Dipping into heavier rock elements can make emotional lyrics seem misplaced at times - it almost seems like the band is intentionally aiming to present a man's record - but even the album's rare moments with jagged guitar are tastefully executed.

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.

I'll keep conceding to Jenny Lewis's voice any day. It's amazing. It could bring the rafters of any church down. But the material it takes up on Rabbit Fur Coat is boring.

This is a solid listen regardless of whether or not it's breaking any new ground.

In both material and performance, From a Compound Eye quickly reveals itself to be classic Pollard.

For Screening Purposes Only is rock without a filter.

Think Au Pairs or Delta 5, but filtered through Bikini Kill and the Rapture.

The guitar work is clean and atmospheric, the vocals light and poppy and the rhythms playful to reflective, but we've been here before.

The members of Tha Alkaholiks may not have wrapped up their stellar career with the bang many had hoped for, but I'll still drink to this.

His tried-and-true lo-fi routine is still there, and die-hard Pipe fans will probably gobble up this release, but these thirteen smoggy ballads are like that week-old liter of Grape Fanta: you know, flat.

Not quite poppy and not quite moody, there's just not enough feeling in any direction to really make it stick.

A majority of the tracks lack in everything but production value.

A disappointingly amateurish performance.

Some of the tracks still don't feel like they offer enough.

Sounds like a band mashing all the current trends and ending up with nothing.

Much of With Love and Squalor is like your old coat rack: You know where the hooks are going to be even in your sleep.

Sia's voice can be affected, and when the songwriting sags and the production becomes more generic toward the middle of the album, she struggles to keep the listener's attention.

From the band we never expected to evolve, there is enough sweeping ambition to have knocked us on our heels - if only the members had learned the art of discretion.

Despite the three or four keepers, 29 suggests that Adams is still struggling to nail down his musical identity.

Where Love and Life limped from song to song, The Breakthrough zips confidently through its sixteen tracks.

Foxx shows some real talent on this album, and he doesn't embarrass himself - except for when he embarrasses himself.

Plays more like a gimmick than a remix album.

One Way Ticket to Hell's blandness seems like the perfect example of the difficulties of riding a revivalist routine longer than necessary.

Coming on Strong is one smooth record; even with all the glitch, all the bleeps and bloops, and all of the genre bending, it never leaves any residue behind.

A wonderfully crafted album built on songwriting that is witty and potent.

It's highlighted by an invigorated Kweli who's back to his old sound-bombing ways.

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.

Though not a particularly groundbreaking or remarkable album among post-rock instrumental compositions, A Colores is solid and has a lot of movement, the rhythms and melodies rolling tempestuously between the speaker channels.