The duo's most commercial and downright joyous album to date.

Red Dirt Girl is a model of tasteful genre blending: a little bit country and a little bit electro-ambient pop.

On G.O.A.T., LL Cool J has renewed his old-school style for a new generation of fans while still retaining old-school support.

Here, country twang knocks against rap, funk basslines and blues harmonicas, and liberal lashings of reggae, ska and dub are added -- all adding up to a groove jam congealed into a multi-faceted but consistent and accomplished sound.

This is Duncan Sheik at his most orchestrally, acoustically indulgent, and it's a lovely, haunting effort.

Take away the album's lone misfire -- the cliché-filled "Rock the Boat," produced by Rapture and E. Seats -- and this work is nearly perfect.

Sugar Ray actually sound like a band -- a quality missing from most of their earlier work.

A strong rebound that finds lang supported by the sleek, techno-lite production of Damian leGassick?

Alison Krauss & Union Station are one of the best instrumental bands in acoustic music today.

Another smart, danceable collection of cultural subversion.

When the Pawn Hits ... is so good that the next album could have a 900-word title and I wouldn't even scratch my goatee.

The band's new sound appropriates slabs of dance music, free jazz, rock and techno to create a menacing landscape of rattling beats, thundering bass and crippling distortion, dotted with lyrics that evoke urban decay and social disgust.

The band continues to rock in the Rush/Metallica eight-minute flexathon tradition: it may impress you with individual lines, but in the end, it excels mainly at musical gymnastics.

Shangri-La Dee Da stands with the band's best work -- a furious tug of war between strychnine-laced grunge and acid-stoked psychedelic pop. In fact, it may be well be the brooding California group's pinnacle.

A strong, expressive singer, Usher is particularly adroit at seductive, late-night ballads.

Mojave 3's lead singer, primary songwriter and aforementioned poet, Neil Halstead, writes simple, graceful love songs populated by lonely characters who are usually hopelessly hopeful and usually, albeit fleetingly, in love.... Excuses for Travellers is beautiful music for romance's never-ending cycles of beginnings and ends.

Replete with tasty elements borrowed from jungle, drum & bass and contemporary Afro-pop, their fifth full-length album manages to blend and synthesize all their disparate source material better than any previous effort save their startling 1982 debut.

Righteous Love turns out to have been worth the five-year wait, as it boasts a higher percentage of good songs than Relish, a more organic instrumental sound, and a singer whose vocal finesse now matches her raw power.

With Sailing to Philadelphia, however, Knopfler fully reclaims his near-unique position as an instrumentalist of purpose -- one whose every note seems to have a reason for being. That reason, of course, is in service of his beautifully written and masterfully arranged songs.

A work that retains their signature sound while embracing a more mature and cautiously positive outlook on matters of the heart.

The collaboration ultimately benefits both players, adding a touch of art house abandon to Hammond's at times studied formalism, and authenticity to Waits' Martian grease-monkey blues.

A curious time warp of a recording: loud, soft, tender, mean, thoughtful, reckless.

Ditching lo-fi aesthetics for a more radio-ready sound in the spirit of, say, the Raspberries or Badfinger, Pollard has wisely chosen not bury his songs in oblique lyrical references and muddy tape hiss.

From its thunderous beginning to its quiet, echoing end, MACHINA/the machines of God is perfect dancing-in-the-dark-with-yourself-'cause-you-have-angst-in-your-pants music.

A smart, sensitive blend of head and heart.

While Bilal's vocal gymnastics -- high-arching notes, off-rhythm choruses and complex harmonies -- add texture to these songs, many of them sound too musically similar to everything else in the neo-soul movement. He's at his best on the tracks that he or his partner, Dahoud Darien, have produced themselves.

Feeding everything from polyrhythmic samba marches and interstellar jazz excursions into his mixer-microprocessor, then topping them off with obsessive beat-programming, Tobin blurs the boundaries between organic and prefabricated, as if the coexistence of the two should be an undeniable rule.

Recorded at various venues between 1990 and 1996, the versions of the songs that appear on Live are generally rougher and more expansive than their studio counterparts. And they're not only loud: they're heavy. Mike Inez's bass feels like it's jammed in your spine. Vocalist Layne Staley -- he of the well-documented battle with heroin addiction -- sounds like someone in crisis who may implode at any moment. He grips you, and you lose yourself in his struggle. All of this helps make these performances vital.

A lot of what distinguishes Wonderful Life is its fragility. At its best, the music feels as though it could blow apart at any moment.

Longtime fans will no doubt be initially thrown by the lack of "motorik" beats and general rock action here. Yet after a couple of listens, many of Exciter's songs begin to worm their way into the subconscious.

Many of the 14 songs here are laced with the type of psychedelic lyrics that have always characterized Kirkwood's writing...

Such lightness of touch is missing from the between-song skits, which have Franti posing as a DJ on a community-radio show, conducting interviews and dispensing commentary on the death penalty. But the between-skit songs are terrific.

Melissa Etheridge's Skin belongs in a tradition of breakup albums that includes Bruce Springsteen's Tunnel of Love and Marvin Gaye's Here, My Dear.

J.Lo has a feisty, damn-I-know-I'm-all-that attitude, combined with pulsating, insistent beats that leap out of the speakers and make you wanna move.

While the San Francisco-based songwriter is still crafting unmistakably Eitzel-esque gloom tunes, his latest, The Invisible Man, is his most eclectic outing to date, veering from the low-key electronica of the opening track to the understated atmospherics of "Sleep."

The new Ben Folds is a lot like the old one: as unpredictable as he is talented.

This maturing band is getting closer to a fully realized vision.

Harding has streamlined his lyrics and placed them in taut, soulful settings à la John Hiatt...

His most consistently slamming release since 1990's Brick by Brick.

Spears' new album does sound exactly like her last one.

With Lewis' weighty, tuneful voice and Mike Mushok's meaty, anthemic guitar, Staind recall the Soundgarden/Alice in Chains era of early-'90s rock. Free of phony posturing, DJ scratching and over-reliance on vapid thrash riffs, they're almost like an alternative version of today's mainstream metal.

And while not so instantly accessible as much of the band's recent output, the songs still manage to be catchy, if elusively so; this is an album that rewards repeated listening.

With guitars down in the mix (when they aren't unplugged altogether), Clapton's ever-evolving voice is the real centerpiece.

It ain't Dusty Springfield's Dusty in Memphis, but it's close.

Even though O'Connor adopts a penitent tone on Faith and Courage, this album is no concession to anyone or anything. O'Connor is still O'Connor: strident, contradictory, motherly, seductive.

Mandy Moore is a pop album to be proud of: every song has a good melody, a solid hook, and dramatically improved singing from its star.

A trip into the prettiest altered states the Lips have yet kissed.

On this latest offering there's hardly any indication that the band was ever the product of post-grunge Seattle.... But this refined sound is also where The Rising Tide starts to sink.

Judging by the funked-up grooves and the hardcore-with-heart rhymes, he's got the goods to satisfy both the faithful and the fickle.

The result is entertaining but so bound by the requirements of Jamaican and American clichés that there's not much room left for his own personality to come through.

Their songs still bulge at the seams with clever ideas, but they're veiled in deep grooves and hooks.... Outkast have developed a major sweet tooth for P-Funk, but what they've picked up from their former collaborator George Clinton isn't his low-end bounce. It's rather his hovering, serpentine vocal arrangements and his acidic political fantasies.... [but] Stankonia's conceptual sprawl isn't all good for the album -- the collection is hampered by more than a little filler.

Producer Don Was allows the surprisingly girlish, persuasive part of Midler's style to shine, working in harmony with the production and the material.

It's not inappropriate to think of Ten New Songs as an audio book of poetry with musical accompaniment.

Garbage have finally discovered a hint of the blood-pumping human heart underneath their icy exterior.

But if "Chemistry" is a pure-pop sugar rush, much of what follows is equally sour, often falling into the thematic trap that snares so many post-hit albums: lots of songs about how success is really hard on rock stars and their girlfriends.

Certain moments find the quartet keying in on the same fugal intertwining of beauty and dissonance that Television explored back in the late 1970s.

The funk-by-numbers grooves of Everybody's Got Their Something borrow heavily from the likes of Sly Stone, Chaka Khan and early Prince, but do so with such affection and spirit that it's hard to take offense.

Although he's the primary MC throughout this album, it's his studio skills that keep listeners on their toes...

A 28-minute, 10-song romantic pop album that includes two gems that handily best their early geek anthems "Buddy Holly" and "Undone (The Sweater Song)."

Fortunately, for most of the album, the soft-but-solid Austin backing band assembled by guitarist/co-producer Derek O'Brien is as well seasoned as Nelson, and shares his gift for making a little go a long way. And, ultimately, the best tracks may well be those sung by Willie alone.

Most of the new disc sounds like noisy grooves in search of songs, and the mechanical accompaniment makes the accomplished jazz-rock fusion of such mid-1970s Beck classics as Blow by Blow and Wired sound downright earthy.

Listeners might tire of its mechanical edge, but luckily Daft Punk folds in a few more layers. Whether the listener believes it or not, Discovery postulates that club music can possess depth of sound and be more than a never-ending beat that simply marshals your body along with it. Thus, the songs are shorter, more eclectic and rife with hills and valleys of beat that urge you to stop and listen.

In sharing its predecessor's desire to cover every musical base, Goodbye Country (Hello Nightclub) suggests a continued identity crisis.

Cake at times manage to counterbalance the smart-aleck cynicism with skilled musicianship, and when [John] McCrea drops the monotone bombast and actually sings, the songs really work.

MCs Evidence and Rakaa's shortcomings are amendable because they do have a great scratchmaster in DJ Babu. The problem is that this inventive DJ is allowed to shift gears and twist and crawl only after the rappers have said their pieces.

While the result is hit-or-miss, the Charlatans manage to hit much more than they miss.

Jakob Dylan and his team have fashioned an album that's longer on big guitars, crunchy grooves and cool changes than overt confessionals. All told, Breach is a subtle, seamless effort with nary a lull or misstep -- in contrast to its multiplatinum predecessor, the second half of which suffered from a series of pedestrian songs.

Fans of "Praise You"'s twisted but hooky soul or the beat-box bonanza "The Rockafeller Skank" may be a bit disappointed with this current collection. Not because the record is a thundering and cohesive example of sequencers used for good instead of evil, but because Fatboy's approach this go around is a lot less (new-) user friendly. The tracks are longer and more measured, many of them built around the ebb and flow so essential to dance music made for the clubs, as opposed to dance music made for TV dance shows.

Private Suit finds them more in command of their craft, filled with less fury, but no less skilled at crafting sublime pop ditties.... Though there are a couple of misfires, it's their most confident effort since their debut.

While they've evolved into a band that can actually, like, play more than a handful of chords, they wisely stick with what they know best -- trim, fast-paced, crunch-guitar-filled songs about sex and partying.

In small doses it's wonderful stuff, though in total it's a little sickly sweet.

An album of surface comfort masking massive insecurities -- a perfect complement to the nation it so redolently evokes.

A borderline adult-contemporary sound that's catchy and exuberant enough to gloss over the intermittently dark verse.

With Movement in Still Life however, BT (born Brian Transeau) offers something many of his peers have failed to deliver: an album that accurately and convincingly reflects dance music's present state and, possibly, its future.

With Cydonia, Paterson continues on the trippy trajectory he established in 1989 with his debut 22-minute single, "A Huge Ever Growing Pulsating Brain That Rules From the Centre of the Ultraworld."

Make no mistake: This album represents a small step for a band, not a giant leap for mankind. But it is energetic, entertaining and several polymer configurations less plastic than the teenybopper product currently being manufactured in Orlando and elsewhere.

Surprisingly, Strange Little Girls is a street project -- daring, visceral and engaging, even when it's not fully successful.

Tha Last Meal, mixed and largely produced by Dre (Master P is the executive producer), manages to sidestep the déjà-vu-all-over-again pitfalls by injecting the formula with sly wit, a healthy helping of cosmic slop, and, last but not least, some mind-bending production.

Simultaneously more tossed-off and expressive than 1995's Elastica album, The Menace is a frustrating listen, oscillating between actively courting the listener and fashioning a more tangential state somewhere between punk momentum and wearisome breakdown

Lemon Jelly's groovy, Technicolor music exudes a warmth and sense of fun that predates samplers, sequencers and the concept of the DJ-as-auteur.

Feminist Sweepstakes does occasionally stumble.

While fans expecting "Thong Redux" might be disappointed, there are flashes of (dare one say it?) integrity and substance nestled deep in the banging beats and big-time excesses that make Sisqó, well, Sisqó.

At times, Yang's ethereal monotone is the attention-getter. Elsewhere, the music takes over, often in the form of lengthy guitar solos and a slow, bittersweet weaving of instruments traditional... and otherwise.... This is smart, deep-thinking slowcore.

Live in New York City is that imperfect creation in which the whole equals something less than the sum of its parts. Taken one song at a time, though, it can be as compelling as live music gets.

Melodies howl along before being ground down under the weight of distorted guitar. Strings float songs along, then scrabble against the flow.

V doesn't bring Live right back to earth, but it does find the group playing to strengths, experimenting with recording techniques, and striving for renewed relevance.

A six-piece with musical roots in the '60s, fronted by a sensual-sounding blonde bombshell called Debbie, the Januaries' most obvious reference point is Blondie.

The duo deliver an evocative, mostly instrumental set that effectively serves their inspiration, as well as their fanbase.

Perhaps what makes The History of Rock most interesting -- and what ultimately validates Kid Rock as the real deal -- is that these old tracks prove that his love affair with rap and rock wasn't something he just cooked up to weasel onto MTV's "TRL."

Folkish acoustic guitar and lumbering trip-hop rhythms grind the second half into one bland, undifferentiated musical mass. Because she's an icon, she probably doesn't feel comfortable releasing a formal coup of an album where she toys with French disco-house the entire time.

The album would have benefited from a few less midtempo grooves; the closest drummer Neil Primrose and bassist Dougie Payne get to really rocking is on the peppier rhythms of "Follow the Light" and "Flowers in the Window" -- not surprisingly, two of the album's highlights.

The resulting sonic model represents a giant step in the evolution of sound sculpture

Another quality installation from an artist who views his entire oeuvre as a work in progress.

If it's energy that it is the single strongest selling point of God Bless the Go-Go's, well, that's kind of where they came in anyway, back in the day when lead singer Belinda Carlisle was a butch-haircutted pudge and "We Got the Beat" was, literally, just about all the Go-Gos had going for them musically.

Traditionalist rock fans have got to be cheered by Fastball, a group plucky enough to take on teenage pop bands and rap-rock sensations with perky harmonies and piles of guitars. But in the end, songs like these shine brightest outside of the album context, as stand-alone songs coming out of the dashboard radio.

From a pounding rendition of "Pistol Grip Pump" by West Coast hip-hoppers Volume 10, to a snarling, grunged-up assault on Bob Dylan's "Maggie's Farm", singer Zack de la Rocha and company deliver atomic thrills with revolutionary fervor. Still, anyone hungry for new insights into this uniquely righteous band, or looking for evidence of risk-taking, may feel shortchanged.

But if it verges on generic pop-rock, Take Back... also has more hooks than a bait and tackle shop.