoofer.

Although its completed form has been framed as the most explicit tribute to Fuchs on the album, it is the furthest thing from somber, rocking an insistent downstroke bass part and a series of statement-making, sunsoaked guitar parts.

Mould is at the top of his game on Silver Age.

Perhaps the most successful aspect of Cross is its appeal on both the dance floor and the headphones, the pounding rhythms complemented by the nuanced detail of the arrangements and unified flow of mood.

So while there’s very little that’s surprising about obZen, the album finds Meshuggah’s strengths filtered through tighter song structures and more approachable grooves than we’ve heard from them in a long time.

In short, I'm New Here is the perfect comeback album, deploying modern production in the service of timeless songcraft and personal vision.

It’s rare for an album to transport you so fully onto its own terrain, and Witching Hour is a worthwhile retreat.

THEESatisfaction's awE naturalE is one of the most adventurous and tradition-bending hip-hop albums of the year, and further cements Sub Pop as the place for imaginative, left-field hip-hop.

Strange Keys to Untune God’s Firmament is classic Skullflower, a set of tunes that pays homage to the band’s history while still finding new inspiration in feedback, drone and monochord assault. This record puts them back in the game, and at the top of the class.

A concise killer of an album.

There's a theatricality that's akin to the Decemberists, but the sweet disco-bobs of "I Understand What You Want But I Just Don't Agree" and "Play a Little Bit for Love" suggest a more outwardly grandness, a notion supported by the Baz Luhrmann-aping album cover.

It's almost impossible to pick favorites off an album that doesn't have a weak track.

Koster's ability to create charmingly imaginative song cycles out of instruments you might find in your grandparent's attic has granted him a fan base that has waited nearly a decade for his sophomore release. It was worth the wait.

Free the Bees shows a group of skilled musicians who are comfortable in their style and songwriting, and it plays like it was unearthed in a warehouse basement, where it was hidden for the last forty years.

For all its delectable dance tracks, infused with Barnes’ latest influences of Afrobeat, disco and electronic music, The Sunlandic Twins still offers thoughtful lyrics and emotionally heady songs.

Local Business may be missing the epic historical bent that lent The Monitor extra credence in a crowded field of garage rock contenders, but in place of the brazen Civil War narrative is a more subtle meditation on being poor and ambitious in America.

It comes as no surprise that Fujiya & Miyagi's sound recalls other neo-futurists.... But Fujiya & Miyagi is undeniably its own band, with peppy melodicism and upfront sense of humor.

Filled with bounce, bite and surprising cohesion, Post-Nothing is a deceptive little piece that is as much fun as it is subversive.

Runner [is] an exceptional Sea and Cake record, and if it's not their best since their classic album, Nassau, it is at least the most surprising since then.

This is a rich, complex and conflicted soundtrack for the best comic book movie never made.

There’s a cornucopia of sounds that definitely needs some time to be digested, but when it finally is--it’s an absolutely satisfying experience.

The Big Pink's A Brief History of Love is exactly the kind of album I wish had existed when I was 14. That's not a dig at the record; one of the more special things that a group can do musically is create a sound that appeals both to teenagers and adults.

Heart of My Own sounds more produced than Oh, My Darling, but not for lack of quality. Despite the yearning lyrical plotlines, the warmth exuded from the woodsy harmony of Bulat’s voice mingling with the amalgamation of guest instruments cozies even the bitterest of winter days.

Celebration Rock is raw frenzy, tender love, and foolish cacophony.

Made of equal parts detached beauty and inspired disintegration, it is a transmission from another place -- no matter where you live.

The album is filled with well-conceived, well-executed pop pieces, but it would be silly to pretend that the musical landscape, including Top 40, isn't occupied by songwriters who make reasonably innocent songs about boys at least as well as Best Coast does.

Because of the Times is Kings of Leon's turn at maturity, without any of the pretentiousness that customarily surrounds that label.