Perhaps his most humane album and warmest work to date.

While Placebo's latest, Black Market Music, doesn't have any single track as galvanizing as "Pure Morning," Molko, Swedish bassist Stefan Olsdal, and English drummer Steve Hewitt have again crafted a hip-hop-laced collection of hard-driving rock that effectively mixes clever wordplay with solid musicianship.

Lions has got style to spare, but ends up light on meaty hooks.

Between the songs sung by the cast and those by famous popsters, Music From Baz Luhrmann's Film "Moulin Rouge" has a split personality, but this purposefully assembled collection is more cohesive than you'd think -- and that's something that can't really be said for most modern film albums.

While Beyoncé is credited with co-writing and co-producing the entire album, merging the Destiny's Child camp with a stronger guiding hand (say, the Rodney Jerkins tribe) might've helped weed out the weaker material -- and kept the flame going throughout this uneven album.

All told, eight producers (including Nicks) were involved in the production of Trouble in Shangri-La, and not everybody is up to the challenge.

Fans of new British bands like Gomez or Minibar should find plenty to like.

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.

All for You is every bit as impressive a collection as Control, her first collaboration with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis fifteen years ago.

There are more layers here than on Mouse on Mars' last album, 2000's critically acclaimed Niun Niggung, and everything is more intricately detailed, each sound given plenty of space in the mix.

A fresh, if unfocused, work saturated with zany personality.

He delivers all this with passion and booming authority: the teacher is back in front of the classroom, where he belongs.

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

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.

Revelling/Reckoning is a dense, daunting work -- and, quite possibly, her strongest one yet.

Throughout the album, Cole & co. offer up one pop nugget after another, all carefully honed through warts-and-all shows held in New York over the last few years. The result is that The Negatives isn't just Cole's most consistent disc in 11 years; it's also quite possibly his best ever.

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.

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.

Time Bomb is loaded with two things that are markedly absent from most of today's hard rock scene: memorable melodies and a loose but swinging rhythmic foundation.

Colvin has a small but honeyed voice, never too sad or too happy, and multi-instrumentalist [producer John] Leventhal has encased it in caressing arrangements, complete with the occasional string quartet. The ensuing pleasures are generally low-key, and while one can appreciate the attentive craftsmanship applied to each song, the cumulative mood is a little snoozy.

The problem isn't so much that this album sounds dated (not surprising, as it was recorded back when Lil Bow Wow was in pre-K), but rather that the songs are so poorly mixed and produced...

Here's music tailor-made for cruising down the road with the wind blowing through your mullet.

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

Comparisons will inevitably be made between Canto and the Buena Vista Social Club disc, but the most significant similarity is that they both feature great songs and terrific musicianship.

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.

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

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.

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.