For Van Etten, it's a logical next step in her upward trajectory.

Tim Hecker’s beautiful meditations are inviting but still retain the edge of a seeker that isn’t quite finished with the trip.

Like much of today's synthetic approaches, Splash reaches broadly, but his process is more substantive than his content.

It holds its cards close, but it's the kind of album that rewards patience and a willingness to dig into the album's complexity and deeply personal nature.

It’s more direct in many places, but finds a power in that directness that has led some of the band’s best music.

Dance Mother leaves many unanswered questions. But a safe bet is that Telepathe have more tricks up their sleeves.

Invisible Ones stands steadily as an encouraging signpost in Fink's career.

On a whole Salon lacks more of these emotional moments.

But for all the sonic changes and glimmers of hope, the best stuff here still sounds like boilerplate Jurado. Swift's production is at its best when it adds subtle atmospherics to the fragile melody of "Kansas City," or the dusty flourishes to the chorus of "Harborview."

Even without the quirky, theatrical pop she offered in the 1980s, she has held up beautifully after her long hiatus from recording, creating a record that is very much her own.

The sound is still layered and textured, and those gut-achingly gorgeous seamless harmonies between Sparhawk and wife Mimi Parker are still there.

That the group’s second effort, Enemy Mine, is able to accommodate all three distinct voices in only nine tracks is even more remarkable. But that Enemy Mine is a firm step sideways is less so.

What Uhlhorn has done on Fin Eaves is reconcile those influences into something unique to him; this is homage or pastiche, rather than imitation. Rather than playing different influences to different effect, Fin Eaves is a whole work, the first of the band's career.

The Wedding is certainly one of the best records this band has released and, more important, one of the better rock records released this year.

The Roots manage to craft another interesting hip-hop experiment with undun.

It feels like a resurfacing, like a promise, and it's a grand closer for this classically GBV (collection) album.

Wedren is game, and the hooks are there, but it’s been proven many times that a person can never truly go home again. It’s how far away Live From Home ends up that provides its greatest interest.

Even as Joyner drifts out into that snow, he remembers to bring some warmth along with him, which is what makes Out Into the Snow the comforting mess that it is.

Barring any idiomatic prejudices against the contemporary production techniques, there are no glaring missteps here.

Yes, believe it or not, The Get Up Kids have produced the first truly surprising album of 2011.

Given the track record Clipse have maintained through this decade with their other two albums and three mixtapes (I’m not counting the official Re-Up Gang album, and neither should you), this is a fine album, but it's still a letdown, plain and simple.

King lacks an overall cohesiveness or direction.

It is a better album than its predecessor in almost every regard, but it hardly shows Condon taking risks.

It's clear that Young Magic have all the tools and instincts down pat; even without meaning to, this album delves happily, though briefly, into pop excellence.

There's a deep sincerity here among the saccharine, and no amount of painstakingly throwback falsetto harmonies can shroud May's songwriting from its fluttering, well-intentioned heart.

Hebden seems to be using the Ringer material to delicately maneuver the Four Tet sound away from the folktronica tag that was foisted on previous releases such as "Rounds" and "Pause."

The 22 tracks on this album range freely in length from 11 seconds to six and a half minutes and a rare few would stand on their own, as the musical shifts between them can be so slight.

An air of pretentiousness definitely sits over Supernature, but this is a rather enjoyable work that surpasses most material of a similar nature.