Once you’ve heard one track from Waterfall (ideally “Salt Carousel”), you’ve pretty much heard them all, and while such a lack of variety might not be a nuisance to a live audience, it’s a problem when a four-song, fifteen-minute EP already feels a little stale halfway through.

It feels disjointed and incomplete.

Where the album certainly succeeds, though, is in its crafting of a colorful, if a tad overlong, mission statement for a producer still only beginning to approach the extent of his potential.

hese Days… isn’t the kind of sharp-to-the-touch effort that one associates with excellent rappers who eschew the mainstream.... It’s the start of a conversation; and one can only hope that he plans on finishing it.

Individual melodies may not stick in your head, but Magnifique, as a complete work, offers a musical experience unavailable beyond Ratatat’s veteran production table.

Semicircle’s many pleasures--of melody, of tone color, of ideals never losing the beat--deserve an essay’s worth of exposition (no, really).

What the band still manages to do so well is use aural snippets from a range of contrasting but conventional sources, weave them together and still sound like no one else out there.

It starts off brilliantly, but by the end of twelve tracks, it tapers off into an incessant and increasingly underwhelming performance.

Chrissybaby Forever is the music of Owens’ heart--unfiltered and unpolished, both to its credit and its detriment.

The brew of Anything In Return is strong enough that its overly sugary moments don’t ruin the experience of the album, and it’s certainly strong enough to merit many, many plays.

The main pitfall of this record is its pacing. Bob’s best moments are lightning fast, like the 28 tracks in 41 minutes Alien Lanes. By contrast, this record is 32 tracks in 71 minutes. Its top moments are when it is moving the fastest.

Rapor is an absorbing and accomplished 80’s sheened synth-pop EP infused with heartache and imagination.

Mechanical Bull is the sound of Kings of Leon de-fanged, de-crowned, and de-throned, further evidence of their inexorable slide towards artistic irrelevance.

Almost nothing about it works.

The reality is that Something to Tell You, though strong in its own right, just doesn’t quite live up to the pomp and circumstance established by Days.

DJ Dahi, Sounwave and Cardo handle the bulk of beats here, with additional help from ScHoolboy staples Nez & Rio, plus the venerable Boi-1da and Jake One. Except the results are less DAMN. and more Redemption, the Jay Rock album from last year that everyone has already forgotten.

Migos have mastered their craft, but they spend too much time delivering what we expect instead of exploring their more interesting caprices.

Yes, Views is both overlong and underwhelming. But there’s a glimmer of something more poignant beneath its bloated surface.

Little Boots knows how to write a hook.

The issue is in direction, and the real issue is that there doesn’t seem to be any.

This Is… Icona Pop is not revolutionary, original, or inventive.... What This Is… Icona Pop, and Icona Pop as an artistic duo, possess that few others can lay claim to, is a firm grasp on the musical zeitgeist.

Flawless transitions are endemic to the record, and necessary in order to cram this many ideas into an attention-deficit 32 minutes.

Ryan Adams unearths new emotional riches, mostly sad ones, from his source material. And his 1989 transcends mere tribute.

Bundick’s inspirations run rampant across the back half of Michael.

It’s an enjoyable and diversionary, if not particularly nutritious, experience.

Offerings of pure pop pleasure are offset with healthy doses of weirdness. It’s a sincere, exciting and excitable album that successfully adds by subtracting.

Though it never quite comes through crystal-clear, the intensity and sincerity of the underlying emotion manages to bleed through a confusing swirl of altered sounds.

Mind Of Mine is a better whole than a collection of songs, and the standouts tend to be the shorter, less unambitious ditties (the theatrical “It’s You”; the gut-punch party jam “She”).