The masks only serve to augment a record whose textural complexities and depths sink in further, quietly addictive, play after play.

Look, if you’re seeking out the latest flavor of the month or are looking to see where this chillwave shit is going, Love Comes Close is probably not high on your list. But spin this thing once and it’s hard not to become engulfed in the aesthetic gloominess and seedy milieus Cold Cave are delivering here.

His mixtapes still might be better (especially Midwestgangstaboxframecadillacmuzik), but Str8 Killa is the first step toward Gibbs regaining the label contract that is so rightfully his.

There’s something deeply captivating about Wood’s songs, and they’re brought to an appropriate close with a tightly wound sequel (of sorts) to the album’s opener, 'Water II.'

Banhart clearly gets bogged down in that freedom, as the amount of sheer hokiness on some of his albums can attest to. But with What Will We Be, Banhart gets back to earning that right for total creative freedom.

Somehow, the final product turned out better than some bands' actual albums.

This new direction doesn't feel like a 180-degree response to the noodly fusion sounds of It's All Around You so much as a natural desire to light out for new territory.

Conservative, instead, describes Shields: Veckatimest authorized it to be far bolder. You yearn for what could've been.

It's encouraging to watch a band shift and grow and manage to stay essentially true to form-such is the case here, as is for the album in entirety.

This buckshot spray of quick pop tunes is another wild success in his constantly twisting variations on a theme.

Still, for all the sophisticated, melodic pleasure to be found on Here and Now, a comfy old shoe of an album, one could be forgiven for occasionally wondering whether things might achieve just a touch more frisson if Holsapple and Stamey surrendered just a little to the temptations of that sharp-edged sound of yore.

Instead of it being just another Earth 2.0 album though, the completed Angels Of Darkness, Demons Of Light is a successful experiment in sounding absolutely huge while doing so little, and the confirming masterstroke of Carlson's new direction.

Besides a cyclical feeling that veers the album into the direction of repetition at several points, Bend Beyond is a solid listen.

This is the best mix of various recordings Moore has done since A Thousand Leaves.

While it would have been easy for Feel It Break to fall into new wave hero worship, it succeeds thanks to the singularity of Stelmanis' vision. Feel It Break announces her as a force to be reckoned with.

It's speculative fiction in album form, gleefully out of step with most sounds of today, demanding attention, but more importantly, keeping it.

What is here, a mixture of jagged dance-punk numbers with pretty sound sketches (of the type Underworld has employed for recent soundtrack work), all succeeds.

Traces of other San Diego bands like Pinback and LaValle's own Tristeza and the Black Heart Procession are distinctly here, culminating in mellow harmonies, relaxed bass lines and subtle ambient effects.

It comes down to what you're expecting here. Do you earnestly yearn for another album full of beautifully arranged, meticulously pored over harmonic acoustic folk? Then this is probably your album of the year to beat.

You will not hear another album as straight-forward, unburdened by emotional distance and downright open as this one this year. And that's Major.

Although the album does lag a bit toward the end--not due to a lack of quality but to the inability to match the album's earlier dazzling heights--it's a very respectable addition to the Swedish canon.

Stronger, more contemplative feelings are at work here; gone are the sugary la-la-la's and superficial lyrics inserted on cue.

Many musicians watermark every second of their albums with their signature, but not Caminiti, and that's what makes his album surprisingly individual.

It is simple, it is pure, it is predictable, it is Another High on Fire Album.

With In Love & War, Amerie has adopted to trying times with spunk and style, grace and flair. And, yes, swag.

In spite of the album's potential obesity at 18 tracks of wildly different musical ideas, the three [Monae and her production partners, Charles "Chuck Lightning" Joseph II and Nathaniel "Nate 'Rocket' Wonder'" Irvin III.] keep the weight off by welcoming coherence and by evenly spreading out their interests.

While the Evens' debut was a little rough around the edges at times, those imperfections have been buffed away for Get Evens.

While Grandaddy may be no longer, Aqueduct appears confidently able to assume is place as a purveyor of lo-fi writ large.